MIRACLES AND MATERIALITY
Published February 1, 2026
EOS/DAWN
Illustration by Abro
A recent video showing a Quran that survived the devastating fire at Karachi’s Gul Plaza has reignited a centuries-old conversation. Throughout history, accounts of Bibles, Qurans or Buddhist sutras emerging unscathed from catastrophic floods and fires have been celebrated as Divine interventions. While these events offer profound spiritual solace, a closer look reveals a fascinating intersection of material physics and psychological bias.
From a physical standpoint, Dougal Drysdale, Professor Emeritus at the University of Edinburgh, suggests that a hardbound book’s survival is often due to the ‘Closed Book Effect.’ When shut, a book functions as a dense, oxygen-starved block of cellulose. Because fire requires a steady flow of oxygen to consume fuel, the tightly packed pages resist ignition by preventing airflow from reaching the interior.
In the event of a flood, the surface tension of water against tightly pressed pages creates a natural barrier. This prevents deep seepage for a significant period, often leaving the heart of the book perfectly dry.
American psychologist Thomas Gilovich explains that when a sacred text survives a disaster, it often becomes more than just a book. It is elevated to a sacred relic. This transformation, according to Gilovich, can significantly redefine a community’s cultural path. In the aftermath of the 2011 Joplin tornado in Missouri, US, survivors and news outlets frequently highlighted the ‘miraculous’ discovery of intact Bibles among the rubble of flattened homes.
The survival of holy texts in the aftermath of natural catastrophes is often termed ‘Divine protection’, revealing the cultural and spiritual narratives people love to attach to such instances
While hardbound dictionaries and cookbooks likely survived in the same ruins due to their similar physical construction, these secular items were ignored by the media as mere debris. The surviving Bibles were immediately elevated from functional reading material to sacred relics, often being framed and displayed as symbols of Divine protection.
By focusing on these specific books, the media triggered a cognitive bias that led people to view the event through a supernatural lens rather than recognising the simple physical durability of bound paper.
British scholar Susan Whitfield, in her 2004 work The Silk Road: Trade, Travel, War and Faith, details the discovery of the Mogao Caves in China. In that instance, the sealing of the Buddhist text the Diamond Sutra (868 CE) within a dry, walled-up chamber created a “natural vault” that protected the world’s oldest-dated printed book from the degrading effects of humidity and oxygen for nearly a millennium. The perception of such objects often shifts from the literary to the ‘miraculous’.
During World War I, pocket Bibles carried by soldiers occasionally stopped shrapnel due to the high density of their compressed paper. This led many soldiers to treat the Bibles as protective talismans.
The Codex Amiatinus, frequently referred to as the ‘Grandfather’ of Latin Bibles, has survived for over 1,300 years due to its immense physical durability. According to Drysdale, this enormous volume, created around 700 CE in Northumbria, England, weighs over 34 kilogrammes and was crafted from the skins of more than 500 calves.
The use of high-quality parchment makes the Bible significantly more resistant to fire and decay, as organic animal skins lack the highly flammable, oxygen-trapping fibres found in wood-pulp paper. This Bible remained virtually untouched for a millennium, preserved by the stable environment of an Italian abbey that served as a ‘natural vault.’
In West Africa, the Desert Manuscripts of Timbuktu offer a compelling example of texts surviving environmental factors, a story often framed as miraculous. When Islamist militants set fire to the Ahmed Baba Institute in 2013, there was widespread global concern over the potential loss of thousands of ancient Islamic manuscripts. However, according to the researcher Mauro Nobili, the extreme aridity of the Sahara desert was critical in aiding their preservation for centuries.
The persistently low humidity prevented mould growth and kept the delicate ink stable, allowing for their long-term survival, which many viewed as a modern miracle. However, the more vulnerable manuscripts were secretly shifted to safer locations before the militants set fire to the Ahmed Baba Institute.
During the Viking raid on Lindisfarne — a tidal island off the northeast coast of England — in 793 CE, a legend emerged concerning a sacred book, Lindisfarne Gospels, which was said to have been dropped into the sea by fleeing priests. Three days later, it washed up perfectly dry. While this specific account is often considered apocryphal, the physical survival of such ancient texts is frequently due to their durable leather and metal bindings, which act as a protective shell for the internal vellum.
