Osama Abdallah is one of many Muslims who seek to convince people that Islam is the religion of the true and only God by making claims regarding scientific miracles in the Qur'an and even in the sayings of Muhammad. The claim is that there are statements that give information which is only recently confirmed by science and could not have been known at the time they were made. This is taken as proof that this information could only have come through divine revelation. Most of these claims are found on many Muslim sites, but Mr. Abdallah is quite creative and has some that seem to be only his own. One of the most bizarre examples of amazing scientific claims will be discussed in this present article. It is bizarre not only because of the topic chosen but it may well be THE WORST Muslim argument we have ever seen.

Since 3 June 2001 and to this day (12 December 2003) Osama Abdallah propagates the following claim on his website:

Islam's claim about the 360 joints in the human body was proven to be true!

"Aisha reported Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) as saying: Every one of the children of Adam has been created with three hundred and sixty joints; so he who declares the Glory of Allah, praises Allah, declares Allah to be One, Glorifies Allah, and seeks forgiveness from Allah, and removes stone, or thorn, or bone from people's path, and enjoins what is good and forbids from evil, to the number of those three hundred and sixty-four, will walk that day having removed himself from Hell.  (Translation of Sahih Muslim, The Book of Zakat (Kitab Al-Zakat), Book 005, Number 2199)"

Narrated Buraydah ibn al-Hasib: "I heard the Apostle of Allah peace_be_upon_him) say: A human being has three hundred and sixty joints for each of which he must give alms. The people asked him: Who is capable of doing this? He replied: It may be mucus in the mosque which you bury, and something which you remove from the road; but if you do not find such, two rak'ahs in the forenoon will be sufficient for you.  (Translation of Sunan Abu-Dawud, General Behavior (Kitab Al-Adab), Book 41, Number 5222)"

Beside from the beautiful teachings about Worshiping the One True Living GOD Almighty and removing obstacles from the paths of people, Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him made a very important scientific claim, and that is: Our human bodies have 360 joints in them.

Prior to 1995 it was thought that there are 340 joints in the human body. In 1995 a scientific institute proved that the internal ear consists of 10 joints each. Thus 20 joints were added and the discovery was made that the human body consists of 360 joints. Please refer to any medical encyclopedia on this.

In this article we will evaluate the specific science-related claims made by Abdallah. The foundation of all science is to bring solid evidence for every claim made. Thus, we will ask: What exactly are the claims, and what is the evidence presented for each one of Abdallah's claims?

Before we begin with our discussion of the particular topic of the number of joints in the human body, we want to point out a methodological problem. Abdallah and all Muslims who refer to "scientific miracles" as proof of the validity of their faith should answer for themselves this question if they desire to be intellectually honest: What do you do with those statements of the Qur'an and Muhammad that are proven wrong by science? If a true statement is evidence for Islam, is a wrong statement evidence against Islam? If not, why not? The current claim regarding the "360 joints" perfectly illustrates the great danger for the Muslims: If it was possible to find another 20 joints just a few years ago, what do you do if in another 10 years time a couple of further joints are found and Muhammad's statement turns out to be wrong after all? If wrong statements about science don't lead you to disbelieve Islam, why should a couple of correct statements convince anyone that Islam is true ... particularly since there are so many scientifically wrong statements? The question whether this whole approach has any validity, is discussed in some details in the article Can "Modern Science" be found in the Qur’an?

Let's now turn to Abdallah's particular claims. He states that the reader may refer to ANY medical encyclopedia on this. We searched in a medical school library, with the aid of the librarian on duty using a computer in attempting to find references, and could not find a source that mentioned the number of joints in the human body.

• No evidence that prior to 1995 the medical literature taught that there are 340 joints in the human body.
• No evidence that in 1995 a "scientific institute" proved that the internal ear consists of 10 joints.
• No evidence that current medical literature teaches that the human body consists of 360 joints.

Question to Mr. Abdallah: Have you yourself consulted ANY medical encyclopedia before publishing this article to confirm your statement as true? If so, please quote the relevant passage and provide the full bibliographical reference. If you have not done so, shame on you. We believe you have not, and have acted very irresponsibly and unscientifically by not providing any reference to the scholarly literature to back your claim. Did you simply make up that claim trusting that your readers will be too lazy to check up on your claims and will just believe you? Or, if you were not the inventor of this claim, were you so gullible that you took this claim from whatever source and are spreading it without caring about validating it first?

In fact, Abdallah's last paragraph is worded so badly that this alone is reason for suspicion that all of it is mere fiction:

Prior to 1995 it was thought that there are 340 joints in the human body. In 1995 a scientific institute proved that the internal ear consists of 10 joints each. Thus 20 joints were added and the discovery was made that the human body consists of 360 joints. Please refer to any medical encyclopedia on this.

Taken literally, this means that the total number of joints in the internal ear is 10. And, that all ten of them were unknown before 1995. Otherwise, not all of them could be added to raise the number from 340 to 360. Only those can be added that were newly discovered, since the others would already have been included in the previously known 340. It may be possible that one or two more tiny bones (and their joints) are discovered even today, but Abdallah's claim implies that until 1995 not even one of these joints (and bones, as there are no joints without bones) was known. This is rather ridiculous. 1995 is not a date from the Dark Ages. Thus, the whole claim seems to be mere fantasy and is now also listed in our section on Muslim Hoaxes. Perhaps we should invent a new term for articles like these calling this genre "islamo-fiction". Nevertheless, let's pursue the issue further.

Medical encyclopedias and textbooks on human anatomy usually list joints in a number of different categories (there are several kinds of joints) and according to the region of the body in which they are located, but we have so far not found even one book that provides a sum total of all joints. We will give in this paper a detailed overview of the kinds and numbers of joints, but since this section is very technical it is placed into an appendix. Only this much for now: Our count did not come out as 360. However, it is not our duty to prove how many joints there are; it is the duty of Abdallah who claims that there 360 of them to give valid evidence for his claim. The burden of proof is on him.

