In the first case the non-Qur'anic frame, from which the traditional Islamic interpretation gets its pivotal idea consists in the pseudo-historical narrative that on the occasion of the initial heavenly appointment of Muhammad as prophet the archangel Gabriel appeared to him presenting him a script and urging him to read. From this narrative the interpretation of the introductory two imperatives "iqra´", understood as "read!", in 96:1-5 is pinned down. The text immediately following after these two imperatives is then taken for the text which the archangel Gabriel allegedly presented to the eyes of the prophet-to-be to recite.
But this orthodox Islamic division of Surah 96:1-5 in such a way as to give us only these two imperatives "read!" as having been spoken by the archangel Gabriel while all the rest is the script exposed by the archangel to be read by the prophet-to-be, is a crude assertion. If this were actually the case why then is there no indication for this division of the text at all, for instance that the first imperative might at least have been introduced by some words like "The archangel Gabriel said to Muhammad: Recite these words here exposed to your eyes..." Since such introductory words are missing from the text and since the frame-narrative, - taken or even invented from beyond the Qur'an to form the core of this text 96:1-5 -, is the only compensation for this missing introduction to the two imperatives, we can imagine by what a weak thread the frame-narrative of the Islamic tradition is connected with the Qur'anic text (1).
The other frame-narrative of Surah 96 imputed by Muslim Qur'an scholarship to its third section, verses 9-19, to procure also for this text section a core by which to interpret it, is the following: A member of the developing Meccan Muslim community, a nameless slave (`abd) or else even Muhammad himself is supposed to have tried to perform the ritual prayer, but is said to have been hindered from doing so (2). The section, - grammatically and lexicographically problematic to the highest degree -, closes with the announcement of God's punishment for the alleged sacrilege of hindering a believer from performing his ritual prayer.
Because there is no specific tradition about such an incident, this frame-narrative must be supposed to be a fictitious tradition elaborated to give this section a new meaning deviating from the originally intended reading of its rasm-text (i.e. nearly the consonantal text, but with greater ambiguity due to the fact that some consonants look the same apart from diacritical points which were added much later).
Between these two larger sections 96:1-5 and 96:9-19 with their respective curious frame-narratives there is finally the short passage 96:6-8. It is, with regard to its content, of such broad significance, that it can be set in relation not only to its preceding and following text sections, but to every religious idea in general. Because then no connection at all can be noted between the "scene of appointment to the prophet" (96:1-5) and the incident of the hindrance of a nameless Muslim believer or of Muhammad himself from his ritual prayer, the content of this middle section 96:6-8 could be brought into relation with the content of either the preceding or the following section, or this middle section could be considered as independent of both.
The curiosity is that although this middle section can, because of its only general relevance, easily be understood as a proem to the third section, it is instead joined by Muslim tradition to the preceding section, the "scene of initial appointment", to which it is much less fitting, the more so because of then being placed in a postponed position. Furthermore, it is a strange rule of the Arabian grammarians (in fact deduced from this crude Qur'anic interpretation itself) that the Arabic expression "kallaa", "not at all", which introduces this middle section, is only ever used as a negation of a preceding sentence. This merely compounds the hardly understandable connection between the middle and the preceding first section of Surah 96.
In view of these textual and compositional problems of Surah 96 and the embarrassment of the Muslim Qur'an commentators to dissolve them it is advisable resolutely to leave aside these two frame-narratives only added from outside the Qur'an by Muslim tradition to make their re-interpretation possible and to tie it to the rasm-text of the Surah.
The text as handed down to posterity goes as:
Then we have to understand/translate:
Now the repetition of "Invoke!" is seen to be a deliberately used means of structuring the text into two sequences of three parts - the first sequence thanking for the creation, the second one for the revelation. To diplay this structure we may write:
Invoke! For your Lord is most noble-minded
for that He taught [= for having taught] by the writing cane
taught man what he didn't know.
iqra' wa rabbuka l-akramu
lladhee `allama bi l-qalami
`allama l-insaana maa lam ya`lam
iqra' wa rabbuka l-akram
alladhee `allama bi l-qalam
`allama l-insaana maa lam ya`lam
If this idea should prove successful - and it will prove successful - our above guess would be confirmed: Forget the familiar story, used as a frame narrative for surah 96:1-5, about angel Gabriel pressing Muhammad in the cave of the mountain Hira to "read" the Qur'an, namely surah 96:1-5!
Eventually, we should add another point: Contrary to the noun `alaqah, which is a nomen unitatis (ism al-waHdah, noun for a singular unit) and normally used in the Qur'an, the noun `alaq is a noun with collective sense (nomen collectivum) and cannot be understood as (a single) clot [interpreted as an embryo]. The correct understanding of `alaq is simply "something sticking together". So it is no remote idea that `alaq in the third line of the first strophe is used instead of the usual Arabic word Teen for "clay", "loam", namely for the sake of rhyme, thus reflecting the old idea that man was created from clay -- an idea which is not confined to the Bible.
So we eventually may understand/translate surah 96:1-5 as follows:
Invoke! For your Lord is most noble-minded
for having taught by the writing cane
taught man what he didn't know.