Gilovich would point to stories such as this ‘dry’ recovery of a Bible as prime examples of how the media and oral tradition prioritise miraculous narratives over the mundane reality of material science, thereby reinforcing spiritual beliefs.
According to the prominent professor of psychological sciences J. Park, communities frequently transform these survival stories into powerful symbols of “Divine protection” as a means of processing the profound trauma of disasters. This phenomenon ultimately highlights a dynamic intersection, where material science meets deep human sentiment.
While the inherent fire-resistant properties of vellum offer logical, scientific explanations for the physical survival of many books, the human psychological element remains paramount. The inherent human need to find order, meaning and hope within chaos is what elevates these surviving sacred objects from mere material items to vital spiritual anchors for a community’s recovery and continuity.
The endurance of these texts represents a profound intersection between material science and human psychology. It is not merely the density of vellum, the chemical stability of ancient inks or the aridity of a desert that ensures survival. Rather, it is the way these physical realities interact with our inherent drive to find order in the wake of destruction.
Gilovich’s research posits that when a community witnesses the survival of a sacred text, they are not simply observing a quirk of physics. They are engaging in what Park describes as “meaning-making”, using the survived sacred object to process trauma and reclaim a sense of ‘Divine protection.’ Whether through the preservation of the Diamond Sutra in caves, or a Bible or a Quran found amidst the ruins of a modern disaster, these serve as a bridge between the tangible and the transcendent. Their survival is a testament to the fact that, while fire and time may consume the material, the cultural and spiritual narratives we attach to them remain indestructible.
Yet, it is equally important that we recognise the physical realities of their endurance, acknowledging that the science of material durability does not diminish the ‘miracle’, but rather provides a rational foundation for understanding how the written word survives the very elements meant to destroy it.
Published in Dawn, EOS, February 1st, 2026
Nadeem F. Paracha is a researcher and senior columnist for Dawn Newspaper and Dawn.com. He is also the author of ten books on the social and political history of Pakistan.
He tweets @NadeemfParacha
Illustration by Abro
A recent video showing a Quran that survived the devastating fire at Karachi’s Gul Plaza has reignited a centuries-old conversation. Throughout history, accounts of Bibles, Qurans or Buddhist sutras emerging unscathed from catastrophic floods and fires have been celebrated as Divine interventions. While these events offer profound spiritual solace, a closer look reveals a fascinating intersection of material physics and psychological bias.
From a physical standpoint, Dougal Drysdale, Professor Emeritus at the University of Edinburgh, suggests that a hardbound book’s survival is often due to the ‘Closed Book Effect.’ When shut, a book functions as a dense, oxygen-starved block of cellulose. Because fire requires a steady flow of oxygen to consume fuel, the tightly packed pages resist ignition by preventing airflow from reaching the interior.
In the event of a flood, the surface tension of water against tightly pressed pages creates a natural barrier. This prevents deep seepage for a significant period, often leaving the heart of the book perfectly dry.
American psychologist Thomas Gilovich explains that when a sacred text survives a disaster, it often becomes more than just a book. It is elevated to a sacred relic. This transformation, according to Gilovich, can significantly redefine a community’s cultural path. In the aftermath of the 2011 Joplin tornado in Missouri, US, survivors and news outlets frequently highlighted the ‘miraculous’ discovery of intact Bibles among the rubble of flattened homes.
The survival of holy texts in the aftermath of natural catastrophes is often termed ‘Divine protection’, revealing the cultural and spiritual narratives people love to attach to such instances
While hardbound dictionaries and cookbooks likely survived in the same ruins due to their similar physical construction, these secular items were ignored by the media as mere debris. The surviving Bibles were immediately elevated from functional reading material to sacred relics, often being framed and displayed as symbols of Divine protection.
By focusing on these specific books, the media triggered a cognitive bias that led people to view the event through a supernatural lens rather than recognising the simple physical durability of bound paper.
