Home > Surah 8 - The Spoils of War
The Quran Verse
Surah 8:31:
And when Our verses are recited to them, they say, "We have heard. If we wished, we could say like this. This is nothing but fables of the ancients (asāṭīru l-awwalīn)."
This verse is an internal admission of what Muhammad’s own contemporaries thought of his message.
The Meccans, who were familiar with the trade routes and the stories of the Jews, Persians, and Christians, recognized that Muhammad was simply recycling older myths.
To the scholar, the "fables" they referred to are the very sources we have identified: the Midrash Tanhuma, the Cave of Treasures, and the Syriac Alexander Romance.