Voices of Islam (14 page)

THE MEANING OF THE TERM,
QUR’AN

The word
Qur’an
means both ‘‘recitation’’ and ‘‘reading’’: it is read from a text as well as recited from memory. These twin meanings carry a signifi- cance that may not be readily apparent. Today, the word
Qur’an
brings to mind a printed copy of the Qur’an. At its inception, however, the Qur’an was essentially an oral communication. But soon it was proclaimed a book. In the history of Arabia, in fact, the Qur’an was the fi t discourse self- consciously to call itself a book. It was only after the revelation of the Qur’an as a book that the arts of reading and writing were seriously cultivated in Arabia, this cultivation leading, relatively quickly, to a transfor- mation of a largely oral culture into a literate one. Since the Qur’an was the Word of God, everything about it was viewed as significant—its vocabulary, its grammar, its law, its theology, and its ethics—and had to be studied with the utmost reverence and diligence. Study of the Qur’an led to the produc- tion of commentaries on the Qur’an. In this way, the science of
tafsir,
or Qur’anic exegesis, was born. But this only was one of the many sciences, or disciplines of knowledge, to which the study of the Qur’an gave rise.

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Voices of Tradition

A close review of Islamic intellectual history would show that practically all of the Islamic sciences are, in one way or another, grounded in the Qur’an.

In Arabic, the name
Qur’an
has the defi te article prefi to it:
al- Qur’an.
This prefix implies that the Qur’an is essential reading, that it pro- vides crucial guidance for life, and that its message may be ignored or neglected only at one’s own peril.

It is important to note a few of the many names the Qur’an uses for self- designation. To begin with, the phrase
Kalam Allah
(Qur’an 9:6; 48:15), meaning ‘‘the Word or Speech of God,’’ sets the Qur’an apart from all other speech, even from the speech of prophets, including that of Muhammad, the bearer of the Qur’an. The name
Tanzil
(Qur’an 26:192), ‘‘sending down,’’ simultaneously connotes (1) descent of something exalted and (2) gradual dispensation. In other words, the Qur’an is exalted Divine speech that was dispensed in portions over many years, such that it may be easy for people to understand, digest, and put it into practice. The name
Furqan
(Qur’an 25:1) means, ‘‘that which sifts, divides, differentiates.’’ That is, the Qur’an clearly distinguishes between truth and falsehood, between right and wrong, so that it can be relied on as a safe guide. The name
Dhikr
(Qur’an 43:44) means ‘‘reminder.’’ The Qur’an is a scripture that reminds human beings, on the one hand, of the verities that they are instinctively aware of but may have forgotten through worldly involvements and, on the other hand, of the truths presented by the previous messengers—truths forgotten or con- signed to neglect in the course of time. Among the other names used for the Qur’an are
Huda
(Qur’an 27:77), ‘‘guidance,’’ that which points out and leads to the right destination;
Nur
(Qur’an 4:174), ‘‘light,’’ that which dispels the darkness of misguidance, causing the truth to shine forth brightly;
Hikma
(Qur’an 17:39), ‘‘wisdom;’’ and
Rahma
(Qur’an 27:77), ‘‘mercy.’’ These and other names of the Qur’an not only represent the Qur’an’s self- understanding but may also serve as clues and suggestions for reading the Qur’an in certain ways.

THE ORGANIZATION OF THE QUR’AN

The Qur’an has 114 chapters and over 6,000 verses. The word for ‘‘chap- ter’’ is
sura,
which literally means ‘‘an enclosing wall,’’ like a wall that enclo- ses a city. As such, the name signifies that each chapter of the Qur’an is like an enclosure in which reside the inhabitants—namely, the verses—that belong in it. Already one can see that the word
Sura
suggests that some kind of kin- ship or close relationship exists among the verses of a given chapter of the Qur’an, a suggestion that we will examine further a little later. The word for ‘‘verse’’ is
Aya,
which literally means ‘‘sign.’’ It is translated as ‘‘verse’’ when it refers to a statement, or a portion of a statement, in the Qur’an.

The Qur’an, the Word of God
49

Thus, the verses of the Qur’an are signs that point to certain truths and real- ities, God Himself being the greatest truth and the greatest reality.

The chapters of the Qur’an vary greatly in length. The shortest
suras
(103, 108, and 110) consist of three verses, the longest
sura
(2) runs to 286 verses, and many are medium sized. The length of verses also varies considerably.

