Hythem Sidky [II]: Radiocarbon Dating Manuscripts and the Early History of the Qur'an
2022 ж. 21 Там.
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In this interview I have the pleasure of talking to Dr. Hythem Sidky for a second time. This time we talk about radiocarbon dating and the proposed dates of some Qur'an manuscripts. Dr. Sidky is the executive director of the International Qur'anic Studies Association and has published many articles on various topics in Qur'anic Studies. Dr. Sidky gives an indepth historical and scientific explanation on how Qur'an manuscripts can be dated.
To keep up with Dr. Sidky's work please visit his Academia page, here: chicago.academia.edu/HythemSidky
Can u also make a written version of this lecture and Dr shady so we can use in our educational purposes please ? Dr Gabriel ❤❤
This is an excellent interview! 👏
When are you getting prof. Reynolds?😁
@El-Ḥaakim be-Amr Allāh I hope once I get to my new home I will have academics on Islam on. Maybe a couple of weeks?
@@valipunctro I'm working on it.
Thank you. I wouldn't have found this channel without Mythvision's post. I don't know how I missed this channel.
@@MythVisionPodcast Yes that would be great. You can get really serious academics on which would be interesting. Though I'm religious, I wouldn't mind you bringing really skeptical academics on Islam on. I think the ones in France are often quite revisionist compared to the traditional narrative.
Interesting research and well presented.
Thank you!
Enable screen sharing so powerpoint presentations, tables etc can be displayed. You are trying to explain complex matters using words. We are visual creatures and need complex data to be in diagram, chart form
Hi Gabriel! Very enjoyed these episodes on Quranic studies. One request, please. As we are dealing with religion which is very much includes people's own beliefs, I would love to hear what your guests believe in, what their religion is etc. This will help keep in mind level of bias and general attitude of your guests towards religion. Thanks!
You would rather search what he is saying first whether it’s true or false so we wouldn’t put or biases in front of what he is presenting!! All the guest is saying is truth . But however he presented himself on earlier interview with Dr Gabriel that he is obviously a Muslim and he memorises the Quran since he was a child and he has got Ijaza in the recitation of the Quran.
Do you think a 7th century AD Quran of Hazrat Ali exists. Can anybody read that if presented.
Why don't they radiocarbon date the 328C to confirm that it and Birmingham folio are from the same codex. Currently, only Deroche has advanced theory.
The argument quite contradicting, he believes one riwayah from who die on 207 H, the most known student if Abdullah bin Mas'ud is the great imam abu Hanifah and there are no report from Abu Hanifah on these "codex" of ibn Mas'ud, the doctor seems accepting one riwayat againts another
Any word on the syro-aramaic antecedents of Quran??
Read Surat Yunus and you will find the rhetorical challenge for all humanity by writing a verse like the eloquence of the Qur'an, no poet or orator can challenge humanity, Until now, not everyone who has lived on the globe for 1400 years has been able to defy the Qur'an The Arab world is home to tens of millions of Christians, Jews and atheists Ask them to challenge the eloquence of the Qur’an, they will be unable, this is enough to challenge that the Qur’an can be written by humans
How many of these are actually antecedents and how many of them are just shared among Semitic languages? Arabic goes back at least 3,000 as the research of Ahmad al-Jallad has shown
@@user-ls8ks7kv8c nope.. Arabic was still a developing language in the 7th century AD.. there was no Arabic language prior to 3rd century AD . As far as languages go, Arabic is relatively new. Whereas, Hebrew and Aramaic languages go back to 1000 BC, i.e.over 3000 years ago.
That's not true. You can go through the various academic works deciphering the Safaitic, Thamudic, and other inscriptions (including Ahmad al-Jallad's excellent "The Religion and Rituals of the Nomads of Pre-Islamic Arabia", available for FREE online) and you can see Arabic going back to a similar time period, such as this going back to roughly the middle of the first millennium BC: ha Malkamu wa Kama:su wa Qawsu bikumu ʕawuðnaː "O Malkom and Kemosh and Qaws, in ye we seek refuge" Every modern Arabic speaker would be able to understand all of this except maybe the last word. You're conflating the relatively new Arabic SCRIPT with the very old Arabic LANGUAGE (which goes back much much further than the script)@@roshlew6994
He literally said two types of Quran we have which is carbon 12 and carbon 14 which is not stable or fixed and we have fixed Quran - but then he went on to contridict himself again and again
"no longer on social media" I wonder what motivated that
Dating these folios and manuscripts is very interesting indeed. However without early and independent sources affirming the Uthmanic recension perhaps we’re dating important documents that have only peripheral ties to the classical narrative and only later had the narrative ascribed to the extant documents…. Dr. Sidky’s work remains interesting and valuable in that we can start to construct timelines for what we know to be Quran of the narratives.