Wait a minute! Why are we talking as if Abdallah had not given any evidence? After all, he writes:

Scientific sites that prove the Islamic claim:

Please do a word search and read the returned paragraphs/sentences in the following official sites on the word "360" without the double quotes: 

http://www.iberr.co.za/biologyfr1.htm   (Islamic Studies: Biology)

http://www.iiu.edu.my/medic/islmed/Lecmed/musskel98.jul.html   (By Prof.Dr.Omar Hassan Kasule Sr.)

http://www.kennewickgeneral.com/telmed.html   (Tel-Med Official Medical Site)

Fair enough! Let's examine what Osama Abdallah considers to be scientific proof. Visiting the first of the above sites, and searching for "360", yields exactly one location on that page, stating:

It is true; that page contains the expression "360 joints" and from the context we can infer that this refers to the human body. But where is the proof? Does Mr. Abdallah seriously believe that a repetition of the same claim by a second person or webpage constitutes scientific proof? After all, he had promised that these are "scientific sites that prove" his claim. This page provides neither a list of these alleged 360 joints, nor a reference to the scientific literature, so that it cannot serve as a proof in any way. In order to understand the above quoted list better, let us ask what kind of page this is. Scrolling upwards a bit, we find the heading for this section which is: "BIOLOGY SYLLABUS ... GRADE 10". Is this a website publishing the results of scientific research in medicine? Not at all, we are looking at a highschool syllabus for 10th grade Biology. Let's ask further. What kind of highschool is this? The title of the page is "Islamic Studies: Biology", and when we open the homepage of that site[*], the title is even clearer, "Islamisation of the curriculum, Muslim school". The above quoted section on the skeletal system makes it already very clear that the topic is not science but Islamic studies. Three times in this short section of the syllabus we find entries beginning with "Islamic perspective(s) on ..." Also, the statement that "Hawa (Eve) was created from the left rib of Adam" is certainly one of faith and not of science. This syllabus is teaching "What Islam says about biology". It is definitely NOT a scientific page giving proof for Islamic claims. It is exactly the opposite of what Mr. Abdallah promised. If any student in this class would raise the question, "How do we know that the human body has 360 joints?", the answer would invariably be: "Because our prophet said so!" and the basis for this answer would be the same hadiths that Mr. Abdallah quoted in his article.

What about O. Abdallah's second "scientific site"? This time let's look at the homepage first: http://www.iiu.edu.my is the website of the "International Islamic University Malaysia" established with the goal of "Integration and Islamicization of human knowledge". This is now a university and no longer a highschool, i.e. the theme is playing out one level higher, but it seems to be still the same overall purpose of teaching an Islamic perspective in all areas of human education. There is no objection against this in principle. The bottom line will be whether the site will provide scientific proof of Mr. Abdallah's claim. If it gives actual proof, then the religious foundation of the institution will not be an argument against it.

What does the particular page say that was referenced by Abdallah? The title is "MUSCULO-SKELETAL SYSTEM (‘IDHAAM & ‘ADHALAAT) and PHYSICAL EXERCISE", and at the beginning of that page we find:

OUTLINE

EXTERNAL ORGANS MENTIONED IN THE QUR'AN

• Head and Neck
• Upper limb
• Trunk and abdomen
• Lower limb
• The bones
• Muscles
• Joints
• Uses of organs
• Significance of wudhu

One could wonder why Muslim students in their Islamic education have to learn that bones, muscles and joints are considered organs, let alone external organs, but that is not our topic here. This page makes no claim to report about recent scientific research. According to the subheading it is apparently simply a list of body parts that are mentioned in the Qur'an. The question is merely: "What is the teaching of the Islamic sources?" What then does this page tell us in the section on joints? Let's quote the paragraph before and after as well to get the context:

Muscles are mentioned in the Qur'an as meat (lahm, 23:14, 49:12): Human civilisation is based on the energy produced by contractions of human and animal muscles.

Joints: A human has 360 joints (KS p.105)

Uses of organs for worship, work, aggression, sinning. Prostration in salat on 17 bones (MB # 464 p 252, KS p. 274). Organs can also be misused to commit sins. Zina of organs other than the genitalia eg the eye, ear, and the leg was mentioned by the prophet (KS p. 264, MB #2061 p 968). Organs will act as witnesses against the owner on the last day so that he or she can not deny their sins.

No surprise here, we find merely a repetition of the same claim. The abbreviated reference (KS p. 105) is not defined anywhere on this page, but probably refers to some Islamic textbook, and this in turn will give a quotation of the hadith that we have already been introduced to.

"Scientific sites that prove the Islamic claim", was Osama Abdallah's promise for these links. What did we get so far? We have only Islamic sites repeating the claim, and no proof at all. It seems that Islamic institutions, even "universities" teach this claim as true based merely on Muhammad's authority with little or no concern whether or not this is objectively true.

Finally, we now turn to Abdallah's last reference for scientific proof, called by him the "Tel-Med Official Medical Site", and find indeed one instance of the number 360 in the line "360 Muscles, Joints & Bones". Even discounting all context, this can hardly be interpreted as informing us that the human body has 360 joints. Or did Muhammad also claim that the human body has no muscles and no bones so that the total of this number has to refer to the joints only? However, if we look closer, then we discover that this page is not even telling us that the human body has a total of 360 muscles, joints and bones. It means something different altogether. Here are some excerpts from that page:

Got a clue already what "360" is about? Not yet? Let's quote a few more pieces of the same "Tel-Med Medical Site", which is actually the website of Kennewick General Hospital in Kennewick, Washington, U.S.. At least we are finally looking at a website of medical experts. However, do they publish on research into the number of joints? Definitely not! The explanation for the above number is found on the page titled "KGH Programs and Services":

Can you believe it? The ‘360’ is part of a telephone number! To be precise, an extension number in an automated information system at a hospital offering medical help to the community via telephone. Whatever else you want to say about it, Abdallah's article is hardly a piece of high-quality research ... Actually, which of the following implications would be worse? (a) Osama Abdallah genuinely believes that this phone number is scientific proof that the ‘360 joints’ hadith is true. (b) He knows exactly what he is doing, but he only writes for such a readership that will believe basically anything if only he adds a few references that mention something about "360 joints", whatever this ‘something’ actually is. (c) He should dial (509) 586-5850, then 359, then 379.

Seriously, if Mr. Abdallah can't distinguish between a phone book and a scientific text, what business does he have with writing articles about Science? (He has published dozens of them!) And who wants to trust his sociological, historical, scientific and theological arguments if he is not able to tell the difference between the statement of a claim and providing evidence for a claim?

