Understanding the place of The Study Quran

but to strive for better understanding with adeb and civility in a manner befitting the greatness of the legacy we aspire to represent and uphold I would like to begin by thanking our primary donor for tonight's events he doesn't want his name to be mentioned but he's asked us instead to pray for his grandmother Ahmed Anissa also known as Bibi Jan who died in childbirth bringing his father into the world may Allah forgive her and accept all of our prayers for her forgiveness in a wonderful hadith are saying of the prophet muhammad salallahu alaihe salam we're informed that when a person dies his deeds come to an end except for three things sabotage area for charity that endures knowledge which is beneficial or a virtuous descendant who prays for the deceased so we pray Allah humma kavula ha what ham ham along with fiddly shahida now bhai even a was not eating our chameleon our Thackeray now my own fauna Allah Aman creates a home in a Ferrari he Allah Islam moment of our fates a human a photographer who al aliy man I mean I'd also like to thank dr. Munir Jeeva the center for Islamic studies for partnering with us for tonight's program and for supporting the many activities of the Sunna College on the hill in so many ways before we begin let me also announce that we have an incredible lineup of events and programs on the horizon next week On January 28th there is a vocal acapella performance by was a Nia ensemble their music is intended to lift the soul and to encourage a connection with the beauty of the Quran also we have present brother Hassan Al Jie in the audience with us he'll be performing a dramatic reading of the 40 rules of love which is on the journey of champs of Tabriz to Konya in the 13th century that'll be in the first week of February and the next main event for the Center for Islamic studies is in raishin with dr. Hatton Bosnian and the Center for race and gender at UC Berkeley entitled Institute institutionalizing Islamophobia critiquing the countering violent extremism CVE framework and emerging programs which will be on February 5th and 6th in both law school on for every 27 as a tuna has its annual benefit dinner in the Bay Area please come out to support us so we can bring more such programs to you and also educate and prepare the next generation and on March 4th to 5th we have a major conference right here in this hall on revisiting the relationship between reason and revelation in the thought of Imam al-ghazali so stay tuned for our coming up and we hope to see many of you here with us turning now to tonight's event the study of Quran is perhaps the most significant publication on Islam in the English language in modern history it's my opinion you don't have to agree with its contents but it's a significant publication a collaborative effort among Muslim academics that took a decade of scholarly labor to complete under the leadership of Professor Syed Hasan us the study of Quran gives the English reader access to the great works of tafseer in the classical scholarly tradition mediated and this is key mediated by the intense scholarly research analysis and creative synthesis of five Muslim academics who have drawn from 40 major sources from the classical exegetical tradition sources that are juristic a mystical theological philosophical and linguistic from the whole breadth from both the Sunni and she traditions both Sunni and she perspectives as such the work carries its own voice as a synthesis it should be considered not as one that simply transmits the tradition of the past but as a work that processes and recasts it among the questions that such a study raises are the following and these are the some of the prompts we've asked our distinguished guests whom I will introduce in a moment to address can Muslims view it the study of Quran as a devotional text if it doesn't fully represent any single tradition within Islam which school of thought if any does this study for an represent if none or all what does that even mean number two should readers who are not Muslim view the book as an objective source on Islam even if it s choose Western academic approaches to the study of the Quran to quote from the general introduction I quote in as much as the Quran is the central sacred revealed reality for Muslims the study Quran addresses it as such and does not limit it to a work a merely historical social or linguistic interest divorced from its sacred and revealed character end quote now this approach stands in stark contrast to what it is acceptable in the academic study of religion how should the work be received and taught in American colleges and university classrooms so in some that's two questions so far number one how should Muslims receive the study Quran and number two how should the Academy receive the study Quran add to these two a third as a work produced by Muslim academics with qualifications from and professional careers in Western colleges and universities does the study Quran shift Authority away from the tradition and traditional scholars in a manner that challenges the consensus reached by them in centuries past so those are three broad framing questions that we'd like our speaker to address initially before we go into conversation with the panelists and inshallah with the audience so tonight we look forward to a riveting conversation around these questions and more with one of the general editors and authors of significant portions of the study Quran Joseph Lombard we also have with us two faculty members on stage as Ted Elliott aji and Abdul Ali whom I will introduce when we get to the discussion portion a little later I would be remiss not to mention that we have also invited Zaytuna faculty member dr. Rania Awad to be with us we had invited her on the panel but she was unable to be here because of another commitment and this is a special note to the hashtag all-male panel movement that has been calling out Muslim institutions for the lack of gender diversity point noted but please note from our side the tremendously rich and diversity of Zaytuna College faculty and staff that consists of women and men on the faculty and on the executive leadership and throughout the staff scholars educated in both traditional Muslim and West Western academic institutions Muslims and members of other faiths we are blessed with one of the finest and most diverse faculties of any undergraduate liberal arts college offering a major in Islamic theology law and theology in the country thanks to your continued support and prayers by the grace of God hamdulillah turning now to our guests for the evening is my distinct pleasure to introduce dr. Joseph Lombard dr. Lombard is a professor at the department of arabic and translation studies at the American University of Sharjah he is also an associate editor for the integrated encyclopedia of the Quran which is in progress a specialist in Quranic studies Sufism Islamic philosophy comparative theology and Islamic eco theology he is the editor of Islam fundamentalism and the betrayal of tradition and author of submission faith and beauty the religion of Islam and this work he published through as a tuna in 2009 he's also author of airmid alavés ali remembrance and the metaphysics of love forthcoming from SUNY press this year prior to moving to Sharjah dr. Lombard served on the faculties of the American University of Cairo and Brandeis University he also spent at the Ahlul Bayt institute in jordan contributing significantly to what is known as the unmanned message he holds a PhD from Yale University where I studied as well as did shake yossel hobby under the tutelage of the jesuit professor Gerhard bowring I distinctly remember my first encounter with Joseph when I was a newly minted graduate student sitting in professor bullrings office at all man alighted from the elevator with his bags and professor bothering have never seen him like this squealed with joy ah and he got up and he rushed to embrace Joseph and my impression was who could this man be and we've grown to be nice colleagues he's been a mentor and a close friend please join me in welcoming dr. Joseph Lambert [Applause] Salam alaikum it's me neither of Manara him salatu salam on sheffield NBA even more saline while you are less harvey rubbish surely suddenly what yes surely Amory listen yes Kali bismillah thank you very much Mahon for the introduction and thank you also to say tuna for this for this opportunity and to the Islamic Center of the the Center for Islamic studies there's a there's a lot going on here on holy hill I haven't gotten all the names down yet for the center of Islamic studies and and thank you all very much for coming out this evening and and taking the time out of your out of your evening to attend this event now I want to begin by I'm gonna address these three points that that dr. Mirza outlined but I want to begin by talking about the genesis of the study Quran and how it came into being one of the reasons I want to do this is because some people imagine that this work came about in the same way that many academic works - which is that you have the idea and you work on your project and then you propose it to a publisher shop it around to different publishers until you finally find one that that is actually willing to put up with you now this was actually very different happened is that the phenomena of this Study Bible is a well established genre there is a HarperCollins Study Bible there's the Jewish Study Bible the Catholic Study Bible the Orthodox Study Bible the Oxford annotated bible the ESB the NIV the list goes on this is a well-established genre that sold many hundreds of thousands of copies and if you walk into the office of any religious studies professor they're gonna have at least one of them on their desk or on their shelf and whatever field they are in so harpercollins who actually began the genre of the of the study bible they published the first one back I think it was in the late 40s or 50s or early 50s they had the idea well why don't we come up with a study Quran and they proposed the idea to say it was st. NASA now I say to say Nasser tells the story he says when they first proposed this idea I didn't want to do this said I'm a scholar of philosophy I'm a scholar of Sufism scholar of Islamic science really for him the Koran has always been a part of his devotional life and of course he was versed in all the academic study of it but I remember one time when I was a student of his a graduate student asked him why don't you teach a course on the Quran and he said because it's too much the Word of God is too much so really is something that he had such reverence for the Quran that in a sense he always avoided it as part of his scholarship I kept it as part of his devotional life and I myself in many ways had followed his lead in that in my own academic career where I had studied as dr. Mirza said under Gerhard overing and this is one of his specialties is chronic studies but I went more into Sufi studies but as versed with all the arguments and of course the Quran was part of my devotional life as well but when dr. Nasir sat down and thought about it after he had initially thought that he didn't want to do this he said to himself and he's told this story many times you can find it on YouTube in all kinds of places he said to himself well I'm gonna have to answer for this before God on the day of judgement I put down God's Word somebody came to me and asked me to help explain God's Word to others and I turned away and I put it down I'm gonna have to answer for that now he hasn't said this in these discussions but I remember one time he was also talking to me and he said to me also you can't control if they've proposed it to you and you say no you don't get to decide who goes to after that if any of you know the field of Quranic studies there are some people out there and there are some perspectives out there that if it was turned over to them Muslims would be in just I mean this would in a sense put the presentation of the Quran from our perspective would put it back 25 years or more within the Western context and so this really one could say that in a sense Eve you'd it as a foggy fire as a sufficient responsibility that somebody had to take on and it had been put in his lap I was a bit more arrogant and I was really excited I stuck for Allah but so this is really how the project came about and it's important to keep that in mind because this is really the spirit that guided this project throughout and it's something that really guided it until until the last into the last days when we finally submitted this to the publisher