I am still waiting to see where the historical jesus actually claimed to be God And that divinity was not ascribed to the historical jesus
@@merlinx8703 I assume you’ll have to wait for a very long time. #offtopic
Please interview Stephan Shoemaker too to hear some opposing views too. Hythem is a scientist and statistician too and familiar with hypothesis testing and data overfitting in statistics. The accuracy of carbon dating is below what can distinguish Uthman vs Abdl Malik rein with enough significance. If they were 2 centuries apart would have been a different story. Also from a more forensic perspective, is there any report in Islamic tradition as to what happened to the uthmanic (physical) copies in cities like Medina and Kufa? How big they were? Any trace of them today?
Well Imam Ali's Quran is in Iran and India. As is Imam Jafar as Sadiqs in India. No testing on them but nonetheless
Great talk! I just have one deep reservation. Dr. Sydky's mention of a reported saying of Ali ibn Abi Talib: . قال علي: "والله لو وليت لفعلت مثل الذي فعل." 2 المصاحف: ابن أبي داود ص32 Ali said: "By God, if I were to be appointed, I would have done the same as he did." [2] [ref.2] al-Masaahif (The Qur’ans) by Ibn Abi Dawood* pg. 32. *Kitab-ul-Masaahif by Ibn Abi Daw'uud as-Sijistaani ( کتاب المصاحف لأبن أبي داؤود السجستاني) Given what I have read of Ali ibn Abi Talib's own words, about the issue of succession, about the Quran and about those who preceded him, *it's very unlikely that he would have said it* . This is esp. so when you look at the wording: "If I was appointed..." *Appointed by who* ? *A mob, like Banu Aslam, a non-Madinite bunch always hostile to Madinites, and brought in by Umar to save the day at Saqeefah, or appointed by one other than the Prophet* ? Who in that case. We already have a huge number of SUNNI narrations about the event of Ghadir where Ali had been chosen by the Prophet. Hardly any need to debate and go into polemics. Just go see the narrations. People do not seem to understand that *the main Sunni-Sh'ia difference on succession to the Prophet is theological, not political* ! *Only God decides succession to the Prophet in the Shia tradition, as in the Biblical tradition* ! Besides, even if he said it, unlikely though it is, it doesn't mean he (Ali) would have done it exactly the same way since *we have very early sources, and Dr. Shady Nasser, Harvard University, also who mentions that NONE of Uthman's ad hoc Quran committee had senior companions of the Prophet who would either have read the Quran in his presence or heard him, or in the presence of Ali ibn Abi Talib or Ibn Mas'uud to know what is right or what is wrong* ! *Shady Nasser also makes the point that even if Ibn Mas'uud's or Ali's Quran versions made more sense they wouldn't be acceptable during prayers, because this (to me ill-defined) 'ijma says so. That 'ijma was all 'spring chickens' so what authority would they have in front of Ali ibn Abi Talib or Ibn Mas'uud, who were the first compilers and reciters of the Quran* ? *Not correct to say that Ibn Mas'uud gave in and accepted Uthman's edited version* . A very cross Uthman called Ibn Mas'uud to Medina from Kufah where he had continued to criticize Uthman's corrupt government. *Just as Ibn Mas'uud came into the mosque of Madina, Uthman broke off his speech and began to insult him. The witness to this was Aisha bint Abi Bakr who was left aghast at the scene. As she protested about Uthman's uncouth manners, he not only forbade Ibn Mas'uud to ever leave Medina again but had him manhandled and thrown out of the mosque* ! *Ibn Mas'uud was done so violently treated that two of hi's ribs were broken and had to be carried away* [1] *Furthermore, Uthman refused to pay Ibn Mas'uud his pension for the remainder of his life* [2] *He died impoverished and miserable, almost as bad as another senior companion, Abu Dhar al-Ghaffari, exiled together with his wife and daughter by Uthman to ar-Rabathah, a hostile environment, all at the behest of Mu'awiyah ibn Abi Sufyan, his kinsman and another highly corrupt member of his government* . Ironically, *it was ibn Mas'uud's Quran compilation that remained the main text - not the Uthmanic text - in Kufah for another 200 odd years, surviving the tyrant, Hajjaj bin Yusuf's governorship. When the 10th century bookseller & bibliographer Ibn an-Nadeem al-Baghdadi went to Kufah he found Ibn Mas'uud's text in use. He also found some folios of Ali ibn Abi Talib's compilation, which was chronological, with the first 6 lines of Surah 96 (al-'Alaq) as the first. Neither Ibn Mas'uud nor Ali ibn Abi Talib had al-Fatiha as the first Surah* ! Refs: [1] Abbott, Nadia (1942). Aishah the Beloved of Mohammed. [2] Muhammad ibn Sa'ad: Kitab at-Tabaqat al-Kabra vol. 3.
