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Rereading Nasr Hamid Abu Zayd’s method of interpreting religious texts


Abdul Mufid
Abd. Kadir Massoweang
Mujizatullah Mujizatullah
Abu Muslim
Zulkarnain Yani

Abstract

The contemporary Qur'anic studies have been marked by amazing development. Various methods and approaches to understand the Qur'an are offered  by the scholars. One of the prominent figures in this field is Nashr Hamid Abu Zayd. Nasr Hamid Abu Zayd (1943–2010 M) is a highly controversial  contemporary thinker. He is an Egyptian scholar who is accused of being apostate, because of his theory of qur'anic hermeneutic (the textual of Qur'an).  This is reflected in his stances towards contemporary religious discourse and the approach to reading religious texts, especially the Quran, which requires  reading according to a hermeneutic mechanism. His books ‘Naqd al-Khitab al-Dini (Criticism of Religious Discourse)’ and ‘AlTakfir fi Zaman al-  Takfir (Thinking in the Time of Atonement)’ caused a great uproar in the early nineties of the last century. Abu Zayd was accused of criticising atheists  because of their stances on the text. Therefore, this study aimed to discuss Abu Zayd’s position on contemporary religious discourse and his new  approach to reading religious texts, and also aims to discuss why Abu Zayd's theory has been string up Islamic world and ending by his expulsive from his  native country. To deal with this problem, this article discusses Abd Zayd's biography and some cultural framework of his people. The methodology of  Qur'anic hermeneutic is the least his. Having examined the topic, the author finds that Abu Zayd believes that modem literary theory and criticism  denote the way to understand and interpret the Qur'an ‘objectively’. The contribution of this research is discussing Abu Zayd’s contemporary religious  discourse and his new approach to reading religious texts.


Contribution: The contribution of this research is discussing Abu Zayd’s contemporary religious discourse and his new approach to reading religious texts.


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eISSN: 2072-8050
print ISSN: 0259-9422