The Quranic Concept of Estinas: Evaluating Interpretive Traditions with a Historiographical and Etymological Approach

The root of the word “Estinas,” which is derived from the core "Ans", has been used twice in the Holy Qur'an; Once in the form of a verb "Tastanisoo" (Noor / 27) and again as a nominal "Mustanasin" (Ahzab/53). While there is no controversy among exegetes about the second meaning for any reason, the first meaning of Estinas has been so challenging that it gave rise to numerous interpretive approaches in the first centuries. The present study aims to discover the reason for semantic discrepancy about Estinas and to determine which of these statements are preferable. One of the methods used in this study is the history of lexicography, meaning that the process of defining related words in dictionaries is reviewed over time along with their changes. In another section, techniques conventionally used in historical linguistics are employed for the analysis of Semitic etymology. The purpose of this research, besides addressing minor problems, is to demonstrate how the two approaches of etymology and the history of lexicography can be adopted to evaluate interpretive statements and how the results of these two approaches can be merged.