In printed copies of the Qur’an, each chapter is identified as having been revealed either in the city of Mecca or in the city of Medina and is, accord- ingly, known as Meccan or Medinan. These designations carry more than just geographical signifi For the first 13 years of his prophetic ministry, Muhammad was in Mecca. It was here that he gained his first converts. But in Mecca, Muhammad and his followers were a minority—often a persecuted minority. The Meccan revelations deal with matters of faith, such as the fun- damentals of Islamic dogma and the principles of ethics. In the last 10 years of his prophetic ministry, Muhammad was in Medina, to which he and his followers had emigrated in 622
CE
. In Medina, the Muslims acquired a position of power and founded the first Islamic state. Reflecting the changed situation, the Medinan revelations deal with the political, social, and economic aspects of Muslim life. Thus, the designation ‘‘Meccan’’ informs the reader that a
sura
is principally concerned with subjects like faith and ethics, whereas the designation ‘‘Medinan’’ indicates that a
sura
is likely to focus on matters of social organization. However, in the larger scheme of Qur’anic thought, the Meccan versus Medinan distinction often breaks down. Medinan
suras
frequently take up the themes of faith and ethics, using them as a base for presenting legislative verses, and the Meccan
suras
often point ahead in the direction of Medina. Partly because of such a relationship between the two types of
suras,
Meccan
suras
sometimes contain verses revealed in the Medinan period and vice versa.

THE QUR’AN AS REVELATION

The Muslim understanding of the Qur’an as the Word of God is the basis of the Islamic view of revelation. The Arabic word for revelation is
wahy.
As a revelation from God,
wahy
carries the sense of otherness—that is, it is an objective phenomenon. In other words,
wahy
is not the product of a Proph- et’s mind but is transmitted by a prophet from God without any alteration of form or meaning. On this view, the Qur’an is the Word of God, not the Word of Muhammad. Revelation (
wahy
) is to be distinguished from inspira- tion (
ilham
). In Islamic dogma, prophets are believed to be in a general state of inspiration. Thus, when they speak in their ‘‘official’’—that is to say, pro- phetic—capacity, their utterances have an authoritative character. Still, such utterances are to be distinguished from the Divine Word, which a prophet himself would clearly identify as divine and not his own and whose conduit he would declare himself to be.

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Voices of Tradition

The notion of revelation has had some ramifications in Islamic religious history; we will note two of them. First, since the Qur’an is the Word of God in respect of form no less than of meaning, the language of the Qur’an, being the language of God, is considered matchless. Islamic theology devel- ops this idea into the doctrine of the inimitability of the Qur’an (
I‘jaz al- Qur’an
). A number of Qur’anic verses challenge the Qur’an’s opponents to produce something like the Qur’an if they deny its divine origin (Qur’an 2:23; 11:13; 17:88; 52:33–34). Muslim theologians take this challenge— which, they claim, has never been met in history—as proof of the Qur’an’s divine origin. Second, since the language of the Qur’an is divine, a translation of the Qur’an by human beings is not the Qur’an. Accordingly, only the Arabic Qur’an may be recited in formal prayers, and only one who memorizes part or all of the Arabic Qur’an can be said to have memorized the Qur’an. This view of the Arabic Qur’an also explains why, historically, Muslims have been reluctant to translate their scripture and why a vibrant tradition of Qur’an translation—comparable to that of Bible translation, for example—has only developed recently in Islam. Even today, many Muslims have a certain distrust of the translated Qur’an.

THE COMPILATION OF THE QUR’AN

The traditional account of the compilation of the Qur’an has been criticized in some quarters of Western scholarship. But so far, this criticism has neither dislodged the Muslim account from its position nor led to the construction of a satisfactory alternative view. Under the circumstances, it would be reasonable to speak of the traditional account as being broadly valid.

According to this account, the compilation of the Qur’an occurred in three stages. The First Compilation was made during the Prophet Muhammad’s lifetime. When a revelation came to Muhammad, it was, on the one hand, avidly memorized by Muslims and, on the other hand, written down in a cer- tain sequence by designated scribes under the Prophet’s instructions. Since the writing materials then available were rudimentary—parchment, thin flat stones, or animal shoulder bones—not all written records could be main- tained in the new and continually evolving order of compilation. Muslims who had some or all of these records possessed them in different arrange- ments, although they often knew the order in which the Prophet intended those records to be arranged.

