reynolds-the-quran-in-its-historical-context-2

70 Nasr Abu Zaydchapter shows that the difference between these three discourses is in the languageemployed rather than in the content; the three adhere to certain essential convictions:l. Islam as a comprehensive system that leaves nothing for human reason to add(human reason's function is to implement God's law); 2. Glorification of al-salafat-~alib ("pious ancestors"), who are above any criticism. The imams, the mufassiriin,and the fuqaha' have explained everything. Ijtihad ("independent reasoning") islimited to finding the suitable solution already provided by al-salaf at-~alil;i. As forthe Qur' an, no ijtihad is allowed. The traditional statement ta ijtihada .fi ma jihf na~~-which means properly "No independent reasoning is allowed when there is a veryobvious clear statement"- is applied to the entire Qur' an.The second chapter is focused on an analysis of the writings ofl;Iasan I;Ianafi,especially his five volumes of Min a!- 'aqfda ila 1-thawra: l'adat bina' 'ilmal- 'aqa 'id ("From Creed to Revolution: A Reconstruction of the Scie~ce ofCreeds"). 56 I;Ianafi is the main representative of the Islamic left; in fact, he is theonly one. He always connects himself to the reformist Islamic movement, startingfrom Jamal al-DTn at-Afghani through Mul)ammad 'Abduh, and surprisinglyI;Ianafi includes among the reformists I;Iasan al-Banna am:! Sayyid Qutb (alwayswith the epithet al-shahfd, "the marty~"). He positions his thought between thetwo extremes, the radical Islamists and the radical secularists, a position whichmakes him a target of attack by both. The radical Islamists condemn him as anapostate, murtad; the radical secularists consider him an Islarnist.- -- ---- -~--------Tcritique-111sapproacll-to-pl1enomenological hermeneutics, by which the readeris king. The ideology of the reader overshadows critical historical analysis, andta 'wfl turns to ideology (talwfn, lit. "coloring"). When I wits his student, I;Ianafi,in a 1969-70 "Islamic Philosophy" course, encouraged me to be critical, not totake ideas for granted just because they are the ideas of the teachers. In fact, II!Ycritique ofl;Ianafi's ideas did not adversely affect our friendship. This was a greatlesson I always try to transmit to my students.The third chapter offers a hermeneutical approach that avoids "semantic manipulation,"as presented in the first chapter, and the "ideological interpretation," aspresented in the second chapter. It is based on three propositions on three semanticdomains of meaning in the Qur' an, as follows.One, the distinction between religious thought and foundational ~eligious textsis essential; religious thought is the outcome of the human endeavor to understand,explain and interpret the foundational text in accordance with sociopoliticaland cultural horizons. The sacredness which the community of believersattaches to the foundational text should not be attached to .the human endeavor,which is to be subjected to criticism in order to develop further understanding ofthe foundational text.Two, the belief in the sacredness of the foundational texts should not preventthe believer from realizing the socio-political, historical and cultural context ofthese texts. This was realized and taken into consideration in classical Islamic56 I st ed., Cairo: Maktabat Madbiill, 1988.Towards understanding the Qur 'an's worldview 71:culture, e.g. issues such as asbab al-nuzt7l and al-nasikh wa-1-mansukh, which·.clearly indicate the historicity of the religious texts, are to be elaborated in light of·· our modem scholarship without fear for one's faith.Three, the fact that the Qur'an is in Arabic clearly situates its semantic domainin the cultural context of its emergence in the seventh century. At the same time it. produces and reproduces multiple levels of meaning dependent on the questionsraised by different generations of believers. Modem linguistics teaches us that: · every speech act, and definitely every unique text, though encoded in a certain.'language, develops its own parole, which is a sub-code within the language code,to communicate its own message. 5 7 Such textual characteristics were realized byclassical Muslim thinkers in the Qur'an and by such an approach they developed· . the doctrine of i 'jaz, illimitability. Modem hermeneutics, on the other hand,.explains that this new meaning generated by the new question addressed to the· is not entirely explicit in the text (otherwise the previous generations would·have found it); neither does it entirely exist in the reader's mind; it is the outcome· of the text-reader encounter. The term shiira (Q 42:38), for example, could not beunderstood to allude to democracy before the nineteenth century.According to the above three propositions, I suggested three domains of mean­.ings to be investigated in the Qur'an in our modem horizon.One: the domain of meaning related to the existence of certain supernatural beingsand their power in affecting human life, such as angels, Jinn and demons. This is thedomain of historical meaning which has no significance in our modem life. In this· domain the Qur'an is addressing the Arab mentality of the seventh century. To take. 'the Qur'anic mention of these beings as actual physical beings that are really and·•·... actually able to affect and influence humans is to imprison the Qur' an in the seventh­.· century cultural domain. To this historical domain of meaning belong the images of> the divine kingdom, such as the divine throne(~/- 'arsh) and the divine chair ( al-kursf).Two: the domain of meaning subject to metaphorical understanding; this is the·· . domain of anthropomorphic features ascribed to God's attributes, such as face,hand, eye and leg as well as human emotions. such as love and hate. Metaphorical· interpretation. is justified, following the classical ta 'wfl theory of majaz but,without adhering to the classical concept which opposes majaz to baqfqa categorically.Third, the domain of meaning of ijtihad ("independent reasoning"), which should:_not be limited to the classical concept of qiyas ("analogical reasoning"). This domain' is to be applied to legal stipulations addressed to the seventh-century context of thenascent Muslim community, which needed certain regulations after moving fromMecca, where Muslims were the minority group, to Medina, where they became the· ruling group. Such contextualization goes far beyond the classical legal theory.An illustrative case ofthese ideas is the female inheritance share in the Qur'an.of the objectives oflslam, deduced from the contextual reading, is "equality,"· .57 Cf. F. de Saussare, Coiwse ill Ge11eral Li11guistics, trans. W. Baskin, New York: McGraw-HillBook Company, 1966, 9~13.