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In Islam, ' (pl. '; , 'recitations' / 'readings') refers to the ways or fashions that the Quran, the holy book of Islam, is Recitation. More technically, the term designates the different Linguistics, lexical, Phonetics, morphological and syntactical forms permitted with reciting the Quran. (2026). 9780415326391, Routledge. ISBN 9780415326391
Differences between include varying rules regarding the prolongation, intonation, and pronunciation of words, but also differences in stops, vowels, consonants (leading to different pronouns and verb forms), entire words and even different meanings. However, the variations don't change the overall message or doctrinal meanings of the Qur'an, as the differences are often subtle and contextually equivalent. also refers to the branch of Islamic studies that deals with these modes of recitation.
There are ten recognised schools of , each one deriving its name from a noted Quran reciter or "reader" ( pl. or ), such as Nafi' al-Madani, Ibn Kathir al-Makki, Abu Amr of Basra, Ibn Amir ad-Dimashqi, Aasim ibn Abi al-Najud, Hamzah az-Zaiyyat, and Al-Kisa'i.
While these readers lived in the second and third century of Islam, the scholar who approved the first seven qira'at (Abu Bakr Ibn Mujāhid) lived a century later, and the readings themselves have a chain of transmission (like hadith) going back to the time of Muhammad. Consequently, the readers ( qurrāʿ) who give their name to qira'at are part of a chain of transmission called a . The lines of transmission passed down from a riwāya are called turuq, and those passed down from a turuq are called or awjuh (sing. wajh; ).
Qiraat should not be confused with tajwid—the rules of pronunciation, intonation, and of the Quran. Each qira'a has its own tajwid. Qiraat are called readings or recitations because the Quran was originally spread and passed down orally, and though there was a written text, it did not include most vowels or distinguish between many consonants, allowing for much variation. (Qiraat now each have their own text in modern Arabic script.)
Qira'at are also sometimes confused with ahruf—both being readings of the Quran with "unbroken chain(s) of transmission going back to the Prophet". There are multiple views on the nature of the ahruf and how they relate to the qira'at, the general view being that caliph Uthman eliminated all of the ahruf except one during the 7th century CE.Abu Ameenah Bilal Philips, Tafseer Soorah Al-Hujuraat, 1990, Tawheed Publications, Riyadh, pp. 28-29. The ten were canonized by Islamic scholars in early centuries of Islam.
Even after centuries of Islamic scholarship, the variants of the qira'at have been said to continue "to astound and puzzle" researchers into Islam (by Ammar Khatib and Nazir Khan), and along with ahruf make up "the most difficult topics" in Quranic studies (according to Abu Ammaar Yasir Qadhi). The qira'at include differences in consonantal diacritics ( i'jām), vowel marks (), and the consonantal skeleton ( rasm), resulting in materially different readings (see examples).Cook, The Koran, 2000: pp. 72.
The Quran that is in "general use" throughout almost all the Muslim world today is a 1924 Egyptian edition based on the (reading) of on the authority of ( being the , or "transmitter", and being the or "reader").
Gradual steps were taken to improve the orthography of the Quran, in the first century with dots to distinguish similarly-shaped consonants (predecessors to i'jām), followed by marks (to indicate different vowels, like ḥarakāt) and nunation in different-coloured ink from the text (Abu'l Aswad ad-Du'alî (d. 69 AH/688 CE). (Not related to the colours used in the graphic to the right.) Later the different colours were replaced with marks used in written Arabic today.
Adam Bursi has cautioned that details of reports that diacritics were added at the direction of al-Hajjaj under Caliph Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan are a "relatively late development" and that "While ʿAbd al-Malik and/or al-Ḥajjāj do appear to have played a role in the evolution of the qurʾānic text, the initial introduction of diacritics into the text was not part of this process and it is unclear what development in the usage of diacritics took place at their instigation." Manuscripts already used consonantal pointing sparingly, but at this time contain "no evidence of the imposition of the kind of fully dotted scriptio plena that the historical sources suggest was al-Ḥajjāj's intended goal", although "There is some manuscript evidence for the introduction of vowel markers into the Qurʾān in this period."
Each reciter had variations in their tajwid rules and occasional words in their recitation of the Quran are different or of a different morphology (form of the word) with the same root. Scholars differ on why there are different recitations (see below). Aisha Abdurrahman Bewley gives an example of a line of transmission of recitation "you are likely to find ... in the back of a Qur'an" from the Warsh harf, going backwards from Warsh all the way to Allah himself:"The riwaya of Imam Warsh from Nafi' al-Madini from Abu Ja'far Yazid ibn al-Qa'qa' from 'Abdullah ibn 'Abbas from Ubayy ibn Ka'b from the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, from Jibril, peace be upon him, from the Creator."
After Muhammad's death there were many qira'at, from which 25 were described by Abu 'Ubayd al-Qasim ibn Sallam two centuries after Muhammad's death. The seven qira'at readings which are currently notable were selected in the fourth century by Abu Bakr Ibn Mujahid (died 324 AH, 936 CE) from prominent reciters of his time, three from Kufa and one each from Mecca, Medina, and Basra and Damascus.Cook, The Koran, 2000: p. 73 Later, three more recitations were canonized for ten. (The first seven readers named for a qiraa recitation died un/readers of the recitations lived in the second and third century of Islam. (Their death dates span from 118 AH to 229 AH).