Actually, there is some truly mind-boggling miraculous knowledge in the above hadith which Mr. Abdallah has seemingly overlooked: Muhammad predicted part of the Tel-Med phone number for joint problems (360 joints) at a time when nobody even knew what a telephone is!

Interestingly, when Abdallah first published his article, and for about one year, it contained an even longer "bibliography":

Scientific sites that prove the Islamic claim:

Please do a word search and read the returned paragraphs/sentences in the following official sites on the word "360" without the double quotes: 

http://www.iberr.co.za/biologyfr1.htm   (Islamic Studies: Biology)

http://www.iiu.edu.my/medic/islmed/Lecmed/musskel98.jul.html   (By Prof.Dr.Omar Hassan Kasule Sr.)

http://www.therapy360.com/Therapeutic.htm   (An official Medical site that provides therapy to the 360 human joints)

http://organix.net/organix/supp.htm   (Organix Vitamins)

http://www.kennewickgeneral.com/telmed.html   (Tel-Med Official Medical Site)

http://www.war-thai.org/gibbon.htm   (Even Apes have 360 joints)

http://pages.zdnet.com/seangler/basicseaangling/id31.html   (New Product Review, from an official Medical Organization)

At some time he must have done a review of his evidence for the claim, and realizing that some of these sites are actually not supporting his claim, he then removed those links and kept only three of the originally seven links. Given that he went through a "critical review" of the evidence about one year after the first publication, it is all the more embarrassing that he still kept the link to the telephone directory.

Conclusion: Osama Abdallah's amazing "Islamic claim" was not proven but has failed in every respect. Even more, the fact that he presents two Islamic sites teaching Muslims the content of Muhammad's sayings and a hospital phone directory as three "scientific sites that prove the Islamic claim" is the ultimate disqualification of his own credibility. If the publication date of Abdallah's article had been the first of April, then it would have been a superb and very humorous April Fools story, an exhortation and reminder to his audience to read critically and not believe simply everything they read on his site or in other publications. In that case it would have deserved to be listed together with Holy Qur'an and Genetics and other satirical writings on the site Freethought Mecca. However, Abdallah's site is not known for parody or deliberate humor. This article was published on 3 June 2001, and there is not even a hint of a disclaimer found in this article. Mr. Abdallah was and is very serious about it, and he expects his audience to believe him. Just how serious he is about it can be seen from the fact how often he links to this article in other places (a list of these is provided in the Appendix 2).

Finally, this whole thing may be as much an indictment of the Muslim readership as it disqualifies the author of the article. We need to ask a question similar to that which was posed in response to Shibli Zaman's article, Lifecyle of the Universe Foretold in the Qur'ân: Is the Muslim audience in general so gullible that they believe everything, if only it appears to support Islam? Doesn't anybody look deeper to confirm such claims with solid evidence and if he finds that the alleged evidence is no evidence at all, he will then alert his Muslim brother that he made a mistake? Or do Muslims think that promoting Islam on the basis of false claims is acceptable? This most ridiculous claim has been online for more than two and a half years already. It is hard to imagine that not even one Muslim among the readership cared to check the evidence. However, in the case that some have checked up on it, found the evidence lacking, and then have informed the author/webmaster that his claim about scientific evidence is wrong, but the article still remained unchanged, does this mean that Abdallah did not care whether or his articles are based on deception, and he deliberately propagates what he knows to be wrong?

This last question becomes even more pressing since we are not the first people to respond to this article. Many ideas in our response were inspired by the contributions found in this discussion thread on the "Qur'an and Science" discussion forum at the website Faith Freedom International. This is a major website and many Muslims are frequenting it and are using its discussion forums. Even if there were no Muslim believer who cared to verify this claim for himself, certainly some of them must have seen that a number of ex-Muslims have exposed this article as a fraud on 8 October 2003, already two months ago. The Muslims did not even have to check the evidence for themselves; it was done for them, and still nobody cared about correcting it? Neither Abdallah nor any other Muslim? [Even more, on 30 November 2003 Denis Giron published another rebuttal on a Muslim-Christian Dialogue Forum with lots of Muslim participation!]

You, the present reader, may never before have seen this particular article by Osama Abdallah, but you may still ask yourself: "Do I usually try to confirm claims promoted on Muslim (and Christian) websites or in other publications? Or do I usally simply believe what my fellow believers write in support of my religion?" You may want to resolve that from this day forward, you will diligently ask for evidence and carefully evaluate claims instead of blindly accepting what, at first sight, seems to support your own convictions or desires. Because if you don't, you are in grave danger of falling for many deceptions.

There is another small "number problem" in the first of the hadiths quoted by Abdallah:

Obviously, 360 is not equal to 364, so there is a contradiction even within this one hadith. When looking up this hadith in the Arabic original, we find that it says 360 both times, i.e. this is not a contradiction but merely a translation error. The only reason to mention this observation here is that it constitutes further evidence of Abdallah's shoddy research. He merely copied the quotation from either the notoriously unreliable online hadith database or some other source (see below) and neither checked his foundational text for logical consistency nor did he bother to compare it against the Arabic original before issuing claims about its miraculous nature. [Below we will discover that the translation of this hadith also contains another quite serious error that has major implications for Abdallah's claim.]

Before we conclude this section, let's take another look at Osama Abdallah's first paragraph following his quotations of the two narrations of Muhammad:

This statement is a perfect example of Abdallah's "fluff and bluff" rhetoric. Even if Muhammad's claim that the human body has 360 joints had been true, what exactly is so "very important" about it? Does O. Abdallah know of even one Muslim doctor in the history of 1,400 years of Islamic Medicine who on the basis of this "very important" information was able to find a cure for any illness of his patients? The very fact that we have not been able to find even one medical encyclopedia or textbook of human anatomy at a university library that mentions the number of joints is certainly a good indication of how unimportant and irrelevant this number is for doctors and scientists.

