An Analysis on the Orientalists’ Early Studies on the Qur’ān

The researches of the Western world on the Qur’ān and Tafsīr are related to the history of Orientalism and are subject to a similar its development and change process. The efforts of the Western researchers to recognize Islam have dated back to the Crusades, and as a result of their acceptance of the superiority of Islam and the civilization and culture in which it had been integrated, it had turned into a struggle attempt. In the beginning, translation movements had played a major role in this struggle. Forasmuch, to able to know culture and civilization is primarily about knowing and understanding the language. The Westerners, who had learned the Arabic language in order to understand Islamic thought, had taken the most important step in this struggle by translating the products and works of this language and culture into the Latin language. Commentaries, quotations, explanations, plagiarisms or whatever their name is, all researches, translations, works, products and studies can be mentioned in the focus of this application and step. In addition to the studies in which language is at the forefront, it is necessary to mention other factors affecting these studies. As a matter of fact, all factors involving life have taken a place in a similar course in academic, scientific, political, religious, social, economic and cultural dimensions. The Renaissance, the invention of the printing press, the expansionist policy of the Turks, other developments in science and philosophy, and the impact of these developments on Europeans had been influential in their work on the field of Islam. The first researches of the Orientalists on Islam and the Qur’ān -which they had done in order to achieve their various goals- had several aims such as religious, political, scientific, commercial and colonialism. The Orientalists, with their works shaped for these purposes, had engaged in activities such as fighting Islam by degrading the value of the Prophet Muḥammad (PBUH), preventing the spread of this religion by spreading the faults of Islam in the way which they had identified, and converting the Muslims to Christianity. Similarly, in academic studies, it has been understood that they had an extremely negative and cynical expression style devoid of criteria such as scientific impartiality, objectivity and originality. This is also evident in the studies on the Qur’ān and Tafsīr. In order to criticize Islam, they had made various criticisms, especially on the source and nature of the Qur’ān. In addition to the study areas where the Qur’ān is at the center, many works on the history of the Qur’ān, on the other hand, have explained how and through which phases the Qur’ān had come to the present day, from a Muslim perspective in a common manner. On the other hand, the non-Muslims have been interested in what the Qur’ān is, its origin, authenticity and its formation process as well as the Muslims. In order to evaluate the perspectives of the non-Muslim researchers and to comprehend the West and the Western studies on these issues, it is necessary to search, analyze and mention about the history of their relations with Islam, the Muslims, the Prophet Muḥammad (PBUH), the historical process of Orientalism and the Oriental studies on many fields in an objective and scientific way for having more new studies that are beneficial to humanity and science. Our work can be evaluated as an introduction for this field with a modest style. We will try to study and focus on especially the early works about these subjects. We will have the aim of explaining the Orientalists’ early studies on Islam, the Prophet Muḥammad (PBUH) and the Qur’ān which they have an extremely vindictive and hateful expression rather than a scientific and academic method although they have reached criteria such as scientific impartiality, objectivity and originality in academic works in recent years. In our research, we will have labour to convey our findings which can be considered as a preliminary on the broad field in question and which we intend to examine by making a periodic distinction in our later works by trying to pass the discourses on the early period through a critical and an objective filter, rather than only mentioning different views.