revealed by God is the third article of faith in Islam.
We can find four main reasons for the revelation of the scriptures:
(1) The scripture revealed to a prophet is a reference point for learning religion, as well as the duties towards God and others. God reveals Himself and explains the meaning of man’s creation in the books of revelation.
(2) If one can rely on something, quarrels and differences between the followers in matters of religious belief and its practice or in social matters are avoided.
(3) The scriptures are intended to protect religion from pollution and corruption, at least for some time after the Prophet’s death. Today the Qur’an, which has been revealed to our Prophet Muhammad – may God praise him – is the only remaining scripture which has been spared from changes and which, according to Allah, will be spared itself.
(4) The scriptures are God’s proof and argument against the people on the day of judgment. They are not allowed to oppose or transgress him.
A Muslim firmly believes that the merciful God has actually revealed the divine revelation books to His prophets to guide humanity. The Quran is not the only spoken word of God, but God also spoke to other prophets before Muhammad.
“… and God spoke directly to Moses” (Quran 4: 164)
God describes the true believers as follows:
“… and those who believe in what was revealed to you (Muhammad) and what was sent down before you … ”(Quran 2: 4)
The most important and central message of all scriptures was to serve God and God alone.
“And We have not sent a Messenger before You, whom We would not have given (the instruction): ‚There is no God but Me, so serve Me!’” (Quran 21:25)
Islam is more comprehensive in the sacred revelations it confirms than any other heavenly religion in its current form.
Muslims pay tribute and respect to the following scriptures:
(i) The Quran itself, which was revealed to the Prophet Muhammad.
(ii) The Torah (Tawrah in Arabic) revealed to the Prophet Moses (different from the Old Testament as it is read today).
(iii) The Gospel (Injiel in Arabic) revealed to the Prophet Jesus (different from the New Testament read in the churches today).
(iv) The Psalms (Zaboor in Arabic) by David.
(v) The Scrolls (Suhuf in Arabic) of Moses and Abraham.
Third, Muslims believe in the truth in today’s scriptures and in what has not been changed or distorted.
Fourth, Islam confirms that God revealed the Quran as a witness and confirmation of the previous scriptures because He says about it:
“And We have sent down to you (Muhammad) the book with the truth to confirm what is said of the book was revealed to him, and as a guardian of it… ”(Quran 5:48)
That is, the Quran confirms what is true in the previous scriptures and rejects what people have changed and exchanged in them.
Original scriptures and the Bible
We have to distinguish between two things: the original Torah, Bible and Psalms and the Bible of the present day. The original versions were God’s revelations, but the present Bible is not the original.
No Divine Scripture still exists in the original language in which it was revealed except the Quran. The Bible has not been revealed in German or English. Different books in the current Bible are at best tertiary translations and there are many different versions. These diverse translations are made by people whose knowledge, ability or honesty is unknown. One result of this is the different lengths, contradictions and inner incompatibility of some Bibles! There is no original. The Quran, on the other hand, is the only script that still exists in its original language and words. Not a single letter in the Quran has been changed since its revelation. It is constant in itself and without contradictions. It still exists today as it was revealed 1400 years ago, transferred in a rock-solid tradition of memorizing and writing it down. Unlike other sacred texts, the entire Quran is memorized word for word by almost every Islamic scholar and by hundreds of thousands of simple Muslims, generation after generation!
The previous scriptures consist mainly of:
(i) the story of creation and the history of the early generations, prophecies of the signs before the day of judgment, the appearance of new prophets and other news.
The stories, prophecies, and news in the Bible that are read in churches and synagogues today are partly right and partly wrong. These books consist of some translated fragments of the original scripture that God has revealed, the testimony of some prophets, mixed with explanations by scholars, mistakes of the writers, and cunning insertions and deletions. The Quran, the last and most reliable script, helps us to separate facts from inventions. For a Muslim, it is a trait to distinguish the truth from the wrong. For example, the Bible still contains some clear sections that emphasize Allah’s uniqueness in His divinity and worthiness of worship. [1] You can also find some prophecies regarding the Prophet Muhammad in it.
(ii) Laws and regulations, permitted and prohibited, like the law of Moses.
If we adopted the laws, what is allowed and what is forbidden, are the contents of the previous books and have not suffered falsification, then the Quran repeals these laws. Like the writings before him, he invalidates the old law, which was appropriate for his time and is no longer applicable today. For example, the old laws on food, ritual prayers, fasting, inheritance, marriage and divorce have been repealed (or in some cases also confirmed) by Islamic law.
The Holy Quran
The Quran differs from other scriptures in the following ways:
(1) The Quran is wonderful and inimitable. Evidently nothing similar can be written by human beings.
(2) According to the Quran, no other scriptures are revealed by God. Just as the Prophet Muhammad is the last prophet, the Quran is the last scripture.
(3) God has undertaken to protect the Quran from change, to protect it from fraud and to protect it from being disfigured. The previous writings suffered from change and distortion and were not preserved in their originally disclosed form.
(4) The Quran corrects the early writings on the one hand and on the other hand it is a reliable witness for them.
(5) The Quran overrides the previous scriptures, which means that it overrides the regulations of the previous scriptures and makes them inapplicable. The law of the old writings is no longer valid; the previous rules have been replaced by the new law of Islam.
Footnotes:
[1] For example the explanation of Moses: “Listen, Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord alone” (Deuteronomy 6: 4) and the proclamation of Jesus´: “… This is the noblest commandment : Listen, Israel, the Lord our God, is only the Lord. ” (Mark 12:29).
[2] See (Deuteronomy 18:18), (Deuteronomy 33: 1-2), (Isaiah 28:11), (Isaiah 42: 1-13), (Habakkuk 3: 3), (John 16 : 13), (John 1: 19-21), (Matthew 21: 42-43), and others.
[3] See, for example, the books of Apocrypha.
Source: https://www.islamland.com/deu/articles/glaube-an-die-schriften