The Qur'an And Hadith As Literary Texts

 The Qur’an And Hadith As Literary Texts

 

Excerpt #26 from my book:  Qur’an, Hadith, and Hikayat:  Exercises In Critical Thinking.

October 12, 2025 

 

The Qur’an contains revelations from Allah. Muslims accept that as a matter of faith. Tradition also has it that the Prophet prohibited his followers from memorizing his utterances or recording his deeds. He feared that those could later be misinterpreted or take precedence over the revelations. Muslims are to pay attention and memorize only the revelations.

 

         The Prophet’s caution was prescient. Muslims, then and now, are driven apart less by interpretations of the Qur’an – all believe and agree on its central message – but by the continued unproductive and divisive debates on the Prophet’s presumed deeds and utterances (sunnah). Obsessions with the veracity (or lack of it) of a particular hadith or deed consumes many Muslims, distracting them from appreciating or understanding the intent of the sunnah or lessons to be learned therefrom.

 

         In asserting that the Qur’an is the words of Allah, we imply that Allah could, like humans, talk and in Arabic too! Anthropomorphizing Allah (giving Him human-like qualities) is a severe and unforgivable sin in Islam. However, that contradiction escapes many.

 

         As for hadith, Muslims put them along a spectrum of truthfulness, from the sahih (true) to the frankly fabricated, and others in between. The more problematic issue of how one could ascertain the veracity of something presumed to be uttered by the Prophet or his actions and mannerisms of over 1400 years ago is brushed aside. Yet much energy is expended on that singularly futile exercise. As such, discussions on hadith create much heat and sow unnecessary divisions while shedding little light.

 

         It would be far more fruitful to discuss possible lessons to be learned from hadith or to relate them to contemporary challenges. I am here excluding hadith qudsi, those mentioned in the Qur’an but its phrasing formulated by the Prophet. Those are integral parts of the Qur’an.

 

         In the beginning, believers memorized only the revelations, heeding the Prophet’s wise advice. Later with many of the reliable memorizers killed in wars, the revelations had by necessity to be written on tablets, barks, and other materials to preserve them. Soon, as would be expected, variations in transcriptions would appear based on differences in dialect.

 

         Accidental missing of key words like “not” would radically change the meaning. Combine that with the lack of punctuations. In the oral tradition those would be assumed by the manner and tone of expressions, as with pauses, emphasis, and gestures as well as dialects. When transcribed, the writer had to add by necessity the necessary interpretations through uses of punctuation marks. 

 

         Following the Prophet’s death and to maintain some semblance of uniformity, Caliph Uthman ordered that only one version of the Qur’an be the official one. For years that edition was referred to as Uthman’s Qur’an, an implicit recognition that there were other equally valid versions. With time however, Uthman’s version became the Qur’an. Just to be sure, he ordered all the others to be burnt or buried.

 

         Humans being humans, many of the owners of those treasured earlier copies kept theirs. Those were their clan’s prized heirlooms. They were not about to burn them. A few have now been discovered. Thanks to the dry desert air, they remained well preserved.

 

         For those confident of their faith, those new discoveries are exciting as they would help shine additional light on this great faith. To others, threatening to the existing order and interpretations.

 

         As with any text, except perhaps those dry terse mathematical ones, we bring our own perspectives and values when we read it, Louise Rosenblatt’s readers’ response theory of literary appreciation. French writer Marcel Proust said something similar. “The writer’s work is only a kind of optical instrument he provides the reader so he can discern himself what he might never have seen in himself without the book.”

 

         I have listened to countless khutbas and tafsirs of the Qur’an as well as hadith, the number increasing exponentially with the advent of social media. Unlike Proust’s observation on reading, with social media video I also get to learn about the deliverer in addition to the content, bringing another dimension to my understanding. 

 

Next:  Excerpt # 27: The Fraught of Literal Interpretations