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The validity of the Qur'an seems to hinge on the miracle of its beautiful language, the miracle of accurate prophecies, the miracle of there being no contradictions, etc.

Are there any Islamic schools of thought that propose other proofs of the Qur'an's validity, something other than miracle?

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    You missed the point that it has never been changed, and the most important reason for that is that it was always orally transmitted from teacher to student until this very day, even if now we have lots of Quran copies one can only call himself hafidh if he got a license or approval from a scholar who has a narrator chain until our Messenger (pbuh) so anyone who doesn't have this isn't truly a hafidh and rather called a mushafi, good hafidh try to look for a hay sanad: means a short narrator chain these days the shortest may have 27-28 narrators after our Messenger (pbuh)!
    – Medi1Saif
    Commented Jul 18, 2016 at 12:59
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    That's a miracle, I think? Tell me if I'm missing something. I wasn't trying to enumerate every kind of miracle, just giving examples. I'm wondering whether there is anything beyond miracle that attests to the validity of the Qur'an Commented Jul 18, 2016 at 14:32

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Some apologists argue that certain mathematical patterns hint at the divine origins of the Qur'an.

For example:

  • The word for man (ar-Rajul) and the word for woman (Imra-ah) occur 24 times each.

  • The word for satan (shaytaan) and the word for angel (malaa-ikah) occur 68 times each.

  • The word for this life (dunya) and the word for the next life (aakhirah) occur 115 times each.
  • The word for month (shahr) occurs 12 times.
  • The word for two months (shahrayn) occurs 30 times.
  • The word for day (yaum) occurs 365 times.

There's also the so called Qur'an 19-Code.

You might find this article useful: http://www.islaminfo.com/3/73/the-number-19-in-the-quran-a-sign-of-the-quran-s-divine-origin

However, as I noted in the beginning, those claims are made by certain individuals. I'm not aware of any school of thought that particularly focuses on the mathematical aspects of the Qur'an.

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  • Note that the 19ers are highly heterodox and I would shy away from calling them muslims, just like I wouldn't call Ahmadiyya muslims - they have no tradition validating their positions or to link their aqidah back to Muhammad and the founding days of islam. Quranists are a similar case.
    – G. Bach
    Commented Aug 3, 2016 at 7:44
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    @G.Bach Don't forget, for the purposes of islam.SE, anyone who calls themselves Muslim counts as a Muslim. Commented Aug 4, 2016 at 16:56
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    @GreatBigBore Completely agree with your comment. It is not up us to judge people. Besides, acknowledging the Qur'an 19 code does not necessarily make you a 19er.
    – SpiderRico
    Commented Aug 4, 2016 at 17:07
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    Patterns are unavoidable in any sufficiently long text. If you look hard enough, you'll find patterns in anything (it's called "data dredging")---the more you look, the more improbable patterns you will find (and with computers, we can do a lot of looking!). Brendan McKay (my academic grandfather), found patterns in War and Peace, and even the lyrics to Ice Ice Baby. Please don't take this stuff seriously. Commented Aug 29, 2016 at 6:50
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    I can phone you by dialling a random phone number. Amazing right? What are the chances? One in a billion? Would it still be as amazing if you found out I dialled say 10% of all possible phone numbers before getting to you [and would have continued dialling numbers until I reached you]? In statistics, we're required to correct for multiple hypothesis testing. (It's essentially a modern-day Jesus on toast.) Commented Sep 3, 2016 at 23:56

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