Voices of Islam (21 page)

The ‘‘Three Books’’: The Qur’an as Logos

What is most important about the unique formal features of the Arabic Qur’an is not their linguistic or literary dimensions as such. What matters most is that each of these distinctive rhetorical elements helps the reader grasp immediately the constant Qur’anic insistence that its actual Reality is the Logos, the creative divine ‘‘Word.’’ Among the many symbolic

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expressions used by the Qur’an for this Reality are ‘‘The Book,’’ ‘‘Wisdom,’’ ‘‘The Mother of the Book’’ (
Umm al-Kitab
), and ‘‘The Criterion’’ (
al- Furqan
). In other words, as traditional interpreters have so frequently pointed out, the Qur’an presents itself as a spiritual mirror whose verses reflect and reveal the divine ‘‘Signs on the horizons and in their own souls’’ (Qur’an 41:53). The comprehensive interrelatedness between the Qur’an’s verses and the Signs constituting all creation is the metaphysical counterpart of the holographic ‘‘rhetoric of allusion’’ referred to above, which discloses new meanings in every new circumstance and situation. As later interpreters put it, this earthly revealed book is meant to reveal the correspondence between the two cosmic ‘‘Books’’—of the Spirit and of all creation—which the Spirit both mirrors and informs.

However, such grand correspondences are never presented in the Qur’an as concepts to be intellectualized or mentally ‘‘believed.’’ This is because
iman,
or true faith, is a spiritual reality and essential connection of a different order. Instead, each reader/reciter of the Qur’an very gradually discovers its essential Reality by coming to recognize the revelatory correspondences that connect each of the Qur’an’s stories, parables, ‘‘likenesses,’’ scriptural epi- sodes, reminders, and symbols with their existential manifestations. In the Qur’anic perspective, it is above all spiritual practice and right action (
‘amal
) that opens the way to true understanding (
‘ilm
). In this respect, for most beginning readers, the Qur’an can more fruitfully be compared, in its perva- sive ontological focus and uniquely allusive mythic and symbolic structure, to such Asian religious classics as the Vedas, Upanishads,
I Ching,
or
Tao Te Ching,
rather than the familiar King James Bible.
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Interpretive Principles

Trusting One’s Intuitions

The language of the Qur’an makes exquisite sense as a comprehensive and revealing ‘‘phenomenology of the Spirit’’—a characterization that is illus- trated, not by theological claims, but by its revelatory re-creations in the mas- terpieces of the Islamic humanities, whether literary, visual, or musical. However, the very uniqueness and specifi of the Qur’an’s spiritual vocabulary means that the English equivalents adopted in most translations of the Qur’an simply do not make much sense in many places. This is due in part to the lack of English equivalent terms, concepts, and symbols, along with the distinctive Arabic rhetorical and grammatical dimensions alluded to above. But perhaps equally important, the opacity of translations often refl the peculiar cultural associations surrounding English Biblical lan- guage. One quickly discovers as a teacher, for example, that most American undergraduates, whatever their family and personal religious background, can- not encounter the word ‘‘sin’’ without immediately associating it with a

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peculiar set of historical–cultural assumptions concerning doctrines of ‘‘origi- nal sin’’ and related Biblical associations. However, the complex Qur’anic vocabulary that uniquely expresses the various degrees and consequences of right actions and intentions (and their contraries) refers to spiritual and psycho- logical states that are intimately familiar to each human being, without requir- ing any further reference to particular cultural contexts or beliefs.

The practical upshot of this observation is very simple: wherever one finds that something in a translated version of the Qur’an does not make sense, and especially when it appears to blatantly contradict one’s most basic spiri- tual and ethical common sense (what the Qur’an calls our universal human
fi a
), the underlying diffi ulty is almost certainly due to an inadequacy of translation. In most cases, such misunderstandings can be cleared up by using the Kassis’s
Concordance of the Qur’an,
referring back to the underlying Arabic root of the pertinent Qur’anic term and the other contexts in which it is used (along with the English synonyms and other translator’s usages also cited by Kassis for each root).