1. No one accused Uthman of changing the Quran Not the rebels from Iraq or Egypt Not Ali Nobody 2. Uthman was himself a hafith a learned person, a quraishi, married to the 2 daughters of the prophet, Why would someone question his personality either ?! 3. Ghadir has its own context, Ali as a commander had rebelious voices in his group, the the prophet said what he said By same token, we have those kind of words for others as well 4. "brought in by Umar to save the day at Saqeefah" - Conspiracy theories wont help u 5. "Shady Nasser also makes the point that even if Ibn Mas'uud's or Ali's Quran versions made more sense they wouldn't be acceptable during prayers, because this (to me ill-defined) 'ijma says so. That 'ijma was all 'spring chickens' so what authority would they have in front of Ali ibn Abi Talib or Ibn Mas'uud, who were the first compilers and reciters of the Quran ? " - Shady Nasser makes some pretty big mistakes in his book, Have u hear of Ubay ibn Kab ?! How many companions knew Quran ?! just 2 ?! 6. "Ibn Mas'uud was done so violently treated that two of hi's ribs were broken and had to be carried away [1] Furthermore, Uthman refused to pay Ibn Mas'uud his pension for the remainder of his life" - Wow, all these are false www.arabnews.com/node/235217 This is not accepted by any sane person Shooting at stars is impossible
@@artf2651 This not about who said what or what not. This is about FACTS! Jalaluddin as-Suyuuti was a very conservative SUNNI scholar and he has gone out of the way to talk about the ORIGINAL verse 67, Surah al-Maa'idah as found in the codex of Ibn Mas'uud. Please have a look at his exegesis of the verse in his famous tafsiir "ad-Durr al-Manthuur". Ash-Shawkaani- another SUNNI (actually a strong Salafi!) also say the same. The ad hoc Quran committee of Uthman didn't have a SINGLE senior companion, nor any member of the Prophet's family, esp. Ali, who was not even invited. Had he been, this committee would have ceased to exist, as its members were all novices, hadn't a clue about either the correct recitation or even what the most "correct" version of a verse might be. None of its members was old enough to have known how the Prophet himself would have recited a passage. At some places it becomes very important. His contemporaries not openly accusing Uthman means nothing here. Everyone knew he had could resort to wanton violence as the incident of having Ibn Mas'uud VIOLENTLY thrown out of the mosque, thus seriously injuring him shows all too well. Noboby wanted to be the victim of the gross violence of Uthman's hoodlums! Uthman was an Umayyad and he had support of the highly questionable Umayyad clan. We all know how powerful a group this was and that originally it was the 'great enemy', should we then believe that they had changed overnight! Headed by the archenemy, Abu Sufyaan at-Taliiq ( طلیق ج طلقاء = those pagans granted amnesty on the day Mecca was conquered - in a bloodless victory), who never recognized the Prophet's apostolic mission. Consequently, one can say that the Umayyad project to alter aspects of Islam from within started with Uthman coming to power. Abu Sufyaan expressed delight when he became caliph, appointed by that dubious committee. Immediately after Uthman being declared caliph, Abu Sufyan goes to the grave of Hamzah ibn Abdul Muttalib. He was killed at the Battle of Uhud and his cannibal wife, Hind (Mu'awiyah's mother) chewed on his liver. This is the same Hamzah, uncle of the Prophet. Abu Sufyan repeatedly kicked Hamzah's grave, while saying:"Get up Hamzah! See what we've done to your nephew's religion!" Now with the Umayyads in charge it would all go downhill and eventually result in the murder of the Prophet's grandson, his family and companions at Karbala, 10th Muharram, 61 AH = 10th October, 680 AD. The dying Umar, formed the committee, namimg 'Ali ibn Abi Talib, 'Uthman ibn 'Affan, 'Abd ar-Rahman ibn 'Awf, az-Zubayr ibn al-'Awwam, Sa`d ibn Abi Waqqas, and Talhah ibn 'Ubaydillah. He also said, if any of these I've named for this, so-called 'shura', refuse to attend, kill them! Some 'shura'! And we all know who was this gross order directed against, but given Umar's rather roguish behaviour it is not surprising. All mentioned openly in our historical sources, most of them being from SUNNI scholars. The problem we have now is that there is a very naive understanding of how the Quran and its text was formed, received & perceived by the first generation or two. It's on