Questions Concerning “Problematic” Verses in the Qur’an

What I mean by “problematic verses” is verses in the Quran that pose difficulties and problems as to how to understand it properly. There are possibilities as to why these difficulties might come about in the first place. One possibility is the apparent contradiction between two verses in the Qur’an. There are many verses of this type where verses contradict each other which obviously beg certain method of reconciliation. This constitutes a whole field of study in the traditional scholarship of the Qur’an called the mutashabih al-Quran, meaning the study of ambiguous verses in the Quran. Qadi ‘Abd al-Jabbar (d. 1025), a Mu’tazilite theologian and a follower of Shafi’i mazhab, authored a whole work entitled Mutashabih al-Qur’an. He strove therein to reconcile Qur’anic verses that might contradict his theological doxa of Mu’tazilism.

This type of verses often led to the outbreak of sectarian conflict in Islamic denominational history. There are dozen of verses in the Quran over which various Islamic sects lay different and even conflicting claims as to how to interpret it in a manner that doesn’t contradict the meaning of other verses. The good example is a known dispute between Sunni and Mu’tazilite over the beatific vision of God (ru’yat al-Lah).

The Sunni said that the highest favour God bestows upon the believers is to allow them to see Him in the Heaven. The Mu’tazilite said that beatific vision of God is not possible, as vision entails physical limitation. If God is capable of being seen as the Sunni think, it is tantamount to saying that God is subject to physical limitation, which contradicts the Islamic doctrine on the Divine’s complete otherness and difference (i.e. God is not like humans as stated in the Quran 42:11).

Both Sunni and Mu’tazilite refer to the Qur’an to support their claims. The Sunni refer to verses 75:22-23 which say that the faces of the believers would beam in the Heaven from seeing God. Equally the Mu’tazilite refers to the Qur’an, pointing to other verse: 6:103, which says that God is beyond any comprehension (idrak). If intellectual comprehension of God cannot be achieved completely by human intellect, so reasoned the Mu’tazilite, then the vision of God via human physical organs, inferior as they are to intellectual faculty, is even far from being plausible.
Apart from this sectarian dispute between Sunni and their opponents, it is clear to us that there are two verses in the Qur’an that, on a first glance, contradict each other on the issue of the vision of God. The Mu’tazilite, believing as they are in strict monotheism and impossibility of the vision of God, are tasked to reconcile verse 75:23 which implies that God could be seen by the believers in the Heaven with verse 6:103 which, as we already know, indicates the opposite. The same task falls on the shoulder of the Sunni in the reverse manner.

This is just one minor example of ambiguity in the Qur’an that in many cases led to sectarian debate and conflict between various sects in Islam. There are other possibilities for such difficulties in understanding the Quran, such as the apparent contradiction between verses and the prophetic traditions (hadiths), or between verses and human reasoning, etc. All these contradictions need to be explained away so as to conform to the basic doctrine of Islam regarding the coherence of the Qur’an as the Word of God. The Qur’an itself denies any contradiction within it, saying that had it came from other sources than God, in-congruency and contradiction (ikhtilaf) would abound therein (4:82).

“Problematic” verses are by no means an issue encountered only by the Qur’anic interpreters in the classical era. The problem is a perennial one and still lingers with the modern interpreters. The general issue remains the same, i.e. the existence of contradiction between certain verses, or between verses and the changing social contexts which apparently necessitates different kind of legal ruling from that found in the Qur’an. Both classical and modern Muslim scholars who venture into Qur’anic interpretive endeavours shared the same thought that contradiction in the Qur’an, no matter how minor it is, needs to be explained away. Otherwise it will cause confusion among Muslim, or, in the context of inter-religious polemics as we saw in the medieval era, could stands as leeway from which enemies of Islam might launch an attack on the Islamic faith.

There are instances in the Qur’an where certain verses look problematic and need further clarification. Verses in the Qur’an concerning inter-religious relation between Muslim and Christian or Jews stand out as the most challenging verses for modern Muslim interpreters. Take for example verse 2:120 which is often exploited by certain Muslim fundamentalist to stir hatred against Christian and Jews. The verse reads thus: The Christian and Jews would never been satisfied unless you (i.e. Prophet Muhammad) follow their religions. The verse came down to the Prophet as a response to the disappointment existing among the Christian of Najran in Yemen and the Jews of Medina after God commanded the Prophet to face Ka’ba in prayer instead of Jerusalem, to which he faced for many years prior to migration to Medina.

For many modern Muslim intellectuals who promote inter-religious dialogue, this particular verse poses an exegetical challenge. Understood literally, and without taking its context into account, would make us believe that Islam pursues an eternal conflict with Christian and Jews. The verse could feed the intolerant attitude that already exists among certain Muslim groups. Whenever the conflict breaks out between Muslim and Christian, such as one in Ambon, Indonesia, in 1999, this verse comes readily as pretext for hating Christians. The same verse has been used by many conservative Muslims to show the futility of inter-religious dialogue. Who should have dialogue with people who are never satisfied until we follow them?

