7/19/2020 0:00:00
Islamic sources
Islamic sources talked about the story in the text of the Qur’an, and in books of interpretations written approximately 250 years after the Qur’an.
The story of the People of the Cave – Islamic sources https://sun2son.blogspot.com/2019/01/blog-post_7.html
How will we deal with these Islamic sources? Will we treat them as historical documents or as religious documents, meaning will we deal with them as historical texts or as sacred religious texts?
Logically, I think we will face some kind of confusion in dealing. The reason for the confusion is that the nature of the sources is mixed between a sacred text and exegetic texts of a sacred text, and this confusion will cause us a problem in research, so we have to separate the sources and divide them into two types. The first type of sources is a sacred religious text, while the second type of sources is exegetic texts. .
– Text of the Holy Qur’an, 622 AD
– Texts of interpretations approximately 850 AD
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We will postpone talking about the first type. We will now discuss the Islamic exegetical sources.
Islamic exegetical sources are of two types. The first type talks about the reason for the presence of the text in the Qur’an, and the second type tells the story that matches the text of the Qur’an.
●●●● The first type ●●●●
We will convey to you some of the reasons for revelation found in heritage books
■ The Quraysh were not satisfied with all of this, but rather they wanted to embarrass him, peace and blessings be upon him, with questions, so they sent Al-Nadr bin Al-Harith and Uqba bin Abi Muait to the Jewish rabbis in Medina and said to them, “Ask them about Muhammad and describe to them his character and tell them what he said, for they are the people of the first book and they have knowledge that we do not have of the knowledge of the prophets,” so they went out until they came forward. Medina, so they asked the Jewish rabbis about the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, and they described to them his matter and told them some of what he said, and they said to them, “You are the people of the Torah, and we have come to you to tell us about this friend of ours.” The Jewish rabbis said to them: “Ask him about three things that we will command you about, and if he tells you about them, then he is a sent prophet, and if he does not do so, then the man is a hypocrite, so flee from him.” What is your opinion? Ask him about young men who went in the first era, what was their matter, for they had a strange story. Ask him about a man who traveled around the world and reached the east and west of the earth, what his prophecy was. Ask him about the spirit and what it is. If he tells you that, follow him, for he is a prophet, and if he does not do so, then he is an imaginative man. . So Al-Nadr bin Al-Harith and Uqba bin Abi Muait came until they came to Mecca against the Quraysh and said: O people of Quraysh, we have come to separate what is between you and Muhammad. The Jewish rabbis have ordered us to ask him about things, and if he tells you about them, then he is a prophet, and if he does not do so, then the man is a speaker, so express your opinion about him.
So they came to the Messenger of Allah and said: O Muhammad, tell us about young men who went in the first era who had a wondrous story, and about a man who traveled around the earth and reached the east and west of the earth, and tell us about the soul and what it is?
So the Messenger of Allah said to them: “I will tell you what you asked about tomorrow.” He made no exception, so they turned away from him. The Messenger of Allah stayed for fifteen nights without Allah speaking to him alive and without Jebril coming to him, until the people of Mecca shivered and said: Muhammad promised us tomorrow, and today we have spent fifteen nights without telling us anything. From what we asked him about, it was difficult for the Messenger to delay the revelation and what the people of Mecca would speak about, then Jebril brought him a surah of the Companions of the Cave in which he rebuked him for his sadness over them and told him what they had asked him about.
The commentators said: When the people asked the Prophet, peace and blessings of Allah be upon him, about the three issues, he, peace be upon him, said: “I will answer you about them tomorrow.” He did not say, Allah willing, so the revelation was delayed for fifteen days, and then the Almighty’s saying was revealed: “And do not say of anything, ‘Indeed, I will do that tomorrow,’ unless Allah wills. And remember.” your Allah, when you forget, and say, “Perhaps my Allah will guide me.” (Al-Kahf: 23, 24) The reason why this saying must be mentioned – Allah willing – is that if a person says, “I will do such-and-such action tomorrow,” it is not unlikely that he will die before Tomorrow will come, and it is also not far-fetched that if he remains alive, some obstacle will hinder him from doing that act. If he does not say, Allah willing, he will be lying about that promise, and lying is repulsive, and that is not befitting of the prophets, peace be upon them.
