Towards A More Enlightened Education Policy

 Towards A More Enlightened Education Policy

M. Bakri Musa

August 2, 2026

Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim’s decision to retain Sixth Form under the Ministry of Education (MOE) rather than transferring it to the Ministry of Higher Education (MOHE) as previously announced, is wise. He should go further. Expand, strengthen, and institutionalize Sixth Form, making K–13 the new standard.

            Malaysian public education is blighted with racial/religious fanaticism, quite apart from corruption, incompetence, and politics. Seeing that the MOE Minister is from Anwar’s Keadilan Party while that of MOHE from UMNO, I do not know where Anwar’s recent decision stands on the merit/politics matrix.

Universities are expensive, delicate institutions. They should be preoccupied solely with undergraduate, graduate, and professional education, alongside meaningful extension services. It is a telling indictment that not a single Malaysian university has a functioning Extension Department.

MOE and MOHE devour over 20 percent of the Federal Budget. Then there are the substantial allocations for education buried within MARA, the Prime Minister’s Department (Religious Affairs), and the various state governments. Despite the massive spending, the results remain mediocre.  

The two ministers concerned with education have not demonstrated any modicum of executive or professional competence. Instead, they are consumed with micromanaging schools and campuses instead of at the macro policy level, as with enforcing 60:40 STEM-to-non-STEM ratio and uncompromising standards of English proficiency. If they (headmasters and vice-chancellors) cannot deliver on those basic metrics, replace them.

The track record of Education Minister Fadhlina Siddiq is illustrative. Her recent decision to admit six-year-olds into Primary One deserves praise; that measure is long overdue. Again here, her leadership weakness was immediately laid bare: fewer than 15 percent of eligible children actually enrolled. Far more damning was her total lack of curiosity in finding out why.

Make no mistake; those left behind are overwhelmingly Bumiputra pupils. Pair that with the swelling numbers now opting for Chinese schools, and the rot that is the national stream becomes obvious.

Fadhlina’s hasty, poorly conceived recent adoption of the Imam Nawawi’s Forty Hadith module is another stark reflection of her ineptitude. Peruse the module’s texts; they are but a sterile rehashing of medieval commentaries. Instead of leveraging them as rigorous exercises in critical thinking and moral philosophy, the module has degenerated into ritualistic, unthinking recitation.

The Anatomy of Waste

Consider the current agonizing ordeal of the typical Bumiputra student. After sitting for her terminal school examination (SPM) at the end of Form Five (Year 11) in November, she must wait until the following April for the results. If successful, she then has to scramble for a slot in Matrikulasi, Sixth Form, or Kelas Asassi. Those programs however, do not commence until late July. That eight-month hiatus represents an irreplaceable waste of young talent as well as severe erosion of hard-won good study habits.

Non-Malays—along with the small minority of enlightened Bumiputras—privately enroll their children in the various private post-SPM programs in January. By the time July rolls around, they are light-years ahead of their public-school cohorts who have been lepaking (idling). Malay parents claim they cannot afford these private bridges, having exhausted their savings on extravagant weddings or endless umrah.

Making K–13 a seamless continuous stream would be far cheaper and infinitely more effective than expanding the heavily politicized Matrikulasi or Kelas Asasi and would benefit vastly more students.

Simple Math, Missing Minds

The leakages in public education are glaring and obvious to everyone except those in charge. Malaysia spends hundreds of millions sending hundreds if not thousands of undergraduates abroad even as local universities starve for basic funds. I would have no objection if those students were to land at the Harvards, Oxfords, or MITs. They do not.

Far cheaper to recruit world-class faculty to teach locally than to send a single undergraduate abroad. America today has a glut of top-tier PhDs. If hired to teach in Malaysia, they would spend the bulk of their salaries locally, repatriating at most US$10K annually.

In terms of foreign exchange loss, for every single undergraduate Malaysia sends overseas, she could easily hire ten American PhDs. Imagine the transformational impact on our students, faculty, and research, not to mention the local economy. Yet this elementary arithmetic escapes our policy makers.

If American scholars prove too elusive or expensive, Malaysia could easily decimate the faculty rosters of the premier Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) for a fraction of the cost. When I was at Malay College Kuala Kangsar (MCKK) back in the early 1960s, all my science teachers were from India. We did not do too badly under their tutelage.

What goes unstated—yet remains blatantly obvious to any candid observer—is that public education in Malaysia today is effectively the education of Malays and other Bumiputras. Non-Malays had long ago abandoned the stream, voting with their feet and their wallets.