In medicine it is important to know how certain organs, bones or joints function and how they can be cured or repaired should they get damaged. But what exactly is the importance of their number? Would knowing the mere number of joints be any more important than the mere number of the hairs on your head? The number of joints is really only interesting for people who play "Trivial Pursuit" or want to become a candidate in some quiz show, but not for medical doctors. It is on the level of "How many peas are in that bottle?" questions. Such information is only to satisfy the curiosity of people who have nothing better to do, but it has little practical value.

[ In fact, the impatient who don't want to wait until we give the solution later in this article, may go to www.UselessKnowledge.com (which redirects to a "Cool Quiz" trivia page), put the phrase "joints in the human body" (including the quotation marks) into their search engine to find out that Muhammad was more than 50% off the mark according to the most commonly given answer. ]

Only somebody who has no clue about science could call such a statement "a very important scientific claim". O. Abdallah probably sees this right next to the importance of Einstein's theory of relativity, or a cure for cancer. Maybe he even thinks that Muhammad has earned a nobel prize for this breakthrough in medical research. No, the importance of this statement is not in medicine or science, but in psychology. Let me illustrate: One unimportant stick in the woods, merely lying there in the wilderness to rot or to be eaten by worms, can suddenly become very important, if you broke your leg and need this stick as a crutch enabling you to hobble home. As we will see in Appendix 2, it is exactly this crutch function that makes these trivia so very important to Abdallah.

Let's ask again: If Muhammad made indeed "a very important scientific claim", what consequence will Abdallah draw from the fact that Muhammad's "very important scientific claim" is wrong? Personally, I do not believe that Muhammad intended this statement to be understood as a divine revelation about human anatomy. Those, however, who make such steep claims, will have to honestly face the consequences of their chosen methodology, or otherwise will expose themselves as hypocrites.

Although our rebuttal could end here, we are not satisfied to merely state the complete failure of Osama Abdallah's claim. There are some other aspects in these traditions that are worthy to be investigated. Most importantly, we will ask the question where the idea that the human body has 360 joints may have originated.

What is the Source of Muhammad's belief that the human body has 360 joints?

If Muhammad's statement had been true, the next step of a proper ‘miracle test’ would have to be that we find out whether Muhammad was the first one to say that the human body has 360 joints. Getting this fact right could be amazing or even miraculous only if he had said something new or contrary to general opinion, not if he merely repeated what was a common belief at his time. Thus, although Abdallah didn't deem it important to investigate this question, we will ask: Have others made this claim before the time of Muhammad?

A quick search on the internet yields the answer effortlessly. In fact, we wonder how Osama was able to find his three alleged "scientific sites" without at the same time finding those other pages mentioning "360 joints" that should have made him suspicious. Why did he just ignore those? Roughly 850 years before the time when Muhammad claimed prophethood, we are told that the following was taught in Chinese philosophy:

According to Nathan Sivin, this was already common teaching in the third century B.C., i.e. it is apparently documented even earlier. We find that this correspondence is also part of (at least some forms of) Buddhism (Buddha lived roughly 500 B.C.).

And:

On pages about Martial Arts (which originated in East Asia and are not merely "sports" but are built on this religious/philosophical foundation) one can find that they still teach today:

However, this number 360 is a mystical one. It has a numerologial significance. It was not derived by counting the joints in autopsies of dead bodies, and it was usually not understood as being scientific information. At the same time period (third century B.C.) when Chinese philosophy speaks of 360 joints of the human body matching the 360 days of the year, various local states were already using a 365.25-day calendar (I received this information via private communication from Nathan Sivin). The number 360 is found in many contexts. A wheel consisting of 360 joints plays a role in the Hindu Vedas (Srimad Bhagavatam 3.21.18). The angle of the full circle is 360°, and the Meccan Kaaba is said to have housed 360 idols [*, *; perhaps one for every day?].

The Muslim sources claim that Mecca was a major trading center. Traders, however, brought not only material goods but also stories and ideas from far-away countries. Given that the "360 joints in the human body" was widely believed in the Far East, there is a high probability that this belief migrated also to Arabia and was either common knowledge or at least known to Muhammad, who himself was a caravan trader for some time of his life. The report that the Kaaba had 360 idols is itself evidence that the number 360 had some significance in Arabia at the time of Muhammad. Given that a considerable number of details from Galen's embryology were taken over by Muhammad (see the article Embryology in the Qur'an), it would not be a surprise to learn that the at least 850 years older belief of 360 joints in the human body was adapted into Muhammad's "knowledge base" in a similar way.

In fact, in the hadith collections one can find several more similar narrations besides the two quoted by Abdallah, and in none of them is any indication that the people around Muhammad were in any way surprised about the claim that the human body has 360 joints. That idea seemed not to be new to them. None of them said: "Excuse me, Messenger of Allah, but our doctors tell us that we have 230 joints. Why are you now saying that we have 360 of them?" No, nothing like this is reported. They were startled only by the conclusion that Muhammad drew from this assumed fact. The exhortation to do good deeds and act charitably toward others is found in all religions. It is the incredible exaggeration in Muhammad's demand to do 360 charitable acts every day which righly shocked his followers. It's very simple math: 360 good deeds per day means one good deed every four minutes. Given that everyone has to sleep, eat and tend to a few other necessities in life, like earning a living to feed the family, that leaves precious little time for all those 360 good deeds that Muhammad demanded here. No wonder his followers were shocked and asked him: Who is capable of doing this? Apart from the scientific problems contained in this claim, this appears to have been one of the most thoughtless and unrealistic statements Muhammad ever made. After having become aware of the total impossibility of his command, the prophet then trivialized the obligation by saying: "Don't worry, ‘two rak'ahs in the forenoon will be sufficient for you’ instead of all this." We may investigate this aspect in more detail in the future in a separate article.

To summarize: So far Muhammad's statement already failed two essential criteria of any reasonable ‘miracle test’. His statement about "360 joints in the human body" is neither true nor was it new. Furthermore, the Muslims produced many dead bodies in their wars against the unbelievers. At one time they slaughtered a whole Jewish tribe of at least 600 men in one day (see the article about the Banu Qurayza). It would have been easy, and perfectly feasible even at that time, to take a few of these bodies, carefully take them apart, and count all the joints. Autopsies of dead people have been performed for centuries even before the time of Muhammad. No supernatural revelation is necessary for finding the number of joints in a human body.

The Source of Abdallah's claim?