and we really put aside so many other things in our lives and my wife and doctor genera Dolly's wife used to joke with each other that they had assumed the status of second wife next to next to the study Quran and it really was all-consuming in many ways now that being said I want to get to some of these issues that dr. Mirza raised really one could break this down his first two questions into how should Muslims approach this and how should non-muslims approach this in the first question he mentioned the issue the way he phrased it is can Muslims view it as a devotional text if it doesn't fully represent any single tradition within Islam I don't view it as a devotional text now it's a text that at what I view as a devotional text view the Quran itself as devotional texts I don't view the tafseer of the report to be as a devotional texts a view that arad that people say that are taken mostly from the Koran as a devotional texts I view many of the of the litanies that we sing embrace the prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam as devotional texts but I do not view to face ear as devotional texts and in this context I don't really think that one could necessarily say that this is a devotional text however just as one can go into a tafseer and read about the verses of Quran that one cites as part of one's regular devotions and gain something from that and gain insight into those devotional texts I think that one can do this with the study Quran as well there are many Muslims out there who will read for example sort of Yassin every morning sort of tell where every evening but really don't have access to Quran commentaries because they really only know enough Arabic to be able to recite the Quran regulated hamdulillah that is a beautiful thing but this is a text that can in that way in a sense help one to do this and one doesn't have to should they do view it as a devotional texts I don't say anybody should necessarily do one thing or the other with the study Quran as my grandfather would always say to me he'd say you can give a person any book that you want but it doesn't mean they have to read it it's the same thing with any book you write you know academics are used to that we write books that nobody reads but but in this case is a little different people are actually reading it a hundred up but so I don't think it's that and I think that it can be that it can be useful for people in that respect if they so choose now the next question is a little bit more intricate should readers who are not Muslims view the book as an objective source about Islam even if it is used Western academic approaches to the study of the Koran the question is wrong because it does not askew Western academic approaches to the study of the text it does not estroux them but it is not grounded in them and this is a very important distinction now one of the things that we have attempted to do with the study Quran is to resituated to the Quran within the Western academia in the classical commentary tradition itself if one goes through the history of Western academic approaches to the Quran they often operate completely independently of the Islamic academic tradition from my humble perspective this is academically irresponsible you can't just simply sit there and say well we're gonna do an independent academic tradition over here and wipe out twelve hundred years fourteen hundred years of scholarship on the text that you want to approach this is something that one sees if one goes into the the encyclopedia of the Quran the encyclopedia have of the Quran has articles in it that cite only Western literature on the Quran this is racism that's all it is it's racism pure and simple all right it's saying that what is that the categories of thought that are determined within the euro american intellectual system and really at only five countries within within that system that those categories of thought are the only valid categories of thought through which one can understand the text of any tradition and we say no that actually there are thousands of books that are written that from within the Islamic tradition that help one to approach the text now this is actually a very important question when one comes to the question of the history of the text the classical tafseer tradition is concerned with the history of the Quran at times to the point of obsession and this is actually something that very much separates the tafseer tradition from the tradition of biblical commentary in the tradition of biblical commentary you don't have anything akin to the s babbitt azul the occasions of revelation which actually i think it's more effective for us to call them the historical contexts so we actually have a historical critical method ology within our tradition and the historical critical method ology is the primary concern of the Western academic tradition now here's the problem because the Western academic tradition has decided to ask you the classical Islamic tradition people come up with all kinds of different approaches to the text these approaches are sometimes called theories but they don't actually even rise to the level of a theory because a theory is something that you take it the data that you have before you and you take the historical factual data and you can then test it against the theory and if the factual data shows that the hypothesis or theory is incorrect you come up with a new theory well this has not been happening in many places within the Western academic tradition so these are really coherent sets of assumptions that rests within the paradigms of the euro american intellectual system and because of that people tend not to challenge them and they think okay well because these other things come from different paradigms then they don't then they don't classify but what has ended up happening is because you have so many of these different approaches from it's grounded in hebrew sources it's grounded in Syriac sources it comes from this origin it comes from that origin and all of these different things that they end up being mutually contradictory and if one were to ground a study Quran in the Western academic tradition of the study of the Quran right now it would be so methodologically diffuse as to render it incoherent because the field is completely inchoate what we hope the study Quran will achieve is to lend some form and shape to that academic tradition now you can't just Beckenham Siddiqui has I think put it best in one simple sentence he says that when it comes the history of the Quranic text the Western academic tradition succeeded in making a mountain into a molehill there is so much historical data out there so much that has been written about just the collection of the text and about how these verses came to be and the circumstances in which they came to be and how they're related to one another that has just been completely ignored now if we're gonna be honest as academics even if we don't agree with it we have to engage it and so this is one of the things that we hope this will this text will achieve so yes to answer the question I do think that people can take it as being an objective source about Islam an objective source about the Quran and as many people have pointed out we have multiple different perspectives in there and I think that we have been relatively objective meaning one one is always making a choice and one always has perspective and so there is nothing one cannot have God is the only one with complete objectivity and may we all insha Allah Allah taint it someday but so no it's not going to be completely objective but but yes I do think that it can be an objective source now the third question as a work produced by Muslim academics for specialists and students as well as for Muslims and the broader public does it shift authority away from traditional scholars when it comes to understanding the and and Islam in the modern world welcome to the 21st century that has been happening all right there's been a lot of this already going on in particular spheres where people who exist more within and said been happening quite a bit from for more than a hundred years actually where people who are more within the university environment and both in the West and in the Islamic world have had some of the authority of interpreting the tradition placed upon them a case in point say to say Nasser I mean say it is a Nasser it writes from within the university context and his perspectives regarding Islam have shaped the way in which it is engaged within faith communities themselves in many parts of the Islamic world in different ways in subtle ways a very important point here that we should all remember well all contemplate I think is that we're at a very interesting time in Islamic history Islamic the Islamic intellectual tradition has had historically two international languages of intellectual discourse Arabic and Persian Turkish was never a language of intellectual discourse it was it was spread internationally but mostly as a language of a kind of administrative discourse and but because the lands that the Ottoman Empire occupied or Arab speaking there was no need to and a switch over to Turkish as the language for scholarship but now all of the sudden English is emerging as a third international language of Islamic intellectual discourse and that by the way is one of the reasons why this institution is so fundamentally important I what Zaytuna has the possibility to do is to really be at the forefront of shaping that discourse and it's a fundamentally important thing that I think all of us should realize where we are in that process the process is too far along for us to stop it so it's a process that we have to figure out ways to shape I believe that the study Quran can be one of the important texts in the shaping of that discourse now there is no effort to shift anything away from shall we say traditional scholars but there is an effort to shift the focus and the weight back to the tradition which is to say that this again comes into the fact that so many people have tried both within the Islamic community there are certain strands out there that just want to say skip all this stuff over what we need to do is throw out supper eat throw out a bin kathira throw out so no I didn't read them but throw them away anyways all right you know it's like what are you talking about you don't even know what they said and you go into some of these guys it's like people want to go into a verse like four thirty four the famous you know but the rebel not the the the verse that is always spoken about the most talked about verse in the in the 21st century jazz the remark on on beating a woman at the end of it and you go into the classic tradition and they tried to deal with it in multiple different ways now we can engage that and use some of those ways to engage with the problems and to address the problems that we have today we should not imagine that people didn't have some of these same issues you go in and you read some of the commentaries that they were just as uncomfortable with some of the implications of that verses we are today and they give us some tools for how to how to deal with it and there are many other instances in the Quran where people are trying to talk about an issue and you find we'll wait a minute everybody else was talking about the same issue five hundred years ago but more importantly even if one is coming up with a new solution it still should be in dialogue with the tradition now that by the way from my perspective that's what tradition is tradition is this living continuing dialogue tradition is alive tradition is fluid tradition is often in tension but when it's in tension is when it is most active when it's staid and it's just sitting there then you've moved in traditionalism traditionalism is dead traditionalism is about making idols of the past all right but we are alive here today and we can be in dialogue with these scholars when we go through certain issues you know you're gonna find that even Tamia disagreed with a Bahaman ah Cazale if they disagreed with even Larabee taja Dean Suki criticized even Tamiya and even now josie for their position later on Rachid rather came down the line and came up with another perspective from all of them but they were in dialogue with each other they were just doing this out of the vacuum now one of the things is that from my perspective when you look at this what holds tradition together is not always coming to the same conclusions but it is also often there are methodological tools that are consistent and sometimes under different historical circumstances those same