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Waḥy and Tanzīl Studia Theologica - Nordic Journal of Theology ISSN: 0039-338X (Print) 1502-7791 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/sthe20 Waḥy and tanzīl Oddbjørn Leirvik To cite this article: Oddbjørn Leirvik (2015) Waḥy and tanzīl, Studia Theologica - Nordic Journal of Theology, 69:2, 101-125, DOI: 10.1080/0039338X.2015.1081617 To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/0039338X.2015.1081617 Published online: 14 Sep 2015. Submit your article to this journal Article views: 154 View related articles View Crossmark data Citing articles: 1 View citing articles Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=sthe20 Download by: [University of Oslo] Date: 15 January 2018, At: 01:55 Studia Theologica, 2015 Vol. 69, Issue 2, 101–125, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0039338X.2015.1081617 Waḥy and tanzīl Modern Islamic approaches to divine inspiration, progressive revelation, and human text Oddbjørn Leirvik This article analyses modern discourses about “revelation” in the writings of three Western Orientalists (Muir, Bell and Watt) and of a selection of contemporary Muslim reformists (Fazlur Rahman, Farid Esack, Ibrahim Moosa, Abdelkarim Soroush, Mohammed Arkoun and Nasr Hamid Abu Zayd). After some terminological considerations, the named thinkers’ views of revelation are analysed in light of their understanding of the Qur’anic terms waḥy (“inspiration”) and tanzīl (“sending down”), which in modern discourses are conventionally associated with the phenomenon of revelation. The author finds that the cited reformists’ understanding of revelation and of the terms waḥy and tanzīl may be wedded to (1) an interest in the inspired person, (2) a progressive view of divine communication or (3) an insistence on the human nature of the sacred text. From a hermeneutical perspective, the author suggests that Paul Ricoeur’s notion of “the world of the text” may offer a more useful framework for discussing the nexus between divine and human communication than the elusive phenomenological category of revelation. In my teaching about Islam and Christian-Muslim dialogue, I have often discussed the notion of revelation in Islam, in comparison with Christianity. Downloaded by [University of Oslo] at 01:55 15 January 2018 With reference to the Qur’anic terms waḥy and tanzīl (key notions when the issue of revelation in Islam is being discussed), I have occasionally suggested that waḥy – in the sense of personal inspiration – may imply a more open understanding of revelation than the term tanzīl which is con- ventionally associated with the idea of a divine message being “sent down” (verbal inspiration). Having become more doubtful of this possible tension, I have felt the need to take a closer look at these concepts and their relation to modern discourses about “revelation” in Islam. The specific aim of this article is to identify and analyse how some clas- sical Orientalists and a selection of contemporary Muslim reformists have © 2015 Studia Theologica 102 Oddbjørn Leirvik understood these terms, and how they have related them to the broader issue of revelation in Islam. In theology and religious studies, revelation has long been a technical term for a cluster of religious phenomena associated with the idea of divine communication or inspiration. There are, however, some problems in subsuming diverse concepts such as waḥy and tanzīl in the Qur’an and apokálypsis in the New Testament under a single, phenomenological heading called “revelation.” In tune with a general questioning of the phenomenology of religion’s tendency to universalize Christian concepts, the very usefulness of the term revelation has been seriously questioned.1 Thus there are good reasons to ask why revelation has become such a key notion in modern Islamic thought, and why waḥy and tanzīl have been singled out as the relevant Qur’anic terms in that respect. Toshihiko Izutsu in his book God and Man in The Koran associates both terms with the broader issue of communication – a perspective that invites a host of other relevant Qur’anic terms such as kalāmAllāh (God’s speech), risāla (message), al-kitāb (the book), hidāya (guidance) and not least āya (sign).2 As regards the phenomenological theme of revelation, however, in the modern context it has mostly been linked with the terms waḥy and tanzīl. In order to avoid the phenomenological fallacy, in the following I will avoid rendering waḥy and tanzīl as “revelation”–translating instead waḥy with “inspiration” and tanzīl with “sending down.” The aim of my study is not, however, to break new semantic ground, but rather to analyse modern understandings of these terms and their implications for the question of revelation. (The restricted format means that classical tafsīr- literature with regard to waḥy and tanzīl will not be considered.) After a brief consideration of (biblical and) Qur’anic terminology, the focus of my investigation will be (1) notions of revelation in the sense of waḥy, as understood by some Western