As such, every structural deficiency, every policy failure, and every administrative blunder in the public system disproportionately punishes Bumiputra children. Revamping this broken architecture is not merely an educational goal; it is an urgent national necessity and priority.

Fixing it does not require pouring billions more down the ministry sieve. It merely requires having slightly smarter and far more courageous people be in charge. That is within Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim’s purview to execute.

 

Hudaybiyyah: Peperangan Yang Paling Menetukan Nasib Rasullullah

 Hudaybiyyah: Peperangan Yang Paling Menentukan Nasib Rasulullah

M. Bakri Musa

Dipetik dan disesuaikan daripada Qur’an, Hadith And Hikayat: Exercises In Critical Thinking (2021)

29 hb Ogos, 2026

Nabi Muhammad s.a.w. telah menempuh pelbagai peperangan demi menyebarkan Islam kepada kaum Arab Badawi. Namun, peristiwa paling menentukan dalam misi baginda langsung tidak melibatkan hayunan pedang. Peristiwa itu ialah Perjanjian Hudaybiyyah pada tahun 628 Masihi (6 Hijrah). Satu Surah khas (Al-Fath—Kemenangan) diturunkan mengenainya. Uniknya, Hudaybiyyah bukannya satu pertempuran fizikal, sebaliknya satu perjanjian damai antara kaum Muslimin terawal dengan musyrikin Quraisy di Mekah yang berjaya mengelakkan pertumpahan darah.

Kisah ini bermula apabila Rasulullah dan pengikut baginda bertolak ke Mekah bagi menunaikan hasrat yang sekian lama terpendam—mengerjakan ibadah umrah. Beribu orang jumlah mereka, disemarakkan lagi dengan keghairahan rohani untuk menunaikan ritual Islam yang serba agung ini. Namun, sebaik tiba di luar kota Mekah, di suatu tempat dinamakan Hudaybiyyah, perjalanan mereka terhenti. Pada keesokan harinya, kaum Quraisy menghalang mereka daripada memasuki Mekah. Apabila rundingan awal menemui jalan buntu, bayangan perang saudara yang berdarah mula memuncak—perang bakal sesama sanak-sedara dan sesama ahli suku.

Setelah melalui rundingan yang panjang dan tegang, Rasulullah akhirnya bersetuju untuk menandatangani perjanjian damai. Namun, sekali imbas, syaratnya kelihatan begitu berat sebelah dan memihak kepada kaum Quraisy sehingga Baginda sukar meyakinkan para sahabatnya. Buat julung kalinya, pengikut Baginda secara terbuka mempertikaikan keputusan itu—satu tentangan yang belum pernah berlaku terhadap kewibawaan Baginda.

Antara syarat menindas yang dikenakan oleh pihak Quraisy ialah kaum Muslimin mesti membatalkan niat mereka dan berundur serta-merta, manakala ibadah umrah ditangguhkan ke tahun hadapan. Bagi rombongan yang sudah sekian jauh berjalan dengan semangat keagamaan yang membara, tindakan berundur dalam keadaan matlamat sudah di depan mata adalah sesuatu yang amat sukar diterima.

Akhirnya, Rasulullah berjaya menenteramkan pengikutnya melalui wahyu Ilahi. Di dalamnya, Allah menggambarkan perjanjian tersebut bukannya sebagai satu kekalahan yang menghina, sebaliknya sebagai "kemenangan yang nyata." Maka turunlah ayat pembuka Surah Al-Fath: “Sesungguhnya Kami telah memberikan kepadamu kemenangan yang nyata!” Baginda terpaksa menggunakan autoriti tertinggi—iaitu wahyu daripada Allah—demi menundukkan keresahan pengikutnya.

Janji Allah itu ternyata benar. Apabila kaum Muslimin kembali pada tahun berikutnya untuk menunaikan umrah yang tertangguh, lanskap politik telah berubah sama sekali. Masyarakat Quraisy dan suku berdekatan—yang dahulunya menentang keras—begitu tersentuh dengan kemurahan hati dan diplomasi Rasulullah yang amat berpandangan jauh itu. Akhirnya, mereka memeluk Islam secara beramai-ramai. Sejak saat itu, Islam terus berkembang pesat tanpa pandang ke belakang lagi.

Perjanjian Hudaybiyyah kekal sebagai pengajaran teragung dalam kearifan strategi: kadang-kala kita perlu mengalah dalam satu pertempuran kecil demi memenangi peperangan yang lebih besar. Itulah teras kearifan yang terkandung di dalam Surah Al-Fath.

