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Esack, F. (1999)
The Qur'an: A Short Introduction
(Oxford: One World)
Esack’s book would be an ideal starting
text for writing an essay on the Qur’an. It is brimming with doors ajar, on
issues including the history of the Qur’an and the Sunnah, and its role of
the latter in both interpreting and even subsuming the Quranic voice; the
socio-history of orthodoxy; the different approaches to studying and
commenting on the Qur’an, including hermeneutics; and the various themes of
the Qur’an.
After Murata and Chittick, Esack was something of an unveiling. The former
dressed the Qur’an in an inspiring, though largely unreferenced, exposition
of traditional fiqh. This latest book leaves me impatient of such ornaments,
and hungry for the Qur’an itself. I will read the Qur’an now with a greater
sense of the possibilities which such a book may and should offer. At a
later date, I intend to reread Ghulam Parwez, who reaffirms the Qur’an as
central to Islam, as well as Fazlur Rahman, insha Allah.
My rekindled interest in Parwez also reflects a minor awakening, provoked by
Esack’s analysis of the arguments around the historicity of the Sunnah. On
the whole, I share Esack's scepticism of the supposedly ‘indifferent’
scholarship of some of the non-Muslim scholars. On the hadith, for example,
their arguments strike me as contrived, and derisory of the piety of the
early hadith scholars and the lineage of piety which they evoke. But
reflecting on this issue, I feel now I was perhaps foolish to assume the
lineage itself were infallible, despite the good works.
I feel saddened when I read or hear Muslims claiming ‘faith’ as an answer to
the doubts raised by scholars questioning traditional understandings of
Islam. It not only smacks of intellectual laziness, but is contemptuous of
the serious barriers which stand between many people in the non-Muslim world
and Islam. Relatively few Muslim scholars have addressed the more plausible
questions posed by Orientalism head on. Yusuf Islam is a lovely man, but I’d
like to see a leading humanities academic embrace Islam!
Like many books I find myself liking, this one was full of little nuggets of
information which were a delight to discover – such as the fact that one
should speak quietly during salah (73:20). I didn’t know that! But I was
most endeared by Esack’s elucidation of hermeneutics and also the importance
of learning, and in both regards, I think my extra-Quranic reading for the
foreseeable future will focus on human sciences. I then want to bring this
knowledge to the Qur’an with a better sense of the world I want to change!
Allah knows better |