■ On the authority of Uqba bin Aamer, he said: One day I was serving the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, and I left him, and a group of people from the People of the Book met me, and they said: We want to ask the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, so he asked permission for us to do so, so I entered and informed him, and he said He said: “My money and their money. I have no knowledge except what Allah has taught me.” Then he said: “Pour water for me.” So he performed ablution and prayed. He said: He had not finished until I saw happiness in his face. Then he said: “Bring them in to me, and whoever I see of my companions.” So they entered and stood up. In his hands, he said: “If you wish, you may ask, and I will tell you what you find written in your book, and if you wish, I will tell you.” They said: Yes, tell us. He said: “You came to ask me about Dhul-Qarnayn, and what you find in your book: He was a young man from the Romans, and he came and built the Egyptian city of Alexandria. When he finished, an angel came to him and took him to heaven, etc.
■ There are those who say that those who came to the Messenger to ask him about the young men who had been absent for a while were polytheists from the Quraish, and some of them say that they are the People of the Book, and some say that they are the Al-Yahoud.
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In a previous article, we talked about an important topic related to the Qur’an and it discusses the idea of whether the Qur’an was revealed all at once or as an astrologer? .. In it, we talked about the basis of this idea, its causes, and its problems, and what is the definitive Qur’anic answer to this question, and we said that the Qur’an speaks clearly that the Qur’an was revealed all at once, citing many verses as evidence.
Here is the link to the article
Was the Holy Qur’an revealed all at once or as an astrologer? https://sun2son.blogspot.com/2018/12/blog-post_30.html
This result will perhaps spare us the need to discuss the reasons for the revelation of Surah Al-Kahf that we mentioned above and which are found in the books of interpretations. But this does not prevent us from discussing it to highlight points that we found important in these interpretations so that the picture becomes clearer more broadly.
■ Read the first explanation
The questioner were the polytheists of Quraish, and they wanted to embarrass the Prophet, so they decided to go to Medina and met with the Jewish rabbis and asked them questions because they were the people of the Torah to embarrass Muhammad. So the Al-Yahoud gave them questions, and if he answered them, then he was a sent prophet, and if he did not answer them, then he was told and they had to decide on his matter. Among these questions: About young men who went away in the first era, what was their situation, for they had a strange story. The polytheists returned to Mecca to preach to the people that they had obtained the questions that would confirm whether Muhammad was a prophet or a pretender.
According to the heritage and history that divided the time of the Qur’an into Meccan and Medinan, the verse is Meccan. This will raise the question: How could polytheists ask Muhammad about a religious story, when they were supposed to ask him about topics such as the Creator, resurrection, etc.
But the writer of the plot found a way for it, that the polytheists only communicated the questions, as they did not know anything about the boys, but there were those who gave them the questions so that they would reveal the matter of Muhammad.
Who will be the person who gave them those questions? ..Because Mecca is devoid of adherents of other religions, then it is necessary to make a trip to the city, because according to what was stated in the biography, the city was the dwellings of the Al-Yahoud and then return to Mecca.
the question :
Why do polytheists go to the Al-Yahoud to ask the Prophet? Is it because they know in advance that the role that Muhammad claims is similar to what the Al-Yahoud have? Is it because Muhammad came with a religion and a Qur’an similar to what the Al-Yahoud have of the Torah, and then the Al-Yahoud will be the ones who will be able to embarrass Muhammad?
So the Al-Yahoud asked the polytheists of Quraish a question about the boys.
Here we ask a question:
How do the Al-Yahoud present a question about the Companions of the Cave, when the Companions of the Cave were followers of the religion of Issa, and the story of the Companions of the Cave was not mentioned in the Jewish books?