The First Compilation of the Qur’an aimed at no more than bringing into existence a written record of the Qur’an. This was because the main way for preserving the Qur’an was still memorization. There is evidence that Muslims knew the proper order of the Qur’anic revelations, but it was physically not possible to induce that order among the numerous

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media on which the scripture had been inscribed. Circumstances soon necessitated the making of another compilation. The Second Compilation of the Qur’an was made in 633
CE
, after the death of Muhammad and under the first caliph of Islam, Abu Bakr. During Abu Bakr’s caliphate, several tribes revolted against Islam, and they had to be subdued by force of arms. In the wars that resulted, a large number of people who had memorized the Qur’an—and were known as Qur’an-readers—were killed. Some people became apprehensive that the First Compilation, given the variety of the media on which it was preserved, would not be adequate. Abu Bakr accepted the suggestion of some to prepare a compilation that differed from the first one only in respect of being more accessible by being written on more standardized media.

During the rule of the third caliph, ‘Uthman (644–656
CE
), this compila- tion was used to make the Third Compilation of the Qur’an. This Third Compilation produced the defi copy of the Qur’an that is read by all Muslims today. The Caliph ‘Uthman appointed a committee of noted com- panions of the Prophet Muhammad and memorizers of the Qur’an to resolve disputes about a handful of verses that some thought should belong to the Qur’an and others thought should be considered Hadith, statements of the Prophet Muhammad that did not come from God. After the Third Compila- tion was approved, copies of this so-called ’Uthman Scripture were sent to major cities of the Islamic world so that they might serve as master copies for people to use as standard reference texts. Today, most Muslim scholars hold that the arrangement of verses and
suras
in the Qur’an follow the arrangement that Muhammad himself approved under the guidance of the Angel Gabriel. Thus, both the text of the Qur’an and the present arrange- ment of its verses are considered to be sacrosanct.

THE GENRE OF THE QUR’AN

What type of a book is the Qur’an, and to what genre does it belong? Is it a book of history? The Qur’an does contain history, but it does not offer a detailed historical account, neither of the world nor of any nation or country. The Qur’an is selective in its use of history. For example, it talks about previous nations and prophets, but only in reference to the message it seeks to present. So, while it contains history, it cannot be called a book of history.

Is it a book of ethics? The Qur’an states and explains principles of ethical behavior and identifies the virtues it seeks to inculcate and the vices it wants people to shun, but it cannot be compared to a research work on ethics. One will not find in the Qur’an a statement and analysis of various theories of ethics. So, while the Qur’an has a defi te ethical perspective, it cannot be called a book of ethics.

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Voices of Tradition

Is it a book of law? The Qur’an has many legal injunctions, and these bear upon criminal law, civil law, and even international law. But again, the Qur’an does not deal with the law in a systematic and comprehensive way. Hence, it cannot be called a book of law. We can similarly ask whether the Qur’an is a book of theology, metaphysics, and so on, reaching, in each case, the same conclusion. So, how do we classify the Qur’an?

The easiest way to describe the Qur’an is to call it what it calls itself—a Book of Guidance. The Qur’an purports to furnish human beings with the fundamental guidance they need to organize their lives in order to live successfully in this world and achieve salvation in the next. This is not to say that the Qur’an has no faith in human beings’ ability to find their own guidance. Quite the contrary is true. Specifi prescriptive material forms only a small part of the Qur’an, though general principles and guide- lines abound in it. This is an important fact that suggests that, to a large extent, the Qur’an leaves human beings free to envision and plan their lives. The imposing body of medieval Islamic law actually proves this thesis, since this body of law represents but one possible instance of the construc- tion of a legal–cultural system undertaken by distinguished Muslim minds in light of the guidance found in the Qur’an and in the Prophet’s exemplary practice, called
Sunna.
This particular historical construction does not foreclose the possibility of Muslims engaging—with proper qualifi tions and preparation, of course—in a similar exercise today with a view to arriving at a new construction more responsive to present-day needs. This explains why, from time to time in Islamic history, one hears the call to return to pristine Islam, such a call representing dissatisfaction with the legal and other structures that are presumed to have lost some or much of their utility after having served Muslim societies well for a long time.