World Religions: Islam

For the scholar as a scholar, the person interested in religions as a person interested in religion, and the believing Muslim as a believer, an understanding of the Quran is an urgent necessity.

Scriptural interpretation was of major importance since early in the history of Islam. Over centuries, Muslim scholars developed a variety of ways to regulate the methods by which interpretation should proceed. How to understand, or interpret, the meaning of a given verse or phrase of the Quran is the central practice of hermeneutics.

Muslims believe that the Quran was verbally revealed from God to Muhammad through the angel Gabriel gradually over a period of approximately 23 years, beginning on 22 December 609 CE, when Muhammad was 40, and concluding in 632 CE, the year of his death. At the beginning of these revelations, Muhammad was confident that he could distinguish his own thoughts from the messages.