Friday Notes From The Quran A Quran Reading Course By Syed Akbar Ali

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NON MUSLIMS CAN SKIP THIS. THANK YOU.

The month of the fast will be coming soon (on 28th Feb)? For many it will also be the month of the feast where people actually consume more food than in other months.

During the fasting month some people will try to read or recite the Quran. Some of the mosques will hire qari or reciters who will try to recite the entire Quran during the nightly terawih prayers which are held in the nights of the fasting month.
In the non-Arab speaking countries people will just stand and listen to the long Quran recitations without understanding even one word of what is being recited.

So those of you who are in your 50s, 60s and 70s you would have gone through maybe 30, 40, 50 years or more of attending terawih prayers and listening to the Quran being recited and still do not understand a single word of what is written inside the Quran. Despite 30, 40, 50 years having gone by.

Hence as I have said before, despite being the most widely read book in the world the Quran remains the least understood book. Because the vast majority of the world's 1.8 billion Muslims simply do not know what is written inside the Quran.  
Let me try to change this just a little bit. The Quran has 114 chapters or surahs. The Quran has 6,348 verses. This is inclusive of 112 'un-numbered' Bismillahs at the beginning of 112 surahs
Two surahs are missing ?Well there is no Bismillah at the beginning of Sura Taubah and in Surah Fatiha the Bismillah is verse number 1.Of the 114 chapters the earlier chapters (say 2 - 18) are the longest. The exception is the first chapter, the Opener or Fatiha which has only seven verses. Surah No. 2 or Al Baqarah is the longest chapter in the Quran with 286 verses.
Not only are these earlier chapters very long but they also have verses which themselves are long. For example the longest verse in the Quran is verse 282 of Al Baqarah. This very long verse is about contracts, futures transactions, loan agreements and about writing down business transactions.  

As you read the Quran, the chapters become shorter and the verses also become shorter. For example Chapter 7 has 206 verses (a blip) but it is shorter than Chapter 6 which has 165 verses.   When you complete reading Chapter 7, that is already 30% of the Quran. 
The end of Chapter 18 (Al Kahfi) is almost exactly half of the Quran. This means the other half of the Quran "squeezes" into the remaining 96 chapters. As I said the chapters get shorter and shorter towards the end of the Quran. The shortest surah is 108 which has only three verses.
Ok I have worked out a method that is quite effective in 
reading the Arabic Quranlearning the Arabic language and understanding the Quran in  Arabic all at the same time.Three birds with one stone.And you can achieve this in a short period of just FOUR WEEKS - which will be this fasting month which begins around the 28th of February. So please do gear yourselves up and give it a shot.
I assume (with all the billions being spent on religion and the legions of lebais influencing your lives from birth to death) that you can read the basic Alif Ba Ta and can recognise the Arabic in the Quran. 
Your next step is you will  need a LITERAL TRANSLATION of the Quran. You can use your own or there are many available for free Online.  It can be a translation in any language. I have said before my top favorite is a literal translation in Bahasa Indonesia. 
Just a few minutes ago I found this literal translation online. A literal translation in English. Quran Word By Word Translation, Transliteration  https://quranwbw.com/1.
It looks OK.    
 


Here is a sample, verse no. 2 of Surah Baqarah:


As you can see it has the Arabic, then the transliteration and then the literal translation in English. Three lines.

So here is my method. I like Surah Baqarah. Not only is this the longest surah in the Quran but it has almost the full range of Arabic words that are repeated again and again throughout the Quran. It is a repetition or mutashabihan.
So all you have to do is read Surah Baqarah slowly and complete reading this chapter. Read the Arabic words, then read the literal translation WORD BY WORD.

Once you have read Baqarah repeat the process again. Read it again. For beginners it will take you about ONE WEEK or seven days to complete reading Baqarah. If you can read faster better for you. You will get better with practise.

So in the four weeks of the fasting month, you can read Baqarah in detail at least FOUR times. Trust me at the end of reading Baqarah four times you will pick up the meanings of many Arabic words. And then you will be able to recognise the meaning of the same words in any chapter in the Quran - which is our main objective here - to read and understand the entire Quran in Arabic. Not just the translation.  

The fasting month is still two weeks away. If you want to start early (like today), you will have six weeks. You can partner with someone, like your spouse, kids, friends, colleagues etc for some motivation and company. Or just do it by yourself.
I once met a Mat Salleh who was an overzealous convert to Islam. He had read the Surah Baqarah word by word over 20 times and it helped him tremendously to navigate the Quran in Arabic. Quite impressive. 

And you will begin to appreciate the meaning of the Quran in Arabic. For example see again the verse above Baqarah verse 2. It is a short and simple verse but with a heavyweight meaning. 
'La rayba fee hi' which means 'there are no doubts in it'. This refers to the Quran.  If any Muslim has doubts about the Quran, show them Baqarah verse 2.  
Or in Surah Maaidah verse 3 'al yawma akmaltu lakum deenukum' which means 'today I have perfected for you, your deen'. If someone says the deen is not perfected show them Al Maaidah verse 3. 
So happy reading Surah Baqarah and mastering it. And mastering the whole Quran in Arabic.
The views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect those of MMKtT.
By Syed Akbar Ali 

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