record that the Prophet himself encouraged a level of 'diversity' in the text - and one only a level, i.e. as he saw fit. So divergent texts may not have been such an issue, only the extent of divergence and he or the person closest to him could have been able to judge. Certainly not this 'ijma of dilettantes and sychophants! Its now impossible to talk of this divergence since those variant "qira'aat" (readings reflecting textual differences) were destroyed. Uthman was the first in history to burn the Quran! One could then say that the modern Quran-burners are following the "Uthmanic sunnah", and some people have even said so! Silence about an act one disapproves of does not necessarily mean agreement with that act! The many Umayyad or pro-Umayyad hoodlums of the caliph who went around threatening everyone who disagreed had no wish to have their persons attacked and / or their homes burnt down! Imam Ali had already witnessed the attack on the house that belonged to Lady Fatmah, the daughter of the Prophet, which also became his house. The attack was led by Umar ibn al-Khattab and his gang, on the direct orders of Abu Bakr who had just usurped power at Saqeefah with Umar's great help. He (Ali) had no intention to put his family's life at risk once again. When Abu Bakr lay dying one of the things he regretted was: "I wish I did not have Fatimah's house searched!" Searched? For what? More like ransacked. Interestingly, Ibn Tamiyyah, well-known for his hostility towards Ali and Fatimah, explained this "search" as the desire of the authorities to check if these two had a secret hoard of gold! Hmm...the two closest relations of the founder of this religion were Ali & Fatimah, and elevated in the Quranic verses of al-Mubaahalh (Quran; 3:61) and at-Tathiir (Quran; 33:33); known also for their honesty and simplicity, have a finger pointed at them ibn Taymiyyah, who ought to know better. The Quran that eventually came to be known as the Uthmanic mushaf was not universally accepted in the community since ibn Mas'uud's Quran kept circulating in parallel and in places like Kufah remained the main text till the 10th century! The version produced by Uthman's Quran committee also seems like a bad job. Even after 1400 years we have between 5 to 7 versions being used in the Muslim world. True, the Hafs version is most prevalent, but there is Warsh reading, Qaluun reading, Dausi reading etc. Some are used in parts of Africa only, but they are being used and their users swear by it. So, what did the Uthmanic mushaf really achieve, other than remove and / or alter things they didn't like or couldn't understand. We are still left with variants minus the things that could have shed more light on important matters, like the issue of succession
Hmm.. Typical Shiite.. Cherry-picking traditions without confirming authenticity to suite their twisted narratives.
@@Zarghaam12 Very interesting read. Thanks for commenting. I also want to know about the theological difference between Shia and Sunni from historical perspective like how and when these two branches were divided, what they disagree with.
Rafidhi, stop spreading lies about the Friends of Prophet PBUH.🤬🤬🤬
Just don't buy it that the Sanaa manuscript must be from an unknown companion, because it has the same levels of variation between the Uthman codex and other companion codices. It is just as plausible to say that the Sanaa manuscript was written by a copyist who made mistakes.
Why would it be just as plausible? Like you said "it has the same levels of variation between the Uthman codex and other companion codices". It has the same kind of differences that different textual traditions would have as academics learned from other textual transmissions like how the different Bible text types there are.
@@stevenv6463 biblical scholars do not then assume it comes from a certain person or group based on a single manuscript. Only because the same amount of variants between the Uthman and other companions codices are stated in the tradition (remember we don't have actual copies to verify this, it all based upon what later Muslims are saying) does not mean the Sanna manuscript derives from a companion. There is no rule to say ah... well this has the same amount of variation than x so it must be from a companion. Just as you can have variation between different authors (companions) you can also have variation amongst scribes and there is no quantifiable method to say one is more plausible than the other.
