God Spoke, Man Edited: The Collapse of the Original Exodus

The book of Exodus, the heart of the Torah exists today in two conflicting textual forms: the Hebrew Masoretic Text and the ancient Greek Septuagint. These are not minor translation differences but structural rewrites. In the Septuagint, entire verses vanish, others are added, and whole sections of the Tabernacle narrative (Exodus 35–40) are rearranged. The Ark and Altar switch places; priestly rituals move to other chapters; and sacred instructions change order. What one version presents as God’s direct command, another presents differently. As Emanuel Tov has shown in his analysis of Esther, the Septuagint often reflects a rewritten Hebrew composition rather than a literal translation of the Masoretic text. The same pattern appears in Exodus, proving that what we call “the Torah” was not transmitted as a single, unaltered revelation, but evolved through redaction and editorial reshaping long before the Masoretic tradition was standardized.

From an Islamic perspective, this evidence confirms what the Qur’an declared centuries earlier that divine revelation was given to Moses but later altered by human hands. The textual instability of Exodus undermines claims of perfect preservation and exposes how communities reshaped revelation to fit evolving theology and ritual. If the very blueprint of God’s sanctuary changes from one manuscript to another, then the claim of an uncorrupted Torah cannot stand. The Qur’an, in contrast, presents itself as a restored and protected revelation “Indeed, We sent down the Reminder, and We will preserve it” (Qur’an 15:9) sent into a world where previous scriptures had been rewritten. Thus, the shifting text of Exodus is not just a historical curiosity; it is a living witness to the Qur’an’s diagnosis of textual corruption and its role as the final, preserved word of God.