İslami İlimler Dergisi

Öz

It is known that the Qurʾan was revealed in an oral form in relation to different events that took place in a certain period of time. The Mushaf emerged when the chapters of revelation, which the Prophet conveyed to the first interlocutors of the Qurʾan as a living dialog, were transformed into written form by observing a certain structural and stylistic standard during the caliphate period. While the Qurʾānic passages in the form of shifāhī had all the necessary aspects to be understood during the period of revelation, they were deprived of their external context when they became Mushaf, or they were textualized by experiencing serious losses in this direction. In this respect, it can be stated that the need for exegesis in history stems from the deformation of the Qurʾanic content’s close relationship with history in the process of textualization. Therefore, an exegetical activity can be considered successful to the extent that it can eliminate this deformation.
Exegeting a Qurʾanic passage is equivalent to revealing its relationship with the history to which it belongs. In other words, understanding a Qurʾanic passage correctly is only possible by dating it correctly. In the tradition of exegesis, the studies on dating the Qurʾan were largely based on the integrity of the suras. The most important proof of this is the lists in the sources that are based on the order of the surahs. This assumption makes it difficult to date the verses in long suras that were revealed in relation to different events at different date intervals. In our opinion, it is not possible to make comprehensive evaluations about a part of the Qurʾan or the Qurʾan as a whole unless individual groups of verses in different parts of the Mushaf are identified and these verses are related to the historical contexts to which they belong.
This study will point out the shortcomings of tafsir studies that consider all suras as chapters with structural and thematic integrity and rely on the lists of the order of occurrence available in the sources to date them, and will include some determinations, suggestions and evaluations regarding the steps to be taken for the dating of individual verse groups.