methodological tools are going to burning us somewhat different conclusions and at the same time there's a flouse sincerity we tend to forget that when people have disagreements about things sometimes it's because once right and once wrong usually it's because they're both wrong sometimes it's because they're both right but they're looking at it from different perspectives now this is actually how if you think about it that's how we actually explain to ourselves many of the conflicts between the Companions of the Prophet peace be upon him in the first century of Islam is that they were all sincere and they had different perspectives now this is the situation where you have in the classical tradition all right but people are coming at it from different ways and so within the study Quran you have lots of different perspectives that are put up side by side there are some verses for which you we've given you six seven different ways in which the tradition has approached a particular verse other verses where we don't actually say much but this really is how the classical tradition worked and it's something that we should experience and appreciate in its full depth and breadth in order for us to live within it in the present and actually be able to use the tools of the tradition to answer the exigencies of the present rather than as Isis before rather than making idols out of the figures of the past so in this way I think that while some people might think that people doing this from within a university context might be shifting the the authority away from from traditional scholars in one place or another I actually think that the main thing that we're really doing is hopefully showing people the tradition and in that way shifting the authority while I once said shifting it but but reminding people that that is actually where the authority lies all right now we're gonna open it up to other questions did you want me to stand here or to sit down for the next part all right as soon as that came in actually a lot of questions that came in online and I can hear okay and it's impossible to you know engage all of them point by point but what I've tried to do is summarize and group them together so we can talk about a broader analytical framework that can help guide the future discussion rather than get us bogged down in too many specifics for which we don't have the time or the format here so I have four points the first is not a question the it's it's pretty much an allegation the study Quran is perennial list and will misguide people away from orthodoxy it digresses from the Sunna Creed and the use of sheee sources is indicative of such digression so you can feel free to respond that's my paraphrase of what I'm reading from outside those were like 52 questions put into one night yeah yeah so alright there's a lot going on in that question I mean for example I mean look when you want to throw around the word orthodoxy you always have to remember that one man's orthodoxy is another man's heterodoxy and vice versa and it's the orthodoxy is a very very problematic term and it tends to be something that is that is at times old about somewhat irresponsibly and yeah there are positions in the study Quran where you've got look there's stuff in there I don't agree with all right there are perspectives in there that I said well you know this is what people said about this first this is really a very widespread interpretation understanding of this verse I don't agree but here it is you don't have to agree with it this is this is not a doctrinal text this is not something that anybody should be picking up as if this is going to give them their Creed for their particular tradition now I think that if Sunnis are upset that it has too many things that don't fit with the Sunna Creed and Shiites are upset that it doesn't represent the Shiite Creed well enough and Sufis are upset that it's not esoteric enough in certain places and Western scholars are upset that it doesn't actually give enough credence to certain aspects of the Western approach to the text and we've succeeded I mean seriously there's a famous there's a famous Arabic proverb that says you know whosoever does not have a critic is a dumbass and it's true you know what I'm gonna go up there one night electril what's that I said on that note I think we can call it a night something so you know really it's it's this is actually you know we knew this coming out mmm we knew that basically you know that ultimately no one was gonna be happy with it now one of the problems that's come out with some of the things that you've said is that people they go in and they focus on one thing and it's like wait a minute okay so that's one interpretation of that verse there happen to be five more that are there you didn't read the ball first and take a look and if you didn't like that particular one then you no big deal there's stuff in top of you you know look if you really go sit down and read the tough sear tradition for a while there's stuff in there that'll make your hair stand on end and it's not all in the study Quran I guarantee you there's some stuff in there where you would sit down there and your jaw you bra zero that you know so and and so there are a lot of things that are in there it is a broad diverse multi-textured tradition and we haven't done it you know the full justice that it deserves we had done a thirty volume work on the Quran we would not have done it full justice but really there is no effort to do that so the idea you use you use the word digresses from the sunni creed to say that it digresses would be to assume that it actually tried to be in it in the first place all right it's when there are certain verses that pertain to certain fundamental issues of sunni creed we have tried to bring that out but we have not said that that's the only perspective on those verses all right okay so now let me just you used the word perennialism yeah now I'm glad you use this word what do you mean by that well I'm hoping I was hoping you would tell me yeah well is he that's it but that's it that's exactly the problem is that people have started to cast the word perennialism around in an incredibly irresponsible way I mean most people don't even know what it actually means you know the baseline and there are lots of different schools of perennialism now the baseline of perennialism is that there is one truth which is manifest in the world's religious traditions in multiple different ways as best I know according to the Koran all the prophets came with one message Lila all right I mean that's that is a fundamental tenet of perennialism that all of the messengers came with one message with the same message all right now that's the most central tenant so right there and you could have that and you could just say okay that's my only part and I'm a praying let's not believe that all right the problem that comes in is that then people start to think that perennialism means syncretism which is that you could take from that tradition you could take from that tradition you could take from that tradition and beside yoga exercises in the morning go to gym on Friday and all these different things and this is I mean if you've read perennial astride Ang's you know that the apprentice actually completely is true that understanding now Algie was Huxley and his perennial philosophy might not completely true that and there are certain New Age movements that cite perennials principles and their defense of doing things like this but insofar as the Prince philosophy he can't be identified as a particular school represented by the likes of rene genome with joshua on cheetah's Burkhardt Martin Ling's say to say Nasser that is a principle that they completely completely is true that is the idea that one could actually mix for many parts of different traditions now what really gets into it and I really think that you're talking about it here is the notion of sociological pluralism that is that people can be saved from other traditions now this is something that is a very interesting has a very interesting history in our tradition people are surprised if you go in and you actually find out that even Tamia is one of the ones who held that eventually everyone is taken out of hell when he was criticized roundly by other people for going against what they considered to be the edge map or the consensus of the of the tradition for that taja team Suki criticized him for this now at the same time there are others in al khazzani and his face South Africa you know he probably goes the farthest in his position regarding the potential for people who are still living in other religious traditions to actually achieve salvation and his to kind of break it down in simplistic term so you don't have a lot of time here but you can actually do a whole lecture just on how because Ally's theory on this and Sherman Jackson would be the better person for that than me but is that he's saying that so long as one has not heard the call of Islam that one can actually in a sense still be saved a Jew or a Christian living somewhere and he mentions the Byzantine Empire and now from these other parts that if they haven't heard the full call they can still be saved and one of the things that he says within that is that even at times if one hears the distorted message you know so for example right now you hear about the Prophet Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wasalam and the Quran on Fox News you're probably not going to become a Muslim I mean you gotta have like some kind of amazing for alsa if when you hear about it on fox news i yes you know that's like you got to be a prophet yourself is gonna that's gonna break through masha'Allah so so anyway so this is one of the ideas that he has now the point is that you bring in this we could talk about even Ilana B's ideas regarding this and Rashid Rida and others and shallowly Allah is somewhat close to alphas ally in his understanding but there are lots of different understandings of this within our tradition the fact that there are all of these different understandings of it shows us the questions not settled all right it is a question that is open for discussion there's not just one single perception of it we have put within the study Quran ways in which that question could be contemplated in relation to particular verses such as the famous verse two sixty two and three 199 and verses along these lines we've addressed in places we haven't said that that's the way that one has to do it in those places we put the other options that you have within what one might call the mainline tuffsy or tradition so I think that we have properly represented what the classical tradition says regarding this and made it clear that there are other ways that this could potentially be approached and it is a question that that you know by the way this is one of the things that we need to think about it's male Farooqi said that one of the things that really distinguishes Islam from other religions and distinguishes the quran from other scriptures is that it commands those who follow this revelation to believe that other prophets and other religions came from God and that they had revelations this is an amazing feature of this religion and it's something that we actually have it's something we have to offer the modern world we have a weight we have something to offer the modern world in how do you address the problem of religious diversity in a way that doesn't make one particular religion have to reign supreme at all times over others and allows for interaction between the different religions when it is our actions our actions our Oracle I mean look when it comes down to it in the Koran basically the question of sociological efficacy what I think the Quran is telling us is that's above your paygrade God's gonna distinguish between them on the day of judgment regarding that wherein they differed God's going to distinguish between you on the day of judgment between you regarding that wherein you differed historical claimant so compete with one another in good deeds or jad didn't whom baletta here hacen argue with them in the most beautiful manner you know don't go out there and say Cofer that's not that's not useful all right and it really isn't something you know one of the things is people think that if you do this somehow you're holding this guard and people are gonna leave the religion of Islam do you know how many people for every person that we celebrate coming in through the front door of the mosque to take Shahada we're ignoring the other person who's leaving out the back door and one of the reasons is because