The author of this plot made a mistake, and perhaps he was forced to make the question come from the Al-Yahoud because there are no Al-Nasarah in the environment of Medina and Mecca.
The author of this plot makes the Al-Yahoud the final say. In proving the truth of Muhammad from his lies.
What was Muhammad’s response to the polytheists’ question?
Muhammad’s response was to give them only Surat Al-Kahf, 17 verses, and this is an answer to the polytheists of Quraysh.
That means 17 verses from Surah Al-Kahf were the answer Muhammad received from Jebril.
Did it increase or decrease?
no
So…what is the reason for interpreting Surat Al-Kahf according to those books of interpretation, as long as the reason for the revelation was that, and Muhammad’s response was with verses from the Qur’an only and did not add or subtract, and he did not talk about Dakyanus or the city of Ephesus?
And the most important question
What is the continuation of the story? Meaning, did Muhammad answer correctly and did the polytheists return to Medina to present the answer to the Al-Yahoud so that they could be sure that his answer was true or false?!
Because the story requires a second trip to Medina, in order to present Muhammad’s answer to the Al-Yahoud, because the polytheists cannot give an evaluation of the answer, as they are polytheists who do not understand the answer, while the Al-Yahoud can do this.
There is no continuation….the story is enough for this.
The story achieved two things. The first thing was that they were only able to embarrass Muhammad, because the revelation was delayed for 15 days. The second thing was that it did not give us a detailed answer about the Companions of the Cave. Who are these boys and when were they? She was satisfied that the Qur’an was revealed with those verses only as an answer to that incident only.
So, to sum up the story, the polytheists were able to embarrass Muhammad by delaying the revelation, and they no longer cared whether the answer was right or wrong.
Let’s go to the second reason for going down
The second reason for the revelation is almost another treatment for the previous error about the Al-Yahoud, as it assumes that the questioner is People of the Book and does not specify their type, People of the Book only, in general, so that the previous error does not occur.
The People of the Book asked him about the youth and about Dhul-Qarnayn, and now the Prophet gives them an answer about Dhul-Qarnayn, but what is strange is that the Prophet did not answer with the Qur’an, but rather answered with the answer found in history. He began to speak like us and his words were no longer Qur’an… Dhul-Qarnayn was Alexander, who built the city of In Misr, etc.
The final point remains about the reason for the delay in the revelation to the Prophet, according to heritage books and in the words of commentators:
Look at the smart writers who wrote this story, in confirming the occurrence of the story of the Prophet being embarrassed by the polytheists, and at the same time finding a reason to remove the Prophet from the embarrassing situation in front of the believers today who read this story.
Because the revelation was delayed for the Prophet, and it caused embarrassment to him in front of the polytheists and also caused embarrassment in front of the Muslim who reads this story, and therefore a convincing reason must be found and the Muslim gets out of the embarrassment as well and convinces him of the story, and reassures him that the topic is normal and logical.
But the writer of the story knows that it is not possible to come up with any reason for any Muslim to be convinced of this story, unless the story is linked to a Qur’anic verse.
They were able to link this story to verse 22 of Surat Al-Kahf, as evidence that it is a connected context with the story.
{And do not say of anything, “Indeed, I will do that tomorrow” unless Allah wills. And remember your Allah when you forget, and say, “Perhaps He will guide my Allah.”
Because when the polytheists came to the Prophet and asked him about the People of the Cave, he said to them: I will answer you tomorrow, and he did not say, Allah willing. This is the reason that caused the revelation to the Prophet to be delayed by 15 days, as a punishment from Allah to the Prophet because he did not say, Allah willing, because not saying, Allah willing, would be in our view and everyone’s view a liar, because he does not know whether he will live tomorrow or die, and perhaps an obstacle will occur that will hinder him. Regarding knowing the story of the People of the Cave, then the Prophet would be a liar and this is a characteristic that does not befit the Prophet… so he had to be punished.