Lensa Analitis: Pemikiran Kritis Berbanding Sekadar Alunan Suara

Pendekatan saya dalam membaca al-Qur’an adalah ibarat tamsilan klasik mengenai beberapa orang buta dengan gajah. Untuk memahami hakikat keseluruhan, kita mesti meletakkan kepingan gambaran berdasarkan pelbagai pemerhatian separa, disatukan dengan pengalaman hidup serta daya pemikiran kritis kita sendiri. Menerusi lensa ini, kepelbagaian tafsiran bukannya penghalang kepada kefahaman, sebaliknya merupakan bahan asas yang wajar untuk mencapainya.

Allahyaraham cendekiawan Islam, Fazlur Rahman, pernah mengungkapkan perkara ini dengan begitu tepat:  Kita mesti mengekstrak prinsip sejagat yang mendasari sesuatu peristiwa sejarah, lalu mengaplikasikan prinsip tersebut untuk mendepani cabaran zaman kini. Kedua usaha ini menuntut daya pemikiran yang tekun serta pemikiran kritis yang tajam.

Sekadar mengaji dan mengulang bacaan al-Qur’an tanpa henti—seindah mana pun hukum tajwid kita atau semerdu mana pun alunan suara kita—tidak mencukupi. Bersandar semata kepada pembacaan ritual tanpa kefahaman adalah ibarat melambai tongkat sakti sambil menjampi "Abracadabra!"

Ini bukanlah bertujuan meremehkan amalan membaca al-Qur’an. Jika dibaca dengan baik, keindahan bunyinya sanggup menitiskan air mata dan mengangkat jiwa pendengarnya—seperti mana penonton yang langsung tidak faham bahasa Itali atau muzik opera masih boleh terpesona mendengar persembahan aria yang memukau. Namun, keterujaan emosi bukanlah satu wacana intelektual.

Al-Qur’an memperkenalkan konsep fitrah—kecenderungan semulajadi manusia terhadap kebaikan dan kebenaran, serta keadaan suci bersih sewaktu dilahirkan. Apa yang jadi pada diri kita kemudiannya dibentuk oleh persekitaran, asuhan, dan keadaan masyarakat sekeliling. Bagi umat Islam, fitrah kita memang cenderung ke arah kebaikan, tetapi kecenderungan itu hanyalah satu bakat terendam. Ia tidak menjamin kebaikan moral secara automatik, mahupun memandu kita secara sendiri di atas jalan yang lurus.

Sebagai pelengkap kepada fitrah, Allah menumpahkan ‘akal kepada manusia—satu anugerah Ilahi yang unik khusus untuk kita. Menjadi satu kewajipan bagi setiap orang beriman untuk memperdayakan ‘akal mereka sewaktu menekuni wacana keagamaan mahupun hal ehwal semasa. Hanya menerusi pemikiran kritis yang aktif barulah kita bolih memborkatkan fitrah kita dan menterjemahkan al-Qur’an sebagaimana tujuan ia diturunkan: yakni satu petunjuk abadi bagi seluruh umat manusia, sepanjang zaman, dan hingga ke akhir hayat.

Sambungan: Kritikan Terhadap Kajian Hadis

 

Hadith As Sources For Critical Thinking

 

Chapter VII - Hadith As Sources For Critical Thinking

 

M. Bakri Musa

Adapted from my Qur’an, hadith, and Hikayat:  Exercises In Critical Thinking 2021.

July 26, 2026

 

H

adith are sayings attributed to Prophet Muhammad, s.a.w., while sunnah, his recorded activities and customary practices. The operative word there is “attributed.” That is often forgotten or not brought to the fore on purpose. I am excluding here hadith qudsi, where the Prophet, s.a.w, was quoting or repeating what Allah had told him. Recorded with fidelity, those should be regarded as integral parts of the revelations.

 

“Attributed” because the Prophet, s.a.w, discouraged his followers from recording his utterances, believing that those could distract from and override the revelations he had received. How prescient was he!

 

Today and throughout Muslim history, controversies (often violent and never ending) over hadith have split the ummah. It is enough for some, like the Qur’anists, to dispense entirely with hadith and revert to or depend exclusively on the Qur’an. As the Tunisian philosopher Mohamed Talbi wisely observed, Qur’an unites, hadith splits.

 

Those Qur’anists however, are missing a precious gift by ignoring hadith and the associated literature. As Jonathan A C Brown writes in his enchanting book, Misquoting Muhammad: The Challenges and Choices of Interpreting the Prophet’s Legacy, hadith and their commentaries reflect the struggles of early Muslims in seeking balance between reason and revelation, reconciling science with religion, and crystallizing the eternal truths of religious texts in times of changing values and circumstances.

