How did the narrations diverge into ten recitations, given that Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) unified the people upon the dialect of Quraish, and how do you refute the orientalist's claim that the origin of the divergence was the absence of diacritical marks (nuqat) and vocalization (dabt)?

Scholars have favored the view that Uthman ibn Affan did not unify people upon a single variant (harf), and that what was copied from the Quran was not limited to the language of Quraysh. Rather, it encompassed variations in imalah (tilting), fath (opening), substituting hamza, tashil (facilitation), naql (transference), tahqiq (realization), hadhf (omission), tarqiq (softening) and tafkhim (emphasis), madd (lengthening) and qasr (shortening), idgham (assimilation) and izhar (clarification), omission and addition of ya'at (the letter ya), and vocalizing with sukun (a vowelless consonant) or fath (the vowel 'a') for the ya'at of addition. This indicates that the seven ahruf (variants) remained as they were, and that the language of Quraysh was the reference point in case of disagreement. Uthman's statement to the scribes, "If you and Zayd disagree on anything, write it in the language of Quraysh," meant that if they did not disagree, they would write it in the manner they all knew. The Muslim community's consensus settled on the premise that a correct recitation is one that conforms to Arabic grammar, aligns with one of the Uthmanic codices, even if potentially, and has a sound chain of transmission. As for the orientalist's claim that the variations in narrations were due to a lack of precise ضبط (vocalization and diacritics), this is incorrect. Indeed, the codices were stripped of dots and diacritics to encompass what was authentically transmitted and whose recitation was established, so reliance was placed on memorization. Furthermore, the variation also included the rasm (orthography) and not just the dabt (vocalization and diacritics).