Therefore, this verse was revealed in order to explain to us the reason for the delay in revelation, and rather to explain to us all this plot and this long and difficult logic that occurred.
Why?
Note that the story of the Companions of the Cave begins from verse 9, and the revelation was supposed to begin with verse 22. That is, the revelation does not begin by telling the story and then the explanation for this delay comes at the end of the revelation. This verse must be to condemn the Prophet to a lie, and after that the narration of the story begins. .
Also, this verse has nothing to do with bashing, and there is no indication in it that the Prophet is a liar. Rather, I find it to be advice to the Prophet so that the Prophet can be guided by the story of the Boys of the Cave with which the revelation came, because the story begins with a call to the youth to provide them with guidance in their affairs, and the story ends with advice. For the Prophet to approach this matter and be guided by it.
I believe that there is no religion on earth whose adherents believe in a heavenly book and sanctify it, and it came to them from a person who was described as a liar, except according to these interpreters. I also believe that there is no person who sanctifies a heavenly book and believes in this story about his prophet.
finally
If we search all the so-called heritage books about the reasons for the revelation of Surah Al-Kahf, we will find them all in dispute over the identity of the questioner, between polytheists and Al-Yahoud, and some of them are People of the Book, and some say Al-Yahoud without the presence of polytheists, and some of them are pure polytheists without the presence of Al-Yahoud or People of the book.
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This account was supported by the Israeli Dr. Wolfensohn, a teacher of Semitic languages at the Egyptian University and Dar Al-Ulum, who said in his thesis (The History of the Al-Yahoud in the Arab Lands), page 98, the following:
“Some orientalists deny the veracity of this dangerous story without providing evidence that we can be reassured about. The truth is that it is difficult to deny a historical narration that was the reason for the revelation of Surah Al-Kahf and the verses related to the Spirit and Dhul-Qarnayn. We have evidence that leads us to believe that this narration is likely to be realistic, which is that in The Talmud is a famous story similar to the story of the People of the Cave, and from this story the Jewish rabbis took the questions they addressed to the Messenger through the Quraysh delegation. This story is supported by what we have said that there were no Al-Yahoud in Mecca. If any of them were found in Mecca, the Quraish would not have sent a delegation to Medina to ask the Jewish rabbis about the affairs of the Prophet, and if any of them were found, he must be unknowing.
I deliberately presented a comment by a Jewish orientalist on the subject because of its importance, and this comment by the orientalist has become an appendix that you can find in books of modern interpretations.
Read what the orientalist said
The orientalist is very interested in the issue of interpreting the verse, and describes it as a dangerous story, and he is surprised by what the orientalists say about their denial of this story because they do not provide evidence so that he and the people can be reassured.
Serious story? ……Why is it dangerous and what is its importance, and who are these orientalists?!, and did they provide a standard and reference for creating reassurance for people?
The orientalist is trying to address the errors in the story. Rather, he is trying to confirm them for a reason we do not know and which he and the writer of this story may know, why not?
It addresses the error in the question being asked by the Al-Yahoud, because Al-Nasarah are supposed to be the owners of intellectual property. Rather, the Orientalist tries to base it in the Talmud and not in the Old Testament, because he knows that the story was not mentioned in the Old Testament.
Rather, the orientalist addresses the logic of the first idea of the story, that Mecca is empty of Al-Yahoud while Medina is full of Al-Yahoud. Is it possible that there is not even a Jew in Mecca for the polytheists of Quraish to make the journey?
How did the Orientalist know this?
Because the story that was presented to the Muslim is understood by anyone that Mecca is the only land in the world that was devoid of all religions, all of them are idols and polytheism, and there are no one in it except polytheists, while Mecca is Al-Yahoud.
●●●● The second type ●●●●
Most of these sources come from figures who have a great position in the religious consciousness of Muslims, such as the Prophet or clerics from the ancestors.
