An Ontological Approach to Jacques Derrida’s Reading of Rum Surah: Benefited from Ayatollah Javdi Amuli’s Persian Exegesis

To present a democratic reading of The Qur’an, Derrida introduces it as a book of hospitality and unconditional forgiveness. However, he considers The Prophet (PBUH) an exemption from this rule of hospitality. His reading of The Qur’an has not yet been examined by the scholars. The aim of this study is to investigate the reason for Derrida’s reading of The Qur'an and its separation from The Prophet (PBUH). In this descriptive-analytical- comparative method, the concepts considered by Derrida in the text of The Qur'an are examined and the epistemological status of The Prophet is analyzed on the base of the text itself. In this regard, "ontological" reading of the text of The Qur'an is used, which considers the text independent of the reader and writer. This reading is comparable to Derrida’s “deconstructive” reading since deconstruction emerged from ontological approach. This approach is similar to Allameh Tabatabai’s “Quran to Qur’an” approach which is suitable for Qur’anic studies. To avoid reducing the text of The holy Qur’an to a literary text the findings of the study in compared with the learned exegesis of Ayatollah Javadi Amuli. The findings of this study demonstrates that Derrida has ignored evidences in the text contradicting his reading, and as a result he has found the actions of The Prophet (PBUH) contrary to The Qur’an.