Was Surat Al-Ahzab equal to Surat Al-Baqarah?

 

Lost from it:

On the authority of Dur bin Habis, he said: Ubayy bin Kaab said to me: How many verses is Surat Al-Ahzab? I said: Seventy-two or seventy-three verses. He said: It (i.e. Surat Al-Ahzab) used to be equal to Surat Al-Baqarah, and we used to recite in it the verse of stoning. I said: What is the verse of stoning? He said: If an old man and an old woman commit adultery, stone them both. It is a punishment from Allah, and Allah is Exalted in Might and Wise. (Al-Itqan by Al-Suyuti, Chapter on Abrogation and Abrogated Verses).

These are the words of their imams, and they acknowledge the deletion and loss of much of the Qur’an. Is Allah not able to preserve His words? If the Qur’an was from Allah, not a single letter of it would be lost, for Allah has promised in His Book: The heaven and the earth will pass away, but My words will never pass away. (Matthew 24:35)

Reply

Al-Zamakhshari said in his interpretation of Al-Kashshaf (d. 538 AH)

on the authority of Zarr who said: Ubayy ibn Ka’b, may God be pleased with him, said to me: How many verses do you count in Surat Al-Ahzab? I said: Seventy-three verses. He said: By the One by whom Ubayy ibn Ka’b swears, it is equal to Surat Al-Baqarah or longer. And we have read from it the verse of stoning: (The old man and the old woman, if they commit adultery, stone them both. It is a punishment from God. And God is Exalted in Might and Wise). Ubayy, may God be pleased with him, meant that this was among what was abrogated from the Qur’an. What is narrated is that this addition was in a document in the house of Aisha, may God be pleased with her, and a rooster ate it . It is from the fabrications of the atheists and the Rafidis because of their hatred of Lady Aisha, may God be pleased with her.