The plate distinguishes five things that are often run together: historical evidence (dated objects and inscriptions), literary dependence (one text demonstrably using another), scholarly interpretation (hypotheses that explain the evidence), theological belief (claims held by communities of faith, recorded here as beliefs attested in texts), and speculation.

Dates are approximate and follow mainstream chronology (Middle Chronology for Mesopotamia). Where scholars disagree about a text's date, the node shows a range and the disagreement is stated in its notes. Sura placements within 610–632 CE follow Nöldeke's approximate ordering and serve only to keep them legible.

A thematic resemblance (grade C) can still matter: shared archetypes tell us something about human religious imagination. They are not evidence that one tradition copied another.