PROBLEMS AND METHODS IN UNDERSTANDING THE QUR'AN

Prof. Dr. Celal KIRCA

 

 

 

Introduction

 

 

For a Muslim, Qur'an is an object of belief and knowledge. Being a knowledge object makes it necessary to be understood. Understanding means to comprehend something not only from outside but also from within; to recognize the essence of something, the meaning of something in a wholeness of context.  It is not always the case that this kind of understanding may occur properly. Accordingly, a statement or a text is sometimes misunderstood by interlocutors for various reasons. To express this fact, Maulana says: “How much you tell depends on your audience's understanding.”

In terms of Qur'anic studies, understanding shows a very complex face. In this context, some deals with the Qur'an as merely an object and considers analysis of its' words as a way of understanding. Others think that comprehending subject is just a servant for this object. From this perspective of interpretative activity, there is a serious difference between understanding and explaining. Thus, in understanding, there is a tendency to penetrate into the essence of internal relations with a respect to wholeness of the text and to its originality; while in explaining, there is an effort to determine the causes of the facts and to divide them into segments. It can be seen that among the reasons of the diversity of Qur'anic understanding throughout history, this multiplicity of approaches had a very effective role.

 

Therefore, the interpretative activity was described as “sharh al-lafz (analysis of word)” , “izhar (expose)”  and “kashf (uncover)”  but, to describe it with the words as expose or uncover has shortcomings in terms of today's understanding of science and method. Since, both terms today are used for the positive sciences. As Dilthey pointed out, interpretative act should be classified not in explanatory sciences but in sciences that based on understanding.  As a matter of fact, Qur’an is not an object that waits to be discovered such as laws of nature but it is a religious and literary text to be understood by its interlocutors. For this reason, Qur’an first to be understood and then to be explained. Yet it seems that there are some radical questions in terms of understanding and explaining the Qur’an. In this paper, I will pay attention just to the problems of understanding of the Qur’an and of its methods.

1. Problems of Qur’anic Understanding

Categorically speaking, one can say that throughout history understanding activities of the Qur’an took place at least in three phases: simple /superficial, ideological / interpretative and methodological.

a. Simple / superficial understanding symbolizes relationships that people correlate between incidents that they experience in their daily life and the Qur’an and also the understanding of it. This kind of understanding is a through method without any connection with vocational, ideological or methodological approaches. This understanding is a personal and it holds the reader, who understand what he read, responsible; without any blame for others. For this reason, its problematic is not that much important. On the other hand, this approach is worthy and necessary because it makes a person connected directly to the Qur’an. Also, this type of understanding puts the Qur’an in an effective state and frees it from a passive condition, so it has been encouraged in the past and also present. During the time of revelation and also later, people read the Qur’an and tried to understand it. Thus, in the history of tafseer, some companions such as Osman b. Maz’un, Cafer al-Sadeeq, Qudame b. Maz’un, Sabit b. Kays, Adiy b. Hatim and Amr b. As, their understanding of the Qur’an and their mistakes in this matter has been mentioned and some examples were narrated .

b. Ideological / interpretative approach represents a path in that Qur’an is understood to support ideological and vocational meanings. What we meant by mentioning the expression of “ideological and vocational meanings” is to refer some tafseer schools and Islamic thought systems that can be summarized as “entire political, legal, philosophical, scientific and religious thoughts.”  This kind of understanding seems to be more problematic because it covers all of individuals that they connect each other with the sense of belonging and this kind of understanding, makes it mandatory to connect to its thought system. The main problem here is that ideological thoughts, which has the potential of following from individual to general, from locality to universal, take the Qur’an as a supportive material for their view, instead of taking it as a whole. In an other words, the Qur’an, in terms of the ideological meaning, is an object for ideological thoughts and principles, not for a through acts of understanding. Among the factors that influences this kind of understanding, there are Qur’anic concepts of each ideology, logic type used for understanding, different definitions of terms, lexicographic tricks (explaining with lexicons)  intuitive perception and scientific datum made a context.

