How do Muslims interpret Qur’an?

By Joseph Victor Edwin

New Delhi, Nov 24, 2023: In my classes on Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations, I am often asked “Do Muslims interpret their Scripture? Recently, I asked the questioner, what was at the back of his mind while asking this question.

He was candid. He said: “I think that Muslims do not interpret the Qur’an. They want to follow their scripture, a medieval text, without interpreting it in accordance with the times in which we live. I think this is the root cause of the backwardness of Muslims.”

I reflected upon his comment and found two concerns raised by him. One is about interpretation of the Quran and second the backwardness of Muslims of India. He connected both as cause and effect. I suggested that he goes through the Sachar Committee Report (https://www.minorityaffairs.gov.in/WriteReadData/RTF1984/7830578798.pdf) which would give a clear picture of the status of Muslims in India. Regarding interpretation of the Qur’an, I suggested that we have a conversation about how Muslims understand and interpret their Scripture.

Our conversation began by noting some of the profound differences in Muslims’ understanding of the Qur’an from the way Christians understand the Bible. Christians often think about the Qur’an as they think about the Bible. As Chapman writes: “While Christians see all the books of the Bible as inspired Scripture, they do not believe that the process of inspiration was such that every single word was dictated to the writers. They believe that these writers were thinking about what they wrote, each with their own style of writing, but that the Holy Spirit of God was at work in their minds.

The letter of 2 Timothy, traditionally attributed to the Apostle Paul, describes the Old Testament in these words: ‘… the holy Scriptures … are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is God-breathed (theopneustos) and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness…’ (2 Timothy 3. 15-16).

The second letter of Peter describes the process of inspiration in the books of the prophets in these words: ‘…prophesy never had its origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along (pheromenoi) by the Holy Spirit’ (2 Peter 1.21; ‘men they were, but, impelled by the Holy Spirit, they spoke the words of God’ NEB).

Christians therefore think of Scripture as both the Word of God and the words of human beings at the same time. They believe that the minds of the writers were fully active as they received the message that God communicated to them. God was at work in their minds as they wrote. The Word of God has come to us in and through the words of the human writer. Although the human element in the process of revelation means that people wrote within their normal limitations, it does not mean that what they wrote is not true and reliable” See: C. Chapman, The Bible Through Muslim Eyes and a Christian Response, Grove Biblical Series [Cambridge: Grove Books Limited, 2008], 5.

The Qur’an, in contrast is a relatively short book revealed by God to Prophet Muhammad through the agency of Gabriel. The holy book refers to the method of revelation in Surah ‘Destiny’ (Q. 97). “We sent it down on the night of the destiny”. For many Muslims the Arabic text evokes the heavenly origin of the book. God did not inspire Prophet Muhammad. He sent down the glorious Qur’an that existed eternally in a guarded tablet (Q. 85: 14–15). It is, therefore, clear that the Bible and the Qur’an are understood differently by each of the communities that revere them as holy books.

Recognizing the differences between the Bible and the Qur’an helps one to answer the question: How is the Qur’an interpreted by Muslims? The Islamic Studies Association organized a webinar to discuss this question. Dr. Herman Roborgh, the head of the School of Philosophy and Religion at Minhaj University Lahore in Pakistan addressed this question during the webinar “Interpretation of the Qur’an – New Approaches”.

Dr. Herman pointed out that the Holy Qur’an consists of three different types of texts: texts about the Unseen (al-ghayb), historically oriented texts and the texts using symbolic language (parables, mathal). Furthermore, he pointed out two different types of interpretation: the textualist (literal) interpretation and the contextualist interpretation. Textualists rely on three principles to interpret the Qur’an namely, the text as the fixed foundation for tafsir (interpretation and the belief that Islam is the complete religion and thus there is no need for further elaboration, justification or clarification based on reason. He further said that the textualist-literalist approach to tafsir based on philology was dominant in Sunni Islam in the pre-modern period. A more flexible approach today considers the socio-historical context of revelation.

Dr. Herman pointed out that Muslims agree that there are three levels of meaning in the Qur’an, namely: the linguistic meaning (based on the Arabic language, the use of dictionaries etc.), the historical meaning (the use of words in their historical setting), and the contextual meaning (understood from the micro and the macro context of the verses). The meaning of the Qur’an according to modern interpretation is the combination of these three levels of meaning. Since meaning emerges from the relationship between author, text, recipient (or listener) and context, the meaning of the Qur’an will change as these elements change.

Another important aspect connected with the interpretation of the Qur’an is ‘abrogation’. We read in Qur’an (2. 106): “Any revelation We cause to be superseded or forgotten, We replace by something better or similar” (Q. 2.106). In the past, many scholars thought that this verse referred to the replacement of certain verses of the Torah and Bible by those of the Qur’an. In contrast, Fazlur Rahman and other modern interpreters of the Qur’an hold that the former scriptures were revealed by God and, therefore, could not have been abrogated.

Dr. Herman also highlighted the contribution of Indian scholars like Shah Waliullah (India, d. 1762) who rejected taqlid (blind following of the ancestors) and advocated ijtihad (independent judgement); Sayyid Ahmad Khan (Aligarh, India, d. 1898) who welcomed Western scientific and rational ways of thinking and rejected the possibility of miracles; Muhammad Wahiduddin Khan (India, d. 2021) who stated that the findings of modern science confirm the meaning of the Qur’an.

Further, Dr. Herman pointed out the some of the outstanding contribution of scholars like Taha Husayn (Egypt, d. 1973) who argued that the Qur’an was not an objective source of history; Amin al-Khuli (Egypt, d. 1967), who called for a literary approach to the Qur’an without any other considerations; Hamiduddin Farahi (India, d. 1930), who recognized the existence of coherence (nazm) in the shorter Surahs of the Qur’an; Amin Ahsan Islahi (Pakistan, d. 1997), who developed the ideas of Farahi into a complete commentary on the Qur’an (Tadabbur-e-Qur’an) in which he found coherence (nazm) in every Surah of the Qur’an; Amina Wadud, b. 1952 and Fatima Mernissi, d. 2015, who both brought feminist concerns to bear upon the interpretation of the Qur’an and argued that the ethico-legal content of the Qur’an about women must be interpreted in the light of the socio-historical context of the time of revelation and of the contemporary period of history. According to these authors, the Qur’an’s message about women had been lost in the subsequent patriarchal society that developed after Prophet Muhammad.

The webinar was informative and enabled the participants to know and appreciate the approach of modern Muslim scholars who stress the importance of the context in order to understand the Qur’an. In this way, the webinar attempted to provide an answer to the question posed at the beginning: “How do Muslims interpret the Qur’an?”

(Jesuit Father Victor Edwin teaches Islam at Delhi’s Vidyajyoti College of Theology)