there are a lot of issues that we aren't answering in a way that is sufficient for our community and this is a door that I think we shouldn't be afraid to open we don't have to agree but we can start to come to some answers that actually reply to the exigencies of the day in which we live hmm thank you you think this is interesting well it's about to get more interesting I'd like to bring in the panel thank you [Applause] if we could bring that microphone down for stars of the lab well I'm really grateful to a couple of our faculty members who are able to join us tonight boost as Ally Italian graduate he is the one closer to me from the program in biblical hermeneutics from the Pacific School of Religion the Graduate theological Union right across the street with a love of languages and working knowledge or expertise in Latin Hebrew Greek Arabic and Persian with that Ali teaches courses at Zaytuna in Arabic the Quran and comparative religion and he's pursuing right now his doctoral work at the Graduate theological Union estas abdullah ali graduated from the caribbean in Fez Morocco before joining the Faculty of Zaytuna College he's continued to pursue his doctoral work at the GTU and runs a dynamic scholarly websites lamp-post productions check it out was that Abdullah teaches courses in law and prophetic tradition at Zaytuna he's also an instructor in our living links program for honors students and these classes are open to the public to take place on Saturdays and they'll begin this semester on January 29th so you're welcome to come here and join them in person or in live stream so let me turn it over to the faculty for questions and comments we begin with Paula it's harder to be here to share a stage with this distinguished cadre of scholars and just to let those of you who may not know that I've actually known professor Lombard and Joseph Lombard for some number of years we first met back in Morocco back when I was a student actually I don't know exactly what year I know it was probably at the either 98 99 really an honor to to be here with him today and I guess I would say begin by saying you know he's sort of he's heated up the mic and there's quite a bit you know that this happening warning in my mind at the moment and of course I did prepare some things to ask him and I do have a few minutes right please okay and Ally he brought his notepad you know I brought my phone yeah before I moved to my question I did want to just just offer and a couple caveats to issues related to and particularly Monica's Ali's and hidden taymiyah regardless the issue of the salvation of people who follow the religions first and foremost the position of Tamiya Tamiya realistically would pertain to the the matter of whether or not the question of whether or not the Hellfire will come to an end so in that sense yes he did believe that that the hell of Hellfire eventually would be done away with a loss upon us out of which undo it and the last person from humanity will eventually come out unfortunately that particular position was never accepted by Islamic orthodoxy and even the seller fees today who actually would claim to be followers of Adam Tamiya they structurally reject this position even in the al-qaeda of the Hawiye and its commentary by is who has a a gloss by shaken also denied mani mani mentions this position which is also mentioned by Ed number is that he said that the Sunnis have two positions one is that you will last forever the other that it won't but Manny says in his laws and no one from the Salif ever said this that is no precedent for anyone who's ever said this and you know in my Macca's Ali's position we I've actually mentioned this position before but it's also been brought to my attention that if Naja hates in me is actually argued that the position of Imam Ghazali actually may be the result of someone meddling in one of his works because in one of his later works she he had a different opinion on that issue at any rate you know there's not really enough time to really get involved with that but I really I really wanted to begin was with well first of all I'll say that I I definitely agree that the study Quran is a very impressive and remarkable work an extremely important work for Islam in our times and there's great benefit to be taken from it and I would say that that even though I can't fairly offer either even a necessarily a sort of a categorical rejection of certain things or even a categorical commendation of it because I haven't really read through most of it yet but I have read some parts of it I feel irrelevant at least for this particular issue but that said I would say that I wanted to begin with a question I guess you would say would be somewhat easy for you to answer and then one and a little bit perhaps a little bit more difficult the first one pertains to the very fact that the very beginning of the study Quran or say with inside cover there is a mention of the fact that this particular translation is one which is accurate how accessible accurate accessible and also get my glasses I've had my glasses on and my glasses there's another word I can't remember what the other word was accurate and accessible a a new English translation of the Quran that is accurate accessible and reliable and how it renders this sacred text there's a question I opposed to professor urns when he was he visited some years ago related to his how to read the Quran and that particular question was if for all of Muslim history the scholars have held as the Quran says itself that the Quran is the Arabic text if I'm reading the translation of the Quran how can I be taught how to read the Quran and related to that with regard to the studied Quran I'm just wondering if if the if mention of this being an accurate translation is understood as being a an exact rendering of the Arabic into the English language and I was just wondering how you might sort of respond to that and I could begin with my second question of what if you or may perhaps you wanted to because this is a very good question and that's marketing material I mean you know ultimately I myself would say I mean I agree that it's very difficult to to fully render the Quran there are certain and you sit there when you're translating there's no way that I can render this accurately and the more you sit there and you go into you you really realize kind of the miraculous nature of the language in the Quran and it really is a daunting task so I think that we did aspire to do something as accurate and as reliable as we could as human beings one of the things that I often when people ask me about transiting the Quran I say you know the idea that the Quran is quote untranslatable and quote as we as we often hear I think that one can really you know there's an explanation in translation theory where they talk about it like energy conduit like you know when you send energy one of the main things in energy is trying to keep as much energy as possible when it's going from one place to another and you're always gonna lose something and it's in translation it's the same thing you're always gonna lose something and especially when you're translating from a semitic language to an indo-european language there are just certain things you're gonna lose you can't do a joomla is mia in in english well if that's what it is from one human discourse to another human discourse then what are we talking about when we're going from divine discourse down into the human there's even more that is lost along the way and in a perfect world everybody would just read arabic and humbly laugh we don't need a translation but as we know you know only fifteen percent of Muslims actually after speak Arabic and you know I teach in the Arab world right now and I can tell you that a lot of my Arabic students you know they don't really understand the Quran how they can recite some of it in this but they don't actually understand many of the words I actually my next-door neighbor's daughter who's Syrian is educated in a in an english-speaking high school prefers to read the Koran in English when she wants to study but if she's gonna recite it you know read it in in Arabic so you know this is a kind of phenomena that we have and since there are I would say if the if if there were not another English translation out there of the Quran I wouldn't try to be the first but given that you've already got 80 out there that seems kind of superfluous to do another one but that there are already that many out there it doesn't you know it seems that trying to do one that can get a little bit be a little bit more accurate and even now I was looking at places where I think that we could have captured the word order of the Arabic a little bit better because I think word order is something that's a fundamental importance in in in in the Koran but I think that there are places where we could have actually captured that a little bit better so no it's not it's or trying to basically make you know and it's not good marketing material to say as reliable as possible in human language so well at least me to my second question which I don't know perhaps it may not be as challenging to you or not but I sort of feel that perhaps it'll it may be somewhat challenging for you because it relates to the question of authority and how persuasive this book is expected to be or potentially could be and I personally have a desire for this to study the Quran to be authoritative to be accepted by as many people as possible and but I wonder if there are certain things that have been done or certain decisions that have been made with regard to the publication of this book or things that happened prior to it even which may challenge will make it difficult for certain people to and Muslims in particular okay now we know that okay we can say it was this an academic work and the but we know that we have two communities generally you know we have the mainstream community which is not an academic community you know our community is largely a devotional community and then of course academic I could look at this say yeah I like this I don't I don't like that I agree I disagree and and and the sort of angst that a lot of people feel on particularly the Sunnis were spoken about earlier I think it has something to do with not so much that you or anyone else had you know played a part in the study Quran but it rather it was because the people were in the Sunni community who they feel are supposed to represent the devotional crowd I guess you would say have not highlighted certain things to be to sort of look out for so at any rate so the issues I think that I challenged to through that objectivity and authority they relate to first and foremost the committee itself and what I mean by that is and this is not something this is something actually dr. Nasser himself is not apologetic about he doesn't try to hide it when you read his introduction and he talks about how he his selection had occurred with regard to who would form this committee and one thing that is apparent from the committee is that there's he see something about this unity that they have the unity of there's an intellectual unity amongst the committee that the philosophical unity and spiritual unity amongst those three of the members of this committee but another thing the members of the committee share is that all of them either we could say mentor mentees of dr. nasir or students in one way shape or form which itself kind of I guess you can look at they said perhaps it can be challenged that that objectivity another aspect of that it would be just the when we look at the qualifications listed of each of the of the editors that we find of course that each of them each of them for instance are what they share would be like specialization and philosophy specialization in Sufism some of them perhaps as well she she is amande some of them theology like yourself comparative theology you find that but I'm wondering if it would have been good to actually also include amongst those people such as someone who's the specialist in Islamic law someone who may be especially simple souls for instance and or especially the hadith scholars you know like that unless we're saying that philosophy itself is the meta discipline and it is sufficient for everything else you know and of course the she's for she is that might work you know on you know but for Sunnis historically it would be a challenge because for Sunnis historically its theology has been the meta discipline for Muslims you know so if we don't have those things there then it could become a challenge and then lastly I'll say another thing that makes it which is a