Since the wholeness of the Qur’an is not intended, Ideological meanings create an “Epistemic Congregation”  that reflects only their own thought systems. This culture is one of the reasons for ideological thoughts in a course of time to be dogmatized. In this context, Karkhi (D: 340/951)’s words: “All verses that seems to be contradictory to our sect are to be interpreted (ta’weel) or to be abrogated (naskh)”  and Sawi’s expression: “It is not allowed to be against to the four sects’ thoughts even if their thoughts contradict to the Qur’anic, Prophetic or of Companions thinking”  are very striking in showing the impact of ideological thoughts to vision of the Qur’an and to understanding of it.

 

So, there is a vision of God, a vision of Qur’an and an understanding of Prophet for each ideological thought. These visions that were created conveniently for their thought system had a very big influence on their understanding of the Qur’an. Thus, among Muslims, there is a thinking system claims that the Qur’an was created, while another one does not claim as such. Some of them think that the Qur’an offers a program regarding human life while others say that it does not offers such a program; people themselves create this program of life, while doing this they find relations between Quranic concepts and realities in life. Those who have sectionist understanding in terms of the relation between Qur’an and science claim that the Qur’an does not have anything to do with positive science; on the other hand, those who adopted inductive method and who thinks that the Qur’an has an inimitable character argue that even positive sciences can be deduced from the Qur’an.

These different thoughts showed themselves also in understanding the Qur’an. Accordingly, the Qur’an becomes an object (formalist aspect), an instrument, a code, a philological work, a prospectus (recipe), a scientific book or a book that does not have any connection with sciences, an ideology book. For these reasons, if a person has integrating understanding, that person defends the absoluteness of traditional exegesis and its effects; if has fundamentalist understanding, that person skips tradition and historical forms and sees the first forms and understandings of text as an unconditional one; if has radical understanding, that person believes sameness of knowledge and faith and takes religion as an ideology.

Thus, a kharijite person takes a sinner as an infidel while a sunni thinks that person as one that did not accomplish his religious duties. It is well known that kharijites understand the verse: “Judgment belongs to none but Allah (12/40)” as: “Humans are not allowed to make judgments.” These much diverse visions of Qur’an lead necessarily to that much different understandings.

Another understanding problem arises from the rationale used to comprehend the Qur’an. Is the rationale used to understand it appropriate to that of Qur’an, or not? Does Qur’an have logic within itself?  If there is one, what kind of logic is it: two-valued, multi-valued or both at the same time? Which type of logic are we using in interpreting the Qur’an? These questions show the problematic aspects of logic in understanding the Qur’an, because, our choice of logic type will form our understanding and explaining the Qur’an. First of all, we can say that with the exception of the period of revelation and just after that time, during the course of time that began with the Umayyads and continued with the Abbasids two-valued logic was effective. Ibn Taymiyyah was the first author who called attention to this.  Later, Muhammad Abduh, Muhammad Ikbal and Musa Carullah pointed out the problematic of that logic. Among these authors, Musa Carullah made the most striking notes and critiques.

In the Qur’an there are such topics that indicate two-valued logic, at the same time there are such matters that are too broad to be covered by two-valued logic. However, an attempt to explain all verses of the Qur’an using such logic built the biggest obstacles in front of the Qur’anic understanding. Besides, it was not possible to understand the Qur’an more truly and more properly and consequently to explain. For example, one can easily find references to the following principles:

a) Allah give guidance to whomever He wants and leave whomever He wants in astray.

b) Allah give guidance to who wants and leave who wants in astray.

c) Who wants guidance arrives to that, who wants to be in astray arrives to that.

 

Yet, following two-valued logic, Jabriyas (sect of compulsivity) took one principle and Mutazilites took the other to make these principles as a standing point for their ideological understandings. So, instead of making the Qur’an a center-point, verses of the Qur’an were made instruments for ideological thoughts. In order to reach this, inductive approach was used. Thus, this approach resulted the Qur’an not to be taken as a whole but to be perceived and understood  partially and analytically.  As evidence to this, Muhammad Ikbal thinks that Greek philosophy, though widening Muslim thinkers’ visual angles very much, it darkened  their thoughts on the Qur’an.

