from memory by those who had heard it from the "Prophet's" lips. Abu Bakr did not publish the redaction which Zaid had made, and so it had no influence in preserving the purity and integrity of the text. Al Bukhari tells us on the authority of Uns ibnu'l Malik that when the Khalif 'Uthman ¹ was engaged in conquering Armenia and Azarbijan,Hudhaifah ibnu'l Yaman came to him and warned him of the danger to Islam which had already in some degree arisen from the different ways of reciting the Qur'an in vogue among different sections of the Muslims. "Hudhaifah said to 'Uthman, 'O Commander of the Faithful, restrain this people before they differ among themselves about the Book as much as the Jews and the Christians do.' 'Uthman sent to Hafsah saying, 'Send us the sheets that we may have them copied into volumes, then we shall return them to thee.' Accordingly Hafsah forwarded them to 'Uthman. He directed Zaid ibn Thabit and 'Abdu'llah ibnu'l Zubair and Sa'id ibnu'l 'As and 'Abdu'llah ibnu'l Harith bin Hisham, and they copied them into the volumes. And 'Uthman said to the company of the three Quraishites, 'Whenever ye differ, ye and Zaid ibn Thabit, in reference to any part of the Qur'an, then write it in the language of the Quraish, for it was revealed in their dialect.' And they did so until they had copied the sheets into the volumes. Then 'Uthman returned the sheets to

Hafsah. And he ¹ sent to every region a copy of what they had written down, and commanded with reference to every sheet and volume of the Qur'an besides these that they should be burned." At least one verse which Zaid remembered having heard Muhammad recite he missed when thus redacting the Qur'an for the second time. He searched for it and at length found a man who could recite it, when he added it in its right place ² to the Qur'an as originally written down by him. The Qur'an thus published by 'Uthman is that from which our present copies come. There are marvellously few and insignificant varieties³ of reading in the book, those which in early days had been introduced having been eliminated, as we have seen, by 'Uthman, by the summary method of committing all varying copies to the flames. There can, however, be no doubt of Zaid's qualification for the important task twice committed to him, nor of the fidelity with which he discharged it, for he did not even eliminate those passages which reflect the "Prophet's"