We will shortly discuss some more problems found in these hadiths. However, in the last section we investigated the source of Muhammad's belief that there are 360 joints in the human body. So let's also ask for the source of Abdallah's claim that science supposedly confirmed Muhammad's opinion. It is somewhat unlikely that Abdallah cooked that up entirely by himself. Indeed, we found one other webpage stating:

360 Joints in the Human Body         "Aisha reported Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) as saying: Every one of the children of Adam has been created with three hundred and sixty joints; so he who declares the Glory of Allah, praises Allah, declares Allah to be One, Glorifies Allah, and seeks forgiveness from Allah, and removes stone, or thorn, or bone from people's path, and enjoins what is good and forbids from evil, to the number of those three hundred and sixty-four, will walk that day having removed himself from Hell. (Translation of Sahih Muslim, The Book of Zakat (Kitab Al-Zakat), Book 005, Number 2199)"       Narrated Buraydah ibn al-Hasib: "I heard the Apostle of Allah (S) say: A human being has three hundred and sixty joints for each of which he must give alms..." (Translation of Sunan Abu-Dawud, General Behavior (Kitab Al-Adab), Book 41, Number 5222)"         However this fact was not known until just recently. In  1995 it was thought that there were 340 joints in the human body. Yet in that year  a scientific institute proved that the internal ear consists of 10 joints each. Thus 20 joints were added and the discovery was made that the human body consists of 360 joints.

(Source: http://www.fortunecity.com/marina/commodity/1089/id170.htm)

Not only is the notation in the reference to the hadiths identical ("Book 005", while the printed edition of Sahih Muslim has "Book V"), and both pages contain the translation error in the first hadith ("to the number of those three hundred and sixty-FOUR"), but most importantly, compare the last paragraph above to the statement found on Abdallah's page (underlined emphasis ours):

Beside from the beautiful teachings about Worshiping the One True Living GOD Almighty and removing obstacles from the paths of people, Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him made a very important scientific claim, and that is: Our human bodies have 360 joints in them.

Prior to 1995 it was thought that there are 340 joints in the human body. In 1995 a scientific institute proved that the internal ear consists of 10 joints each. Thus 20 joints were added and the discovery was made that the human body consists of 360 joints. Please refer to any medical encyclopedia on this.

The formulation is so similar that it is clear that there is a relationship of dependency between them. Since Islam supposedly puts such a strong emphasis on "isnad", i.e. chain of transmitters for its narrations, it is striking that both of these Muslim webpages containing this claim do not give a source for it. Did O. Abdallah plagiarize the above page? Or did the webmaster of the above page plagiarize Abdallah's article? Or do they both have a common source which neither of them acknowledges? We may never know for sure. Personally, however, I consider it unlikely that somebody would have taken the article from Abdallah's site but remove the sentence, "Please refer to any medical encyclopedia on this", as well as his links to the ‘scientific sites’, i.e. removed all references for the credibility of the claim. [How likely would you think that somebody checks several medical encyclopedias, but can't find any support for the claim, checks those internet links, but realizes they are all bogus, and still designs a webpage to propagates the claim for which he could not find any evidence?] It is much more likely that Abdallah (believing the claim to be true since Muhammad said so), plagiarized this page (or some other Muslim publication containing these statements) without acknowledging the source, but adding a couple of sentences (this being a beautiful teaching) and the claim that people may "refer to any medical encyclopedia on this". After all, since it is true, one will certainly find it there. In addition, he made a hasty search of the web for "360 joints", found three webpages that looked to him like scientific proof (the two Islamic ones, plus the telephone directory!), added these links to his page as proof of the claim, and then quickly published it.

Yet another scientific error

Finally, since Abdallah's claim was about scientific accuracy of Muhammad's statement, let's give these hadiths even more scientific scrutiny. As it turns out, the claim of 360 being the number of joints in the human body is not the only scientific error in these hadiths! Muhammad suppposedly said: "A human being has three hundred and sixty joints ..." and this was clearly a general statement about ALL human beings, not merely about one exceptional human being. This is proven by the formulation in the other hadith stating, "Every one of the children of Adam has been created with three hundred and sixty joints; ..." as well as by the fact that the obligation to do 360 sadaqa applied to everyone. Where is the problem? Well, Muhammad apparently did not know that not all human beings have the same number of bones and joints. Not even all adult people have the same number. Particularly, however, the number of bones and joints changes while growing up. After birth they first increase for a number of years, and later they decrease again. [Some details will be given at the end of Appendix 1.] Muhammad's statements were clearly made under the assumption that all people have the same number of joints. Thus, he is not only wrong about the number 360, but also in the assumption that the number is constant and equal in all human beings.

Confusion and contradiction: Did Muhammad speak about joints or about bones?

Let's have another look at the first hadith quoted by O. Abdallah as basis for his claim of Muhammad's statement being scientifically true. In the following we quote first the original Arabic version, and then give the translation in which we are going to highlight two important words:

إنه ‏ ‏خلق كل إنسان من بني ‏ ‏آدم ‏ ‏على ستين وثلاث مائة ‏ ‏مفصل ‏ ‏فمن كبر الله وحمد الله وهلل الله وسبح الله واستغفر الله وعزل حجرا عن طريق الناس أو شوكة أو عظما عن طريق الناس وأمر بمعروف أو نهى عن منكر عدد تلك الستين والثلاث مائة ‏ ‏السلامى ‏ ‏فإنه يمشي يومئذ وقد زحزح نفسه عن النار

Every one of the children of Adam has been created with three hundred and sixty mefsal; so he who declares the Glory of Allah, praises Allah, declares Allah to be One, glorifies Allah, and seeks forgiveness from Allah, and removes stone, or thorn, or bone from people's path, and enjoins what is good and forbids from evil, to the number of those three hundred and sixty salama, will walk that day having removed himself from Hell. (Sahih Muslim, Hadith Number 2199; emphasis ours)

Comparing our rendering of this hadith with the official Muslim translation by Abdul Hamid Siddiqui (see above), we observe that Siddiqui left the word salama simply untranslated (whether intentionally or unintentionally). However, for our discussion this word is rather important.