challenge of objectivity has to do with the very fact that the three main general editors you know two of them being American converts and then a third one being from Canada of course not a convert but as mentioned Circassian heritage why not someone else from why it's not someone from Europe why not someone from an Arab the Arab world why not someone from the Muslim world in general as well you see so those are some issues that I feel could be potentially damaging to the authority of the book even without getting to the details you know so I just wanted to just put that out there just to get your thoughts on well first of all one thing I should say there were several other people that we actually did try to get along the way to be editors in the project and most people looked at the size of this project and I've got a family in life and and so we really did actually try in many ways to have a larger more expensive and more representative committee we actually tried that also with some of the essays and and that is something that you know it's one of these things that by the will of Allah so Allah you end up with what you end up with and in some ways I think that one of the things that might have happened here is that a loss upon us Allah knew how difficult this task is going to be we didn't we had some knock-down drag-out you know nights on skype and stuff and there there was some there was some stuff that we really you know win over and you know you had to go back to it the next night and try to like say look I'm sorry you know I was just you know I'm just into that okay so we'll forgive each other to move on you know but I mean yeah it's a few more ingredients into that pot and then you start that would get even more complicated so I think that really it was a lot of the wisdom of Allah Spanish Allah that made some of these people have him for in some instances it was just life circumstances that didn't allow them to be involved even when they wanted to be involved so these are you know this is this is how how it ended up now one of the things that you part of what you are leading into here is or part of what is related to this is the question of the authority of the text man I really don't it's out there it's gonna assume whatever position it assumes and I don't I can't control that in any way really but what I think is important is that the study Koran should be viewed as the first it should be viewed as the beginning if you look at the history of study Bibles out there many of them were done because people who were pious Christians within certain denominations were not at all happy with the perspectives that were out there in study Bibles and so they wanted to do another one that had a more evangelical perspective a more Catholic perspective a more orthodox perspective and things along these lines and so I think that others should be done and if anybody wants to do another one I'd be happy to tell them the pitfalls and the things to watch out for and help them compose their goodbye letters their wife for the next you know nine years and and and then you know go on your way but it really is something that I think one of the things that you bring out is like you would actually be really great to see this if you want to do the Sufi study Craig coming in you know but there should also be a Shiite study Quran and I think that there should be multiple study quran's out there I think that it should be I think it is a genre that opens up the discourse in a way that could be very useful for our for our communities and it really it could be a way that we could see because if you look at the history of tafseer it takes on very different forms over time in in different ways and this could be a way in which I don't I don't want to call this a tough series if this here has a particular place within the tradition and I do view view it more as being kind of a study academic text but I think that there's a room for many more and and I personally welcome it and I hope to see them thank you spend a lot of mana raheem some of the water he was a Marine Salam alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakaatuh dr. Lombard thank you very much we actually met two years ago I used to drive the cabin you came to I'm just joking maybe on Yom Yom alast thank you very much for your presentation very enlightening I have two questions for you the first one is just sort of your opinion about something recently you described the Tufts eared of the study foreign section the commentary as being something like the heart of the project and the sense that it's very ecumenical bringing together traditional Sufi Shiite as you said in Sunita faasil and that's a remarkable achievement and something that should be appreciated I mean this man gave 9 or 10 years of his life doing this project so bottle of fecal mail lost kind of Allah bless you for that and give it acceptance in sha Allah to Allah so my question is in in Christian academic circles they have you know critical editions of the Greek New Testament the United Bible Society Nestle Allen so and so forth where you have an eclectic text in Greek basically taking from the most reliable manuscript witnesses and then at the bottom of the page you have this critical apparatus showing the variant readings of the Greek so my question is do you think there's merit and doing something like that I know Arthur Jeffrey used to call for something like that karl ernst a critical arabic edition of the quran or you have maybe the hofstra the russell or as you translated the consonant skeleton there and then a critical apparatus showing or showing the differences of the seven readings or ten or several whatever seven means the thousand or so differences there in the critical apparatus but also maybe showing in that critical as Preet lamonica codices or manuscripts like even mustard or baby no cob or the Yemeni palimpsest or even the one that was just discovered in Birmingham to sort of own the differences because this one gets demanded by Western academia there's no critical Arabic edition of the Quran why don't you do that own the differences and then actually take some time and explain through sophisticated answers why we have these differences do they touch upon the integrity of the text at all do they preclude the belief that the is a divine revelation what's your opinion about having an eclectic Arabic critical Edition I don't think it would necessarily be eclectic I think that actually but I think it's a great idea actually and I think that you know and and as you know there are multi volume works in Arabic that collect not only the ten kiddo ads but also you know the shaft and those that are that are considered to be you know that there were 80 different guitar at or more before the kind of tradition went down and in the fourth century they said these ones are these seven or MOTU out there these three are much more and these are the ones that are acceptable for recitation in prayer this is actually a really interesting distinction is that they say that these are acceptable for recitation in prayer but sometimes in the tough sear tradition you'll find them say this reading is not acceptable for you know but it is acceptable or forty lava but it is acceptable for tafseer and so there was a much broader view than sometimes we imagined there may have been regarding these these different readings and I think you're absolutely right I think not only own them and do that but I think actually a translation that has the translation and then it has the translation according to the to the different it all adds below it I think that would be a fantastic contribution and I do think that it's something that that we should do and and there's a lot of these tools that exist within the field of biblical studies that sometimes we're afraid of because we're afraid of what of the way that some people in other disciplines want to use them as regards as regards the Koran but actually some of them are very art if we were to reimagine them and like you say I want it known it within our tradition they're actually very useful I mean you know there's somebody who's doing his his dissertation on the history of the is nad at Harvard and he's basically saying you know this was actually a tradition borrowed from outside of the Islamic tradition and then used and like now we say like you know if you don't have the astad you and you don't have knowledge and it's like wow we took that from outside and we used it like we should not be scared of these tools they offer interesting things for us they're also fascinating things for us and as another point that you brought in which is somewhat different towards the end of that as does it in any way impugn the integrity of the text this is one of the things that I came to kind of realize through the process of doing this is that it doesn't at all that one of the things that actually preserves the integrity of the Quranic text and I think that this is part of the will of a loss of an art ala is that that kind of polyvalence is built in even on the linguistic level why because just have that approach when you realize that the text is is multi-layered and multivalent even on the linguistic level it's gonna help you realize how it can be multi-layered and have multiple different meanings when you get into the interpretive level the other thing is is that it's almost like this instant linguistic reminder that human language cannot fully contain the divine word and it's just like it's like the the Koran is human language fractured by the divine presence as the credible genius of the of of this text and there is nothing like it in the world and we can own it and we can show it to the world my second question is a slightly different topic here regarding the qur'an's criticism of traditional Christianity I don't think the issue is that you know the prophets did not bring the same message or that all religions and not come from God but you know do these religions and their traditional understandings teach the same things about God is there a theological critique in the court on of Trinitarian Christianity the reason I'm asking is because in a translation in the translation of the study for on sort of Maui I believe I number 72 in which allah subhanho wa taala says that pikarin adeana qua do in the kuffara daddy in the father in allah have thirty-two thought that it is a statement of those who have disbelieved who say this is not your translation this latter part is that God is one of three God is one of three the third of three God is a third of three so my question is here you know you you mentioned in the essay towards the back that the Quran does not oppose as a direct quote the various forms of Orthodox Trinitarian doctrines it opposes crude mr. misunderstandings of it so essentially what I gather from that is that this verse is condemning try theism and not necessarily Orthodox you know I know you don't like that word or traditional Trinitarian belief and if that's true then the traditional belief Trinitarian belief is that Jesus is Hamas Eos that he shares an essential essence with God so is that not problematic from an Islamic standpoint so basically does the put on in your opinion consider Orthodox trinitarianism as constituting a type of shirk or not I think that this gets in I mean the Trinity is a very complicated issue obviously and I actually agree I mean I think that one of the things people tend to criticize the perennial school and and then not read them because they're told that they shouldn't read them and then have no idea what they say and you go when you look for example Fritjof chuan has an excellent discussion of the Trinity and he basically says look the Trinity was an unnecessary doctrine it has a way of explaining God but it is unnecessarily complicated and and I do think that they're all that when one gets into what the Christian tradition is trying to explain with its understanding of the nature of ISA idea Saddam is in many ways the same thing a lot of people are gonna like this but it's in many ways the same thing that we are trying to explain with the doctrine of the Quran as the uncreated Word of God is that where is that where is that line between the Word of God and this attribute now it's not exactly it's if it's not a one-to-one correspondence I know between the traditions but it is the same kind of overall metaphysical problem of where you draw that line between the absolute divine presence and the nature of the revelation or we could call it the logos to use a Christian terminology or the akeli mots Allah as you know easily as salam is referred to as a word from god and