The Holy Quran and the Issue of Alteration by the People of the Book, Particularly Jews

Alteration of the religious documents and holy books is seriously condemned in the holy Quran since it leaves terrible moral effects, and unwholesome consequences for the destiny of mankind and human societies. The verses of the holy Quran testify to the fact that the torah and the Gospel have undergone different verbal and semantic types of alteration by certain groups of the People of the Book, especially Jewish rabbis.Most of the outstanding exegetes of the holy Quran and scholars of the Holy Scriptures have regarded the present torah and the Gospel as the target of the alteration referred to in Quranic verses. They have also pointed to alteration as a concept including verbal and semantic aspects both. However, some have denied the verbal alteration recognizing the semantic alteration of the present Holy Scriptures as the authentic view.Furthermore, some contemporary scholars have referred the verses concerning alteration to the semantic alteration of the original version counting the present Holy Scriptures as an incomplete and distorted version of the former. Still some others believe that the present Torah and Gospel are invented by man. In their opinion, alteration verses refer to the oral distortion of the Holy Scriptures, not the present Torah and Gospel.