Each reciter recited to two narrators whose narrations are known as riwaya (transmissions) and named after its primary narrator ( rawi, singular of riwaya).
Each rawi has turuq (transmission lines) with more variants created by notable students of the master who recited them and named after the student of the master. Passed down from turuq are wujuh: the wajh of so-and-so from the tariq of so-and-so. There are about twenty riwayat and eighty turuq.
In the 1730s, Quran translator George Sale noted seven principal editions of the Quran, "two of which were published and used at Medina, a third at Mecca, a fourth at Kufa, a fifth at Basra, a sixth in Syria, and a seventh called the common edition " He states that "the chief disagreement between their several editions of the Koran, consists in the division and number of the verses."
Abu Bakr Ibn Mujāhid (859 - 936 CE) wrote a book called Kitab al-Sab' fil-qirā'āt. He is the first to limit the number of reciters to the seven known. Some scholars, such as ibn al-Jazari, took this list of seven from Ibn Mujahid and added three other reciters (Abu Ja'far from Madinah, Ya'qub from Basrah, and Khalaf from Kufa) to form the canonical list of ten.
Imam Abu Ishaq al-Shatibi (1320 - 1388 CE) wrote a poem outlining the two most famous ways passed down from each of seven strong imams, known as al-Shatibiyyah. In it, he documented the rules of recitation of Naafi', Ibn Katheer, Abu 'Amr, Ibn 'Aamir, 'Aasim, al-Kisaa'i, and Hamzah. It is 1173 lines long and a major reference for the seven qira'aat.
Ibn al-Jazari (1350 - 1429 CE) wrote two large poems about qira'at and tajwid. One was Durrat Al-Maʿniyah (الدرة المعنية), in the readings of three major reciters, added to the seven in the Shatibiyyah, making it ten. The other is Tayyibat al-Nashr (طيبة النشر), which is 1014 lines on the ten major reciters in great detail, of which he also wrote a commentary.
The qira'at that do not meet these conditions are called shādh (anomalous/irregular/odd). The other recitations reported from companions that differ from the Uthmānic codex may represent an abrogated or abandoned ḥarf, or a recitation containing word alterations for commentary or for facilitation for a learner. By contemporary Ijma, it is not permissible to recite the shādh narrations in prayer, but they can be studied academically. The most well documented companion reading was that of 'Abdullah ibn Mas'ud. Dr. Ramon Harvey notes that Ibn Mas'ud's reading continued in use and was even taught as the dominant reading in Kufa for at least a century after his death and has shown that some of his distinctive readings continued to play a role in Hanafi fiqh. In 1937, Arthur Jeffery produced a compilation of variants attested in Islamic literature for a number of companion readings. More recently, Dr. Abd al-Latif al-Khatib made a much more comprehensive compilation of qira'at variants called Mu'jam al-Qira'at. This work is widely cited by academic scholars and includes ten large volumes listing variants attested in Islamic literature for the canonical readings and their transmissions, the companions, and other non-canonical reciters, mainly of the first two centuries. The process by which certain readings became canonical and others regarded as shaadhdh has been extensively studied by Dr. Shady Nasser.Nasser, The Transmission of the Variant Readings of the Qurʾān, 2012
The three mashhur qira'at added to the seven are:
Among the reasons given for the overwhelming popularity of Hafs an Asim is that it is easy to recite and that God has chosen it to be widespread (Qatari Ministry of Awqaf and Islamic Affairs). Ingrid Mattson credits mass-produced printing press mushaf with increasing the availability of the written Quran, but also with making one version widespread (not specifically Hafs 'an 'Asim) at the expense of diversity of qira'at.
Gabriel Said Reynolds emphasizes that the goal of the Egyptian government in publishing the edition was not to delegitimize the other qira'at, but to eliminate variations found in Quranic texts used in state schools, and to do this they chose to preserve one of the fourteen qira'at "readings", namely that of Hafs (d. 180/796) 'an 'Asim (d. 127/745).
According to one study (by Christopher Melchert) based on a sample of the ten qira'at/readings, the most common variants (ignoring certain extremely common pronunciation issues) are non-dialectal vowel differences (31%), dialectal vowel differences (24%), and consonantal dotting differences (16%). (Other academic works in English have become available that list and categorise the variants in the main seven canonical readings. Two notable and open access works are those of Nasser Appendix Comprehensive Table of Quranic Variants in and Abu Fayyad.)
The first set of examples below compares the most widespread reading today of Hafs from Asim with that of Warsh from Nafi, which is widely read in North Africa. All have differences in the consonantal/diacritical marking (and vowel markings), but only one adds a consonant/word to the rasm: " then it is what" v. "it is what", where a "fa" consonant letter is added to the verse.
The second set of examples below compares the other canonical readings with that of Ḥafs ʿan ʿĀṣim. These are not nearly as widely read today, though all are available in print and studied for recitation.
