Frequently, in this Islamic forum, we perennially get controversial post
about the Quran. Many of these hostile posts rely on sloppily constructed
exegesis and assertions to further an anti-Muslimism political agenda.
This
is often done, under the disingenuous guise of , according to Dinesh
D'Souza, "having found their Quranic reference, and they are sticking with
it all textual and empirical evidence to the contrary".
To widen the Quranic debate, I just thought this "Still Quarrelling over
the
Quran Five Interventions" article, by Asma Barlas, might interest
rational,
open-minded readers. Asma Barlas is Professor at the Department of
Politics
and Director of the Center for the Study of Culture, Religion, and
Ethnicity, Ithaca College.
Full story at this freely available link:-
http://www.isim.nl/files/Review_20/Review_20-32.pdf
<Extract> ...
In this article, Barlas joins the debates on the right and authority of
Muslim women to interpret the Quran. As a way to move the conversation
beyond simply asserting or refuting the right of this or that person to
read
the Quran on this or that condition, she distinguishes between different
types of interpretations and authority. Simultaneously, she attempts to
come
to grips with the tensions between an individual believer's reading of the
Quran and that of the community.
On subjectivity
Some scholars argue that in order to interpret the Quran, one must avoid
all
subjectivity. I do not agree with this proposition since, to be human, is
to
live a life that is politically, economically, ***ually, culturally, and
historically situated
and subjectivity is merely the effect of encountering and comprehending
the
world through this situatedness. It is, therefore, unavoidable. Hence,
instead of pretending that we encounter texts from some pure or abstract
location outside the confines of time and space, we need to be open,
honest,
and self-conscious about the material and ideological sites from which we
read them. In fact, that is one of the pre-requisites for entering into
the
hermeneutic circle. My first thesis, then, is that no Quran interpreter
can
avoid subjectivity because it is an inescapable human condition. At best,
we
can be more or less cognizant about how our subject positions shape our
readings of a text.
On language and interpretation
Another common idea is that only those people who have mastered Quranic
Arabic should be allowed to interpret the Quran. I also disagree with this
idea since it suggests that there is only one type of scriptural
interpretation and seems to confuse translation with interpretation. In
its
most basic sense, interpretation is simply the act of giving meaning to
what
we read, so one does not need to be a language expert or a philologist to
read a text interpretively since one does that anyway merely by virtue of
reading it. Moreover, mastering a language does not ensure that we will
arrive at the best or only valid reading of a text. If it did, the Quran
would not have distinguished between better and worse readings of it; the
Prophet's companions would not have differed in their understanding of
some
ayat; Muslims would have had a universally agreed upon interpretation of
the
Quran; and scholars like al-Ghazali would not have held that each ayah has
possibly 60,000 meanings.
The point that I am making is that interpretive differences are not
reducible to language alone but also have to do with an interpreter's
methodology, epistemology, theology, and ***ual politics. I will give two
examples from Quranic exegesis to sup****t my claim.
The first applies to those cases where, no matter how well scholars know
Arabic, they cannot agree on the meaning of a word. A good example is
idribuhunna in verse 4:34 that most scholars read as "to beat" thereby
interpreting the verse as giving a husband the right to beat his wife.
However, the root of this word, daraba, has several different
meanings-including "to go away"-and the Quran itself uses this word in
seventeen different senses. So, the fact most interpreters have chosen one
meaning, and the worst, and that most Muslims refuse to accept alternative
interpretations as legitimate has less to do with language than with the
***ual politics of patriarchies that want to maintain male power over
women.
...
<End extract> ...
What do regular readers make of this short article? Have the regular
"critics" of the Qur'an, in this forum, learnt anything?
--
Peace
--
If it is true that there is always more than one way of construing a text,
it is not true that all interpretations are equal. [Paul Ricoeur]
Zuiko Azumazi
zuiko.azumazi@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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