Discovering the Spiritual Virtues

One particularly important aspect of the Qur’an defying adequate transla- tion is the spiritual virtues, especially since these virtues constitute the practi- cal core of the Qur’an in human terms. It is revealing in this respect to note that Muslims have repeatedly adopted into their own vernacular languages many of the key Qur’anic terms for the spiritual virtues. The problem here is not just one of translation, but also of the basic fact that human beings (and the cultures they constitute) tend to reduce the unique reality and inspired spiritual realization underlying each Qur’anic virtue to more familiar social, ethical, and political norms.
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For example, it makes relatively little difference whether one employs En- glish words like ‘‘patience’’ or ‘‘perseverance’’ for the Qur’anic term
sabr.
Such words alone simply cannot convey the key dimension of the suffering soul’s struggle to discover the unique divine purpose that underlies its par- ticular situation of suffering. This is an individually unique illumination that each person is forced to rediscover whenever this spiritual virtue is brought into play. So
sabr
is not about suffering or grudging patience as such, but rather about the active inner search and eventual discovery of the transforma- tive spiritual lesson underlying each test we undergo. But translators, under- standably, cannot use such lengthy paraphrases for each key technical term in their Qur’an.

The same is true for each of the spiritual virtues in the Qur’an, as well as for the culturally specific images of those Prophetic exemplars (Job, for example, in the case of
sabr
) who are subject to the familiar historical processes of rou- tinization and misunderstanding. Here again, the Islamic humanities have often come to the rescue, precisely because of the recurrent necessity of

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fi appropriate and spiritually effective means for communicating the realities expressed by such archetypal Qur’anic images and symbols.

The ‘‘Voices’’ of the Qur’an

Another important interpretive principle that is present throughout the Qur’an—while being normally invisible in most Western translations—is the understanding that God (or the truly ultimate Reality,
al-Haqq
) is the Speaker and Subject behind the mysterious play of constantly shifting voices (whether I, ‘‘We,’’ the unnamed Narrator, Muhammad, or other prophets and individual actors) and audiences in the Qur’anic text. This constant and often mysterious shift of perspectives is one of the most distinctive rhetorical and structural features of the Qur’an. In the fi l analysis, all possible per- spectives and persons are included within the One Real. In the later Islamic humanities, this interplay of shifting but ultimately Unitary perspectives and points of view is beautifully illustrated in many of the most extraordinary masterpieces of Islamic art, such as the incomparable lyrics of the Persian poet Hafez or the paintings of Behzad. So far, however, translators have not only failed to highlight this extraordinary semantic dimension of the Qur’an but have also often attempted to ‘‘polish’’ and gloss over these repeated, inten- tionally mysterious shifts among the different divine/human/Prophetic voi- ces and perspectives.

Any translation of the Qur’an that adequately refl such shifts in per- spective and their accompanying pronoun indeterminacies (that is, who is it that is really speaking, and to whom?) confronts the English reader with what at fi appear to be bizarre and even paradoxical ambiguities, unexplained jumps, and undefined subjects, audiences, and references. Certain Qur’anic verses and phrases (such as Qur’an 17:1 or 2:285–286), when translated lit- erally, read like a kind of literary ‘‘Moebius strip,’’ in which the initial Voice and its apparent addressee are supplanted, replaced, or even apparently reversed by the time one reaches the end of a single short passage. In such sit- uations, the English reader must pay particularly close attention, just as when deciphering an unusually challenging poem (for example, Pound’s
Cantos
), to note and then refl t upon the cinematic yet meaningful fluidity of this unique Qur’anic discourse.

Who Is Addressed by the Qur’anic Speech?

This interpretive principle has already been suggested by the points just discussed concerning the shifting voices and perspectives of the Qur’an. However, in existential and spiritual terms it is even more decisive. Although the Prophet Muhammad is often apparently the initial intended ‘‘receiver’’ of Qur’anic verses, a crucial mystery for all other readers of the Qur’an is their own individual relationship to the recurrent
singular
‘‘you’’ that marks

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God’s address to the Prophet in the Qur’anic text. This constant dramatic interplay between the singular ‘‘you’’ directly addressed to the Prophet and the publicly plural ‘‘you’’ (in the sense of ‘‘you people in general’’), which runs throughout the Qur’an, can be seen as a kind of Qur’anic representation of the mystery of transubstantiation.

