Even those people, known as Hafez-e-Qur’an, who commit the whole Qur’an to their memory, do not understand the meaning of the words they so assiduously memorize over a long period of time.
This being the reality, the question is why do Muslims read or memorize the Qur’an without understanding it? The answer to the question lies in the fact that most of them, especially those Muslims who live in the non-Arabic speaking countries, depend on their Mullahs for learning the essential doctrines and practices of their faith. They do what they are told by their Mullahs. This is more so in case of those Muslims who are illiterate and poor. A casual observation of Muslims of the Indian sub-continent will make this fact clear to any interested observer.
These Mullahs tell the ordinary Muslims that reading or reciting the Qur’an in Arabic is the easiest way to earn the pleasure of Allah, a condition without fulfilling which, no human or Jinn would enter the Garden (Jannat in Arabic) on the Day of Judgment. This leads not only the illiterate and poor Muslims, but also the highly educated and rich Muslims to read the Qur’an in Arabic without trying to understand what they are reading or reciting in their prayer.
As I’ve blogged here before, this is where I part company with the great Robert Spencer, who I admire unreservedly. It doesn’t matter what the Koran says, because most Muslims are illiterate anyway.
Here’s what I wrote earlier this year:
Charles Manson claimed he got his ideas from the Beatles “White Album”. But only an idiot would take him seriously and arrest the Beatles as accomplices in the murder of Sharon Tate, ban their albums, write 900 page reports on their lyrics (and maybe even some of Charlies’) and hold expensive conferences at which non-British non-musicians debated what they really meant.
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