نشریه مطالعات تاریخی قرآن و حدیث
سال بیست و نهم شماره 2 (پیاپی 75، تابستان 1402)

"Ḥamd" is a key concept in the Quranic theology that underwent fundamental changes in meaning upon entering Islamic culture. The lexicographers and commentators have considered ḥamd to mean praise (madh) or thanksgiving (shokr). In traditions and Islamic culture, the same meaning for ḥamd has been reflected. Meanwhile, in its pre-Islamic history and in semantic languages, ḥamd had two meanings: first, it means "fire, heat" and second, "desire, interest and pleasure"; that the second meaning is constructed from the first meaning. These semantic evidences show that ḥamd has undergone a fundamental change in its meaning through its life. in this research, by the historical method, the concept of ḥamd is investigated at the pre-Islamic era, age of Qur’an and the period of Islamic culture, and its semantic changes through the history, by the approach of history of concept. This research has reached the conclusion that the meaning of ḥamd in the Holy Qur’an is along its pre-Islamic meaning (desire, interest and attention) and it should not be carried over the changed meaning that evolved in the Islamic era (praise, thanks).

The status of women in different periods is influenced by the texts that came in the form of hadiths. Some of these texts have an originality after the period of the Prophet (pbuh) and were created for various functions. Israelite was one of the tools that helped to create texts needed for women in line with the goals of some rulers. Narratives mixed with Israelite are part of the larger flow of these teachings in Muslim narrative texts, of which the story of al-zuwjah’s betrayal is an example. In this way, the teachings of the Torah were usually presented in the format of traditions. In this research, based on the document-text dating method, it was found that the textual authenticity of the narrative of adultery was republished in the first half of the first century, and based on the document history, it was republished in the late second century. One of the results of creating this narrative was its various functions. The cultural function of this narrative in the first century was to limit women and its function in the Abbasid period was political and to keep women away from government positions and rulers. Considering the situation of the Jews in the neo-Muslim society of that day, the Israeli language was used to exploit the cultural and political goals of the rulers.

The pure obedience of the people of Shām to Muʿāwiyah is a special and common language. In some statements of Nahj al-Balāghah, the people of Shām are presented with characteristics such as ignorance, meanness and baseness, violence, vileness, despicable, humiliation and rude servants. Some historians have stated that the reason for the compliance of the people of Shām is lack of intelligence, blind compliance, lack of thought and reflection, indifference to the news and hidden events. This is despite the fact that based on some propositions of Nahj al-Balāghah, the people of Shām are described as orderly, trustworthy, loyal and united, and even Imam Ali (as) wished: “I wish Muawiya would exchange ten Iraqis for one from Shām”. This research is descriptive-analytical, focusing on the Umayyad movement in Shām, and the reason for the pure compliance of the people of Shām. Among the results of this research is that although the people of Shām had special characteristics, but these characteristics were used by the Umayyad movement under the leadership of Muʿāwiyah to use the positive characteristics of the people of Shām by relying on their pre-Islamic beliefs and policies that fit their spirit.

In a superficial view, it seems that the commentators in the narrative interpretations, without any struggling effort, have only collected narrations related to the words and expressions of the verses. Contrary to this idea, the evidence shows that the authors of narrative interpretations, like other commentators, have been influenced by the background conditions in order to discover the meaning of the verses and have started to select and arrange the narrations. What specifically distinguishes these interpretations in the issue of Friday prayer is the consideration of the conditions for the obligation of Friday prayer in the later interpretations of Ṣāfi and Nūr al-Thaqlain; this is not seen in the previous interpretations of critical argument. The reason for this difference in approach can be evaluated considering the simultaneity of the writing of later narrative commentaries with the emergence of the Safavid Shiite government. Belonging to Bahrani's interest in expressing the esoteric and ta’wīl aspects of the verses and Huwyzi's greater interest than Bahrāni and Fayz in planning jurisprudential debates in accordance with the verses are other factors influencing this distinction. Also, Sufi characteristics of Fayz's personality has caused him to not look at this issue solely from the point of view of a jurisprudential issue, which his statements in Zād al-Sālik's treatise and Olfat-Nāmeh are proof of this.

The issue of historicity of Qur’an gained so much support that some deconstructive ideas were raised about Qur’an and the Holy Book was even called a man-made text. In studying the interpretational words of the Ahl al-Bayt (as), one can see that enough attention has been given to the issue of historicity so that it can be reconsidered as one of the interpretational principles with roots in the words and deeds of Ahl al-Bayt (as). The current research defines historicity before it uses a descriptive-analytical approach to distinguish between text historicity and understanding historicity in the view of hermeneutists. Then based on what has been said in the words of Ahl al-Bayt (as) about historical approach in understanding the text of the Qur’an, the history of people, history of conditions of revelation and the history of the environment in which Qur’an was revealed can be distinguished. The research then concludes that the Ahl al-Bayt’s way of dealing with historicity was focused on the understanding historicity of the Qur’an and not the text historicity of Holy Book. Making a reference to the words of Ahl al-Bayt (as) which indicate that understanding of Qur’an is beyond the history, the research seeks to further explain and elucidate that view.

Among the Shiite scholars, especially the later scholars, the books al-Iḥtijāj and Tafsīr of Imam Hassan Askari (as) are controversial. These disputes are multidimensional and consist of several layers such as: date of authorship, attribution of the book to the author, documents and content of the books. In the meantime, it is noteworthy that the whole book of Tafsīr Askari (as) and also a significant part of the book al-Iḥtijāj, according to a narrator, is called "Abū Ja'far al-Marʿashī". Therefore, it is important to identify and translate the narrator's status. An analysis of Abū Ja'far's situation in earlier sources may shed light on these two books in terms of the rijālī identity of the narrators and authors; also, it may be able to methodize the history of transfers of these books, and even to resolve some of the controversies surrounding these two books. Based on the present research, which has been done by the library method, it became clear that in the early and later Shiite sources, there is no information, more than one text line, about Abū Ja'far Marʿashī and his student Tabarsi; and apart from the fact that his fame is one of the latest made. However, there is little translation of Abū Ja'far by Samʿānī, and he has called him an "exaggerated Shiite."