At first glance it appears simple to answer this question in the affirmative. Look at surah 96:6-8! The nowadays Arabic text in kind of English transcription goes as:
All English (or German) translations we know - whether of muslim or non-muslim scholars - follow traditional Muslim commentaries and translate 96, 6.7 as "Day, but man doth transgress all bounds in that he looketh upon himself as self-sufficient" (Yusuf Ali), "Nay, but verily man acts presumptuously because he thinks himself independent" (Richard Bell) or alike.
96:8 is translated as
This understanding/these translations interpret the individual words
as follows:
| Kallaa | "No" - or when used for an oath -->"Indeed", "nay" or alike |
| 'inna | "look", like "voila" in French - used for "is" with emphasis |
| al-'insaana | "the man", "the human" |
| la-yaTghaa | "he (really) transgresses" |
| 'an | "that", "in that" |
| ra'aahu | "he saw himself" instead of correctly: "he saw him" |
| (i)staghnaa | "he/she/it considered him/her/itself as rich [therefore: independent, souvereign]" |
Though the understanding of verses 6 and 8, too, may be questionable, I restrict myself to a discussion verse 7. As you may realize, the above understanding of verse 7 depends on four grammatical mistakes:
1. To render the consecutive conjunction "'an" with "because" is not quite correct. In correct Arabic "because" would have been expressed in another way.
2. "ra'aahu" is perfect tense, not imperfect tense (or in European grammatical terminology: present tense) meaning.
3. "ra'aahu" has no reflexive meaning. It cannot be translated by "he looked upon himself" or "he thought of himself", but only by "he looked upon him" or "he thought of him".
4. "(i)staghnaa" is perfect tense, not imperfect tense (or in European grammatical terminology: present tense) meaning.
It is, however, possible to get rid of these problems by taking care of the Arabic grammar and by realizing a peculiarity of the Arabic script, namely that we only can more or less trust the rasm (approximately: consonantal script). The old Qur'an mss. are without vowelling and diacritical marks. Vowelling signs and diacritical marks are later comment. So we are absolutely entitled to read the Arabic text as follows:
| 'anna | "that" (if a noun follows) |
| 'in | "when", "whenever" |
Now the verses are in perfect accordance with the Arabic grammar and to be translated as:
1. The consecutive conjunction "'an" has been replaced by the conditional conjunction "'in", which poses no problem.
2. The perfect tense in "ra'aahu" is absolutely correct, because according to the rules of Arabic in a conditional sentence the perfect tense has a timeless (and in this case imperfect or present-times) meaning.
3. "ra'aahu" no more is erroneously translated as rendering a reflexive sense.
4. The perfect tense in "(i)staghnaa" is correct as the so called "prophetic perfect" in (timeless) assertions about God.
Putting together what we have achieved so far we arrive at this rather familiar scheme of popular Arabic poetry:
iqra' wa rabbuka l-akram
alladhee `allama bi l-qalam
`allama l-insaana maa lam ya`lam
Kallaa 'anna-l-'insaana la-yaTghaa
'in ra'aahu-staghnaa
inna ilaa rabbika r-rug'aa
Invoke! For your Lord is most noble-minded
for having taught by the writing cane
taught man what he didn't know.
No, that man shall be presumptuous,
whenever he [man] sees Him [God] as souvereign.
Behold, to God is the return.
Invoke! For thy Lord is the most generous
who taught (=for having taught) by the writing cane,
taught man what he didn't know.
Not at all that man shall be presumptuous
when ever he sees Him overbearingly independent!
Behold, to God is the recourse!
Have you ever seen
that He denies
a servant (of God) when he prays?
Have you ever seen?
- when he clung firmly to the creed?
- or spoke as a God-fearer?
Have you ever seen
that He betrayed and turned away?
Have you not learned that God sees?
Not at all! If He is not given peace (by prayers),
truly He will be seized
by His forelock (=by His honour)!
(Late gloss "a lying sinful forelock" to be cancelled.)
So call for His High Council!
You will then call up the High Angelship!
Not at all! Be you not presumptuous against Him!
Prostrate (for prayer) and approach!
(=Summary or title of Surah 96)
There has therefore been furnished the irrefutable evidence that a transmitted rasm-text of some length, and if conserved under and because of a wrong re-interpretation for more than a millennium, concedes only and alone the originally intended interpretation.
Notes
(1) The frame-narrative of the initial appointment of Muhammad to prophetship (allegedly being at the bottom of verses 96:1-5) was submitted to a thorough criticism by the Swedish theologian and islamicist Tor Andrae already in 1912 in his article "Die Legenden von der Berufung Muhammeds" ("The legends of Muhammad's vocation"), Le Monde Oriental 6 (1912), 5-18. It became obvious that these and similar frame-narratives were the subject of invention and legend by Muslim tradition. Further research on the iqra'-tale was published by Gregor Schoeler in 1996.
(2) Muhammad Taqi ud-Din Al-Hilali and Muhammad
Muhsin
Khan in their well-known Qur'an translation identify this alleged
troublemaker
as Abu Jahl.
