Historical Criticism and Recent Trends in Western Scholarship on the Qur’an: Some Hermeneutic Reflections
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Abstract
Purpose: The article examines how a historical-critical approach to the Qur’an differs from premodern Islamic exegesis and explores avenues for cross-pollination between Qur’anic scholarship as conducted at Western universities and in the Islamic world.
Methodology: Synthetic, comparative.
Findings: Recent Western research on the Qur’an has yielded results that are apt to interest scholars based in the Islamic world even if some of them may not be prepared to accept the historical-critical approach in its entirety. These results include a close comparison between Qur’anic narrative, on the one hand, and ancient Jewish and Christian traditions, on the other. Such a comparison permits a deepened understanding of the specificity of Qur’anic doctrine against its contemporary intellectual background. Moreover, the last few decades have witnessed a strong interest among Western scholars in the literary and rhetorical structure of the Qur’an. There is increasing awareness that the literary and rhetorical analysis of the Qur’an, even if practiced from a historical-critical perspective, can significantly benefit from Islamic scholarship.
Originality: The article synthesizes recent developments in Qur’anic studies in the light of comparative hermeneutics.
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Historical-critical methodWestern Scholarship on the Qur’anhermeneuticsancient Jewish and Christian traditionsliterary and rhetorical structure of the Qur’an
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