A study of the theory of interpretation from the perspective of Nasr Hamed Abu Zayd and Mohammad Hadi Marefat and its impact on religious beliefs

Interpretation is a subject of great significance in Quarnic sciences and theology, which plays a crucial role in understanding the Quran and Islamic narrations, especially some verses related to names and attributes.  Avoiding this concept is equivalent to ignoring the true depth of the divine word and as a consequence, misleading to analogy and imagination (of God corporeality). From the early days of Islam, different religions and scientists have had inconsistent understandings through interpretations or explanations about the religious literature. This has even resulted into cases of tolerance in interpretation of religious concepts without in-depth understanding and thus, misconceptions of people from grasping their true messages. The first step is to understand what interpretation means and how is it different from explanation. Interpretation is not simply extending an explanation of Quranic verses when it is not enough for getting in-depth understanding. Instead, it is an independent issue to be taken care of by the scientific giants and the innocent In this research work, after introducing the subject and describing the lexical and idiomatic meanings for interpretation, the theory of interpretation is investigated from the viewpoints of these two researches in Quranic sciences. Ayatollah Marefat, the representative of the traditional discourse, and Nasr Hamed Abu Zayd, a representative of the modernist discourse, have a minimalistic view of it, interpreting from the class of concepts, a kind of interpretation, and with simple rules for all individuals. In addition to these commonalities, there are other similarities and distinctions between the interpretive approach of these two contemporary thinkers. Historicity, humanity of religion and Qur’an, relativism, pluralism and secularism, the influence of Abu Zayd’s interpretive approach on religious beliefs. against, immortality, divinity of religion and Qur’an, realism and infallibility of prophets can be seen from epistemic works and supplies the Ayatollah’s Interpretative approach of religious beliefs has been concluded.