@@Deomnibusdubitandum274 What do you propose happened then?
@@stevenv6463 We have a manuscript with variants to the Uthmanic text type, that’s it. To make a statement that it goes back to a companion is maximising the data bound the evidence.
@@Deomnibusdubitandum274 But besides the things we already discussed, there is the recent research of Hythem Sidky that shows that the Uthmanic manuscript tradition has four strands based on four origins confirming one version of the traditional account. So how would this one arise? Does it look like one of those four types?
Brilliant stuff. Even as an ex Muslim I'm still so fascinated by the origins of Islam and other abrahmic religions Great work!
Hey! Could i ask you what made you leave the faith?
@@strange1094 hey, it's not just one thing that made me leave Islam but a sequence of many findings. Finding out the Qurans isn't "perfectly" preserved was a big one, the scientific and grammatical errors of the Quran, the contradictions in both the Quran and hadiths, the character of Muhammad, and ultimately, the realisation that Islam is simply an anti-trinitarian Christian sect Men write books, not god
@@thenun1846 i see. thanks for sharing, but i have to ask whyd you put quotations around perfectly?
@@strange1094 well the Quran is well preserved from the time Uthman burnt all competing copies of the Quran. But it is not perfectly preserved. One of the core Islamic claims was that the Quran was preserved dot for dot, letter for letter, but that is not the case
@@thenun1846 oh ok yeah that makes sense and i agree. The standardized Quran after Uthman is well preserved but before that we have no idea what the true Quran looked like based on Muslim sources
These are some of the Muslims who studied in Islamic universities that you can host: Dr.Tahir Wyatt, Abdullah Smith ، Saajid Lipham, Joe Bradford ,Nicholas Pelletier, Ustaadh Muhammad Tim Humble - Abdur Raheem McCarthy , Shaykh Hasan Somali , , Khalid Green. I suggest hosting Sheikh Hasan Somali to talk about the attributes of the Creator in Islam + Islamic monotheism, which are incompatible with the Trinity + The whole story of Jesus pbuh in the Qur'an and Sunnah from birth until return to earth and death. Abdullah Smith : He can be a guest to talk about the stories of all the books of the Prophet's hadith and the methods of Al-Bukhari, Muslim, etc.. in the rules of writing hadith and to ensure their authenticity. I advise you to host the Salafis because they are the people of hadith: it means the Muslims who were interested in the sciences of hadith, which are the sayings of the Prophet Muhammad pbuh and the knowledge of the authentic and weak hadiths, and the Salafis: it means adherence to the texts of the Qur’an with the understanding of the companions of the Prophet Muhammad and their descendants from the first generations because they are the ones who understood the religion directly from the Prophet Muhammad and his friends, because some Muslims They invented worship, rituals and recipes for the Creator that are not from the teachings of our Prophet Muhammad pbuh.
@El-Ḥaakim be-Amr Allāh someone is mad, that's quite a list of buzzwords you got there.
It is healthy to host people of different opinion and have intelligent and peaceful debate in pursuit of the truth. Only suggesting that people you agree with are invited is worrying. Are you afraid of your ideas being subject to criticism?
@@ProfYaffle No, because the Qur’an is the only book in which there is a challenge enough to destroy Islam and no one can keep up with it. Therefore, it is stable and does not shake like the unshakable sky. The rhetorical challenge continues until the Hour of Judgment. Read Surah Yunus and you will find the answer. There are more than 20 million Arab Christians who understand the Qur’an and among them are many From the eloquent poets, writers, orators and priests, let them challenge the Qur’an only if they can. Criticism of Islam and combating it from non-Muslims has been going on for more than 1400 years and every year it becomes more and more powerful and widespread. Muslim preachers my request to host them, his goal is to understand the reason for our belief in this great religion only and to know our vision of the reality of Islam and our evidence for that. live in peace
@@user-kj8yl6sn2z are you aware that you have said nothing of any substance in your comment. Just rhetoric. The Quran certainly has enough challenge in it. The errors are enough to challenge its validity. Add to that its lack of clarity and its lack of substance. There is a reason critics of Islam are increasing. The easier it is to access the Islamic scriptures the easy it is to refute. Pre internet Muslims listened and absorbed the lies. Now you can scrutinise and check for yourself. Sadly, many Muslims are so manipulated they choose not to check, nor to believe obvious errors
Hilarious
Anyone who does a quick search and is knowledgeable about Christianity will know that the so called Birmingham Folio is just Surah 18 to 20 which are Christian text lol. Surah 18 comes from sleepers of ephesus, Surah 19 is James the lesser and Surah 20 is about Moses.
