The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions (2678 page)

b
s became dominant in conservative control, introducing
mutawwi‘
n
, ‘enforcers of obedience’, a kind of private religious police, monitoring not only public but also private conformity to Islam (since before All
h there is no distinction between private and public).

 
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see
V
HIGUR
.

 
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(Arab., ‘to suggest, put something in someone's mind’). The idea of ‘revelation’ in Islam. The term wa
y is used especially for the giving of the
Qur’
n
, itself described as a
‘revelation revealed’
(
wa
y y
, 53. 4). Wa
y refers also to revelation given to former prophets, as to
Moses
(20. 13), and is indirect, for humans cannot see All
h (42. 50). The
ad
th
give details as to the manner of revelation, and the way in which Mu
ammad himself was affected physically by the force of the message he received.
The more common term for the giving of the Qur’
n is
‘sending down’
, from the verbal root
n-z-l
, hence
nazzala anzala
,
‘cause to descend’
.