We will find that these explanatory texts also take on a historical character, and this character overwhelms the interpretive aspect, and they begin to appear as purely historical sources, but rather as sources that deal with the subject from a historical aspect, and it is not difficult for anyone to realize that they are a copy of Christian sources, but after If it is matched with the Qur’anic text, such that the period appears to be 300 years, the location of the cave, its name, descriptions of the place, the number of young men, the construction of a mosque, etc.
This type has two sources: Shiite and Sunni sources.
There is an observation…that there is a difference between the sources in Shiite thought and the sources in Sunni thought.
– Shiite sources.
Let’s discuss the details of the story.
■ Notice in the story…the name of one of the boys is similar to the name of the Syriac sources, but with a slight distortion. Here his name is Emilichus, and in the Syriac sources he is Imlecha.
■ Note that there is accuracy in the story…in determining the location of the cave and its location in relation to the four directions of north and south and in relation to the sun. It even displays the area of the cave in metres.
I actually do not know the exact source from which this information was mentioned, but I quoted it from an official website. But if the first source speaks in this way, then it is not an ancient source, but rather a modern source, because it is a modern awareness that deals with metric length.
■ Notice the strange behavior of the boys. The source says that the boys decided to sleep because they were tired.
Here you wonder whether they need to get tired in order to sleep, or is sleep a natural thing, and the boys will go to sleep, any human being will go to sleep. But it seems that the story teller is rushing the miracle by finding a convincing reason for the first sleep, which will make them continue it for 300 years.
This indicates that the writer of the story is the one who draws the events, and they are not spontaneous events.
■ Note also an important point
Read the names of boys and the names of kings and cities, you will find them with a purely Greek character and flavour, a purely Greek world that pervades space and time, a purely Greek story, but within this world you find a strange, anomalous and completely different point that does not belong to this world at all…. ….which is the name of the village (Al-Raqim)….a pure Arabic name…..but inside a story whose entire atmosphere is pure Greek.
There is no relationship between the name (Al-Raqim) and the name of Philadelphia, Max Melianus, Amilichus Mutianus, Danius, and Antonius.
So whose name is Antonius, and in the city of Philadelphia, and whose king’s name is Arrican, and in whose city there is a statue of Athena, it is assumed that he lives near a village called (Salcius) and not a village called (Al-Raqim).
Totally illogical, unnatural and unreal
Of course, the name indicates that someone tried to give one pre-existing story another story so that he could match it with a name found in the Qur’an. The name of the Companions of the Cave and Ar-Raqim found in the Qur’an.
■ There is an important point in the story…… The seller’s behavior while taking gold money from one of the boys who went to buy food, when he said, “We do not deal with this money,” and then he says that he believes that the boy has obtained a treasure.
Totally illogical
Because people, in any place or time, deal with gold regardless of the antiquity of its mint. The value is in gold and silver, not in the instrument.
The story also makes each king issue a coin in his name, and then the presence of old money becomes a very natural thing, and this situation imposes a general character that makes anyone not need to be astonished and look at it as a treasure, but it also means that with each king the previous instruments become irrelevant. Common and this is illogical.
Why does every king mint money?
Because the story requires a process of coining money with each king… because its function is to determine the period during which the cave boys slept, and by reviewing the list of the kings of Rome, then it is possible to calculate the period between one king and another, by comparing the coins, and it will be the period of sleep of the cave people. .
That is, there is a prior goal in the story scenario, and there is awareness from the beginning in pushing the story towards this goal, which is the miracle, meaning that all the story’s characters play roles to achieve a pre-determined goal.
■ The story places the time when the boys got up from sleep during the reign of King Theodosius, who is almost the same king in the Syriac sources.
This means that the time difference is 440 – 120 = 320
This means they slept for 320 years.
In conclusion, these sources are similar in general to the Syriac sources, but they differ in scenario, plot, and geographical location.
It comes from the tongue of Imam Ali, and it is a long story in which all the verses of the Qur’an are explained……..But we find in it the same character found in the Syriac sources, an organized and beautiful literary character in general, mixed with a historical and interpretive character.