ultimately i think that if you look at how much debate there has been within Christianity itself regarding this issue it's not something that you're ever going to have an agreement coming out I mean remember that even the people who even some of them won't tessa lights who were criticizing the later became who later those who later became the asha rights one of the things that they said is they said you're saying the same thing about the koran that the christians are saying about jesus that was one of their actual criticisms of the argument now again i like i said i don't think that there's a one-to-one correspondence between what's being said there but but i do think that there is there is a line and i do think that one of the things that the gran is opposing is the potential for very crude misunderstandings of the of christian doctrine and and unfortunately the history of debates regarding it has shown that there are a lot of crude misunderstandings I think that as and and this is one thing point where I actually agree quite a bit with mr. Sean is that this is an esoteric doctrine that should not have been made in a sense to a full exoteric doctrine because there's too much room for misunderstandings to arise regarding that and when I read many of when you read many of the verses and you probably know all of the debates within Christian theology regarding the nature of ISA they had salaam better than I do when I read the verses of the Quran regarding these issues I see them I see it as taking positions within that ongoing debate regarding the nature of ISA within within and beyond the Christian tradition okay would you say the Quran is rejecting this idea that Jesus is God himself that Jesus is God himself yes follow-up question last question in in that same ayah in the LA fatty food siddhartha could it be here that allah here could be because i'm thing about john 17:3 where jesus calls the father when mine on are they they don't say I'm the only one who was truly God he's the only one who was truly God so in other words the foot on here is is criticizing the Trinity as it is understood traditionally by Christians but not using the word father but using the word Allah but sort of accepting that meaning of up as rub as someone who takes care of use one who raises you in stages so when those personal God's imminence could it could it be could you read it like that as well that you know if you think God is one of three that here God is essentially you know the father without using that term when you're seeing that guy well I think that you know there's an issue here when you get into the church you remember that when you're talking about the three people the three persons of the Trinity there's a tendency to say that they are of one essence and no one single one of them is is prior to the other however the father causes the Spirit and the Holy Spirit and the son and as one Christian theologian said to me he said well a cause is necessarily prior to that which it causes and so I think that even you know within that aspect of training that when you are viewing the father as being the cause and if you take that aspect of it and this is where I mean I even the you know meister eckhart referred to swing beyond the Trinity into the Godhead and then of course as we know he was criticized for that and he and later accountant the position at least in an open discourse and so but I do think that as regards that that position again this gets into these subtleties regarding the nature of the Trinity that there is a way that one can understand it as as indicating a principle that is beyond before you go just add one thing yeah I wanted to just won't begin just because I don't I don't want the question to turn this into silver necessary in a personal interrogation because was this project was a collective project on your part but I did that this issue does stick out and it is a very passionate people Muslim Sunnis in particular you know who are critical of the Sunnis about the study Quran are very passionate about this particular issue and it comes up a number of times throughout the study Quran by different authors multiple authors and so for me for me it's more my concern is more with the obligation I feel that you're sort of an academic or scholastic obligation that a person like yourself and others would have to at least highlight in your comments that while you may adopt a particular interpretation that historically you know this view which actually accommodates you know or accommodates or I guess you say offers salvation to people other than Muslims who I mean people who himself have been reached by Islam and people themselves who understand the message and they still reject it that this itself is something something relatively new Islamic history and I just wanted to read this one quote from this is from Professor Doug Lee on page 187 is commenting on various no it's not very long but it just basically just he goes and say they say there may be a third possibility well the verse a and truly among the people of the book are those who believe in God and that which has been sent down unto you and that which has been sent down unto them humble before God and so and not selling God's sign for a paltry paltry price it is they who shall have their reward with their Lord truly God is Swift and reckoning so he goes on and says there may be a third possibility often left unexplored by Muslims until recently that one can remain a Christian while affirming the veracity of the Prophet Muhammad and what was revealed to him all right so you know so for me I just think that when those type of quotes are made in the book that is you know just as often when other opinions that the editors disagree with they would say well this particular opinion is not popular or is not backed up by a strong narration you know that you would think that you know that honesty would sort of dictate that okay well this is an interpretation but it doesn't represent historical Islam you say you know I mean he said all flawed explored by the commentary tradition I mean so recently yeah but you know the other thing is though is that within that context I mean it's interesting that the that the historical context of that particular verse is said to refer to the death of the venegas the the Christian leader of Abyssinia and and it said that actually that that it was in that context that the verse that the rose came down and so there's some dispute actually within the classical tafseer tradition itself as to whether or not that was an affirmation that that Venegas had actually affirmed Islam but remained but it but you know whether or not the Prophet actually in said that he prayed the funeral prayer for him and that he did you know that takbir for him and that he was even accused some of in his community were actually unhappy with that and confused by it at the time so and there's different opinions within the classical tradition but that's you know that it that fact that that's the the the essence or the Suburbans rule is is is well attested and so you know if I were to ever it in the commentary on that that's something that I would have brought out more and and and related to it okay but it's but I get what you're saying regarding that that I would say that there are points within the text where maybe that consideration could be could be brought out I mean I was actually reading my essay regarding sacred history and I realized that the question of the abrogation of other religions is something that I I felt like I didn't feel we deal with sufficiently part of it we had I mean even that as they went over the word limit but still I feel like that that I kind of ran over that dimension of it a little bit more than I shouldn't I should have represented what some of the classical debates are regarding the abrogation of other religions rather than just kind of running through it and saying well you know there's another way to look at it well we've covered quite a bit of ground and I think there are some interesting things that are just lurking even a question like you know they're being word limits and marketing exigencies what does that do to the nature of a work but we've talked about you know the intricacies of the Trinity the possibility of a critical Arabic edition of the Quran at least one with the critical apparatus translation as an energy conduit where there's loss that takes place the we use that word that I won't repeat we talked about the difference between traditional ISM and tradition and also I thought I heard earlier on something like an intellectual battle for the soul of the study of Islam in the Academy that's being waged here so some very interesting material and food for thought before we conclude we're about an hour and 40 minutes in but we should give probably about 10 or 15 minutes for questions from the audience before we wrap up perhaps by around 9:30 and then they'll be opportunity to purchase books and have a book signing with one of the editors so are there any questions what I would like you to do is line up here and from that side so you're not standing in the middle and please keep it to a brief question and respect right of others to ask after you and I'd also like brief as brief and direct response as possible so we can get as many as we can in dr. Jennifer Bryson is in the front so my question is primarily for you Mahon although there may be other responses and I felt that Joseph in many ways responded to his perspective on my question during his remarks during your introduction you drew a very stark dichotomy between with Western Academy and the Islamic tradition yes and you didn't say classical tradition it was not a time frame but the Islamic tradition yes you saw that and I'm curious as to why and whether or not there's room if this is a living intellectual and spiritual and devotional tradition for this to this these roots to grow branches and other places and where do believing Muslims who happen to be in Western institutions right and who cherish and draw from the tradition where do they fit in and this relates to you know what is the studying wrong sure that's a very nice question and you know I was conscious of it when I was doing it in part because it's most helpful to frame something in as stark of attention as possible on its end points and then to unravel that because it's a very problematic dichotomy and you know I'm very happy that you know some of the comments rolled rolled that back in and if they hadn't I would have you know maybe pushed a little bit further because you know what do you do with the Muslim academics who are studying their sources but may not have traditional training or traditional licenses but nonetheless have access to those very sources and are reading them and arguing and using the same tools of reasoning that we all share in common so that's that is a tension that I deliberately set up so that we could perhaps perhaps question it thank you my wife and I were reading a sort Miriam dr. Lombard there was one verse we were we never heard this before it was the surah about or the I about say that no Miriam eating dates from the palm tree and considering that Christmas for Orthodox and Protestant Jews is around the winter time a lot of Muslims would say Oh since she was eight dates from palm tree then say now he says birth was around the summer because that's one dates are right but Cydia put on in the commentary explains well the evidence that they that she dates in the winter is actually a miracle from God that's the first time I heard that so I was wondering where the origin of that came from I actually can't say because I didn't write the commentary on that one of the things about the study Quran is that is that so as an editor I was an editor for the commentary on Sora's 2 through 28 and I wrote the commentary for and wrote and research the commentary for sores 29 through 114 and for the first surah as well so unfortunately sometimes when he gets into in into into some of those issues I actually you know some of them I'm like I'm really glad that my some of my colleagues had to deal with some of the more contested verses and I didn't have to but at the same time it doesn't mean I actually you I would have to ask Maria de cake about that one in particular so my apologies great presentation and wonderful discussion afterwards I wanted to know what method you used when deciding which commentaries to cite from on which versus cuz you use I think like over 40 different tough I Sarah how did you decide which taps here to draw on for which verse and then just very quickly secondly I wanted to ask about the issue of