The Koran, the holy scripture of Islam, is the record of Mohammed's oral teaching delivered between the years immediately preceding the Hegira and the Prophet's death in 632. First published 652, by order of the Caliph Othman, it was divided into one hundred and fourteen suras (chapter), each subdivided into verses, the suras being placed according to length, with the longest first. This work, like the bible, has exerted untold influence upon the history of mankind. Apart from its specifically religious content, which inspired the triumphant arms of Islam through out vast area of Asia, Africa and southern Europe, it was the starting point of a new literary and philosophical movement which powerfully affected the most cultivated minds among both Christians and Jews in the Middle Ages; and the movement thus inaugurated has resulted in some of the finest products of genius and learning.