What are the meanings of the two words mefsal and salama? The Arabic-English online dictionary at ajeeb.com provides the following meanings:

Some of the words in the second entry may not be familiar to readers who are not native English speakers. Webster's Encyclopedic Unabridged Dictionary of the English Language defines "digit" as "a finger or toe", and states that in the context of anatomy or zoology "phalange" is a synonym of "phalanx" and both denote "any of the bones of the fingers or toes".

Before we return to the above hadith from Sahih Muslim, it will be instructive to look at two consecutive narrations found in the Sunan Abu Dawud. The first of these was quoted by Abdallah, the second was (deliberately?) ignored, since it would have undermined his case. In the translation by Prof. Ahmad Hasan we read:

Narrated Buraydah ibn al-Hasib: I heard the Apostle of Allah (peace_be_upon_him) say: A human being has three hundred and sixty joints (Arabic: mefsal) for each of which he must give alms. The people asked him: Who is capable of doing this? He replied: It may be mucus in the mosque which you bury, and something which you remove from the road; but if you do not find such, two rak'ahs in the forenoon will be sufficient for you. (Sunan Abu Dawud, Book 41, Number 5222; emphasis ours)

Narrated AbuDharr: The Prophet (peace_be_upon_him) said: In the morning alms are due from every bone (Arabic: salama) in man's fingers and toes. Salutation to everyone he meets is alms; enjoining good is alms; forbidding what is disreputable is alms; removing what is harmful from the road is alms; having sexual intercourse with his wife is alms. The people asked: He fulfils his desire, Apostle of Allah; is it alms? He replied: Tell me if he fulfilled his desire where he had no right, would he commit a sin? He then said: Two rak'ahs which one prays in the forenoon serve instead of all that. (Sunan Abu Dawud, Book 41, Number 5223; emphasis ours)

Both hadiths obviously deal with the same topic, but in the first tradition Muhammad speaks about the JOINTS, while in the second one he speaks about the BONES. However, joints are not bones and bones are not joints. Furthermore, does he speak about all the joints/bones in the whole human body, or does he speak only about the joints/bones in the fingers and toes? Fingers and toes are obviously only a small part of the human body. On a spiritual level both hadiths are similar enough. They speak about the obligation of giving alms (sadaqa), and give definitions of what can be counted as sadaqa, and even give the same conclusion that two rak'ahs in the morning are sufficient sadaqa for the whole day. However, the topic of this article is the alleged scientific accuracy of Muhammad's claims in regard to human anatomy.

On the scientific level, however, these two hadiths contradict each other, since bones and joints are different entities and concepts. If we do not even know whether Muhammad talked about bones or about joints, the statement is useless for scientific evaluation because it is not precise. Is one of the hadith corrupted? How would we know which is the corrupted one and which one is correct? Moreover, if it is possible that one is corrupted, how do we know that they are not both corrupted? Alternatively, we could assume that Muhammad at one occasion spoke what is reported in the first version and at another occasion said what is found in the second version. If these are narrations about separate events, then it is possible that both are historical. However, this interpretation is rather strained, and this would raise a number of different questions: Do the two rak'ahs substitute for the alms due for the joints or for the alms due for the bones? Should a Muslim maybe pray four rak'ahs in the morning: two rak'ahs for the joints and two for the bones — just to be on the safe side? Or are the two rak'ahs covering both obligations simultaneously although Muhammad never said so? Also, this ‘solution’ would imply that Muhammad himself is confused and forgetful.

Although not very credible, this interpretion that they are reporting two different events is perhaps a possibility in regard to the two narrations found in the Sunan Abu Dawud. More precisely: This suggestion would be a possibility if these were the only narrations on the topic, but there are several more which is further complicating the matter. Whatever the impact of those other traditions, this ‘solution’ is definitely NOT possible for the tradition found in Sahih Muslim:

Aisha reported Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) as saying: Every one of the children of Adam has been created with three hundred and sixty JOINTS (mefsal); so he who declares the Glory of Allah, praises Allah, declares Allah to be One, glorifies Allah, and seeks forgiveness from Allah, and removes stone, or thorn, or bone from people's path, and enjoins what is good and forbids from evil, to the number of those three hundred and sixty DIGITAL BONES (salama), will walk that day having removed himself from Hell. (Sahih Muslim, Hadith Number 2199)

What is it, Muhammad? Make up your mind! Are we supposed to count the joints or the bones? Or is the true meaning of this statement that we have both: 360 joints in all of the body AND 360 bones in our fingers and toes? This would be completely wrong and utterly ridiculous. Moreover, this interpretation is impossible since the word "those" in the last part of the sentence points back to the first mention of "360" and the statement as recorded is really identifying bones with joints as if they were the same. This is a gross scientific error.

[ Now we also know why the Muslim translator of the hadith left the word salama untranslated. A correct translation would have revealed immediately that Muhammad's statement is complete nonsense. Therefore, he decided to cover up the error by a dishonest translation. This advice proves to be true again: if you need to know the exact meaning of a verse in the Qur'an, of a saying of Muhammad, or of other Muslim source materials, never simply trust the Muslim translations. Always get a second opinion. ]

The above discoveries now leave us with the following two alternatives:

1. Muhammad is confused, contradicting himself, and making completely unscientific statements.
2. These canonical collections of hadiths are confused, contradictory, and unreliable. Therefore they are (not only) scientifically useless.

In either case, Abdallah's attempted argument for the divine inspiration and authority of Muhammad is dead. The discussion in this last section provides even more evidence of how shoddy and untrustworthy Osama Abdallah's ‘research’ truly is.

Summary on the scientific aspects covered in this paper

First, O. Abdallah claimed that Muhammad's statement was scientifically proven in 1995. Every part of the alleged scientific evidence turned out to be bogus, being not only unscientific but plainly ridiculous.

Second, this particular statement by Muhammad cannot serve as proof for the divine origin of the teachings of Islam since it fails the test for being a genuine ‘scientific miracle’ on several counts:

• The belief that the human body has 360 joints was already nearly a millenium old at the time of Muhammad and may even have been common knowledge in Muhammad's environment.
• No supernatural revelation is needed to determine the number of joints. A complete and detailed autopsy may be a tedious task, but it was perfectly possible to do so in Muhammad's time.
• Muhammad's claim about the number of joints is wrong in two respects:
  • Muhammad's assumption that all humans have the same number of joints is wrong.
  • Muhammad's claim that the human body has 360 joints is wrong also for the average adult person.
• Muhammad's statements on the issue are at best very imprecise, but more likely they are plain contradictory. Therefore they can hardly be considered as scientific statements. We do not even know whether he is talking about bones or joints.

