Approaches to the Qur'an (1/2)

Muslims assert that the Qur'an is a revelation appropriate for all persons, times, and places, and it is not difficult to summon Qur'anic verses to support this claim. If they held to the opposite, there would not be much point in considering their scripture. In order to entertain this premise sincerely, we certainly should allow for, even anticipate, that the Qur'an would use allegory, parables, and other literary devices to reach a diverse audience.

The language of the Qur'an would have to be that of the Prophet's milieu and reflect the intellectual, religious, social, and material customs of the seventh-century Arabs. But if the essential message is universal, then it must transcend the very language and culture that was the vehicle of revelation.

Since a community's language grows with and out of its experiences, how then are realities outside that experience communicated? There' appears to be only one avenue: through the employment of allegory, that is, the expression of truths through symbolic figures and actions or, as the famous Qur'an exegete Zamakhshariput it, "a parabolic illustration, by means of something which we know from our experience, of something that is beyond the reach of our perception."[1]

For example, the Qur'an informs us that Paradise in the hereafter is such that "no person knows what delights of the eye are kept hidden from them.as a reward for their deeds" (Surah Al-32: 17). Yet it also provides very sensual Images of Paradise that are particularly suited to the imagination of Muhammad's contemporaries.

These descriptions recall the luxury and sensual delights of the most wealthy seventh-century Bedouin chieftains. If the reader happened to be a man from Alaska, he may be quite apathetic to these enticements.

He may prefer warm sandy beaches to cool oases' sunshine to constant shade; scantily clad bathing beauties to hours, with the issue of whether or not they are virgins of no real consequence. This reader will probably take these references symbolically, reinforced by the Qur'an's frequent assignment of the word mathal (likeness, similitude, example) to its eschatological descriptions.

Similarly, though God is "sublimely exalted above anything that men may devise by way of definition" (Surah Al-An’am, 6:100) and "there is nothing like unto Him" (Surah Ash-Shuraa, 42:11) and "nothing can be compared to Him" (Surah Al-Ikhlas, 112:4), the reader nonetheless needs to relate to God and His activity. Thus we find that the Qur'an provides many comparative descriptions of God. For instance, while human beings are sometimes merciful, compassionate, generous, wise and forgiving, God is The Merciful, The Compassionate, The Generous, The Wise, and The Forgiving. The Qur'an mentions God's "face," "hand," "throne" and other expressions which at first sight have an almost anthropomorphic hue, for instance, God's "wrath" (ghadab) or "condemnation"; His "pleasure" at good deeds or "love" for His creatures; or His being "oblivious" of a sinner who was oblivious of Him; or "asking" a wrongdoer on Resurrection Day about his wrongdoing; and so forth."[2]

To disallow the possibility of symbolism in such expressions would seem to imply contradictions between some statements in the Qur'an. To do so is entirely unnecessary, especially in consideration of the following key assertion:

“He it is Who has bestowed upon you from on high this divine writ, containing messages clear in and of themselves (ayat muhkamat and these are the foundation of the divine writ-as well as others that are allegorical (mutashabihat). Now those whose hearts are given too swerving from the truth go after that part of it which has been expressed in allegory, seeking out confusion, and seeking its final meaning, but none save God knows its final meaning.” (Surah Al-‘Imran, 3:7)

Therefore the Qur'an itself insists on its use of symbolism, because to describe the realm of realities beyond human perception what the Qur'an designates as al ghayb (the unseen or imperceptible)-would be impossible otherwise. This is why it would be a mistake to insist on assigning a literal interpretation to the Qur'an's descriptions of God's attributes, the Day of Judgment, Heaven and Hell, etc., because the ayat mutashabihat do not fully define and explicate these, but they relate to us, due to the limitations of human thought and language, something similar. This helps explain the well-known doctrine of bilakay! (Without how) of al Ash'ari, the famous tenth century theologian whose viewpoint on this matter became dominant in Muslim thought. It states that such verses reveal truths, but we should not insist on, or ask, how these trurhs are realized.'[3]

Throughout Muslim history,  the literalist trend in Qur'an exegesis was one among a number of approaches…Today, in America and Canada, it has emerged as the most prevalent. It appears that the majority of Muslim lecturers in America tend to take every narrative or description in the Qur'an as a statement of a scientific or historical fact, So, for example, the story of Adam is assumed to relate the historical and scientific origins of Homo Sapiens. This tendency is reinforced by the current widespread excitement over recent Qur'an and Science studies, where many, if not most, of the discoveries of modem science are believed to have been anticipated by the Qur'an.

It is true mat some of the descriptions in the Qur'an of the "signs" (ayat) in nature of God's wisdom and beneficence bear a fascinating resemblance to certain modem discoveries, and it is also true that none of these signs can be proved to be in conflict with science. But part of the reason for this may argue against attempts by Muslims to subject the Qur'an to scientific scrutiny."[4]

The Qur'an is very far from being a science textbook. Its language is of the highest literary quality and open to many different shades of meaning. 

The  descriptions  of many  of the Qur'an's  signs that are believed today  to predict  recently  established   facts  appear  to be  consistently   and intentionally  ambiguous,  avoiding  a degree  of explicitness  that would conflict with  any reader's  level  of knowledge   of whatever  era.  If the  Qur'an contained  a precise  elaboration  of these  phenomena   (the big bang  theory, the splitting  of the  atom,  the expansion   of the universe,   to name  a few), these  would  have  been known  to ancient  Muslim  scientists.  A truly  wondrous  feature  of the Qur'an  is that these signs  lose nothing  of their power, beauty,  and mystery  from  one generation  to the next; each generation  has found  them compatible  with the current  state of knowledge. 

To be inspired with  awe  and  wonder  by  the  Qur'anic   signs  is one  thing;  to  attempt  to deduce  or impose  upon them  scientific  theories  is another  and, moreover, is contrary  to the Qur'an's  style.

(Continued)