 

Between those who reject hadith (the Qur’anists) on one extreme and those who put hadith on par with if not superior to the Qur’an on the other, are the vast majority of Muslims where the traditional hierarchy stands:  Qur’an, the ultimate and unchallenged guide from Allah; followed by hadith; ijma (consensus); and then qiyas (analogical reasoning). At the local operational or retail level, the fatwas (edicts) of local scholars and judges. 

 

Prophet Muhammad, s.a.w., was the last and exclusive bearer of the revelations. That is the tenet of Islam. As such hadith cannot by definition as well as a matter of faith contradict the Qur’an. Where there are differences between the two or between verses within the Qur’an, those must only be apparent, not real. Meaning, we have not exhausted our ijma and qiyas to reconcile them. The efforts must continue. Nor can differences in revelations be simplictically dismissed through “abrogations” where later revelations take precedence over earlier ones. God’s words are perfect; they do not need re-editing much less abrogating.

 

A variant of the Qur’anist movement is the “Qur’an centric” approach where the focus is on reading the Qur’an to clarify its meanings, using materials from and within the text itself, as per Qur’anic injunction. 

 

Aware of human tendencies and weaknesses, the Prophet, s.a.w., wisely prohibited his followers from recording his deeds or memorizing his words. Those prohibitions notwithstanding, many of his companions and followers nonetheless committed to memory many of his utterances and recorded his many deeds as well as habits. Many would emulate his many personal habits and attire, such as sporting long beards.

 

Memories however, are just that; they are less a sponge to help you absorb everything, more a filter to retain what you desire. Memories of hadith are no different.

 

The collection widely viewed as the most sahih (authentic) is that of Imam Bukhari. He was not born till nearly 200 years after the Prophet’s death, that is, many generations later. We could be generous and assume that the recollections of those upon whom Bukhari relied upon were accurate and reliable. Afterall during his time, the pace of change was glacial. Today with the dizzying speed of change we could hardly remember events and things a mere decade ago. Who could recall the sweet voices of those switchboard ladies or the rotary analog phones of only a generation ago?

 

Bukhari in his piety, honesty, and humility admitted the limitations of his methodology of depending on isnads, the uninterrupted chain of narrators. In the introduction to his encyclopedic collection, he acknowledged that he may have included a few false and excluded other authentic hadith. Muslims in our fervor have forgotten his caution. Nor were those narrators neutral players and recollectors. They were for the most part members of the establishment of their time, with their bias (acknowledged or otherwise) towards maintaining the staus quo and that power that be. No surprise that the hadith collection of the shiites are substantially different from that of the sunnis.

 

Next:  A Critique of Traditional Approaches to Hadith

 

Sumbangan Kajian Bukan Agama Terhadap Memahami Al-Qur'an

 Sumbangan Kajian Bukan Agama Terhadap Memahami Al-Qur'an

M. Bakri Musa

23 hb Julai 2026

Petikan daripadabuku saya Qur’an, Hadith And Hikayat: Exercises In Critical Thinking (2021)

Shahrour memberi penghormatan kepada rakan sejawatnya di Jabatan Linguistik yang menggunakan teori bahasa dan tatabahasa moden untuk membantu memahami al-Qur'an. Kita juga patut mencontohi Shahrour dan memanfaatkan segala wadah yang ada untuk mencapai kefahaman yang lebih mendalam terhadap kitab suci al-Qur'an.

Tokoh ilmuwan Islam pada masa lampau melakukan perkara yang sama persis. Mereka pelajari ilmu falsafah daripada masyarakat Yunani purba dan menggunakannya sebagai reja untuk memahami al-Qur'an. Para cendekiawan Muslim awal itu sedikit pun tidak berasa tergugat atau gusar untuk belajar daripada orang Yunani yang tidak percaya pada Tuhan. Mereka (yakni cerdik pandai Yunani purba) juga mempunyai satu dua perkara yang boleh mereka ajarkan kepada kita orang yang beriman, khususnya umat Islam.