This concludes our rebuttal to Osama Abdallah's propaganda that "Islam's claim about the 360 joints in the human body was proven to be true" by recent scientific research. If these narrations have any implication for the credibility of Islam, then they are evidence that Islam is wrong.

Jochen Katz (German, mathematician)
together with "Wildcat" (American, medical student) and Khaled (Iraqi Arab Christian, formerly Muslim)

Appendix 1: The number of joints in the adult human body

Before we get into the nitty-gritty and rather technical details, let us first present the rather amazing result of searching the internet with Google for the expression "joints in the human body" (i.e. without specifying any number beforehand). We want to share with you a quite amusing collection of quotes that should get you into the right mood for this section:

• There are 230 joints in the human body. (Source, and many more)
• 187 joints in the human body. (Source)
• There are 143 different joints in the human body (Source 1, 2, 3, and more)
• 100 joints in the human body (Source)
• There are roughly 640 muscles and 100 joints in the human body. (Source)
• Most of the ~150 bone joints in the human body are ... (Source)
• three hundred sixty five joints in the human body (Source)
• Altogether there are 68 joints in the human body. (Source)
• about 70 moveable joints in the human body. (Source)
• There are hundreds of joints in the human body. (Source 1, 2)
• There are hundreds ( far too many to count! ) of joints in the human body ... (Source)
• There are 147 joints in the human body (Source)
• There are nearly 200 joints in the human body. (Source)
• 248 joints in the human body (Source)

Conclusion? Anyone who used to simply believe something that he "found on the internet" without carefully checking up on the facts should be cured now. The above listed sources are largely not even amateur sites, but include university pages, news agencies and pages of professional health care organizations! Some webpages simply and more wisely state:

• There are many joints in the human body. (Source 1, 2)

The two most commonly claimed numbers are "230 joints" (usually found on "Did you know that ...", "Amazing facts ...", etc. trivia pages) and "143 joints" (mainly found on pages about arthritis). One thing should be obvious: If you only search for "360 joints" you will find those sites that claim that the human body has 360 joints. If you only search for "230 joints" you will find those sites that confirm what you searched for. It is very easy to get your intended result ‘confirmed’ with a certain number of webpages. It holds true in many areas that the form of a question often determines the answer. True knowledge is all about asking the right questions. Furthermore, it is essential to develop the ability to distinguish between credible and untrustworthy sources.

Before we discovered the extent of confusion on this issue and compiled the above list, we did what Abdallah should have done before publishing his nonsense: We checked out his claims in a medical school textbook on human anatomy. For the list of joints given below we refer to the 4^th edition of "Clinically Oriented Anatomy" by Keith L. Moore and Arthur F. Dalley. The Fourth Edition was published in 1999 and is still in use by medical schools in the United States. Unfortunately, it is not easy to find statements anywhere that indicate the exact number of joints found in the human body. However, the textbook we have in our possession lists the joints of the body. Below we will actually list these by name according to body part and give the total number in each part. Finally, we will add up all of the numbers to determine approximately how many joints there are in the human body. The great differences in the above listed numbers may in part be explained that different authors are using different definitions for what is to be counted as "a joint". For example, if one would only count those "bone connections" that allow at least some movement this would then exclude the sutures of the skull. Since those above listed pages mostly do not make their definitions explicit, we are left guessing. However, for our own list, we want to be precise and first ask: What is a joint? Furthermore, to be as fair as possible, we will use the widest definition that is still reasonable in order to allow a greater number of joints to be found. In addition, note that the author of the textbook we are using is Keith L. Moore, who is referred to by many Muslims as a prime authority in anatomy and is their "main witness" to another alleged scientific miracle (cf. the articles on embryology in the section on Qur'an and Science).

Let's begin. Our source defines "joint" as ...

In case you missed it ...

There is one more intersting aspect to Abdallah's specific claims. He wrote:

Prior to 1995 it was thought that there are 340 joints in the human body. In 1995 a scientific institute proved that the internal ear consists of 10 joints each. Thus 20 joints were added and the discovery was made that the human body consists of 360 joints. Please refer to any medical encyclopedia on this.

As observed above, one can find a good number of webpages to support each of the opinions that the human body has 230 joints (trivia pages) or 143 joints (arthritis pages) or 360 joints (Muslim pages and Chinese philosophy pages). But is there anyone who shares Abdallah's claim that before 1995 it was believed that the human body had 340 joints? Searching for "340 joints" yields (currently) only those two Muslim pages making the claim under discussion here. Thus, the claim that before 1995 people believed that the human body had 340 joints seems to be completely unknown otherwise and is simply a Muslim hoax.

We found one Arabic webpage mentioning a similar claim:

ولم يثبت إلا بعد 1996 ميلاديا أن عدد المفاصل 360 مفصل، وهذا يدل على ان هذا العلم جاء من قبل ربه.

Approximate translation of the meaning of the above quotation: "It has never been proven before that there are 360 joints until after 1996. That proves that this knowledge came from his lord (i.e. was revealed to Mohamed by God)." Although being close, "until after 1996" is obviously different from "in the year 1995". Apparently, there are a number of different (independent?) hoaxes that are circulating among Muslims on this issue. The above source knows nothing about the alleged earlier belief of 340 joints, nor does it make any statement about a recent discovery of ten joints in the internal ear. It seems to be a more primitive version of the hoax which later was extended with further invented details. According to the Arabic source, this statement was made by an Egyptian medical doctor under the name Abdel Baset Sayed in answer to a question during an interview in 5/8/2003.

Why did we so far speak only about the ADULT human body?

