Dictionary: NOSD OUP UNCORRECTED PROOF – FIRST PROOF, 08/23/2019, SPi chapter 42 Early Qur ’ anic Exegesis From Textual Interpretation to Linguistic Analysis Kees Versteegh The First Exegetical Efforts According to the Qur’an (Q. 16:44), the Messenger of God who brought the revelation to the Quraysh was the best authority on the meaning of the revelation. Al-Suyūt ̣ ī (Itqān, 2:404) even claims to have written a book, Tarjumān al-Qurʾān, in which he collected more than 10,000 reports about the tafsīr al-nabī. And, indeed, most collections of had- ith, such as al-Bukhārī’s S ̣ ah ̣ īh ̣ (book 60), contain a section devoted to tafsīr. Yet, these reports do not involve many instances of text interpretation. Te majority of these had- iths narrate the circumstances of revelation, or they concern verses used by the Prophet in sermons, for instance, about his journey to Heaven or about other prophets. In some cases, a verse is revealed to confrm something the Prophet just said (nazalat hādhihi ’l-aya taṣ dīqan li-qawl rasūl Allāh ṣ lʿm, al-Bukhārī, S ̣ ah ̣ īh ̣ , book 60, chapter 222, no. 284). In one instance, the Prophet corrects someone’s recitation of Q. 54:17, 22, 23, 40 where he should say muddakir instead of mudhdhakir (al-Bukhārī, S ̣ ah ̣ īh ̣ , book 60, chapter 290, nos. 395, 396, 397). Other examples of exegetical tafsīr ascribed to the Prophet are cited by Abdul-Raof (2010:112–16). Early hadith collections do contain, however, numerous reports about Companions or Successors being asked about the interpretation of specifc verses, in which both legal and lexical matters are mentioned. One assumes that during the frst decades of Islam the believers, many of whom were converts with insufcient command of Arabic, were puzzled by the meaning of certain verses and wished to know what God’s message meant. Tose in the community with frst-hand knowledge of the circumstances of the revelation were the natural authority to turn to. In ʿAbd al-Razzāq’s Muṣ annaf, we fnd a large number of these questions and answers. Te majority concern details of Islamic 0004457474.INDD 634 8/23/2019 2:19:13 PM