Masyarakat Islam awal itu begitu juga yakin dengan pegangan mereka. Mereka percaya sebulat hati bahawa segala ilmu pada hakikatnya bersumberkan daripada Tuhan. Mengapa Dia dengan segala kebijaksanaan-Nya memilih untuk mengurniakan cetusan pemikiran tersebut kepada masyarakat Yunani purba yang tidak bertuhan itu, bukanlah urusan kita untuk mempersoalkannya, melainkan untuk kita pelajari dan ambil manfaatnya. Umat Islam terdahulu banyak belajar daripada orang Yunani, seperti dalam hal menggunakan akal fikiran dan kaedah pemerhatian. Hasilnya, sains berkembang mekar sewaktu Zaman Kegemilangan Islam. Inilah iktibar paling penting buat umat Islam semasa: untuk belajar dan menghargai, atau lebih tepat lagi, untuk belajar semula dan menghargai semula.

Hari ini wujud pengiktirafan yang meluas mengenai dua bahagian yang jelas berbeza di dalam al-Qur'an: yakni ayat-ayat Makkiyah yang awal berbanding ayat-ayat Madaniyah yang terkemudian. Sebelum Shahrour, seorang reformis dari Sudan bernama Mahmoud Mohamed Taha—yang secara kebetulan juga merupakan seorang jurutera—memberi pemikiran yang serupa dalam bukunya The Second Message of Islam (Perutusan Kedua Islam). Seorang lagi reformis pada abad lalu berasal dari India, iaitu Asghar Ali Engineer. Ya, "Engineer" (Jurutera) adalah sebahagian daripada namanya, dan beliau juga bekerja sebagai jurutera selama 20 tahun sebelum menumpukan seluruh hidupnya kepada usaha pembaharuan Islam.

Berbeza dengan ketiga tokoh Islam abad ke-20 ini yang kebetulan merupakan seorang jurutera, golongan sejawat mereka seratus tahun kemudian yang turut terjun dalam urusan Islam mempunyai kehebatan yang jauh daripada murni. Gambetta dan Hertog dalam buku mereka Engineers of Jihad (2017), memperincikan jumlah jurutera yang terlibat dalam gerakan Islam radikal. Antaranya yang paling jelek ialah Osama Bin Laden. Malaysia juga tidak terkecuali daripada fenomena ini, termasuklah pengebom Bali, Azahari Husin, yang memegang ijazah PhD dalam bidang kejuruteraan dari Universiti Reading.

Kita sepatutnya menerapkan intipati daripada segala teori kritikan moden sastera apabila membaca al-Qur'an dan rencana agama. Mengikut Reader Response Theory (Teori Tindak Balas Pembaca) oleh Rosenblatt, seseorang itu harus melibatkan sepenuhnya keupayaan unik serta latar belakang budaya dan peribadi tersendiri semasa menelusuri sesebuah teks. Oleh yang demikian, seseorang guru harus mengelak daripada memaksakan “tanggapan awal tentang cara yang betul untuk bertindak balas terhadap sesebuah karya dan rencana.” Karya penulis Inggeris Charles Dickens juga membangkitkan kesan emosi yang sama hebatnya dalam kalangan pembaca, sama ada mereka berada di zaman Victoria England, di Britain hari ini, mahupun di sebuah kampung Melayu. Setiap pembaca membawa pengalaman unik persenderian untuk dihubungkan dengan plot, latar, perlambangan, dan watak yang dipaparkan.

Walaupun al-Qur'an itu bukanlah sebuah karya sastera sebagaimana yang kita fahami secara umum, namun apabila membacanya, kita harus menggunakan segala kemahiran sastera yang ada demi memahaminya dengan lebih baik. Kita harus melihat melampaui watak-watak yang ada—seperti kisah Luqman yang disebutkan sebelum ini—sehinggalah kepada pelbagai peristiwa penting serta liku-liku plot utama dalam garis masa kerasulan Nabi Muhammad SAW.

 

Contributions Of Non-Religious Disciplines To Understanding The Qur'an

 

Contributions of Non-Religious Disciplines To Understanding The Qur’an

M. Bakri Musa

July 19, 2026

Excerpted and adapted from Qur’an, Hadith And Hikayat: Exercises In Critical Thinking (2021)

 

The late Syrian scholar Muhammad Shahrour once paid a glowing tribute to his colleagues at the University of Damascus’s Linguistics Department. He freely credited them with using modern theories of language, structuralism, and grammar to help untangle his own understanding of the Qur’an. Likewise, modern Muslims should eagerly emulate Shahrour. We must aggressively leverage every contemporary analytical tool available—whether forged in the East or the West—to better comprehend our Holy Book, rather than treating it as a stagnant crystalized artifact frozen in seventh-century Arabia.

Our historical luminaries during the Islamic Golden Era did precisely that. They did not suffer from the intellectual insecurities that plague today’s ulama. Those early scholars eagerly devoured philosophy from the ancient Greeks and weaponized that alien logic to analyze and articulate the truths of the Qur’an. They were not at all perturbed about learning from those godless, pagan Greeks. They rightly recognized that Aristotle and Plato had a thing or two to teach us believers.

