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Customer Review
Reviewed in the United States on May 9, 2022
The academic textual critical study of the Quran is a limited field, especially at the popular level. What academic textual critical scholarship that looks at the Quran as a document in the historical context has been either very old or very deeply aimed at a professional audience.
The Critical Quran presents a useful introduction to the academic and critical study of the Quran to a popular audience. The translation is clear and leans to the literalist. The copious footnotes attempt to clarify the text of the Quran using references primarily to classical Islamic sources, and to early Christian writings on the Quran, such few that exist, and refers to 20th and 21st century academic analysis as well.
Given the very limited availability of resources for the study of the Quran as a historical document, this is an essential volume for those interested in that area.
There are some negatives however. First is that the footnotes cross reference other parts of the Quran by sura number and verse, but the running headers only give the sura titles. It would have been immensely helpful to have the sura number in the headers for those of us who don’t have the sura titles and numbers memorized. The other negative is that Robert Spencer has quite a controversial reputation, whether deserved or not, and that alone will prevent some people from taking this book seriously as an academic work, which is quite unfortunate, since there’s nothing else like it available.
The Critical Quran presents a useful introduction to the academic and critical study of the Quran to a popular audience. The translation is clear and leans to the literalist. The copious footnotes attempt to clarify the text of the Quran using references primarily to classical Islamic sources, and to early Christian writings on the Quran, such few that exist, and refers to 20th and 21st century academic analysis as well.
Given the very limited availability of resources for the study of the Quran as a historical document, this is an essential volume for those interested in that area.
There are some negatives however. First is that the footnotes cross reference other parts of the Quran by sura number and verse, but the running headers only give the sura titles. It would have been immensely helpful to have the sura number in the headers for those of us who don’t have the sura titles and numbers memorized. The other negative is that Robert Spencer has quite a controversial reputation, whether deserved or not, and that alone will prevent some people from taking this book seriously as an academic work, which is quite unfortunate, since there’s nothing else like it available.
