Classical Sufi Exegesis and Malay Qur’anic Interpretation

Tarjumān al-Mustafīd, the earliest extant complete Malay Qur’anic commentary, has rarely been examined through direct comparison with classical Sufi exegesis. This article investigates how selected ishārī motifs—nūr (Q 24:35), tazkiyah (Q 91:9–10), and qalb salīm (Q 26:89), with raḥmah and mīzān as supplementary cases—are rendered in the Malay commentary. Using comparative textual analysis, it reads Tarjumān al-Mustafīd alongside al-Sulamī’s Ḥaqāʾiq al-Tafsīr, al-Qushayrī’s Laṭāʾif al-Ishārāt, and Ibn ʿAjībah’s al-Baḥr al-Madīd. The comparison identifies three recurrent textual mechanisms—lexical retention, selective omission, and ethical amplification—operating within broader processes of semantic compression, contextual adaptation, and pedagogical domestication. The findings do not establish direct borrowing or justify classifying Tarjumān al-Mustafīd as a Sufi commentary in a strict generic sense. They indicate, however, that selected ishārī resonances remain discernible through semantic compression and ethical reformulation. The article therefore proposes “textual appropriation” as a limited analytical category for tracing how classical Sufi motifs were rearticulated within a concise Malay exegetical register while preserving pedagogical intelligibility.

Exegesis · Extant taxon · Malay · Philosophy of religion · Tracing · Islamic Studies and History · Linguistic, Cultural, and Literary Studies · Qur’anic Interpretation Studies