Spatial Expressions of Ascetic Tendencies in the Qurʾan

In this article, I propose viewing the early Qurʾanic movement as an expression of strong ascetic tendencies. More specifically, I suggest seeing aspects of Qurʾanic rhetorics as offering a specifically spatial expression to broader ascetic tendencies that characterized late antiquity as a whole, and which may be labeled “axial,” insofar as they can be traced back to the middle of the first millennium B.C.E. , i.e., to the period coined by Karl Jaspers and others as “the Axial Age.” In the Qurʾan, rhetoric about striving for religious perfection takes on a spatial and horizontal expression, since the soteriological aspirations are formulated, to a certain extent, as a spatial ambition of “going out in the way of God.” As I suggest here, spatial imagery constitutes a prevalent theme throughout the Qurʾan and, based on an analysis of a number of examples, I argue that this spatial rhetoric indicates ascetic tendencies within the early Qurʾanic movement. The Qurʾan’s articulation of the tension between the believers and the surrounding world, including the tension between the muhājirūn (emigrants) and “those who stay behind,” is a prevalent theme throughout the text. This suggests that ascetic piety should be enacted spatially. In the last section of the article, I discuss the apparent change in semantics of two Qurʾanic terms that suggests the later Islamic exegetical tradition appears to favor an interpretation of these terms that allows for a more settled mentality and “stationary piety.”

Aesthetics · Art · Asceticism · Epistemology · Expression (computer science) · Interpretation (philosophy) · Linguistics · Literature · Perfection · Piety · Rhetoric · Theme (computing) · Theology · Archaeology and Historical Studies · Historical and Linguistic Studies · Islamic Studies and History · Philosophy · Religious studies