This is a lexicon entry that gathers the technical meaning of this term in Shahrur’s various books and connects its multiple usages.
This entry belongs to the Shahrur lexicon. For reading by theme, see Shahrur’s major themes and shared concepts.
Meaning in Shahrur
A traditional science that works to clarify the meanings of the verses and arrange them in light of the inherited tools of the exegetes, but here it is viewed as having exceeded its proper bounds until it became a factor in confusing the Qur’anic sciences and privileging the traditional reading over others. It is therefore not an ultimate authority for understanding the Qur’an, but a historical construct that needs to be reconfigured within a new method for understanding the text.
Distinctions
- It does not coincide with all the Qur’anic sciences, but is one of them and has dominated them in traditional usage
- It is not equivalent to the contemporary reading, because the latter seeks to go beyond the inherited intermediary and build a new hermeneutical method.
- Here it is not understood as a direct interpretation of the Qur’an alone, but as a historical epistemic apparatus whose extension and hegemony have become the object of critique.
Occurrences in his books
- The Mother of the Book and Its Elaboration: exegesis is criticized here because it overran the other Qur’anic sciences and became part of the traditional conflation. It is therefore not treated as an ultimate authority, but as a historical science that needs to be reordered within a new method
What is adjacent to it and differs from it
- Qur’anic sciences
- The Mother of the Book and Its Elaboration presents a project for reconstructing understanding of the Qur’an, religion, and legislation on contemporary foundations
- The contemporary reading removes the inherited intermediary
- The contemporary reading requires a new hermeneutical method that goes beyond traditional exegesis
- The inflation of traditional categorization
- The traditional Qur’anic sciences emerged historically and then became mixed together under the dominance of exegesis
- killing one’s children for fear of poverty
- the hegemony of exegesis