Orality and Islamic Scripture

Orality and Scripture


As we have seen in the readings so far, the early Muslim accounts
provide vivid depictions of the experiential aspect of the revelation
of the Quran to the prophet Muhammad.
If you look at accounts of how the prophet received the first revelation,
he was meditating in a cave when he heard the words, “Recite!
Recite in the name of thy Lord.”
He then found that these words had been inscribed on his heart.
The oral and written forms of the Quran have complemented each other
from the very beginning of its revelation to this day.
Since the prophet is generally considered
to have been illiterate and unable to write,
and since the Quran was most likely compiled only
after the prophet's death, it is undeniably the oral aspect of the Quran
that takes precedence.
In fact, the medium through which most Muslims today
interact with the holy scripture of Islam is still in its recited form.
But why should it be important for us that the Quran is oral?
In the readings and exercises that follow,
we will investigate several approaches to this question.
We usually approach a written text in terms of its meaning alone,
but encountering the Quran through its recitation
is simultaneously an intellectual engagement with meaning,
and an aesthetic and existential encounter with the divine.
Thus, for Muslims, listening to the Quran is a form of communion with God.
This was crucially important for the way early Muslims engaged with the Quran.
So we will read accounts of diverse early reactions
to the sonority of the Quran. But the sonority of the Quran
is as important today as it was 1,400 years ago.
So we will end day two with an exercise in which we
ask you to experience and reflect on the recitation of the Quran.
It is only by experiencing the recitation for yourself
that you can deepen your understanding about what the orality of the Quranic
has meant for Muslims in diverse contexts across the centuries.