Sealing and the Root kh-t-m in the Qurʾān and pre-Islamic Christian Literature: On the “Seal of the Prophets” and Disbelievers Having “Seals on Their Hearts and Hearing”

This study examines two Qurʾānic concepts expressed through the root kh-t-m : “the seal of the prophets” and disbelievers “having seals on their hearts and hearing” in light of pre-Islamic Christian and particularly Syriac literature. It suggests that both concepts entered the Qurʾān via the Syriac cognate of kh-t-m , ḥ-t-m , albeit in different ways: whereas Syriac interpretations of Isaiah 8:16, Daniel 9:24, Matthew 5:17–18, and Luke 24:44, found in the Diatessaron, the Peshitta, and works of Syriac theologians, informed the Qurʾānic conception of “the seal of the prophets,” it was the Syro-Hexapla that inspired the concept of disbelievers being sealed by adopting a minority rendering of Isaiah 8:16 from the Septuagint. The study then proposes that the Qurʾānic notion of “sealing the prophets” has a legal dimension, and that the Qurʾān positions Muḥammad as the great lawgiver prophet, ending the line of the prophets who are the recipients of God’s covenants and “laws.” Muḥammad taking on such a role provides him a position comparable to Jesus’s role in the Syriac texts. Moreover, the study demonstrates that discussion of disbelievers “having seals on their hearts and hearing” with the Biblical precursor of disbelievers being sealed fits neatly into the broader context of the Qurʾān, when several phrases with Biblical antecedents become a part of the Qurʾānic discourse.