Taking the second version of the history of the ahruf described above, Bilal Philips writes that Caliph 'Uthman eliminated six of the seven ahruf about halfway through his reign, when confusion developed in the outlying provinces about the Quran's recitation. Some Arab tribes boasted about the superiority of their ahruf, and rivalries began; new Muslims also began combining the forms of recitation out of ignorance. Caliph 'Uthman decided to make official copies of the Quran according to the writing conventions of the Quraysh and send them with the Quranic reciters to the Islamic centres. His decision was approved by the Companions of Muhammad, and all unofficial copies of the Quran were ordered destroyed; Uthman carried out the order, distributing official copies and destroying unofficial copies, so that the Quran began to be read in one harf, the same one in which it is written and recited throughout world today.
Philips writes that Qira'at is primarily a method of pronunciation used in recitations of the Quran. These methods are different from the seven forms, or modes ( ahruf), in which the Quran was revealed. The methods have been traced back to Muhammad through a number of Companions who were noted for their Quranic recitations; they recited the Quran to Muhammad (or in his presence), and received his approval. These Companions included:
According to Philips, among the Successors (aka Tabi'in) generation of Muslims were many scholars who learned the methods of recitation from the Companions and taught them to others. Centres of Quranic recitation developed in al-Madeenah, Makkah, Kufa, Basrah and Syria, leading to the development of Quranic recitation as a science. By the mid-eighth century CE, a large number of scholars were considered specialists in the field of recitation. Most of their methods were authenticated by chains of reliable narrators, going back to Muhammad. The methods which were supported by a large number of reliable narrators (i.e. readers or qāriʾūn) on each level of their chain were called mutawaatir, and were considered the most accurate. Methods in which the number of narrators were few (or only one) on any level of the chain were known as shaadhdh. Some scholars of the following period began the practice of designating a set number of individual scholars from the previous period as the most noteworthy and accurate. The number seven became popular by the mid-10th century, since it coincided with the number of dialects in which the Quran was revealedAbu Ameenah Bilal Philips, Tafseer Soorah Al-Hujuraat, 1990, Tawheed Publications, Riyadh, pp. 30. (a reference to Ahruf).
Another (more vague) differentiation between Qira'at (recitations) and Ahruf (styles) offered by Ammar Khatib and Nazir Khan is "... the seven aḥruf are all the categories of variation to which the differences found within qirāʾāt correspond. In other words, they represent a menu of ingredients from which each qirāʾah selects its profile."
Abu 'Ubayd Qasim Ibn Sallam (died 224 Hijri year) reportedly selected twenty-five readings in his book. The seven readings which are currently notable were selected by Abu Bakr Ibn Mujahid (died 324 AH, 936 CE) at the end of the third century from prominent reciters of his time, three from Kufa and one each from Mecca, Medina, and Basra and Damascus. It is generally accepted that although their number cannot be ascertained, every reading is Quran which has been reported through a chain of narration and is Arabic correct. Some readings are regarded as mutawatir, but their chains of narration indicate that they are ahad (isolate) and their narrators are suspect in the eyes of rijal authorities.Javed Ahmad Ghamidi. Mizan, Principles of Understanding the Qu'ran , Al-Mawrid
Contrasting with the view of early scholars that the readings included human interpretation and errors, Nasser writes, "This position changed drastically in the later periods, especially after the 5th/11th century where the canonical Readings started to be treated as divine revelation, i.e. every single variant reading in the seven and ten eponymous Readings was revealed by God to Muhammad."Nasser, The Transmission of the Variant Readings of the Qurʾān, 2012: p.77
However, according to Morteza Karimi-Nia of the Encyclopaedia Islamica Foundation:
The view of some scholars that the differences, not just the agreement, between the canonical qira'at were transmitted mutawatir was a topic of disagreement among scholars. Shady Nasser notes that "all the Eponymous Readings were transmitted via single strands of transmissions (āḥād) between the Prophet and the seven Readers, which rendered the tawātur of these Readings questionable and problematic." He observes that qira'at manuals were often silent on the isnad (chain of transmission) between the eponymous reader and the Prophet, documenting instead the formal isnads from the manual author to the eponymous reader. Like Ibn Mujahid, often they separately included various biographical accounts connecting the reading back to the Prophet, while later manuals developed more sophisticated isnads.Nasser, 2nd Canonization of the Qurʾān, 2020: p.110-116 Nasser concludes that "the dominant and strongest opinion among the Muslim scholars holds to the non-tawātur of the canonical Readings".Nasser, The Transmission of the Variant Readings of the Qurʾān, 2012: p.116 Marijn van Putten has noted similarly that "The view that the transmission of the Quran is tawātur seems to develop some significant time after the canonization of the readers".