The whole discussion is further complicated by the fact that the number of bones and joints in our bodies does not remain constant during our lifetime, nor do all people have the same number of bones (and thus joints) even as adults. The teeth are the most obvious example. Newborn babies have no teeth. In the first years children usually grow 20 teeth. Adults usually have 32 teeth (though not everyone gets the wisdom teeth). Thus the number of teeth (bones) and their sockets (joints) clearly changes. But there is more:

The total number of bones varies at different ages. At birth, the human body contains ~270 bones. This number declines slightly during infancy as a few separate segments join to form single bones. From young childhood through puberty, the bone count increases as wrist and ankle bones develop. Post-adolescence, the bone count steadily declines again with the gradual union of independent bones. (Source)

... Babies are born with bones that are soft and flexible. Babies' bones have lots of cartilage, the flexible material that will later harden into bone material. In fact, babies have around 300 bones at first. Later, as the bones harden, some of these will fuse together until the adult number of 206 bones is reached. (Source)

Of the 206 bones in the average adult human body, ... (Source)

One in 20 people has an extra rib. (Source)

As observed above, Muhammad apparently assumed that the number of bones/joints in the human body is the same for all people and that it remains constant. Thus, this constitutes another error on his part. We will not go into any detail on this issue. Apart from noting that this is another error, it is not important to our discussion to determine the exact number of bones and joints at each age. We leave this exercise to Abdallah if he thinks he could get any mileage out of it.

Appendix 2: Why the ‘Scientific Miracles’ are so VERY IMPORTANT to Osama Abdallah

The following is just a sample of what is found on Abdallah's website. In the article Muhammad and Dogs many superstitious beliefs of Muhammad were discussed. O. Abdallah did little but simply deny that they are superstitious, and concludes his defense of Islam with:

Note that throughout this section emphasis by underlining is ours. The above is only a small excerpt since Abdallah's long list of ‘miracles’ actually takes up about six screens/pages. Let's look into a few more of his articles. Muhammad serious contradicted himself on the issue of inheritance and the making of wills, breaking several of the commands he had given to be observed by all Muslims. O. Abdallah wrote a response to our article in which he writes again:

Again, Abdallah does little more than brushing the problem aside and instead points to the miracle of science confirming Islam. Even if all else fails, for him this seems to be the proof that overpowers all other problems.

Among other difficult issues, Sam Shamoun pointed out one problem in Surah 37:147 regarding Jonah and the city of Niniveh, to which Osama Abdallah responds in his article, My rebuttal to Sam Shamoun's "Allah's Guessing Game, Is Allah an All-Knowing GOD?" article:

Further down in the very SAME article he repeats the whole lengthy list (six pages!) of scientific miracles again as proof for the truth of Islam (including the link to the 360 joints article).

Responding to the arguments in a paper discussing Muhammad's Suicide Attempts, Abdallah gives this impressive rebuttal:

Does anyone besides Abdallah consider this an answer to the issue?

In another article on Osama's Mantras, Sam Shamoun showed how irrational Abdallah's arguments really are (on the topic of the deity of Jesus). What is Abdallah's "answer"? You are probably able to guess it by now ... He writes:

Does Abdallah not realize that he completely misses the mark? Whether or not Adam was 90 feet tall will not make any one of Abdallah's arguments on the deity of Christ any more rational than before. If anything, with this answer he only proved that his arguments are indeed completely irrational. And yet again, the whole six-page list is included TWICE in this "rebuttal" as well.

In reaction to Sam Shamoun's rebuttal to Jamal Badawi's claims, Abdallah writes:

Abdallah simply lists nearly the same six pages of alleged scientific miracles instead of directly interacting with even one of Sam Shamoun's arguments. Talk about a mantra! NO, sorry Mr. Abdallah, these do not refute Shamoun's arguments in the least.

Even into the debate with Sam Shamoun on the relationship of baptism, salvation and sanctification, Abdallah manages to insert his favorite but completely unrelated argument:

That certainly helped to clarify the issue under discussion, right?

In his response to Silas' article on Muhammad and the Snakes, arguing against Muhammad's superstition that many snakes are evil spirit beings, we find:

Again, Abdallah does not really interact with the argument. He certainly does not care whether or not it is "scientific" to believe that snakes are spirit beings which only look like snakes. Despite the fact that Islam is full of unscientific elements, he derives all his confidence in Islam from some alleged congruences between Islam and science. This is again an article where it was not enough for Abdallah to quote the same six pages of links only once. No, he included them twice, since later in the same article we find:

There is no longer a surprise, that Abdallah's reaction to the article, Muhammad and the Animals, is exactly the same as all the others when he states:

Again, he needs no proof where the claims of Islam are "difficult", but will believe Islam is true because Muhammad said there are 360 joints in the human body which is wrong as well. And Abdallah never becomes tired to repeat the same six pages of science claims another time in this same article as well (and a thousand and one times on his site):

And it continues in this way without end.

It is obvious that Osama Abdallah bases his faith in Islam primarily on these alleged scientific miracles supposedly found in the Qur'an and sayings of the prophet.

The article, Muhammad the Sinner, apparently caused him even more problems than others, since he included his six-page mantra about the scientific miracle THREE TIMES in his response to that one. On the same grounds, another hard one for him seemed to be his rebuttal to "60 Questions Muslims Don't Like to Be Asked!, since we find it included three times in that article as well. I will only quote one of them. In response to this theological question:

Abdallah "answers" with these words:

In other words: I don't really have an answer, but I know Islam is true because "Science" has proven Islam to be true. This article may beat all his other ones. Not only is the complete six-page list of links repeated three times in it, but parts of the list are repeated even more often. In particular the link "Islam's claim about the 360 joints in the human body was proven to be true!" is included in this one paper as a proof of Islam SIX TIMES! Certainly this is sufficient proof of just how important this particular claim is for Abdallah's confidence in Islam. Too bad for him that Muhammad's "very important scientific claim" IS COMPLETELY WRONG.

There are probably even more articles on his site that contain the same references and claims over and over again. In these two articles, The human embryonic development and Embryology in the Noble Quran:, the link to the "360 joints" article is part of a different short list of links. However, the point is made and we finish our investigation at this point.

In the end, the most interesting question will be this: Is Osama Abdallah going to draw any consequence from the fact that Muhammad was wrong? Only removing this one claim from his long list would be too simple and too cheap. The question is whether or not Abdallah will finally start to rethink his whole approach and if a list of alleged scientific miracles can really be a secure foundation for his confidence in Islam, particularly since there are at the same time so many scientific errors in Islam, starting with this claim of 360 joints in the human body.

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