بِسْمِ اللّهِ الرَّحْمـَنِ الرَّحِيمِ
My Dear Readers,
السلام عليكم ورحمة الله وبركاته
As-salaamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. (May the Peace, Mercy and Blessings of Allah be upon you)
بِسْمِ اللّهِ الرَّحْمـَنِ الرَّحِيمِ
الْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ نَسْتَعِينُهُ
وَنَسْتَغْفِرُهُ وَنَعُوذُ بِاللَّهِ مِنْ شُرُورِ أَنْفُسِنَا
وَسَيِّئَاتِ أَعْمَالِنَا مَنْ يَهْدِهِ اللَّهُ فَلاَ مُضِلَّ لَهُ
وَمَنْ يُضْلِلْ فَلاَ هَادِيَ لَهُ
وَأَشْهَدُ أَنْ لاَ إِلَهَ إِلاَّ
اللَّهُ وَأَشْهَدُ أَنَّ مُحَمَّدًا عَبْدُهُ وَرَسُولُهُ
(See Note below)
About Nazm Al-Qur'an
Throughout the history of Qur'anic studies, there have been numerous approaches towards exegesis (tafseer), historical, linguistic, rational etc to name a few. In the opinion of this blogger, all of the approaches have their own merits, and insha Allah, God willing, we will be able to look at each approach and its resulting exegeses (tafaseer).
Today, for starters, we will look at an approach that has been demonstrated more recently by the late Amin Ahsan Islahi in his magnum opus the Tadabbur-i-Qur'an, which is an immensely valuable contribution in the field of Qur'anic studies.
This monumental tafseer rests on the principle of nazm-al-Qur'an, or the idea of inherent thematic and structural coherence in the Qur'an. However, this approach is fraught with challenges, as Islahi laments in the foreword to Tadabbur:
"Coherence is a must for any work of high quality. Therefore it is surprising that a group of exegetes would hold an opinion that a miraculous and wonderful book such as the Qur'an to be devoid of any coherence. That one surah (chapter) would not be related to another, nor would ayat (verses/signs) in the same surah be related to each other. What is more surprising that the same group would contend that the verses in the chapters are organized without any forethought, and the same goes for arrangement of chapters in the Qur'an.
Although any serious student of Qur'anic exegesis would know that the placement of ayah within a surah, and the arrangement of surahs in the Qur'an was Divinely Inspired, and arranged in presence of the Prophet (ﷺ) himself, although the arrangements into ajza' (pl of Juz)/Siparah, was done much later.
On the other hand, the proponents of nazm, or coherence, have always been present among the rank and file of mufassireen (exegetes). For example, Al-Suyuti quotes in his book Al-Itqān fi ‘Ulum Al-Qur’an (which has been translated as The Perfect Guide to the Sciences of the Qur'an):
"Abu Ja'far bin al-Zubayr has written a book on this topic, titled Al Burhan fi Munasabat Tarteeb Al-Suwar , and so has Burhanuddin Abu al-Hasan al-Baqai, in his Nadhmu al-Durar fi Tanasub al-Ayat wa al-Suwar"
Al-Suyuti himself considers the knowledge of structure and coherence extremely important, but admits that its difficulty deters many exegetes from it. He further states that Al-Razi has spent considerable effort in expounding such knowledge due to his belief that much wisdom is hidden in the coherence, themes and structure of the Qur'an.
Another exegete who has attempted to do a coherent exegesis is al-Mahaimi, in his work Tabseer al-Rahman wa tayseer al mannan, popularly known as tafseer al-Mahaimi."
However, it is clear that the challenges in exegesis using nazm as an approach are of immense magnitude, and most of the works in this area are still wanting.The late Farahi, restarted efforts in this area in an organized way, and the results were there for all to see. It is unfortunate that he was unable to replicate his success throughout the entire Qur'an, thereby achieving a complete Tafseer, as he left for his heavenly abode prior to that. Islahi, a student of Farahi, has attempted to follow his teacher in this methodology, and after a period of 20 odd years, and 6000 odd pages presented to us his life's work based on the concept of nazm-al-Qur'an.
In the opinion of this blogger, the effort is immense and the contribution is unparalleled, and hence definitely worth a read. For those familiar with the Urdu language, it is available as Tadabbur-i-Qur'an, and some of it is available in the English language as well.
May Allah guide us, and help us be on the right path.
والله أعلم
Wa Allahu 'Alam (And Allah is the All-Knowing)