One of the logical problems in understanding the Qur’an concerns the logic of language. As we all know, each language has it’s own logic. Based on this, we can tell that Turkish and Arabic languages have different logic from each other’s. Though in some instances they might be very close, in many aspects they differ. For example, in Arabic, each word is accepted as either masculine or feminine; plurals must be at least three in quantity; there is dual state in words; involuntary acts are expressed in passive forms. In Turkish, gender is not an issue in words; plurals start from two; there is not dual state in words; involuntary acts are expressed not in passive but in active forms. These differences make it difficult to express synonyms or antonyms equally in each language. This problem occurs mostly in translations of the Qur’an (Maals). For that, examples will be taken mostly from maals.

For example, such words as ism, zanb, lamam and junah in the Qur’an, in some translations are taken as synonyms , while in other translations they are presented as antonyms. For instance, the term “junah” translated into Turkish as “sakinca (prejudice)”;  the term “ism” as “günah (sin)”;  the term “zenb” as “hata, kusur (error, deficiency)”  or “suçlama (blame)”.  Seeing these words as synonyms is not considered as good translations. This is also against to language logic.

Following the same understanding, translating the words ibil, be’ir, cemel and naaqa with a single word does not reflect a true meaning, because in Arabic ibil means camels,  beir means camel, cemel means male camel and naaqa means female camel.

 

 

In Turkish translations of the Qur’an, “ibil”  translated as camel”  “beir”  as camel”  “cemel”  as camel” and “naaqa”  as both camel and female camel.  More interestingly, the word naaqa translated in some maals in some places as camel  and in some places as female camel.  Same goes with the word “ibil.” This word has plural meaning just as “naas” and for this reason it must be translated as camels. On the other hand, Muhammad Asad translated “ibil” as “the clouds pregnant with water.”  In front of such a picture, can a true understanding be mentioned?

In the same manner, richness of time-forms in Turkish does not exist in Arabic. Also in Arabic simple present tense is not that clear and in it’s language logic matters, not humans, come first. These differences make it difficult to translate from Arabic to Turkish. I hope, what I quoted below from Ali Ozek will make it more understandable. He says:

“In Arabic, simple present tense is not that clear. If mudaree word mentioned without any restriction, then it may mean both present and future. For this, it is very important to look at words’ conditions when translating. Language logic is also important. Because in some cases subjects take places of objects and accordingly meaning changes. We can mention the sentence of فاتتنى الصلاة as an example. In this, the word salaah is subject. At first glance, it means: ‘The Prayer missed me.’ This sequence is true for Arabic language logic. In Turkish language logic, it means: ‘I missed the prayer.’ The distinction here is the relation between human and matters. In Arabic language logic, matters come first, while in the latter human has the priority. In the Qur’an this is an expression: و أتينا موسى الكتاب. In Arabic language logic, it means: We gave Musa to the Book. While in Turkish language logic its meaning is: We gave the Book to Musa.”

Another problem is to put ideological understanding in the center and to look at the Qur’an from that angle or at least to make it as a supporting element for that ideology. In doing this, many words were put in the form of terms; abstract concepts were materialized or privatized in order to support this ideology. For example, among various Islamic sects, faith defined by one as confirmation by heart, by another as confirmation by heart and confession by tongue and by a third one as confirmation by heart, confession by tongue and demonstration by acts. Accordingly, each sect understands the Qur’an from its definition of faith. So, which of these three approaches is compatible with the Qur’anic soul? What is our criteria for this compatibility? Yet these questions are waiting their answers.

So, we should question the terms that emerged after the time of revelation, not that were defined by the Qur’an itself or by the Prophet whose duty was “to explain.” Because ideological definitions and understandings mostly established by some linguistic tricks. So, they must be questioned. For example, lets have a look at these verses: Following some ideological thoughts, is it acceptable to translate al-atqa in : “Seyucannabuha al-atqa / But the devout will avoid it.”  as Hz. Abu Bakr or Hz. Ali;  or: “A people whom He loves and who love Him”  as Ansaar, Yamani or Hz. Ali?  Which of them is correct and on which criteria?

Generally commentaries understand the expression of “la yamassu” as imperative and consequently they require not to touch the Qur’an without ablution. Whereas the imperative form of the word: “massa - yamassu” is: “la yamassa or la yamasse” not as: “la yamassu.” In this case, the word that mentioned in the verse is not in imperative but negative form. So, its meaning is not: “Do not let anybody touch it” but is: “Nobody can touch it.” Some commentators, accepting this approach, say that what is meant from this word is imperative. For instance, Hanafi legislator and commentator Jassas thinks so.

