Questions of the Followers to the Companions رضي الله عنهم on Interpretation: A Theoretical Study 10.35781/1637-000-130-004

Abstract

This research addresses the definition of key terms related to its topic: questions, the Companions, the Followers, and interpretation. The research devotes a separate chapter to studying the interpretation of the Companions, highlighting its status and importance, which is evident in several considerations. The most prominent of these are: their companionship with the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), their knowledge of the circumstances of those to whom the Qur'an was revealed, their being native speakers of the language in which the revelation was revealed, and their sound understanding and purity of purpose. The research demonstrates that the Companions relied on five main sources for their interpretation: the Holy Qur'an, the Prophetic Sunnah, the Arabic language, the accounts of the People of the Book, and what they derived through their own independent reasoning. The subsequent chapter is devoted to studying the interpretation of the Followers, explaining its status and impact. Its importance lies in their proximity to the time of the Prophet and their receipt of knowledge directly from the Companions (may God be pleased with them). The research then moved on to examine the questions the Followers asked the Companions, discussing their importance, scope, and impact on the science of interpretation. It became clear that the importance of these questions has two main dimensions: the first relates to their origin and motivations, and the second reveals the methodology of reception during that era. The induction of a number of these questions also revealed the diversity of their scope, including those related to clarifying the meanings of verses, rulings, individual words, reasons for revelation, readings, or ambiguities in texts. The examples studied demonstrated that these questions have a clear impact on guiding the interpreter, both in terms of providing evidence and in weighing between opinions when conflicting interpretations occur.