In other words, the mystery of the singular ‘‘you’’ initially addressed to the Prophet is the repeated invitation to each reader/reciter/listener to redis- cover—indeed quite literally to ‘‘remember’’ (the central Qur’anic theme of
dhikr
)—our shared human nature as Spirit. Each momentary glimpse of this reality of our being—of what it means to
be
Spirit—is itself a renewed revelation. The recurrent challenge and summons to actualize oneself in Spi- rit is lost in most English translations of the Qur’an, even those that attempt to more clearly distinguish these two radically different forms of ‘‘you.’’

Similar problems with metaphysical and spiritual implications are raised by the other distinctive voices in the Qur’an, such as the ‘‘We’’ that stands in dramatic contrast to the otherwise nameless Narrator, the rare divine ‘‘I’’ that stands for the most intimate Subject of the Qur’anic discourse, or the constant references to the unnameable Essence (
Huwa
) of the ultimately Real. From the earliest eras of Islamic history, cautious theological inter- preters have attempted to gloss over such potentially troubling dilemmas, explaining the recurrent ‘‘We,’’ for example, as the collective plural voice of all the divine names and attributes. But such facile verbal formulations are by no means universally accepted. Paradoxically, in such cases, the non- Muslim reader’s encounter with a bare English translation of such central Qur’anic ambiguities may actually provoke more serious and open-ended spiritual and metaphysical reflections than are normally found in more tradi- tional hermeneutical contexts.

Scattering, Singularity, and Repetition

Another important interpretive principle of the Qur’an involves the inter- play between the scattering and the dispersal of its teachings (especially those that are metaphysical and eschatological) throughout the text, and the strik- ing contrast between certain
repeated
injunctions and other uniquely
singu- lar
symbols and expressions. Fortunately, these hermeneutical challenges are normally as apparent in translations as in the original Arabic. The Qur’an as a whole is marked by an elaborately detailed symbolic coherence, particu- larly in the details of its eschatological teachings, which integrate literally hundreds of scattered verses. This coherence is also refl in the similar correspondences between the Qur’an’s depiction of the ontological stages of manifestation of the divine Spirit and the corresponding stages of the human soul’s spiritual purifi and return to its Source. In general, the Suras of the Qur’an from all periods tend to cite repeatedly certain themes and images, especially with regard to practical ethical teachings that are

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understandable and applicable to everyone: for example, warnings of the Judgment, reminders of the rewards for the righteous, and so on.

However, careful readers of the Qur’an will soon begin to pick out a vari- ety of rarer, often strange, and initially puzzling images and symbols—such as the different cosmic ‘‘Trees’’ mentioned in the Qur’an, or the seven paral- lel names assigned to different Gardens and Fires—which initially might appear opaque and mystifying. To a great extent, the attempt to piece together and make sense of such scattered symbolic expressions is necessarily driven by each reader’s individual sense of ‘‘cognitive dissonance.’’ Simply put, this means that attentive readers will find it particularly revealing to focus on apparent contradictions, inconsistencies (whether ethical, metaphysical, spiritual, or simply logical), or apparent mysteries in the Qur’an. When one reads the Qur’an seriously, this task amounts to resolving an immense sym- bolic and metaphysical puzzle.

Many of these initially puzzling metaphysical and eschatological ‘‘contra- dictions’’ are not always resolved, but are instead simply taken for granted in later systems of Islamic thought. And in any case, prepackaged theological ‘‘resolutions’’ of such problematic passages are quite distinct from the far more demanding—and rewarding—spiritual tasks that arise when those Qur’anic mysteries interact with the personal challenges that are raised for each reader by his or her own spiritual situation. Such central existential issues include the recurrent Qur’anic themes of theodicy, divine Justice, undeserved suffering, and the mystery of outwardly arbitrary destinies and earthly conditions. Serious study of the Qur’an is profoundly ‘‘interactive’’ in just this sense, and as such, it is intrinsically a lifelong process. The effects of actively exploring and working through the Qur’anic perspectives on such unavoidable spiritual questions are radically different from simply agreeing conceptually with this or that interpretive ‘‘resolution’’ drawn from later her- meneutical traditions.