The Shiite sources appear to be an exact copy of the Syriac sources in literary terms…but they differ from them in the place of the incident, the names of the boys, the time of the story, the name of the king from whom the boys fled, and even the name of the dog.
The place of the story is the city of Philadelphia, Amman, Jordan, and the time of the story is approximately 120 years after the birth of Christ, and the name of the ruler is (Rajan). As for the names of the boys, their pronunciation is completely similar to the names in the Syriac sources.
We find the story in general to be somewhat arranged and organized, but it is less good in literary terms than the Syriac version. It is a story that appeared all at once and in one breath without any interruption.
The story places the incident in the year 106 after the birth of Christ in Jordan, when the armies of Rome invaded Jordan during the rise of the Nabataean Kingdom. In the year 112 AD, the ruler Trajan issued a decree that whoever refused to worship the gods would be treated as a traitor and would be executed. And that all Al-Nasarah are traitors, and the Christian had the choice between worshiping the gods or death!
The same story of persecution is repeated here, but in a different time than the Syriac sources. Throughout history, the role of the Romans before they embraced Christianity was to persecute Al-Nasarah, and there must be a convincing reason about the circumstances of the story and the environment from which the story emerged, as the Romans are always the reason for the persecution of Al-Nasarah. It is not known what the purpose of this decree is. Are they looking for taxes or belief in the Roman gods?
In the Syriac version, it talks about the cave being in Asia Minor, Turkey, the city of (Ephesus) during the reign of Decius 250 AD, and in this version it makes Jordan the city of Amman (Philadelphia) and the village of Al-Raqim as the location of the cave during the reign of Aragon 112 AD.
I think we have finished discussing the story, and there is no need to discuss some other points related to the story, because we talked about them in the first article when we talked about the Christian sources of the story.
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Now we will discuss the Sunni sources
We will extract some of them for you, because they are small and brief
It was said about the conditions of the young men that they were sons of the nobles or sons of kings, and that they were young in age, and that King Daqnius was touring the Roman cities and did not leave anyone in them following the religion of Issa, son of Maryam, peace and blessings be upon him, except to kill him, and the young men had denied what King Daqnius was upon. And his people worshiped idols and disdained their situation, so they mentioned to Daqnius that among the members of your entourage are those who disobey your command and disdain your gods. So Daqnius gathered the young men and ordered them to follow his gods and sacrifice to them, then he threatened to kill them after he saw among them the steadfastness of their religion and their determination to cling to it and defend it, then he decided to make They had a date in which he would seek their return to him and his gods, and he would not delay their account except to take into account their young age and their ignorance of what might be done to them of killing, bloodshed, and hanging their remains at the gates of the city, as is done to those who are not of a religion. And Diqnius went outside the city to seek something, so the young men gathered to isolate themselves from the people. And fleeing to a cave in a mountain on the outskirts of the city called Benjalous, so they started worshiping Allah and occupied all their time with supplication and remembrance, and they put one of them on their food and his name was Yamlikha, so if he wanted to go out to the city market, he would put off his clothes by which he was known for his honor and lineage, and he would wear torn clothes to hide himself from them. The people of his city, so he returns to his friends with food and sustenance without anyone realizing it.
The return of the king
When King Daqnius returned to the city, he asked for the boys to be allowed to wait for their term, which he had delayed for them. The people mentioned to him what had happened to them, so he gathered his soldiers and then went to the cave and built on it so that they could die inside it, as if Allah had struck their ears, and in their sleep there was a loss of hearing, which is the most affected of the senses. During sleep. Then Allah sent a king to follow the religion of Issa, son of Maryam, peace and blessings be upon him, and it was during his reign that Allah gave permission for the cave to be opened by the hand of a shepherd who went to the cave to protect his sheep from the rain. So Allah sent the owners of the cave, but they disagreed about the length of their sleep, then they sent Imlikha, who was in charge of their food, to buy for them, and it happened whenever it passed. With a teacher he denied it, until when he reached the market and showed his dirhams, the people denied him and gathered to ask about his matter, then they brought his matter to the king, who told him the stories, so the king and his people followed him to the cave to witness the departure of his companions, and when they arrived, Yamlkha preceded them to his companions, so Allah struck them and they died, so the king slowed him down, so he entered with his people. They found them in their condition and hastened their affairs, so they established a church and a mosque in which prayers were to be performed.