Kali valence other things having multiple meanings or the the Quran having different readings because that's something that seems to be much more challenging for Muslims or just people of faith in general today then when we look at the classical tradition when you have poverty just lists all these kinds of opinions without even discriminating and saying this is the one I think is right or not if you could maybe why is that the case why do we seem to have more trouble saying that different people say different things about things today thank you that's two questions so the first question the methodology for using it I think that all of the different authors of the commentary had a slightly different methodology there's a different toughest ear that we might have preferred and for most of us one of the main things that we did and we pretty much agree that you know you would you'd go through means some of what you recall the Ummah hats at Tufts ear and these being the principal commentaries such as somebody even Cathy or well even Cathy are actually historically it wasn't always but you know you know somebody order to be and Jane and things like this and look at some of these kind of fundamental suffice ear that that have had a certain you might say staying power within within the tradition and oftentimes like I think the citation that you'll see more often than any other one is QRT meaning this opinion is in court to be rosy and bubbly and and so oftentimes for a lot of verses you know that really is sufficient it's a you know if you go to those three tough s ear you're gonna get a lot already I mean oftentimes with somebody you need a flowchart for just about anything so I mean so not somebody rosy need a flowchart and so that would be that but then sometimes like if you if it was a particularly --gel issue there are there are other toughest year that that you would want to go to you know you were to me is much stronger on a legal issue then obviously and and often you know how the Abubakar didn't he had not sorry called the abu bakr IBN al-arabi his is an excellent source for for legal issues and then there were even other sources you know outside of that sources on cam and put on that are not sometimes considered to be tough sear necessarily that we would look at if it was a legal issue and sometimes you know honestly there are some verses you just go through and through and through and be like man nobody what's going on you're like nobody seems to be getting this verse and you go through and like literally you'd be on your 40th tuffsy okay finally you know they're they're just some verses that it's like i mean and really this is part of how you see it's like people want to say tradition in our tradition tradition and it almost became a thing where people are following each other along and it's like not writing about this verse so why does everybody keep not saying anything about this verse and then you finally get through and you find somebody who opens up an extensive on extensive commentary on it and sometimes it's just happenstance and other times you know these were human beings and bad week at bad month you know but the tafseer had to get done alright and so you know you go through and you find that and you're like you know this is sorry man so once it was just not hitting on all cylinders on this one and you know you go to another one and then at the same time you know the the inverse savanah that sometimes you open up and you go whoa this man had a foot an inspiration from allah subhanaw taala when it comes to this particular surah or this particular ayah and you just say wow like you it really just hit him and so you're just like you know and and you just go with that to seer and in in some instances and a lot of times as you know you're doing this for year after year after year you know and you don't even know why you know that's something it's gonna be you don't even know how you know it but you know like that that's his type of issue and so you end up you know in this it kind of becomes somewhat intuitive after times now when it comes to some of those issues those verses go for myself a baseline that I had was to look at the kid or at the multiple different readings and employ them when they had an impact on the meaning and of the thousand variations that you have most of them don't actually have much impact on the meaning of them when they had an impact on the meeting and then also to look at the historical context of the espheni's ooh and again employ them when they were when they seemed to be somewhat because a lot of the ESPA vendors will actually aren't very reliable and even somebody well so this like somebody will give you here five is five in the zoo but all five of them contradict the meaning of the verse and they're mutually contradictory and so and so just and so we would use them and use them sparingly but it's actually one of the baseline things that I did was actually to list them all out and then and then actually trim them out over time and use those ones that actually help illuminate the verse in some in some useful way and but then also there's also Sufi TFS here because when it comes to certain verses so verses about you know that pertained to sort of be the training of the soul and also certain you know ideas such as you know that every soul you know knows no isn't it can't even if it makes an excuse you know you just can't escape it's like you know it ultimately deep down like you know and this by the way and so there's kind of expands but I would say one of the things it's like people have asked me what would you say is one of the things that that you learned through the course of this project and one of the things I learned from the course this project is that you often say the Quran is about there is no god but Allah this than anything ultimately what the Quran i think is really about is like you know the truth you know the truth and as much as you try and and deep inside no matter what excuse you proffer you're gonna confront that you're gonna do now and this is how you do it and the ground helps that gives you ways to do it or you do it when you die and that's gonna suck you know if you don't try to take care of it now and but but it is but it is it's like it's like and if you really think about it I mean there's so many things so many little ways that we all lie to ourselves about so many different things in our lives and so many little things that we do to try to escape some of those little lies that we're telling our self on both as both as regards major issues and disregards minor issues you know like procrastinating there's something something along these lines and and ultimately the grind is trying to tell you you know you've all of that sinew and you know it and you need to bring it out so sorry that was kind of a digression for me answer your question maybe you can do your second question offline and we'll take the next one so Monica okay so since this is not literalist def seer do you think the political implication would be the possibility of aspiring a new political philosophy out out of the Quran and that is more anarchist and by anarchist and more social liberal due to the very nature of the absolutist yet diverse perennial outlook and is this anarchism a new hope for uniting Sunni and Shia thought [Laughter] it's next all right I I really honestly I don't I don't I don't know how to answer that question I actually think that we've gotten into trouble with ways in which people have tried to lead some some political philosophies into or out of the Koran at the same time so and whether or not it could be more anarchist I I do think that one of the things is that the Koran does acknowledge that human collective ities are ultimately going to need some kind of water and and that without that order there there will be major complications and it gives some of the principles for for establishing that and I think that that had to do as well so an ultimately anarchist way and something that could unite Sunnis and Shiites you might have some other ideas here that you've come up with but I I've never fought off the question and I've never seen it in any way as a very interesting question first of all like to thank you gentlemen for a very stimulating presentation exchange and I encourage the audience to give them another rousing head my question is Josefa from the way you responded to Ali's question concerning the Trinity and I might have heard this wrong it seems like you're implying there's a Trinitarian tradition and Christianity it has its more sophisticated and nuanced understandings that ultimately d2i a Unitarian position and it has its crude manifestations my question and that the Koran is responding within that context when those who say that Jesus is the third of three have rejected faith could it be possible that the Koran is defending a Unitarian position that is an opposition to Trinitarian doctrine and all of its manifestations and that Unitarian position was the position that was taken by those who were arguing against the Trinity at the early church senates and councils that was set up to affirm Church doctrine on this issue yeah I think you I think it's possible I think it's definitely a possibility to read it that way but I I do think that when it comes down to it ultimately I mean remember that even a lot of the things Robert fisty key has written an article that deals with the issue bringing out that when you go into the intricacies of Trinitarian theology and particularly in the Catholic Church that it is trying very hard to to take into consideration many of the considerations though that we have in in theology as Muslims and really is trying to look very hard at how to maintain I mean this is the Catholic catechism the Orthodox catechism that we believe in the One God and and they understand that for them God is one all right yes God is one and God is is three in the Trinity at the same time when you get into the the ultimate details of that exactly where it all falls historically in the context of the of the Quran I think is something that that you know we'll never fully know but but I do think that in terms of what it says mean for example when it says that the Virgin Mary is the part of the Trinity in sort of Miriam what it talks about that and making that the Trinity I mean this is not the Trinity as understood by the Catholics you know one of the things that that share comes has brought out at times is that when you are talking to an atheist and they say you know I don't believe in God what do you think God is and then you say well I don't believe in that God either and so a lot of times when you were to say to shoot Catholics say you know we don't believe in in the Trinity if you were to go to most Muslims and they were to say okay well what do you think the Trinity is Catholic who knows Trinitarian see I don't believe in that either and I do think that it's I think that when it comes to the question of the Trinity I mean there's been so much ink spilled within this and is a far more complicated doctrine than pretty much anything you have a basic Islamic Creed that it is something that that is that there's always going to be a question but yes I am suggesting a that there is a way that it could be read as being as referring to misunderstandings and corruptions of that but I also think that the possibility that you raise is definitely one as well thank you I just I have a question an idea like one of the ideas so you're talking about how people have different ideas and they argue because of it so even you said like most of the times they they both may be right it's so like this just made me think about the verses of the Quran having different different explanations and so it's like it's like so so I just think that that's really motivating to think that when we read the Quran we don't always have to think I'm am I right about something but it's more like this is the experience that my heart had on it the reflection you know likes because everyone is different so so I just um in my question is just like basically what do you think about the Quran different meanings and how maybe since its sent from Allah everyone is a creation so everyone has an independent reaction with this so so it's basically like that that doesn't my feelings but I'm I just I just was very interested in this topic yeah thank you for asking that question because also it gets back to to Allah dominates question that about the polyvalence of the Quran that we didn't answer yeah that's right yeah we make this the last question so if you can also wrap up your concluding thoughts and if you have