Missing Verses: Stoning, Adult Suckling, and the Sheep
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Umar ibn al-Khattab, preaching from Muhammad’s own pulpit, declared: “Allah sent Muhammad with the truth and revealed the Book to him, and among what was revealed was the verse of stoning (ayat al-rajm). We recited it, memorized it, and understood it… I am afraid that after a long time has passed, somebody will say, ‘By Allah, we do not find the verse of stoning in Allah’s Book,’ and thus they will go astray” (Sahih al-Bukhari 6829). The verse is not in the Quran; the punishment it prescribed (stoning for adultery) remains in sharia, sourced from a verse that vanished. Aisha reported that a verse prescribing ten (later five) sucklings to establish foster-kinship “was among what was recited of the Quran” when Muhammad died (Sahih Muslim 1452), and in Sunan Ibn Majah 1944 she adds that the page on which it was kept was eaten by a sheep after his death. Abu Musa al-Ash‘ari recalled an entire lost surah “similar in length to Bara’a” of which only one line was remembered (Sahih Muslim 1050).
Common Muslim Responses
Islamic scholarship classifies these under naskh al-tilawanaskh al-tilawa“Abrogation of recitation” — the claim that some revealed verses were divinely removed from the Quran's text while their ruling (or memory) remained.Full glossary →: the recitation was abrogated by Allah while (for stoning and suckling) the legal ruling remained. The sheep detail in Ibn Majah is graded weak (da‘if) by many scholars (so IslamQA 175355), though the underlying suckling-verse report in Sahihsahih“Authentic.” The highest grade of hadith reliability; also the name of the two most authoritative collections (al-Bukhari and Muslim).Full glossary → Muslim is accepted. Nothing was “lost”; Allah withdrew what He willed, per Quran 2:106 (“We do not abrogate a verse or cause it to be forgotten except that We bring forth one better”).
Counter-Rebuttal
Critics respond that “abrogationnaskhAbrogation: the principle that a later Quranic revelation can cancel or replace an earlier ruling. Classical scholars catalogued dozens to hundreds of abrogated verses.Full glossary → of recitation with retention of ruling” is a category invented to reconcile these reports with 15:9, with no Quranic basis — 2:106 speaks of replacing verses with better ones, not of deleting them while keeping their laws. Umar’s own stated fear (“people will say we do not find it in Allah’s Book”) shows he regarded it as belonging in the Book, not as graciously withdrawn. On the preservation claim as advertised — every letter intact from Gabriel to today — Islam’s most authentic sources answer: verses existed, were recited, and are not in the codex. That is the definition of textual loss, whatever theological name is given to it.
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Editorial note: Early manuscripts and Islamic literary sources provide unusually direct evidence, though theological conclusions remain disputed.
Side-by-side comparison
Umar ibn al-Khattab, preaching from Muhammad’s own pulpit, declared: “Allah sent Muhammad with the truth and revealed the Book to him, and among what was revealed was the verse of stoning (ayat al-rajm).
Islamic scholarship classifies these under naskh al-tilawa: the recitation was abrogated by Allah while (for stoning and suckling) the legal ruling remained.
Critics respond that “abrogation of recitation with retention of ruling” is a category invented to reconcile these reports with 15:9, with no Quranic basis — 2:106 speaks of replacing verses with better ones, not of deleting them while keeping their laws.
Evidence register
Each source card separates what the evidence supports from what it cannot establish by itself.
Formal Proof System
Mostly robust · 77%Structured logic extraction for Missing Verses: Stoning, Adult Suckling, and the Sheep based on premise chain quality, dialectic balance, and risk flags.
P1
Umar ibn al-Khattab, preaching from Muhammad’s own pulpit, declared: “Allah sent Muhammad with the truth and revealed the Book to him, and among what was revealed was the verse of stoning (ayat al-rajm).
P2
Islamic scholarship classifies these under naskh al-tilawa: the recitation was abrogated by Allah while (for stoning and suckling) the legal ruling remained.
P3
Critics respond that “abrogation of recitation with retention of ruling” is a category invented to reconcile these reports with 15:9, with no Quranic basis — 2:106 speaks of replacing verses with better ones, not of deleting them while keeping their laws.
Conclusion
Critics respond that “abrogation of recitation with retention of ruling” is a category invented to reconcile these reports with 15:9, with no Quranic basis — 2:106 speaks of replacing verses with better ones, not of deleting them while keeping their laws.
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Citations used
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Risk flags
77%
Proof confidence
Logical risks detected
No major heuristic risks detected.
Argument Strength Dashboard
Moderate · 48%Composite score from citation density, concept coverage, dialectical structure, and graph connectivity.
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Citations
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Concepts
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Connections