On the contrary, Muslim promoters of dialogue refers to verse 49:13 in which God states that He created human and made them into different tribes and nations so that they know each other (li ta’arafu). Diversity, according to them, is wired into the very fabric of human society, and mutual understanding between people belonging to a variety of belief systems or cultural backgrounds is something God prescribes in order to hinder conflicts and hostilities. The kind of life Islam pursues is that of peace and mutual respect, not enmity and hatred. The war in Islam, according to dialogue-seeking Muslim scholars, is permissible as the last resort after other means of peaceful conflict resolution comes to a dead-end.

The challenge remains for pro-dialogue scholars to reinterpret verse 2:120 in a manner that doesn’t contradict the vision of peace and dialogue. The verse seems to be seen by them not a prescription for hostility and conflict with Christian or Jews. It is rather a descriptive statement with regards to the factual condition during the life of the Prophet. It only told about historical “is”, not a normative “ought to be”, about what was going on during the Prophet’s lifetime when, according to the historical account concerning the revelation of the above verse, he was ordered by God to change the direction of prayer from Jerusalem to Ka’ba (See, for example, Al-Suyuti’s commentary, al-Durr al-Manthur, vol. 1, p. 576).

There are other verses in the Qur’an indicating that enmity and hostility are not natural condition that always governs the relationship between Muslim and Christians. The Qur’an sees other possibility of amicable and peaceful ties with both parties as shown in verse 5:82. The latter verse applauds Christian (al-nashara) for their peaceful attitude and compassion toward Muslims, while scolding the Jews for their hostility towards them. In other words, the relationship between Muslim and Christians is not static as implied by verse 2:120, but rather dynamic, which necessitates different treatment accordingly. The basic rule for inter-religious relationship remains what has been stipulated in verse 49:13 that pursues mutual understanding and dialogue.

With such hermeneutical reconciliation, pro-dialogue scholars try to explain away the apparent contradiction between verses in the Qur’an concerning the rules that govern relation between Muslim and people of other faiths.
The most daunting challenge is certainly verses in the Qur’an that concern jihad or holy war against non-Muslim. This is exactly where misunderstanding about the nature of Islamic mission arises both among Muslims and non-Muslims alike. For Muslim jihadis who pursue eternal war with Christians and Jews such Osama bin Ladin and his sympathisers, jihad verses provide an ample support for their belligerent causes. For the Islamophobes in the West and elsewhere, these verses are proof from within Islamic Scripture that Islam is religion of violence, not of peace as its followers claim.

The question remains whether such verses are in fact meant by Islam as a prescription for constant conflict and war with non-Muslim. My answer is categorical “no”. It is not a coincidence that Islam is so called, i.e. Islam, being derived etymologically from the root silm, meaning peace. Islam, therefore, is peace-loving religion. The natural state of inter-human relationship envisioned by Islam is that of peace, mutual respect, friendship, etc. War is not the rule in Islam, but rather an exceptional condition where means towards conflict resolution is completely gone. Only in such condition is the war permissible, with very strict rules that limit its conduct.

The Qur’an uses two different terms concerning war, jihad and qital. The word jihad is used in the Quran at least 40 times, meaning broadly an exertion or strife for a noble purpose. Jihad in the Qur’anic usage is broader in its meaning than a holy war. The other term used by the Qur’an is qital which is used therein at least 51 times, meaning simply waging war against polytheists and those who posses Scripture (ahl al-Kitab), i.e. Christians and Jews.

If we study the entire historical and semantic context in which both terms, particularly qital, are used in the Qur’an, it is evident that God’s granting of an approval to do war is conditioned by a hostile environment. That was the kind of environment Muslim lived during the time of the Prophet. In other words, war is none but a defensive mechanism for the purpose of protecting the nascent Muslim community in Medina. Verse 22:39 is very categorical about this conditional war, saying that: Those who were wronged (dzulimu; or suffered from persistent discrimination) were permitted to launch war. War is self-defence, not an offensive as some jihadi Muslims (following Qutb’s theory of offensive jihad) would have us to believe.

Two methods have been proposed by modern Muslim exegetes and scholars to interpret what they may see as “problematic” verses in the Qur’an. The first method is the historical approach, meaning interpreting the Qur’an in the light of specific historical context in which those verses were revealed to the Prophet, or else within a linguistic/semantic context in which certain terms or concepts had been utilized in the Qur’an. Only when we treat the Qur’an as a text that has its own history and interpret it accordingly shall we do justice to it.

The second method is to extract from the Qur’an its universal message that permeates through all its verses, and understand it in lights of these messages. In other words, we need to deal with the Qur’an as wholeness, and not as particularistic parts that are isolated from its whole context. Only then shall we be able to understand Qur’an in a coherent manner, explaining away the apparent contradictions that may exist therein.[]