The Qur’an is Arabic, not Aramaic:

A thread refuting the claim that the Qur’an is in Aramaic and/or has to be interpreted using the Aramaic
language

Aqīl

@aqilazme

This is a strange, strange methodology to adopt in interpreting the Qur’an. It basically boils down to
“we’ve been understanding the Qur’an wrong because we don’t understand Aramaic”. Let me explain
why that’s wrong, inshāAllāh.
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@SiriuslyCold
· May 23
For the first time in history, a book is written to reveal that the language of the Qur'an is Aramaic, not
Arabic. The Aramaic language of the Qur'an renders interpretations that are different from what
Muslim commentators rendered in the last fourteen centuries.

@aqilazme
Firstly, let’s look at the development of these three languages and its relation with each other: Arabic,
Syriac, Aramaic. This is important to clarify since the OP used words like “dominant”, “borrowed”, etc.
But does that all really mean the Qur’an is purely Aramaic?

Let me make it simple. Arabic is a language, and it’s a member of the Semitic language family. The
Semitic language family also includes a language known as Aramaic. Syriac meanwhile is a dialect of
Aramaic. So for the sake of simplicity, let’s discuss Arabic and Aramaic.

Arabic is not derived from Aramaic, and by extension is not derived from Syriac because Syriac is
derived from Aramaic. Arabic and Aramaic, despite being in the same family, are two different
languages, hence they developed independently from each other.

This is because they both are in different language groups within the Semitic language. Arabic
developed with other Southern-Central Semitic languages, while Aramaic developed with other
Northern Central Semitic languages, and this is common knowledge in linguistics.
Why I’m telling you all this is to establish an important fact: just because two languages share some
words between them, or had the same origin/root words, that does not necessarily make the two
languages the same. Language A ≠ Language B even if Language A ≈ Language B

The people in the Arabian Peninsula spoke Arabic. Classical (fusha) Arabic to be precise. And the
Qur’an was sent down to them in Arabic. Even the Qur’an establishes this fact: “Indeed we have sent it
down as an Arabic Qur’an so that you might think” - Yūsuf: 2

But you contest the meaning of the verse above by citing a blog called “ahle aql” (people of reason)
which says this in the picture below. What’s ironic is that one of the greatest people of reason, al-
Zamakhsharī who was a Mu’tazilī (definitely not a traditionalist)…
also disagrees with the article. al-Zamakhsharī said in his tafsīr al-Kashāf, “it is named for a part of the
al-Qur’an as ‘qur’anan’ (indefinite). Because al-Qur’an(definite) is a noun that encompasses the
entirety of the Qur’an”.

Therefore, the word “arabiyyan”, being an adjective, has to follow the noun in being indefinite, this is
simple Arabic. Why does the Qur’an only use “a part of the Qur’an” in that verse? al-Zamakhsharī says
because only a part of it is “so that you might think”. That’s it.

It’s not that complicated. I’ll give another example: Sibawayh, the greatest grammarian of the Arabic
language, in the 8th century wrote an encyclopedia of Arabic grammar called al-Kitāb. In it, he draws
examples from both the Qur’an and pre-Islamic poetry. If the Qur’an was in Aramaic surely the
greatest grammarian could tell the difference?

Putting the Qur’an alongside pre-Islamic poetry tells us an important but obvious thing: they’re the
same language. Again, another choice: do you believe the greatest...

Arabic grammarian of all time, or some random people on the Internet in the 21st century? The second
fallacy to clear up is thinking that knowing Aramaic is necessary to interpret the entire Qur’an, and this
is false. Knowing the etymology of a word could help to tell you the...

characteristics of the word, sure, but it definitely does not tell you about the word itself. Example: The
word helicopter is from the Ancient Greeks words “helix” (spiral) and “pteron” (wing). If I understood
Ancient Greek, all it tells me is that a helicopter is something with spiral wings. That does not help me.
What helps is knowing the English word “helicopter” itself to know that it refers to a machine with
propellers that can fly.

But I noticed that you also contest the reliability of hadīth. The errors of a Qur’anist is not really
relevant so I don’t wish to discuss it here but I do want to personally say that it breaks my heart
knowing that all the hard work and effort put in by the scholars of hadīth—Imām al-Bukhārī spent 16
years of his life writing his Sahīh, memorised more than 600,000 hadīth—being dismissed so easily by
some people. Selamat Hari Raya. Wallāhu a’lam. Correct me if I’m wrong.