Orientalists, and (2) selected Muslim reformists’ understanding of waḥy and tanzīl in light of broader Downloaded by [University of Oslo] at 01:55 15 January 2018 discussions about the inspired person, progressive revelation, and the human nature of sacred texts. Revelation and modernity As for my understanding of the terms modern and modernity, I will lean on the Norwegian sociologist Dag Østerberg’sdefinition of “the modern code”–cues of which are the closely interrelated concepts of (1) the free individual, (2) reason and (3) progress. In modernity, the individual claims freedom externally as well as internally; reason challenges the mythical and religious mind; and human progress is conceived of as the Waḥy and tanzīl 103 mounting emancipation of individuals and their potentials.3 In all its aspects, the modern code challenges traditional religious structures and ideas – including the notion of revelation. Historically, Enlightenment- inspired notions of modernity (such as Østerberg’s) have been paralleled by Romantic notions which focus more on authenticity and the inner depths of the individual.4 The latter perspective has inspired modern per- ceptions of revelation as springing from the inspired person’s inner sources. Enlightenment critique of the idea of revelation (associated with superna- tural events) dates back to the eighteenth century, epitomized by Fichte’s Attempt at a critique of all revelation from 1792 and Kant’s Religion within the limits of reason alone from 1793.5 Closer to our time, L. S. Thornton’s Rev- elation in the Modern World (from 1950) inspired the famous Orientalist William Montgomery Watt’s book Islamic Revelation in the Modern World (from 1969). In Thornton’s modernist approach, taken over by Watt, revel- ation is seen as “a mode of divine activity by which the Creator communi- cates himself to man and, by so doing, evokes man’s response and cooperation.” Wedded to a dynamic understanding of communication, Thornton’s understanding of revelation is contrasted with the more tra- ditional idea of “a deposit of truth laid up in scripture.”6 Watt seeks an understanding of the process of revelation that is more acceptable to the modern mind. He also suggests a dialogical and “inter- religious” approach to the phenomenon of revelation, with the explicit intention of increased understanding between Christianity and Islam.7 The two religions have often been seen by Christian apologists as har- bouring two different conceptions of revelation – the one personal and dynamic, the other literal and static. But in the view of Watt, Christianity and Islam face many similar problems in translating the notion of revel- ation to the modern mind. In tune with the modern code, modernist (or modernizing) under- standings of revelation are often associated with a reformist agenda Downloaded by [University of Oslo] at 01:55 15 January 2018 focused primarily on values and ethics. My term reformist Muslims refers to thinkers with a declared commitment to certain “progressive” values such as rationalism, anti-authoritarianism, democracy, gender equality, and pluralism.8 Their discussion of the idea of revelation,as well as their search for a critical scriptural hermeneutics, seems to be inti- mately wedded to modernist values such as those mentioned above. Some notes on terminology In European languages, the wordrevelation (cf. German Offenbarung)israrely attested before the fourteenth century.9 It harks back to Latin revelatio – a 104 Oddbjørn Leirvik translation of the Greek word apokálypsis which occurs relatively frequently in the New Testament. Semantically, both words connote “uncovering.” New Testament usages This is not the place to detail New Testament uses of apokalúptein and apo- kálypsis and other notions which were later associated with the idea of revelation – such as phanéroun and epipháneia.10 Apokálypsis refers basically to disclosure, often associated with visions – be it “the Book of Revel- ation,”11 the eschatological revelation of Jesus Christ in glory,12 or diverse forms of Spirit-inspired communication.13 With regard to the Qur’anic notion waḥy, the singular occurrence of a similar word in the New Testament is theópneustos (“inspired by God”) in 2 Timothy 3:16. Although the word is only found in this particular verse, its close association with pneuma (spirit) made it a standard refer- ence in later discussions in Christian theology about personal or verbal understandings of revelation. Qur’anic usages In comparison with the New Testament, the Qur’an does not contain any word or concept parallel to that of apokálypsis, with the exception of the infrequent verb jallā/tajallā (cf. Q 7:143). Most frequently, the phenomenological idea of revelation is associated with the Qur’anic word waḥy, which is often referred to as the standard Islamic term for revelation.14 Waḥy and its cognates belong, however, to a semantic field quite different from that of apokálypsis and revelatio and connote instead inspiration – most often in a non-textual sense.
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