Those early Muslims possessed a robust, supreme confidence in their faith. They believed to their very marrow that all knowledge ultimately originates from the Creator. If He, in His infinite and inscrutable wisdom, chose to impart profound rational insights to those ancient, toga-wearing, non-believing Greeks, it was not for us to question His divine distribution system. Our job was simply to learn, absorb, and benefit. By marrying Greek deductive reasoning with empirical observation, science blossomed in the Islamic world while Europe was still trapped in the dark mud of the Middle Ages. That is the crucial diagnostic lesson for today’s stagnant Muslim ummah: we must re-learn how to learn.

Today, there is wide academic acceptance of the two distinct textual and thematic halves of the Qur’an: the early, universally spiritual Meccan verses versus the later, highly contextual and political Medinan ones. Decades before Shahrour popularized this, the tragic Sudanese reformer Mahmoud Mohamed Taha—coincidentally also an engineer by training—argued this exact thesis in his seminal, fatal work, The Second Message of Islam. Another towering reformer of the last century was India's Asghar Ali Engineer. Yes, “Engineer” was literally his surname, and he practiced the profession for twenty years before turning his analytical mind toward dismantling the crust of orthodox Islamic jurisprudence.

There is a fascinating, if dark, irony here. While those 20th-century Muslim luminaries used their engineering mindsets for benign reformation, their counterparts a century later used the exact same technical training towards far more malignant ends. As Diego Gambetta and Steffen Hertog documented in their 2017 Engineers of Jihad, there is a bizarrely disproportionate number of engineers embedded within violent radical Islamic movements. Osama bin Laden is the obvious poster boy, but Malaysia too contributed her own lethal share to this statistic. Consider Azahari Husin, the brilliant mastermind behind the horrific Bali bombings—he wasn’t a product of some backwater madrasah (religious school), but a man holding an engineering PhD from the University of Reading. When an engineering mind lacks the humanizing guardrails of the liberal arts, it treats theology like a rigid plumbing blueprint, with catastrophic results.

This is precisely why we must apply the nuanced insights of modern literary analyses when reading the Qur’an. Take Louise Rosenblatt’s Reader-Response Theory. She argued that readers must fully engage their own unique cognitive capacity, cultural milieu, and personal biography when interacting with a text. A rigid teacher should never impose preconceived dogmas on how one ought to react to a work.

Consider Charles Dickens. His vivid narratives evoke the exact same visceral, tear-jerking emotional responses whether the reader is a wealthy aristocrat in Victorian London, a commuter on the London Underground today, or a barefoot Malay boy sitting in a rustic kampung (village) stilt house. Readers bring their own unique luggage of human experience to bear on the plots, scenery, and characters.

While the Qur’an is obviously not a mere piece of human literature, nonetheless when we open its pages we must still utilize our highest literary and cognitive faculties to truly digest it. We must look past the static historical characters—like the wise Luqman I cited earlier—and trace the sweeping narrative arcs, the psychological tensions, and the dramatic twists and turns inherent in Prophet Muhammad’s grueling twenty-three-year prophetic journey. Only then will the text come alive, transforming from a chanted ritual into a dynamic manual for the modern intellect.

Next:  Hudaybiyyah:  The Prophet’s Most Pivotal Early Battle

Kinsey Tanpa Sinonim Petra Shahrour Membaca Al-Qur'an

 Konsep Tanpa Sinonim Petua Shahrour Membaca Al-Qur'an

M. Bakri Musa 

12 hb Julai 2026 

Petikan daripada Qur’an, Hadith And Hikayat: Exercises In Critical Thinking (2021)

Bila membaca Al-Qur'an, sifat seorang jurutera dari Syria, Mohamad Shahrour, ialah untuk  mendorong kita menetapkan andaian terlebih dahulu, kemudian menilai dan menguji andaian tersebut secara berterusan sepanjang kita membaca Kitab Suci itu.

Andaian pertamanya ialah konsep tanpa sinonim (tiada persamaan makna mutlak). Apabila Allah menggunakan dua istilah yang berbeza, Dia pastinya memaksudkan dan merujuk kepada dua perkara yang berbeza. Kita tidak boleh mengandaikan keduanya sebagai sama makna (sinonim), atau menganggap Allah berbuat demikian sekadar untuk gaya sastera atau kepelbagaian bahasa—seperti mana Shakespeare yang tidak pernah menggunakan perkataan yang sama dua kali dalam satu ayat. Allah tidak perlu menonjolkan kehebatan sastera atau kekayaan perbendaharaan kata-Nya.