In his book on Quranic Arabic and the reading traditions (open access in pdf format), Marijn van Putten puts forth a number of arguments such that the qira'at are not purely oral recitations, but also to an extent are readings dependent on the rasm, the ambiguities of which they interpreted in different ways, and that the readings accommodated the standardized rasm rather than the other way around.van Putten, Quranic Arabic, 2022: p.52-55
A summary of these findings is given by van Putten in his book, Quranic Arabic: From Its Hijazi Origins to Its Classical Reading Traditions.van Putten, Quranic Arabic, 2022: p.184. For further detail, see chapter 7 which covers the lack of 'i'rab and tanwin in the QCT dialect. He also notes on pp. 100-101 ff. the work of al-Jallad on the Damascus Psalm fragment, which shows no signs of 'i'rab or tanwin, further supporting the picture of the old Hijazi / QCT dialect. In the concluding chapter, van Putten reiterates his overall argument that the Quran has been "reworked and 'Classicized' over time, to yield the much more Classical looking forms of Arabic in which the text is recited today". He suggests that "we can see traces of the Classical Arabic case system having been imposed onto the original language as reflected in the QCT, which had lost most of its word final short vowels and ".van Putten, Quranic Arabic, 2022: p.216
Van Putten has further argued that no canonical reading maintains any particular dialect. Rather, through a process of imperfect transmission and explicit choices, the readers assembled their own readings of the Quran, with no regard as to whether this amalgamation of linguistic features had ever occurred in a single dialect of Arabic. In this way the readings came to have a mixed character of different dialectical features.van Putten, Quranic Arabic, 2022: pp.78-79, 96
However, not only do the written vowel markings and written consonant diacritical marks differ between , there are also occasional small but "substantial" differences in the "skeleton" of the script (, see Examples of differences between readings) that Uthman reportedly standardized.
Similarly, the Oxford Islamic Studies Online writes that "according to classical Muslim sources", the variations that crept up before Uthman created the "official" Quran "dealt with subtleties of pronunciations and accents () and not with the text itself which was transmitted and preserved in a culture with a strong oral tradition."
On the other hand, Aisha Abdurrahman Bewley writes that different have "different diacritical marks", and the differences "compliment other recitations and add to the meaning, and are a source of tafsir." Ammar Khatib and Nazir Khan contend that "constitute a unique feature of the Qur'an that multiplies its eloquence and aesthetic beauty", and "in certain cases" the differences in "add nuances in meaning, complementing one another."
Abu Abd Al-Rahman al-Sulami writes, "The reading of Abu Bakr, Umar, Uthman and Zayd ibn Thabit and that of all the Muhajirun and the Ansar was the same. They would read the Quran according to the . This is the same reading which was read out twice by the Prophet to Gabriel in the year of his death. Zayd ibn Thabit was also present in this reading called the . It was this very reading that he taught the Quran to people till his death".Zarkashi, al-Burhan fi Ulum al-Qur'an, 2nd ed., vol. 1 (Beirut: Dar al-Fikr, 1980), p. 237. According to Ibn Sirin, "The reading on which the Quran was read out to the prophet in the year of his death is the same according to which people are reading the Quran today",Suyuti, al-Itqan fi Ulum al-Qur'an, 2nd ed., vol. 1 (Baydar: Manshurat al-Radi, 1343 AH), p. 177. which seems to contradict the recent Sanaa Mosque discoveries.
Examining the hadith of Umar's surprise in finding out "this Quran has been revealed in seven ", Suyuti, a noted 15th-century Islamic theologian, concludes the "best opinion" of this hadith is that it is "", i.e. its meaning "cannot be understood."Suyuti, Tanwir al-Hawalik, 2nd ed. (Beirut: Dar al-Jayl, 1993), p. 199.
van Putten, Quranic Arabic, 2022: p.52-55
History
According to Islamic belief, the Quran is recorded in the preserved tablet in heaven (), and was revealed to Muhammad by the angel Gabriel.
Quranic orthography
Early manuscripts of the Quran did not use diacritics either for vowels ( ḥarakāt) or to distinguish the different values of the rasm ( I'jām) see, -- or at least used them "only sporadically and insufficiently to create a completely unambiguous text".
Recitations
In the meantime, before the variations were finally committed entirely to writing, the Quran was preserved by recitation from one generation to the next. Doing the reciting were prominent reciters of a style of narration who had memorized the Quran (known as hafiz). According to Csaba Okváth,
It was during the period of the Successors i.e. and shortly thereafter that exceptional reciters became renowned as teachers of Qur'anic recitation in cities like Makkah, Madina, Kufa, Basra, and greater Syria (al-Sham). They attracted students from all over the expanding Muslim state and their modes of recitations were then attached to their names. It is therefore commonly said that for he recites according to the reading of Ibn Kathir or Nafi'; this, however, does not mean that these reciters Ibn are the originators of these recitations, their names have been attached to the mode of recitation simply because their rendition of the Prophetic manner of recitation was acclaimed for authenticity and accuracy and their names became synonymous with these Qur'anic recitations. In fact, their own recitation goes back to the Prophetic mode of recitation through an unbroken chain.
Reciting
Some of the prominent reciters and scholars in Islamic history who worked with qiraʼat as an Islamic studies (Islamic science) are:
Abu Ubaid al-Qasim bin Salam (774 - 838 CE) was the first to develop a recorded science for tajwid (a set of rules for the correct pronunciation of the letters with all their qualities and applying the various traditional methods of recitation), giving the rules of tajwid names and putting it into writing in his book called al-Qiraat. He wrote about 25 reciters, including the seven mutawatir reciters. He made the recitation, transmitted through reciters of every generation, a science with defined rules, terms, and enunciation.
