Over the last year, I have received several emails containing the following "verse from the Qur'an". Sometimes it arrived in my personal mailbox, passed on as if true; at other times it came to our Answering Islam feedback address as a question whether or not this is true. Here is one of the versions that I received:

This is something to think about! Since America is typically represented by an eagle. Saddam should have read up on his Muslim passages... The following verse is from the Quran, (the Islamic Bible)

Quran (9:11) - For it is written that a son of Arabia would awaken a fearsome Eagle. The wrath of the Eagle would be felt throughout the lands of Allah and lo, while some of the people trembled in despair still more rejoiced; for the wrath of the Eagle cleansed the lands of Allah; and there was peace. (Note the verse number!)

Frankly, this is utter nonsense. Searching Google or another search engine for any of the more unique phrases in the above quotation, e.g., "The wrath of the Eagle" will turn up a dozen pages talking about this. Some of them seem to believe it, but most of them confirm that this is a hoax (one of thousands, as there are tons of urban legends out there). Two of the more interesting pages about this hoax are these: [1], [2].

Before you pass on any such claims, try to verify them first. How? If you want to search the Qur'an to see whether or not a certain word or phrase occurs in it, I recommend the site www.quranbrowser.com. Search for "eagle" in the Qur'an and you will come up with ZERO matches, i.e. an eagle is not mentioned anywhere in the Qur'an, neither in any of the different English Versions of the Qur'an, nor — to the best of my knowledge — in any of the different Arabic Versions of the Qur'an.

Speculations about the author's possible motivation for this hoax are rather useless, since it will remain nothing but speculation. In this case, however, there is a certain irony. The hoax was seemingly created to give some kind of religious justification for the US invasion in Iraq. This ‘quranic verse’ was intended to support the American policy when it was opposed by the protest of most Muslim countries, and a considerable number of non-Muslim countries as well.

However, instead of the Qur'an supporting the US invasion, the invasion turns out to support the veracity and authenticity of the Qur'an. Why's that? It attributes to the Qur'an an amazing historical prophecy that was fulfilled by an event taking place centuries after it was supposedly written.

There are, however, no genuine prophecies in the Qur'an; that is, there are no predictions that are in any way comparable to biblical prophecies.

Jochen Katz

Rumors and Hoaxes
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