 

A similar situation happens for the word: “al-mutahharoon.” In Turkish translations this word generally mentioned as: “temizlenenler /ones who cleaned.” Whereas this word is not the meaning of “al-mutahharoon” but of “al-mutahheroon.” Since, “al-mutahharoon” is object-noun and it means “ones that is cleaned.” “Ones who cleaned” in the Qur’an is mentioned with the words "mutatahher" or "muttahher." In the Qur’an in one place "muttahhereen" and in two places "mutatahhereen" are mentioned as subject-nouns. Translations explained these words as ones who cleaned. Clearly, their translations of : “al-mutahharoon” as object-noun is not acceptable in terms of linguistics. However, this translation has been quoted because it happened not to be against the idea that the Qur’an is not allowed to be touched without ablution.

Again, such expressions that were not emerged as terms during the time of revelation as “istifta”  and “hadeesan yuftera”   can be mentioned. Although “istifta” originally means “to ask someone’s opinion”, they translated it as “to ask fatwa.”  Similarly they translated “hadeesan yuftera” as “hadith that is to be made-up” although it means “words that is to be made-up.”

Similarly, in the Surah al-Duha, the word: “akhirah” has a same translation problem: Does it mean “Life after death is better for you than this life”  as the word’s terminological meaning, or “Life after this is better for you than that before”  as the word’s conceptual meaning? Which translation do we accept and on which criteria we depend?

 

A parallel situation occurs for the word “zakah” in the verse: “allazeena hum li al zakati failun”  In some maals this word is translated as “almsgiving”  with it’s terminological meaning; while in others as “cleansing”  with it’s conceptual meaning. Consequently, we see this verse’s translations as “who pay their religious tax”  and “and who are intent on inner purity.”  The point of question here is whether terminological meaning of “zakah” or conceptual meaning must be used. If the criteria is the period of revelation, this verse was revealed in Maccah, and conceptual meaning fits in here; otherwise terminological meaning may be taken. This kind of variations in translations shows that there is a general understanding method in these works. I would like to give the example of “nushuz” for these variations.

 

The word “nushuz” mentioned in Nisa 34 to express unfavorable acts of a married woman and in Nisa 128 of a married man. In another words, this word denotes both wife and husband’s same acts. Yet, in some maals translators gave different meanings for the same word that occurs in the verses of Nisa 34 and Nisa 128. One translation explains “nushuz” of Nisa 34 as: “obstinate of whom you are bored” while of Nisa 128 as: “her husband’s bad behavior and turning away from her.” Likewise, other one gives to the first verse the meaning of: “not to fulfill obligations of marriage and to cheat on you” and to the second the meaning of: “to sense frigidity from her husband because of his senility and ailment or she thinks that he will forsake her.” Similarly, a third one says that the first verse means: “to worry unfaithfulness and impurity from her” and the second one: “to fear her husband to behave badly to her and his carelessness.”

 

The same wrong-doing versus these diverse translations! This can be explained only by ideologies of the writers. For, these verses for a person who agrees with the male-dominated family concept means in a way, and for a person who thinks equality between male and female means in another. Yet, a word in the same verse is sometimes explained diversely. For instance, the word “darb” means alongside beating, edification, sexual intercourse or divorce.   Among these, the first meaning represents the classical understanding while the others symbolize the contemporary approaches. Because, the first type of understanding is adequate for male-dominated agricultural societies and the others are relevant for egalitarian industrial societies. But the question of: Which of them is true, is still unanswered. If a word has multiple meanings, only one of them is true for a specific occasion. If one argues that all of its meanings true at the same time, this argument is not acceptable in terms of linguistic and contextual understanding methods. Besides, it is necessary to make a semantic analysis for this kind of words. In addition, considering the usages during the revelation period among Arabs will give a solid insight to comprehend that specific word.