The readings
Criteria for canonical status
All accepted qira'at according to ibn al-Jazari follow three basic rules:
The seven canonical qira'at
According to Aisha Abdurrahman Bewley, seven qira'at of ibn Mujahid are mutawatir ("a transmission which has independent chains of authorities so wide as to rule out the possibility of any error and on which there is consensus").
+The seven readers and their transmitters Nafi' al-Madani 70 AH 169 AH (785 CE)Shady Hekmat Nasser, Ibn Mujahid and the Canonization of the Seven Readings, p. 129. Taken from The Transmission of the Variant Readings of the Qur'an: The Problem of Tawaatur and the Emergence of Shawaadhdh. Leiden: Brill Publishers, 2012. Ibn 'Abd ar-Rahman Ibn Abi Na'im, Abu Ruwaym al-Laythi Persian with roots from Isfahan. Qalun 120 AH 220 AH (835 CE) Abu Musa, 'Isa Ibn Mina al-Zarqi Roman, Client of Bani Zuhrah Libya and most of Tunisia Warsh 110 AH 197 AH (812 CE) 'Uthman Ibn Sa'id al-Qubti Egyptian; client of Quraysh Morocco, Algeria, Mauritania, the Sahel, West Africa, and some parts of Tunisia Ibn Kathir al-Makki 45 AH 120 AH (738 CE) 'Abdullah, Abu Ma'bad al-'Attar al-Dari Persian Al-Bazzi 170 AH 250 AH (864 CE) Ahmad Ibn Muhammad Ibn 'Abdillah, Abu al-Hasan al-Buzzi Persian Not commonly recited Qunbul 195 AH 291 AH (904 CE) Muhammad Ibn 'Abd ar-Rahman, al-Makhzumi, Abu 'Amr Meccan and Makhzumi (by loyalty) Not commonly recited Abu 'Amr Ibn al-'Ala' 68 AH 154 AH (770 CE) Zuban Ibn al-'Ala' at-Tamimi al-Mazini, al-Basri Al-Duri 150 AH 246 AH (860 CE) Abu 'Umar, Hafs Ibn 'Umar Ibn 'Abd al-'Aziz al-Baghdadi Grammarian, blind Sudan, Chad, Central Africa, East Africa, and parts of Yemen Al-Susi 173
AH 261 AH (874 CE) Abu Shu'ayb, Salih Ibn Ziyad Ibn 'Abdillah Ibn Isma'il Ibn al-Jarud ar-Riqqi Not commonly recited Ibn Amir ad-Dimashqi 8 AH 118 AH (736 CE) 'Abdullah Ibn 'Amir Ibn Yazid Ibn Tamim Ibn Rabi'ah al-Yahsibi Hisham
153 AH 245 AH (859 CE) Abu al-Walid, Hisham ibn 'Ammar Ibn Nusayr Ibn Maysarah al-Salami al-Dimashqi Parts of Yemen Ibn Dhakwan 173 AH 242 AH (856 CE) Abu 'Amr, 'Abdullah Ibn Ahmad al-Qurayshi al-Dimashqi Not commonly recited Aasim ibn Abi al-Najud ? 127 AH (745 CE) Abu Bakr, 'Aasim Ibn Abi al-Najud al-'Asadi Persian ('Asadi by loyalty) Shu'bah 95 AH 193 AH (809 CE) Abu Bakr, Shu'bah Ibn 'Ayyash Ibn Salim al-Kufi an-Nahshali Nahshali (by loyalty) Not commonly recited Hafs 90 AH 180 AH (796 CE) Abu 'Amr, Hafs Ibn Sulayman Ibn al-Mughirah Ibn Abi Dawud al-Asadi al-Kufi Middle East, most of Asia Hamzah az-Zaiyyat 80 AH 156 AH (773 CE) Abu 'Imarah, Hamzah Ibn Habib al-Zayyat al-Taymi Persian (Taymi by loyalty) Khalaf al-Bazzar 150 AH 229 AH (844 CE) Abu Muhammad al-Asadi al-Bazzar al-Baghdadi Not commonly recited Khallad ? 220 AH (835 CE) Abu 'Isa, Khallad Ibn Khalid al-Baghdadi Quraishi Not commonly recited Al-Kisa'i 119 AH 189 AH (804 CE) Abu al-Hasan, 'Ali Ibn Hamzah al-Asadi Persian (Asadi by loyalty) Al-Layth ? 240 AH (854 CE) Abu al-Harith, al-Layth Ibn Khalid al-Baghdadi Not commonly recited Al-Duri 150 AH 246 AH (860 CE) Abu 'Umar, Hafs Ibn 'Umar Ibn 'Abd al-'Aziz al-Baghdadi Transmitter of Abu 'Amr (see above) Not commonly recited
"The Three after the Seven"
Bewley notes a further three qira'at, (sometimes known as "the three after the seven"), that provide additional variants.See for example 19:25, 82:9, and 21:104 on corpuscoranicum.de Quran database These three—named after Abu Jafar, Ya'qub and Khalaf—were added to the canonical seven centuries later by ibn al-Jazari (d.1429 CE) though they were popular since the time of the seven.Various sized selections of qira'at were published over the centuries. Ibn Mihran (d. 991) was the first to choose the same set of ten. Christopher Melchert (2008) The Relation of the Ten Readings to One Another Journal of Qur'anic Studies Vol.10 (2) pp.73-87 They are mashhur (literally "famous", "well-known". "these are slightly less wide in their transmission, but still so wide as to make error highly unlikely").
