Understanding the Text (Qur'an) and the Position of Reason in the View of Nasr Hamid Abu Zayd and Allameh Tabataba'i

Understanding the meaning of the Holy Quran as the eternal miracle of the Holy Prophet (s) has always been of interest to scholars from different angles. Some scholars have taken an extreme approach to understanding the role of reason in understanding the meaning of the text of the Qur'an, such as Mojassameh and Hanabalah. They ignore the reason, and then validate the appearance of the text in understanding the Qur'an. Some other scholars such as No-mu'tazili payed to much attention to the human reason and called the revelation as humanistic issue, and then they tried to test the Qur'an with human reason. The question is, in which range do Allameh Tabatabai and Nasr Nasr Hamid Abu Zayd exist? And what do they mean by reason in understanding the text? The present study argues that Allameh Tabataba'i by adopting a middle path by presupposing the divine text, the words and meanings of the Holy Qur'an, considers reason to be at the service of revelation, not a criterion for understanding it. Whereas Abu Zayd, by the divine presupposition of the origin of revelation, considers revelation humanistic words. Therefore, he has made reason the criteria for understanding the Qur'an.