نشریه قرآن پژوهی خاورشناسان (قرآن و مستشرقان)
سال ششم شماره 2 (پیاپی 11، پاییز و زمستان 1390)

The issue of the inscription of the Qur’an is one of the most vital and debated issue in the history of the Qur’an and among the scholar of the Qur’anic Sciences. This issue has also inspired some orientalists, having not enough information, to use it to raise uncertainty about the authenticity of the inscription of the Qur’an. In this paper, the views of the orientalists such as of Regis Blachere and Ignaz Goldziher concerning the inscription of the Qur’an have been mentioned and then, their doubts about ignoring some part of the revelation through the Prophet, suspicion concerning some of the inscribers of the Qur’an, Prophet being amnesic, differences of letters and etc have been examined and analysed. Furthermore, with reference to the Qur’anic verses about the Qur’an being immune from any kind of alteration and with reference to the hadith that prove that the Qur’an had been scripted during the lifetime of the Prophet by inscribers under his supervision, and observation and by proving the prophet not being amnesic, all these suspicion have been responded.

The compilation of the Qur’an is one of the hot issue among the scholars of Shi’i and Sunni sects and orientalists. Most of the orientalists are of the view that the Qur’an in a single codex had not been compiled either by the prophet or Imam ‘Ali. Some of them propounded this view in nineteenth century and assumed most of hadith that implicate the collection of the Qur’an, during the lifetime of the prophet, as fabricated. Most of the orientalists and Ahlu sunnites have considered the first caliph as the compiler of the Qur’an while shi’i scholars have endeavour a lot, with reference to authentic and propound proofs, to establish the fact that it was compiled during the lifetime of the Prophet in a single codex and Imam ‘Ali also put his effort on this great work.In this paper, with reference to narrative and rational arguments, the claim of the orientalists and Ahlu sunnites have been responded.

The Christian theologians give enough importance to miracle and to prove the authenticity of their religion they give a detail account of the miracles performed by Jesus Christ. Based on this, apart from the Qur’an that itself is a miracle there are many miracles that have been performed by the Prophet such as the miracle of the split of moon that in resemblance is similar to that of Jesus Christ and thus, place it in stark contrast to Christian theologians. Therefore, an attempt has been done to analyse the Christian view of Prophet Muhammad’s miracle and after analysing their arguments and to convince them a profound answer should be given to them. Hence, the views of Christian scholars have been classified into two parts: one who views the two distinctive biographical or textual problems in it and deny the overall occurrences of miracles and those accept miracles but deny the legitimacy of their implications has been separately responded.

Orientalists have raised many uncertainties on the personality of the prophet concerning his belief, worship, political comportment, and his socio-individual etiquettes. Some of these are based on not having studied accurate and profound Islamic sources.The present paper has dealt with the same issue of suspicious views raised by the orientalists concerning the Sunnah of the prophet. This article has critically examined the issue of tauheed (monotheism) and belief in it, prophet being Ummi (uneducated), and elucidation of the obligation of slaat (worship), dealing of the prophet with other religions and the view of the prophet concerning Jesus Chirst.

One of the most important juristic and legal issues in Islam is of inheritance that has always been an issue discussed in Islamic Jurisprudence and the proportion and percentage of male, female, children and others have already been mentioned. Since many Qur’anic verses deal with this issue hence this has become an issue of interest for the scholars of the Qur’anic sciences as well. A lot of research has been taken place on this issue. One of these researches is the same article of the Encyclopaedia of Islam, Leiden entitled irth (inheritance) written by Mr. David Pawurz that has almost dealt with the issue comprehensively mentioning the views of various Islamic schools of thought. But some part of the article needs to be elaborated, critically examined and criticise and the critique has mainly focus the same aspect.Concerning the incoherency of the article, it is clear that the understanding of the certain verses of the Qur’an is not in accordance with the proper exegesis and some of the views are based on the views of Ahlu Sunnah and no attention has been paid to Shi’i Scholars’ views. And the reference of Imam ‘Ali concerning the issue of awl is not actual and similarly, abstraction of the law of inheritance either from the Christianity or Rome as has been mentioned is also not the right one.

It is the translation of the article entitled sawm written by C.C. Berg in volume 9 pages 94-95 of Encyclopedia of Islam Leiden.Sawm (fasting) is one of the pillars of Islam and possesses an exalted place from amongst other teachings of Islam with refernce to the Qur’an and hadith of infallibles. Orientalists have also, while studying and researching Quranic sciences and Islam, paid attention to it. The author in his article firstly, discusses the concept of the word Sawm and mentions its place prior to Islam and assumes that the meaning of this word has been derived from Jewish-Armenian and Syrians. Then he has dealt with the subject from juristic perspective of the verse and mentions the peculiarities of fasting, its conditions of accomplishing properly, things that invalids it, Obligatory and recommended fasting and its rulings and penalties. At the end, he discusses the concept of sawm from the traditional and hadith perspective and mentions it importance from ethical and moral viewpoint. However, the most important criticize on this article is on the views expressed in this article. Such as its concept and meaning that whether it has been derived from the Jewish-Armenian and Syrians or not? Conditions of the obligation of sawm, kinds of penalty, the condition of fasting for older age people, pregnant women or feeding women or patients, intention of recommended and obligatory fasting, those days when observing fasting are recommended or forbidden, issues of not recommended fasting, condition of the fasting of traveler, invalidity of fasting, stages of fasting. The critical analysis of this article is based on the view of popular shi’i jurists.

In this paper, after introducing the issue of the need of recognition of Orietalists and their contribution almost twenty two prominent orientalists have been introduced who have worked in the Qur’anic sciences. Those who have been mentioned in this paper are: Defregeh, Curer J. Von, Goustawelbebon, Dandus, diaond, daranbur, Dorrfur, Duriya, Duminuques,Doyeik, Diternisi, diwharast, radol, ras, robasan, rudansun, rozantal, rokart, Runkaliya, rifshatal, zetarastan, zilhayem and zumar.