+The three readers and their transmitters Abu Ja'far ? 130 AH Yazid Ibn al-Qa'qa' al-Makhzumi al-Madani 'Isa Ibn Wardan ? 160 AH Abu al-Harith al-Madani Madani by style Ibn Jummaz ? 170 AH Abu ar-Rabi', Sulayman Ibn Muslim Ibn Jummaz al-Madani Ya'qub al-Yamani 117 AH 205 AH Abu Muhammad, Ya'qub Ibn Ishaq Ibn Zayd Ibn 'Abdillah Ibn Abi Ishaq al-Hadrami al-Basri Client of the Hadramis Ruways ? 238 AH Abu 'Abdillah, Muhammad Ibn al-Mutawakkil al-Basri Rawh ? 234 AH Abu al-Hasan, Rawh Ibn 'Abd al-Mu'min, al-Basri al-Hudhali Hudhali by loyalty Khalaf al-Bazzar 150 AH 229 AH Abu Muhammad al-Asadi al-Bazzar al-Baghdadi Transmitter of Hamza (see above) Ishaq ? 286 AH Abu Ya'qub, Ishaq Ibn Ibrahim Ibn 'Uthman al-Maruzi al-Baghdadi Idris 189 AH 292 AH Abu al-Hasan, Idris Ibn 'Abd al-Karim al-Haddad al-Baghdadi
Other modes of recitation
In addition to the ten "recognized" or "canonical modes" there are four other modes of recitation: Ibn Muhaysin, al-Yazidi, Hasan al-Basri and al-A'mash. These qira'at became unpopular over time as they all forgo one or more of ibn al-Jazari's criteria (mentioned above) and are now considered shadh (irregular/odd).
Hafs 'an 'Asim
One qira'a that has reached overwhelming popularity is the Hafs 'an 'Asim (i.e., the mode of ʿĀṣim ibn Abī al-Najūd (d. 127 AH) according to his student Ḥafs ibn Sulaymān (d. 180 AH)), specifically the Cairo Edition first published on 10 July 1924 in Cairo. Its publication has been called a "terrific success", and the edition has been described as one "now widely seen as the official text of the Qur'an", so popular among both Sunni and Shi'a that the common belief among less-informed Muslims is "that the Qur'an has a single, unambiguous reading", namely the 1924 Cairo version.Reynolds, "Quranic studies and its controversies", 2008: p. 2 (A belief held, or at least suggested, even such scholars as the famous revivalist Abul A'la Maududi -- "not even the most sceptical person has any reason to doubt that the Qur'än as we know it today is identical with the Qur'än which Muhammad set before the world"—and the Orientalist A.J. Arberry -- "the Koran as printed in the twentieth century is identical with the Koran as authorized by 'Uthmän more than 1300 years ago"—both of whom make no mention of Qira'at and use the singular form in describing the Quran.)Abul A`la Maududi, Towards Understanding Islam. International Islamic Federation of Student Organizations Gary, Indiana, 1970. p.109
Another source states that "for all practical purposes", it is the one Quranic version in "general use" in the Muslim world today.Böwering, "Recent Research on the Construction of the Quran", 2008: p.74
Variations among readings
Examples of differences between readings
Most of the differences between the various readings involve consonant/diacritical marks ( I'jām) and marks ( Ḥarakāt) indicating other vocalizations -- short vowels, nunization, glottal stops, long consonants. Differences in the rasm or "skeleton" of the writing are more scarce, since canonical readings were required to comply with at least one of the regional Uthmanic copies (which had a small number of differences).
Al-Māʾidah 5:6 al-Isrāʼ 17:102 Maryam 19:25 Ṭā Hā 20:96 Al-Anbiyā' 21:96 Al-Anbiyā' 21:104 Al-Hashr 59:14
Qira'at and Ahruf
Difference between them
Although both Qira'at (recitations) and Ahruf (styles) refer to readings of the Quran, they are not the same. Ahmad 'Ali al Imam (and Ammar Khatib and Nazir Khan) notes three general explanations, described by Ibn al-Jazari, of what happened to the Ahruf. One group of scholars, exemplified by Ibn Hazm, held that Uthman preserved all seven ahruf. Another group, exemplified by Al-Tabari, held that Uthman preserved only one of the seven, unifying the ummah under it. Finally, Ibn al-Jazari held what he said was the majority view, which is that the orthography of the Uthmanic copies accommodated a number of ahruf -- "some of the differences of the aḥruf, not all of them".Ibn Ḥajar, Fatḥ al-Bārī (Riyadh: Dār al-Ṭaybah, 2005), 11:195–96. He further explains that this was a reason for the textual variants between ʿUthmānic codices, to increase the number of readings that could be accommodated.
