Reading
&
Writing

By now reading should be easy,

at least the sort of reading that we learned when we were small,

so perhaps all that's left is to reconsider what we mean by read,

Muslims everywhere know that the first word of the Reading was Iqra,

which English speakers usually translate as

Read

and its easy to forget that the word has two meanings,

one of which is the way that we would first think of today,

something done with the eyes and mind,

which can be strictly useful or indulged in for pleasure,

something internal derived from characters displayed on a screen

or marked on paper and bound into books.

The other meaning of the word is of course Read Aloud,

Recite,

something done to pass on the words apprehended to a listener,

an idea that would be much more familiar to the people of the Messenger's time,

a non-literate community for whom reading would mostly mean

public recitation by poets and storytellers to whom they listened.

Reading can have different meaning and implications for different readers,

and can serve different purposes and be approached in different ways.

And so it is with our reading of the Qur'an.

Of course there's the way that we do the best we can,

recitation out loud, in a state of wudhu, with full concentration, avoiding distractions,

surrendered,

as perfect as possible for the listener.

And the listener is God as well as human.

Sometimes there might be humans, but always there is God,

the Hearer.

But other occasions can be less formal,

perhaps learning ayats by out loud repetition,

to help imprint the words upon the mind,

perhaps occasionally referring to written excerpts,

reading text to check what you've been reading aloud.

Such reading can take place at any time

and including while performing other permitted actions.

The Reading doesn't always demand too much formal reverence.

Whatever you do to draw closer to God is of its nature reverent,

and we are told that if we walk towards God,

God will come to us running.

The Reading can be spoken out loud for the joy of recitation, while performing tasks that don't involve the brain too much.

While keeping the fingers busy we can keep the heart, mind and tongue busy with the Reading,

remembering God.

Obviously at other times it will be more appropriate to read silently,

reading for study,

or silently reading for pleasure.

And in Juz 21-30 there are such pleasures to discover.

The Reading impresses upon us that it is not poetry,

it is so much more than that,

but as we draw towards the end of the Qur'an

we find some of the most gloriously poetic suras in the Reading.

Here we find Sura Rahman,

the Fount of All Mercy,

with its questioning refrain repeated over and over.

Then there are the declamatory rhymes dominating so many of the later suras,

and the brief flourishes of the very shortest,

the thud of the Ayats of Ikhlas,

and the sibilant ending of the Reading with Nas.

The joy of the reading of the Reading

is to remember its good news,

though still remembering to live our lives remembering its warning.

Reading Creation

Calligraphy