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This is a summary of Sunni sources
Sunni sources do not need a long explanation in their explanation as in Shiite sources, because we find it merely a summary of the story found in Syriac sources only.
Just a summary of the story in Syriac sources.
The Sunni sources seem not to be interested in the literary character, and have tendencies towards the interpretive character and matching it with the story of the Qur’an. They are more than inclined to the literary and narrative character, and are not interested in details and names as in the Shiite sources, that is, they bear the character of the event and the brief historical aspect. Not long.
There are differences in the Sunni sources from the Syriac sources regarding the name of the king and the name of the city. In the Syriac version, the name of the king is Dakios, while in the Sunni sources his name is Dakios, and it is certain that he is the same king.
Also, the name of the mountain in Syriac is Angelus, and in Sunni sources the name of the city is Pengelius…….. These differences are certain to be due to distorted translations, which is the reason, when transfers and copies were made from other sources, which had a fundamental role in Creating imaginary worlds, imaginary characters, and imaginary times.
We have almost finished discussing the story in Sunni sources.
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What is the conclusion?
Reading Islamic sources that talk about the story of the People of the Cave makes us ask an important question:
Do we consider those texts found in Islamic heritage as sources for the story of the People of the Cave?
I think the answer is no
Why ?
Because, as we found, the Sunni sources are nothing but a summary of the story found in the Syriac sources. These explanatory texts can only be considered a process of copying and pasting, that is, they are not the first source of the story, and therefore they cannot be considered as sources, because the first source of the story is the Syriac sources.
What about Shiite sources?
Almost the Shiite texts can be considered a source, because they have a somewhat different story, they have a different scenario, a different geography, and a different time from the Syriac sources, and they came from the tongue of Imam Ali, in the chapter on knowledge, and this gives it a separate character and an official document, even though The Shiite sources bear a character in narratives and attributes similar to the character found in the Syriac sources.
So….in the end, we come up with a certain conclusion, which is that the story of the Companions of the Cave contains only two sources, the Syriac sources and the Shiite sources only.
These two sources are the reason why some believe that the story of the Companions of the Cave occurred in Turkey, while others believe that it occurred in Jordan.
So there is a disagreement between the two sources about the location of the incident and the source of the story.
But the question is logical:
Did Imam Ali talk about the story of the People of the Cave in general and not restricted by prior data, or was he based on prior data that he had? .
Of course, the answer is that he was based on a prior given, and this given is the Qur’an in which the story of the People of the Cave is mentioned. It is the prior given that made him speak of the story of the People of the Cave, and if it had not been present in the Qur’an, Imam Ali would not have spoken about it.
So the logical question:
Could Imam Ali put himself in a position of disagreement with the Qur’an?
Why ?
Because Jebril could tell the same story that came from Imam Ali, and in detail, and if it were really the same story that Imam Ali narrated, today we would read in the Qur’an the name Philadelphia.
In Surah Al-Kahf, specifically in the verse {So send one of you with this paper of yours to the city of Philadelphia}.
The choice is yours.
As for me… logically, I consider that the true sources for the story of the People of the Cave are the Syriac sources, because they are the first official source that mentions the story, and the second source that mentions the story is only the Holy Qur’an.
I do not rely on the text of Imam Ali’s interpretation as a primary source for the story, but rather as a secondary source attached to and subordinate to a primary source that preceded it, which is the Qur’an, because I am searching for the first primary sources that mentioned the story.
The only Islamic source that talks about the story of the People of the Cave is the Qur’an.
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