Many of the other Companions learned from them; master Quran commentator Ibn 'Abbaas learned from Ubayy and Zayd.Abu Ameenah Bilal Philips, Tafseer Soorah Al-Hujuraat, 1990, Tawheed Publications, Riyadh, pp. 29–30.
Scriptural basis for seven Ahruf
While different ahruf or variants of the Quran are not mentioned in the Quran, hadith do mention them.
According to Bismika Allahuma, proof of the seven ahruf is found in many hadith, "so much so that it reaches the level of mutawaatir." One scholar, Jalaal ad-Deen as-Suyootee, said that twenty-one traditions of companions of Muhammad state "that the Qur'aan was revealed in seven ahruf". One hadith (reported in the Muwatta of Malik ibn Anas) has "Umar manhandling Hisham Ibn Hakim Ibn Hizam after what he (Umar) thinks is an incorrect reading of the Quran by Hisham. When Umar hauls Hisham to Muhammad for chastisement," where Hisham and Umar each recite for Muhammad, Umar is surprised to hear Muhammad say, "It was revealed thus", after each reading. Muhammad ends by saying: "It was revealed thus; this Quran has been revealed in seven Ahruf. You can read it in any of them you find easy from among them."Malik Ibn Anas, Muwatta, vol. 1 (Egypt: Dar Ahya al-Turath, n.d.), p. 201, (no. 473).
Disagreement
Javed Ahmad Ghamidi (and others) point out that Umar and Hisham belonged to the same tribe (the Quraysh), and members of the same tribe and would not have used different pronunciation.
Supporters of the theory reply that Hisham may have been taught the Quran by a companion of Muhammad from a different tribe. Nevertheless, Ghamidi questions the hadith which claim "variant readings", on the basis of Quranic verses (, ), the Quran was compiled during Muhammad's lifetime and questions the hadith which report its compilation during Uthman's reign. Since most of these narrations are reported by Ibn Shihab al-Zuhri, Imam Layth Ibn Sa'd wrote to Imam Malik:Ibn Qayyim, I'lam al-Muwaqqi'in, vol. 3 (Beirut: Dar al-Fikr, n.d.), p. 96.
Questions and difficulties
Developing view of full authenticity
Professor Shady Nasser of Harvard University is the author of books and papers on the canonization process of the Quran. Nasser has explored examples of prominent early scholars and grammarians who regarded some variants that were later considered canonical to be wrong (not just wrongly transmitted) or preferred some variants over others. In particular, he gives examples of such views from the time shortly before canonization expressed by Al-Tabari,Nasser, The Transmission of the Variant Readings of the Qurʾān, 2012: pp.39–47 the grammarian Al-Farraʼ,Nasser, The Transmission of the Variant Readings of the Qurʾān, 2012: p.167 and Ibn Mujahid in the very work in which he selected the 7 readings ( Kitab al-Sab'a fil-qirā'āt,Nasser, The Transmission of the Variant Readings of the Qurʾān, 2012: pp.59-61 particularly his "critical remarks ... against Ibn ʿĀmir, Ḥamza, and some canonical Rāwīs such as Qunbul".Nasser, 2nd Canonization of the Qurʾān, 2020: p.89 In one summary he states in reference to certain critics and examples (elaborated in earlier chapters) that "The early Muslim community did not unconditionally accept all these Readings; the Readings of Ḥamza, al-Kisāʾī, and Ibn ʿĀmir were always disparaged, criticized, and sometimes ridiculed."Nasser, The Transmission of the Variant Readings of the Qurʾān, 2012: p.111
Disagreement on mutawatir transmission from Muhammad
Doctrine holds that the readings that make up each of the canonical Qira'at can be traced by a chain of transmission (like hadith) back to Muhammad, and even that they were transmitted by chains so numerous that their authenticity is beyond doubt (mutawatir). In theory, evidence of the canonical Qira'at should be found among the oldest Quranic manuscripts.