anything someone else back there it's blocked okay one more so you will be the last or and then when he comes I'll ask for your concluding thought so yeah I think that that is but that one does have to make the distinction within this regarding this last question yes every verse I think is addressed to the individual hearing or reading that verse at that particular time and that things can come that things can come from that and that it's it's an intimate conversation between between the individual and a loss of heart Allah and it's dressed directly to the heart now however the issues that might come to mind from that are not ones that are necessarily that then apply outside of that to others and so you know whatever inspiration if it doesn't mean it's always necessarily right but this is there's a very technical science within the classical Islamic tradition of of knowing you know what you could call the the places from which inspirations arise and that is a very technical science that are the Delaware debt Italia you know where did they where did they actually come from and actually one time I asked a Sufi Shaye's you know because he was saying he said you know particular people when they're given when they're made Sufi shapes by Allah so Allah he gives them particular up and she got a gift asked him what's the gift you give you and he said I know where people's speech is coming from when they speak you could see what aspect of their being was it from their shadows from their desires was it from the purity of heart pure tea of intention and things like this and because we don't always know those were did that idea and we don't always know that then sometimes that's one of the reasons why we can't say that this might be a more universal understanding and it's one of the reasons why in a sense we have the tough sear tradition to kind of you might say channel some interpretations but there is definitely I think first and foremost is an intimate conversation between the individual and God and this gets into the polyvalence of the text which is that really I mean even on the linguistic level you've got these multiple different ways in which in which the the Quran is recited and then you have the possibilities that just arise from the grammar okay you read it this way you read it this way you know you read that as as MF will be he or a hat and all of a sudden BAM you've got a different meaning out of the verse and and so it's on that level just linguistically you've got it but you know the way that this is going to come out and one of the things that we tend to not take account of is that over time in our different historical circumstances just as today there are going to be issues regarding our historical circumstances that are going to condition how we read and interpret some of these verses so - in the past there are different historical circumstances that conditioned the ways in which classical authors read and what they wrote within their within their toughest year at different times so if there wasn't like you know even better Jan at his time the hiss matey's were a big problem and so he actually wants to write a whole idea of how one can understand the Koran that excludes the possibility of his merely readings and his readings are very much bit his entire approach is actually very much conditioned by that it doesn't mean that what he's saying is wrong it means that at that historical period these are some of the the readings that one could come out with to answer those eggs is the time and they're going to come out in different ways at different times and that is part of how a loss of heart Allah preserves the text if it wasn't something that actually ended up having a different manifestation you might say within humanity and helping answer our questions in different ways then it wouldn't be preserved and it wouldn't be something that we could apply to to the human condition in all times quickly the most transient question that kind of stuck out to me inside the discussion was talking about the study Quran not being devotional by design and study Bibles are largely devotional across all denominations so I guess my question is could there be an innovation of the Study Bible that would be more devotional in nature or do here the very nature of the Quran as a recited scripture lends itself to for study grants to not be devotional always the way that this one was particularly designed as this seesaw between the and sex and academia and Eastern tradition lent itself to be less devotional and more academic so selectra no no first of all I mean I wanna say clear if I wanted things I said that it's not something that one should necessarily view but one but one you know could actually have and actually somebody else told me that they were finding it very helpful in their particular and their particular recitations and their daily I would add that they were doing these people also told me that they took it with them on their honeymoon so they're unique individuals so so you know it can I don't recommend that by the way so but anyways so it really is something that can that can help you in that I think it could help and people have told me that I mean other people have told me that that they actually never really like this has you know kind of reawakened their relationship with with the Quran and I really feel you know blessed you had an ounce of anything I mean it's really all lost by Matala you know yes allow me yet that's not me that's only lost by Allah but it's an honor to have been involved in some way and and you know so I think that that now when it comes to other what you're saying about some of the the study Bibles yes like the evangelical the Catholic the Orthodox yes they are but the Oxford annotated isn't really the HarperCollins Study Bible as in these so and it actually began as a non devotional and non-denominational endeavor and I think that that's one of the things that that you know I think for the first one to a degree it was best that it not be within and I've thought about this for a while why did this end up on our laughs you know is kind of weird you get this question about how we ended up with this team I think that actually the fact that none of us had particular commitments to the manner in which the study of the core was expressed within any particular schools was to some degree providential because it made it something that we really could in a sense do something that might have the possibility of establishing a new a new paradigm in some way for for how text can be done regarding that within the Western context and that and that insha'Allah other things will come that will be more than motional that will be a Sunni study Quran a sure that's a really study Quran I hope that those cannot I hope that those are written and they don't have to necessarily be done in English thank you that's a good question thank you would you like to have any concluding thoughts a lot of him thank you very much for coming and for any enlightening I learned a lot myself I just want to conclude by saying you know the Quran says a failure to Deborah and Quran do they not have deep thought penetrating insight into the Quran and I think this is something that the story of Quran has achieved bringing together these two FS here I actually find it very devotional myself reading the toughest fear maybe I'm just strange but I enjoy reading tough seer I find it I feel my my spirituality increase if you will so it's a very interesting text I think what we can take away from tonight I think the areas of of contention were soteriology plurality of religions you know does the Quran condemn the Trinity that is is the Trinity reference at the end of al-ma'idah I think those are the issues that I would like to expand upon more and I and I encourage others to to look into those issues as well but thank you very much there's a colossal monocle thank you I would also like to thank you as well for coming here and and and this has been very very nothing very useful very beneficial conversation here and I think it the audience definitely would could would admit that you know there's a lot has been learned here I think it's important for the Muslim community to try their best to I guess you would say it make a distinction between I guess you would say one a work which is largely produced as an academic project even though it may contain devotional aspects to it you know and I similar to aside the Holly I do with our reads have series like if anything like of all the books I ever read actually enjoyed to see it more than anything else and actually feel like it it does something to increase my my my faith by just learning more by going through it you know be it something I agree with or don't agree with it just just to be engaging with the Quran it does something to the soul and so this is definitely a particular project you know I can understand doctor dr. Nestle is sort of ambivalence about it you know it is really a major undertaking to try to translate the word of God and of course many other people have to have attempted to do so as well that there's no way to perfectly convey the words of God want from one language to another and even as you pointed out even in the Arabic language is sort of like the Creator breaking through you know it's in human language but the Creator breaks through a shatters through it you know and reveals himself through the language and I do think that is important for that and and so so there's a tendency for people who are very religious I guess you would say quote-unquote you know very religious or less academic I guess you'd say and very committed to some type of orientation ideology to find a way to to discover the parts that are offensive more offensive than the other parts that can be very useful you know so now I would say that definitely to say Quran they're more useful things about it then thing that maybe not so useful so certain people so I definitely applaud the effort and you know thank you for coming in and giving us this opportunity to interrogate you thank you hopefully you have a safe safe safe trip back home Joe thank you thank you well thanks to everyone I had some things I wanted to say towards the end but in the interest of time I'm gonna put those aside and really just pick on one one aspect I think of what we've talked about today that's really stuck with me and I think what's been helpful to understand and really appreciate is maybe we shouldn't think of this as the study for an when when it's when it's put forward as this study for an and the impression that people might receive is well all the other scholarship on the Quran has now been superseded and this is the one that should be taken as the chief reference and that's certainly not at all what's intended at all the study Quran is part of a genre of study material and it fits itself within that category and I think the way that the editors and the scholars have approached it would in the broad sense of the term also place it within our tradition and the tradition has always been contentious its vast and as such this is inshaallah the first of many this is a study Quran and that's not a very good title yes and you know for anyone who thinks that everything about the Quran that has needed to be said as been said in the past they should take heed of the saying of the prophet sallal either salaam latin katya je boohoo it's a longer hadith on the authority of a leave of allah and know that it's wonders will never cease and what is Barrowman hulu allah ma and the scholars will never be satiated from its study so please join me in thanking our panel [Applause] we'd like to thank also Eastwind books there outside and study copies of the study Quran are available dr. joseph has kindly agreed to sign books so you can make your way out there and without any further ado subhanak allahumma rabba Hamrlik machado la ilaha illa anta stuff to look over at uber lake all the villa he min ash-shaitani rajim bismillah r-rahman r-rahim o allah's in the Linsanity host illa allatheena Avenue who are amylose olive hats whatever so we'll hop but alas of the Sun Salam alaikum you

Channel: Joseph Lumbard

Views: 2,596

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Keywords: Quran, Koran, Islam, Zaytuna, Tafsir, the study quran, joseph lumbard, quran study, quran translation, hamza yusuf, quran (religious text), understand quran, quran in english, quran karim, koran karim, zaytuna college, zaytuna quran, the study quran book review, joseph lumbard study quran, joseph lumbard debate

Id: L-UgqwRzI74

Length: 123min 21sec (7401 seconds)

Published: Fri Dec 08 2017