 

Without considering the revelation medium and reasons behind it, just using intuitive perception and scientific datum creates another understanding problem. Our intention here is to question methods and understandings that are used in sufi and scientific approaches. To make scientific datum as a medium in understanding the Qur’an has as much problems as to explain verses in terms of sufi approaches and with their concepts. The problem in sufi approach is to move away from linguistic understanding method and from language logic. The question in scientific approach is about rationalizations of verses.

 

For example, Alusi explains four kind of birds that mentioned in the Surah al-Bakara concerning Hz. Abraham as four unseen birds: Reason, heart, soul and spirit.  In doing this, he explains expressions of tangibles with intangible ones. This apprehension is a questionable understanding in terms of language logic. For, to equip a conception with the meanings that it includes and covers is the best understanding method. If that concept is over dressed, it cannot reflect true meanings. Likewise, the rationalization used in scientific tafseer is subject to the same rule. For example, to interpret the word “tayr/birds” in the verse: “He sent upon them swarms of birds”  as: “some kinds of illness, germ carrying insects or mosquitoes”; and also the word “hejarah/stones” as “dusts full of germs in front of wind.”   is not considered as true understanding.

 

Just as to interpret the verse: “The Last Hour draws near, and the moon is split asunder!”  as: “Human landing on the moon and bringing some stones from there down to the earth”  or to explain the verse: “I will cast him in the Saqar”  as: “Saqar is a computer that uses electricity”  are another examples of rationalizations.

Eventually, ideological sights not being able to develop an understanding method based on the Qur’an, instead its being an instrument for ideological understandings is inappropriate to the principle of alteration in that all parts should be in relation with the whole and with the other parts constantly and rotatively.

 

This explanation and given examples show that problematic of ideological understanding is obvious. By then, the question of: “Is there a non-problematic understanding” comes to minds. Unfortunately there is not. If there was, there should not been written that much tafseers and more than two hundred Turkish translations. However, we can talk about a “methodological understanding” that may rescue understanding from subjectivity at least a little and give it some objectivity, so may be a less problematic method of understanding.

2. Methodological understanding of the Qur’an

 In this understanding mode, linguistic understanding and contextual understanding may be used together. Linguistics is defined as: “a science that aims to examine language or dialect with an objective manner, to explain features of language, language laws that are followed by phonetic, mythological, syntactic, semantic and entomological facts, and relations among these facts and other psychological, sociological and geographical facts.”

 

So, linguistic understanding is to comprehend verses within language logic and language rules such as morphological, syntax and semantic ones.  This kind of understanding helps us to notice what the Qur’an says while contextual understanding shows us what is meant by the Qur’anic verses. For this reason, we should understand first what the Qur’an says with the aids of language logic and rules.

 

Contextual understanding has two dimensions. One is internal and the other is external context. Internal context deals with the modes of utterance while external one deals with the reasons that lead this expression to be said. This provides for readers to catch up meanings and to understand it correctly, because, words have their meanings within their contexts. So, the context is as much important as the saying in terms of understanding. The best way to grasp the meanings of a text is to know in which context it is said or written. A statement may have different meaning according to its different contexts. For this reason, it is very important to know by whom, where, in which context and for what purpose a statement was created. Thus, connotations are shaped and changed by this. Therefore to say that “what determines the meaning is the context” is not an overstated expression.

 

In this sense, owner of the word is Allah, interlocutor is the Prophet, word was first in form of a parole and then a text; places of revelation was Macca and Madinah; the time was 610-622 (AH). To know how it was said: According to the shapes and contexts of verses, they are in praising, satirizing, stimulating,cynical, heralding, explanatory, argumentative, detecting and narrative forms. Finally, to know why it was said so: Backgrounds of revelation as special, cultural, economic or political. These requirements would make the expression of “understanding the Qur’an” a meaningful one.

 

This method of understanding is an indispensable criterion. Without considering the time, place and reason of used words, one just understand it in one’s own context and time. Thus, the aimed meanings in the text are not noticed. That understanding is made of only reader’s comment. For instance, we can mention Eco’s extreme sample here: Concerning last century’s poet Wordsworth’s line: “A poet could not but be gay” two ways of understanding may occur:

1. A poet could only feel happy.

2. A poet could only be a gay.

The first meaning is true in terms of the time of the poet, because during his time the word “gay” did not have to do with the meaning of homosexuality. Translator should consider the text in its own context in order to grasp its true meaning.  Otherwise, that person may give unwanted meanings to the word and may build a new understanding of it. Same goes with the Qur’an. Especially, after the period of revelation, many concepts that were used as terms do not fit with the meanings of the Qur’an itself.