British scholar Susan Whitfield, in her 2004 work The Silk Road: Trade, Travel, War and Faith, details the discovery of the Mogao Caves in China. In that instance, the sealing of the Buddhist text the Diamond Sutra (868 CE) within a dry, walled-up chamber created a “natural vault” that protected the world’s oldest-dated printed book from the degrading effects of humidity and oxygen for nearly a millennium. The perception of such objects often shifts from the literary to the ‘miraculous’.
During World War I, pocket Bibles carried by soldiers occasionally stopped shrapnel due to the high density of their compressed paper. This led many soldiers to treat the Bibles as protective talismans.
The Codex Amiatinus, frequently referred to as the ‘Grandfather’ of Latin Bibles, has survived for over 1,300 years due to its immense physical durability. According to Drysdale, this enormous volume, created around 700 CE in Northumbria, England, weighs over 34 kilogrammes and was crafted from the skins of more than 500 calves.
The use of high-quality parchment makes the Bible significantly more resistant to fire and decay, as organic animal skins lack the highly flammable, oxygen-trapping fibres found in wood-pulp paper. This Bible remained virtually untouched for a millennium, preserved by the stable environment of an Italian abbey that served as a ‘natural vault.’
In West Africa, the Desert Manuscripts of Timbuktu offer a compelling example of texts surviving environmental factors, a story often framed as miraculous. When Islamist militants set fire to the Ahmed Baba Institute in 2013, there was widespread global concern over the potential loss of thousands of ancient Islamic manuscripts. However, according to the researcher Mauro Nobili, the extreme aridity of the Sahara desert was critical in aiding their preservation for centuries.
The persistently low humidity prevented mould growth and kept the delicate ink stable, allowing for their long-term survival, which many viewed as a modern miracle. However, the more vulnerable manuscripts were secretly shifted to safer locations before the militants set fire to the Ahmed Baba Institute.
During the Viking raid on Lindisfarne — a tidal island off the northeast coast of England — in 793 CE, a legend emerged concerning a sacred book, Lindisfarne Gospels, which was said to have been dropped into the sea by fleeing priests. Three days later, it washed up perfectly dry. While this specific account is often considered apocryphal, the physical survival of such ancient texts is frequently due to their durable leather and metal bindings, which act as a protective shell for the internal vellum.
Gilovich would point to stories such as this ‘dry’ recovery of a Bible as prime examples of how the media and oral tradition prioritise miraculous narratives over the mundane reality of material science, thereby reinforcing spiritual beliefs.
According to the prominent professor of psychological sciences J. Park, communities frequently transform these survival stories into powerful symbols of “Divine protection” as a means of processing the profound trauma of disasters. This phenomenon ultimately highlights a dynamic intersection, where material science meets deep human sentiment.
While the inherent fire-resistant properties of vellum offer logical, scientific explanations for the physical survival of many books, the human psychological element remains paramount. The inherent human need to find order, meaning and hope within chaos is what elevates these surviving sacred objects from mere material items to vital spiritual anchors for a community’s recovery and continuity.
The endurance of these texts represents a profound intersection between material science and human psychology. It is not merely the density of vellum, the chemical stability of ancient inks or the aridity of a desert that ensures survival. Rather, it is the way these physical realities interact with our inherent drive to find order in the wake of destruction.
Gilovich’s research posits that when a community witnesses the survival of a sacred text, they are not simply observing a quirk of physics. They are engaging in what Park describes as “meaning-making”, using the survived sacred object to process trauma and reclaim a sense of ‘Divine protection.’ Whether through the preservation of the Diamond Sutra in caves, or a Bible or a Quran found amidst the ruins of a modern disaster, these serve as a bridge between the tangible and the transcendent. Their survival is a testament to the fact that, while fire and time may consume the material, the cultural and spiritual narratives we attach to them remain indestructible.
Yet, it is equally important that we recognise the physical realities of their endurance, acknowledging that the science of material durability does not diminish the ‘miracle’, but rather provides a rational foundation for understanding how the written word survives the very elements meant to destroy it.
Published in Dawn, EOS, February 1st, 2026
Nadeem F. Paracha is a researcher and senior columnist for Dawn Newspaper and Dawn.com. He is also the author of ten books on the social and political history of Pakistan.
He tweets @NadeemfParacha
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