Shahrour menumpukan kepada dua istilah penting, yakni Al-Qur’an dan Al-Kitab. Bagi Shahrour, kedua istilah itu mesti membawa maksud yang berbeza dan tidak boleh ditukar ganti sesuka hati pembaca. Bagi menegaskan perkara ini, beliau merujuk kepada banyak keadaan di dalam Al-Qur'an di mana kedua perkataan itu digunakan dalam ayat yang sama.

Kepada Shahrour, Al-Kitab merujuk kepada wahyu sama yang telah Allah turunkan sebelumnya kepada para nabi terdahulu, bermula dari Nabi Adam sehinggalah kepada Musa dan Isa, sebelum berakhir dengan Muhammad s.a.w. Al-Kitab mencerminkan mesej universal yang sama seperti yang terkandung dalam wahyu terdahulu seperti Taurat dan Injil (Bible). Nabi Muhammad, s.a.w., menerima wahya itu di peringkat awal kenabian baginda, yang secara kolektifnya dirujuk sebagai ayat-ayat Makkiyah. Ia mengandungi mesej universal yang sama tentang keadilan, rahmat, dan keterangkuman seperti wahyu terdahulu, contohnya “tiada paksaan dalam agama” (2:256) dan “Mereka yang terbaik di antara kamu adalah mereka yang berkhidmat kepada masyarakat" (2:238).

Al-Qur’an pula merujuk kepada wahyu yang khusus mengikut zaman serta budaya, yang diterima oleh Nabi ketika baginda sedang membina Masyarakat Islam pertama di Madinah—iaitu ayat-ayat Madaniyah. Kota tersebut sememangnya sudah mempunyai masyarakat yang mapan dan rencam yang terdiri daripada kaum Yahudi, Kristian, Pagan, dan ateis semasa kenabian Muhammad s.a.w. mula muncul.

Oleh sebab itu Baginda terpaksa berhadapan dengan masalah harian dalam tadbir urus sebuah masyarakat yang sedia ada dan pelbagai kaum dan agama yang ketika itu belum lagi menerima keabsahan agama baharu ini. Maknanya, Baginda terpaksa berhadapan dengan realiti getir seperti cara mengendalikan musuh dalam selimut, orang munafik, serta pengkhianat (tali barut) yang berniat busk untuk memusnahkan penguasa baharu ini. Wahyu seperti “bunuhlah si-musyrik" (9:5) berlaku pada tahun awal di Madinah. Itu mencerminkan perjuangan parah dan getir yang dihadapi oleh masyarakat agama baru ini.

Para sarjana lama mengakui bahawa Al-Qur'an mengandungi dua bahagian yang jelas berbeza. Satu mempunyai mesej universal, seperti pada zaman awal Makkiyah (komponen yang dirujuk oleh Shahrour sebagai Al-Kitab); dan satu lagi, ayat Madaniyah yang lebih khusus. Apa yang mengelirukan ialah komponen khusus itu juga dirujuk sebagai Al-Qur’an—istilah sama yang digunakan untuk gabungan kedua-duanya sekali.

Ulama silam menyelaraskan dua percanggahan yang ketara ini—antara mesej Al-Qur'an yang universal, aman, dan murni pada zaman awal Makkiyah, berbanding wahyu yang khusus mengikut budaya dan zaman di Madinah—melalui konsep “nasakh” atau pembatalan. Yakni ayat Madaniyah yang turun di kemudian “membatalkan” ayat Makkiyah yang terdahulu. Namun seperti yang ditegaskan oleh Shahrour, tidak ada apa di dalam Al-Qur’an yang mencadangkan atau memberi bayangan sedemikian. Mengatakan bahawa wahyu Tuhan perlu disunting, dipinda, atau “dibatalkan” tidak selari dengan konsep Tuhan yang Maha Sempurna dan Maha Mengetahui.

Satu lagi pasangan istilah, mukmin dan muslimin, juga kerap digunakan dalam ayat yang sama. Pasti ada perbezaan antara keduanya. Bagi Shahrour, mukmin bermaksud orang yang beriman—kategori umum yang merangkumi orang Yahudi, Kristian, dan Zoroaster sebelum kedatangan Islam—manakala muslim merujuk kepada kelompok kecil (subset) orang beriman yang mengikut Rasul Terakhir, atau orang Islam seperti yang kita fahami hari ini.

