• Media type: E-Article
  • Title: Die Spaltung des Mondes in der modernen Koranexegese und im Internet
  • Contributor: Görke, Andreas
  • Published: Brill, 2010
  • Published in: Die Welt des Islams, 50 (2010) 1, Seite 60-116
  • Language: German
  • ISSN: 0043-2539
  • Origination:
  • Footnote:
  • Description: This article explores the scope of interpretation in the contemporary exegesis of the Qurʾān and the underlying trends in modern Islam that influence this exegesis. It focuses on one Qurʾānic verse—Q 54:1—and investigates the differences and similarities between the contemporary exegesis of this verse and the classical exegetical tradition as well as the possible influence of an author's regional, professional and confessional background on his interpretation. In classical exegesis, Q 54:1 (iqtarabati l-sāʿatu wa-nshaqqa l-qamaru) is mostly interpreted as referring to the splitting of the moon, a miracle allegedly granted to Muḥammad, but usually the classical exegetes also discuss the—equally possible—eschatological and metaphorical readings of the verse. In contrast, modern exegetes mostly confine themselves to discussing only one interpretation, but they differ radically in their conclusions and thus add a number of new—and sometimes rather bizarre—interpretations to those known from the classical tradition. While some exegetes try to minimize the miraculous aspect of the verse and offer alternative readings—historical, eschatological, metaphorical, or symbolical—others explicitly defend a miraculous reading of the text and try to adduce new arguments for this interpretation. The article draws attention to regional and confessional differences in the interpretation and shows the importance of non-scholarly exegetes and the Internet in assessing how verses from the Qurʾān are understood by Muslims today.