😂😂😂😂
Exactly.
And the remainings of the Birmingham manuscript can be found in Paris. So if your argument is that Surah 18, 19 and 20 are the only and earliest chapters ramainings because they are copies from ephesus, james the lesser etc then you really need to come with better arguments..😂😂 And a side of that we have the rhymes and rhythms found in these chapters which codify the content of the Quran which most of you are ignorant about.
@@samkb6374 Wow amazing you found that remaining of Chapter 18, 19 and 20 in France. What's your point
@@yassinzao9790 Its evident these people are trolling, the conversation below shows a conversation between why a supposed ex Muslim left Islam, jokers! he says grammatical errors in quran, literally regurgitated what every single person orientalist etc has been trying to do for centuries. they even said the quran confirms the trinity, Quran is the highest form of Arabic, one of the rchest languages to exist. According to these donkeys, The story of esphesus would have had to been copied from lives of saints in greek gregory of tours in latin or syriac even though he (pbuh) couldn't write Arabic, but decoded them then would have compiled them into 3 eloquent stories with the highest form of eloquent poetry that ever existed.
The collection of the Nobel Quran doesn't have any concerns with shia's ! because they don't have any chains of Quran, it's collected only by Ahl Al Sunna. ❤
*We dont know what quran was supposed to be since uthman burnt down 80% of the original arabic quran.
Wrong
The story in short, the Arabs are tribes that have their own way of speaking, such as the British and the Americans, and they used to recite the Qur’an in their own dialect, so the Arabs began to fight over that, so the Caliph ordered it to be written in the dialect of Quraish (people of Mecca) and this is what happened.
We dont know what jesus actually thought because all of his biographies come decades after his death and Paul never met jesus
This 80% is based on ..?
@@samkb6374 The percentage of toast he burnt this morning.
So the evidence at hand establishes that standardized Quranic codices were sent to major cities sometime during the time period which coincides with the reign of Caliph Uthman. Also the ridiculous view promulgated by certain academics that the conventional Muslim narrative concerning the standardization by the Caliph Uthman was forged by Ibn Shihab al Zuhri can be falsified based on the following TWO traditions ( Ibn Shihab al Zuhri is NOT in the chain of transmission): 1- Narrated Ibn Az-Zubair: “I said to `Uthman, "This Verse which is in Surat-al-Baqara: "Those of you who die and leave widows behind...without turning them out." has been abrogated by another Verse. Why then do you write it (in the Qur'an)?" `Uthman said. "Leave it (where it is), O the son of my brother, for I will not shift anything of it (i.e. the Qur'an) from its original position." (Abdullah bin Zubair was part of the committee formed by Uthman to Standardize the Qur’an) (Reference: Sahih Al Bukhari) sunnah.com/bukhari:4536 2- Narrated Ibn 'Abbas: "I said to 'Uthman bin 'Affan: 'What was your reasoning with Al-Anfal - while it is from the Muthani (Surah with less than one-hundred Ayat), and Bara'ah while it is from the Mi'in (Surah with about one-hundred Ayat), then you put them together, without writing the line Bismillahir-Rahmanir-Rahim between them, and you placed them with the seven long (Surah) - why did you do that?' So 'Uthman said: 'A long time might pass upon the Messenger of Allah (ﷺ) without anything being revealed to him, and then sometimes a Surah with numerous (Ayat) might be revealed. So when something was revealed, he would call for someone who could write, and say: "Put these Ayat in the Surah which mentions this and that in it." When an Ayah was revealed, he would say: "Put this Ayah in the Surah which mentions this and that in it." Now Al-Anfal was among the first of those revealed in Al-Madinah, and Bara'ah among the last of those revealed of the Qur'an, and its narrations (those of Bara'ah) resembled its narrations (those of Al-Anfal), so we thought that it was part of it. Then the Messenger of Allah (ﷺ) died, and it was not made clear to us whether it was part of it. So it is for this reason that we put them together without writing Bismillahir-Rahmanir-Rahim between them, and we put that with the seven long (Surahs).”” (Reference: Jami At Tirmdhi) sunnah.com/tirmidhi:3086