Al-Qur'an menyatakan bahawa kita semua dilahirkan sebagai orang yang beriman, yakni seorang mukmin. Hanya melalui ikutan ibu bapa kita menjadi Yahudi, Kristian, Muslim, dan lain-lain. Ini menjelaskan trend semasa yang merujuk kepada saudara baharu Islam bukan sebagai convert (mualaf/saudara baru), seperti amalan sebelum ini, tetapi sebagai revert(kembali). Mereka sememangnya sudah menjadi seorang Muslim (atau lebih tepatnya mukmin) sejak lahir, dan kini kembali kepada fitrah tersebut, iaitu status asal kelahiran mereka.

Seterusnya: Sumbangan Disiplin Bukan Agama dalam Memahami Al-Qur'an

 

Sahrour's Concept of Non-Synonymity On Reading The Qur'an

 Shahrour’s Concept of Non-Synonymity on Reading The Qur’an

M. Bakri Musa

July 12, 2026

Excerpted from Qur’an, Hadith And Hikayat: Exercises In Critical Thinking (2021)

 

In reading the Qur’an, the engineer in Shahrour would have him first set his assumptions, and then continually assessed and tested them as he read the Holy Book.

 

His first was the concept of non-synonymity. When Allah uses two separate terms, He must mean and refer to two different things. We cannot assume the two to be synonymous or Allah doing it for the sake of literary style or variety, as with Shakespeare never using the same word twice in a sentence. Allah has little need to display his literary prowess or rich vocabulary.

 

Shahrour focused on two pivotal words:  Al Qur’an and Al Kitab. To Shahrour those two terms must mean different things and cannot be used interchangeably at the reader’s whim. To emphasize this point, he referred to the more than a few occasions in the Qur’an where the two terms are used in the same ayat.

 

From his reading Shahrour concluded that Al Kitab refers to the same revelations Allah had previously given to His earlier prophets, from Adam down to Musa (Moses) and Isa (Jesus), before ending with the Last Messenger, Muhammad, s.a.w. Al Kitab reflects the same universal message as contained in those earlier revelations like the Torah and the Bible. The Prophet received those revelations early in his prophethood, collectively referred to as the Meccan verses. They contain the same universal message of justice, mercy, and inclusiveness of previous revelations as with “there shall be no compulsion in matters of faith,” (2:256) and “the best among you are the ones who serve the community” (2:238).

 

Al Qur’an on the other hand refers to the era- as well as culture-specific revelations the Prophet received as he was setting up the first Muslim community in Medinah, the so-called Medinah verses. That city already had an established and diverse society of Jews, Christians, Pagans, and outright atheists when Muhammad, s.a.w., arrived. 

 

As such he had to deal with the practicalities of governance in an already established and diverse community that had as yet to accept the legitimacy of this new faith. Meaning, he had to confront such raw realities as to how to handle potential saboteurs, hypocrites, and fifth column elements intent on destroying this new usurper of power. The “kill the infidels” (9:5) types of revelations occurred during those early Medinan years reflecting the struggle the new faith.

 

Scholars have long acknowledged that the Qur’an contains two distinct components. One has the universal message, as with the earlier Meccan period (the component that Shahrour refers to as Al Kitab); the other, the more specific Medinan verses. To confuse matters, that component is also referred to as Al Qur’an, the same term for the combination of the two.

 

Ancient scholars reconciled the two apparent contradictions between the Qur’an’s universal, peaceful, and uplifting messages of the earlier Meccan period versus the culture and era specific revelations through “abrogation,” whereby the later Medinan verses “abrogate” earlier Meccan ones. As Shahrour pointed out, there is nothing in the Qur’an to suggest or even infer this. To suggest that God’s revelations had to be edited, amended, or otherwise “abrogated” would not square with the Islamic concept of God being Perfect and All-Knowing.

 

Another pair of terms, mukmin and muslimin, are also frequently used in the same sentence. There must be a difference between the two. To Shahrour, mukmim means believers, the generic variety that would include Jews, Christians and Zorastarians before Islam came, while muslim refers to the subset of believers who follow the Last Messenger, or Muslims as we understand the term today.

 

The Qur’an states that we are all born a believer, a mukmin. Only through our parents we become Jews, Christians, Muslims, and others. That explains the current fashion in referring to new Muslims not as converts, as was the previous practice, but reverts. They were already a Muslim (or mukmin to be accurate) at birth and now reverting to that fitra, or original birth status.

 

Next: Contributions of Non-Religious Disciplines to Understanding The Qur’an