Struggles of the
The writings of Ibn Mujahid give a great deal of insight into the community of the (Arabic: "reciters"). In his book on Ibn Mujahid's Kitab al-Sab'a, Shady Nasser cites specific examples to make many observations on the difficulties that the eponymous readers and their transmitters are therein reported to have experienced, while emphasising that they were "driven by sincere piety and admiration for the Qurʾānic revelation" and "went to extreme measures to preserve, perform and stabilize the text".Nasser, 2nd Canonization of the Qurʾān, 2020: p.182 For example, when precise information was missing on part of a reading, "the resorted to (analogy)", as did Ibn Mujahid himself in documenting the readings transmitted to him.Nasser, 2nd Canonization of the Qurʾān, 2020: p.178 In other cases, canonical transmitters such as Shu'ba said he "did not memorize" how his teacher 'Asim read certain words, or Ibn Mujahid had conflicting or missing information.Nasser, 2nd Canonization of the Qurʾān, 2020: pp.178-180 Accounts report what Nasser describes as incidents of "ambivalence and indecisiveness" by readers themselves such as Abu 'Amr, 'Asim and Nafi,Nasser, 2nd Canonization of the Qurʾān, 2020: p.173 while Ibn Mujahid often lacked certain information on Ibn Amir's reading.Nasser, 2nd Canonization of the Qurʾān, 2020: p.174 Nasser also notes examples recorded by Ibn Mujahid of readers such as Abu 'Amr, al Kisa'i, Nafi, and the transmitters of 'Asim, Hafs and Shu'ba, in certain cases "retracting a reading and adopting a new one", or Shu'ba recounting that he "became skeptical" of his teacher 'Asim's reading of a certain word and adopted instead that of a non-canonical Kufan reader (al-A'mash).Nasser, 2nd Canonization of the Qurʾān, 2020: pp.175-176 He notes the case of Ibn Dhakwan finding one reading for a word in his book/notebook, and recalling something different in his memory.Nasser, 2nd Canonization of the Qurʾān, 2020: p.159 Nasser observes that "when in doubt, the Qurrāʾ often referred to written records and personal copies of the Qurʾān", sometimes requesting to see the copy belonging to someone else.Nasser, 2nd Canonization of the Qurʾān, 2020: p.172
Arabic dialect of the Quran
Contrary to popular conceptions, the Quran was not originally codified in Classical Arabic, instead originating in the Old Hijazi dialect of Arabic. Linguist and Quranic manuscript expert Dr. Marijn van Putten has written a number of papers on the Arabic evident in the Quranic consonantal text (QCT). Van Putten brings internal linguistic arguments (internal rhymes) to show that this dialect had lost the hamza (except at the end of words spoken in the canonical readings with a final long ā), not just in the orthography of the written text, as is well established, but even in the original spoken performance of the Quran. He also notes Chaim Rabin's (d. 1996) observation of "several statements by medieval Arabic scholars that many important Hijazis, including the prophet, would not pronounce the hamza" and quotes his point that "the most celebrated feature of the Hijaz dialect is the disappearance of the hamza, or glottal stop". The canonical readings on the other hand use hamza much more widely and have considerable differences in its usage. In another paper, Van Putten and Professor Phillip Stokes argue, using various types of internal evidence and supported by early manuscripts and inscriptions of early dialects found in Arabia, that unlike the dialects found in the canonical readings, the spoken language behind the QCT "possessed a functional but reduced case system, in which cases marked by long vowels were retained, whereas those marked by short vowels were mostly lost".
Van Putten also reconstructs the spoken dialect represented by the QCT to have treated nouns ending with feminine -at as diptotes (without nunation) rather than the triptotic feminine endings spoken in Quran recitations today.
Recitation of scribal errors inherited from the original Uthmanic copies
In modern times some academic scholars have regarded descriptions by Muslim scholars of the 40 or so differences in the rasm (skeleton text) of the four copies of the Uthmanic codex sent out to Medina, Syria, and the garrison towns of Basra and Kufa, to be scribal errors in those copies, especially after Michael Cook (who expresses this view) established from these descriptions that they form a stemma (tree structure), widely considered to prove a written copying process. All subsequent manuscripts can be grouped into these regional families based on the inherited differences. Marijn Van Putten and Hythem Sidky have noted that the canonical readers strongly tended to include the differences found in the codex given to their region and adapted their readings accordingly, (pp.13-15 of the linked open access pdf) while Shady Nasser gives a somewhat more complex picture, with a more comprehensive list of the documented differences including those that are less well attested. He also identifies examples where different readers from the same town sometimes seem to have used codices from elsewhere.Nasser, 2nd Canonization of the Qurʾān, 2020: pp.144–163 Hythem Sidky too notes some such examples, suggesting that as knowledge of regionally isolated variants proliferated, new options became available to the readers or that codices became contaminated through copying from multiple exemplars. He also finds that the less well attested variants in the rasm literature have a "poor agreement" with the regionality found in early manuscripts, whereas the well attested variants in the rasm literature (which form a stemma) have an "excellent agreement" with the manuscript evidence. He finds that "by all indications, documentation of the regional variants was an organic process", rather than being known at the time the codices were produced.
Misunderstanding
Using ""/"recitations" to describe Quranic variants may sound as though different reciters are reading from the same text (or reciting based on the same text) but with different "prolongation, intonation, and pronunciation of words"; or if their spoken words are different it's because they have the same consonants but different vowel markings (see orthography diagram above). (Ammar Khatib and Nazir Khan, for example, talk of the "basis of the " being "words that can be read in multiple ways" rather than different words or word forms used in the same verse.)
Rationale
According to Oliver Leaman, "the origin" of the differences of "lies in the fact that the linguistic system of the Quran incorporates the most familiar Arabic dialects and vernacular forms in use at the time of the Revelation." According to Csaba Okváth, "Different recitations different take into account dialectal features of Arabic language ..."
Questions
Other reports of what Muhammad said (as well as some scholarly commentary) seem to contradict the presence of variant readings -- or .
See also
Notes
Citations
Sources
External links
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