 

Therefore, it is as crucial to know socio-cultural, socio-economic and socio-politic conditions of the time that the Qur’an was revealed as to know Quranic language. Thus, awareness of external context (sabab al nuzul) prevents that specific verses to be perceived as rule-makers and restricts words to be taken out of their contexts to be in wider or narrower sense. Contexts do not allow contextual practices to be theoretical principles in their particular forms. Besides, if the contexts of revelation do not be taken into account, thoughts of universality, historicity, locality or contingency of the Qur’an cannot be understood adequately. Contrarily, if these contexts are given priority and the Qur’an is imprisoned in this historical boundary, then its universality becomes meaningless. Contexts of revelation are important in order to notice new meanings that the Qur’an added to these old words. A word’s vocabulary meaning may change under influences of new and diverse approaches, so that its meaning may enlarge, narrow or alternate. For this reason, it is not a good way to determine meaning of a word in the Qur’an just looking at a lexicon. In order to understand its meaning, one need to know its context.

 

Conclusion

Each reader of the translations of the Qur’an may understand some things more or less. But individuals have different understanding capacities. Since, understanding depends on personal knowledge and talent. So, level of understanding of a shepherd or a peasant is not the same as of a learned or a civilized person. Similarly, level of understanding of a companion (sahabah) who witnessed the conditions during the revelation is not the same as of a person who did not. Even among scholars there are differences in terms of understanding and interpreting the Qur’an. Muhkam verses may be covered by all; but understanding mutashabeeh verses needs more knowledge then average. However, that much differences in a book of faith and knowledge shows that it is not understood sufficiently.

 

It is not possible to say that a book that everyone understand it from the angle of their thoughts or vocational and ideological approaches is comprehended well enough. Some verses may be understood with some mistakes, this is not that big problem. But what must be explained is why that much important a book has been understood in big differences through history. Such a situation has problems in terms of understanding methods. To solve this problem, one must revise cause – effect relations or at least, a commonly accepted understanding method must be established. This method should try to remove subjectivity and to bring objectivity closer; instead of person- or sect-centered understanding, it should encourage method-centered understanding. Such an understanding may bring us to at least a partial objectivity.

 

This kind of understanding is possible with a method that will help us to comprehend the Qur’an within its socio-cultural contexts and with the logic of revelation-language. This approach is a kind of understanding that shows what the Qur’an said and what it meant. In another words, in such an understanding, the Qur’an is not an instrument for vocational and ideological understanding but it is an object for understanding. This is essential or even necessary for correctness of understanding. To know Quranic historical conditions and environments is as much important as to know text of the Qur’an linguistically, because knowledge of the language of a text ensures what it says; knowledge of its historical conditions and environments assures what it means by saying so. For this reason, an understanding using both linguistic and contextual understanding is a true approach.

 

A linguistic understanding that lacks of contextual understanding is as incomplete as a contextual understanding that lacks of linguistic understanding. For a true understanding, both approaches should or must be mixed together. Linguistic understanding is the first step in determining words’ meanings and their extension but it is just a beginning. For a correct understanding, internal context, socio-cultural context or reasons for revelation should be considered along with the linguistic understanding. For, a meaning which a word does not confirm means nothing. Similarly, a meaning that lacks of contexts does not reflect a true meaning.

On the one hand, an approach that lacks of unity exists, and on the other hand, an approach that lacks of its contexts, with expanded or shrunk meaning stands! Which one solves understanding problems well?

In conclusion, these explanations show that interpretation is in the first step an understanding and then an explanatory work; there are many problems of understanding; to solve these problems a method that covers wholeness of the Qur’an is needed. Narrating the past comments without or with minor changes, explaining words against linguistic rules, to exegete Quranic verses without taking contexts into account may be put under the expression of “commentary writing” but it is not a “commenting.” To comment, a true understanding method is crucial. This method must lead a true understanding.