Different Approaches to Teaching Arabic Language

Two Divergent Methodologies for Teaching the Arabic Language in Nadwat al-ʿUlamāʾ

Written

7/6/2026 CE

Among the pedagogical questions that have occupied the educational mind of Nadwat al-ʿUlamāʾ, and have provoked a profound scholarly debate among its shuyūkh and lecturers, is the question of the curriculum that ought to be followed in teaching the Arabic language to beginners. This debate did not arise from any difference in the estimation of the Qurʾān or of the rank of Arabic—for in that matter there has never been disagreement among the ʿulamāʾ of the Nadwah—but rather from a difference in outlook regarding the best path that leads to the sound acquisition of an authentic Arabic faculty and to a deeper understanding of the Book of Allah, Exalted is He.

One group of the shuyūkh held that Arabic ought to be taught through the Qurʾān itself, and that its vocabulary, compositions and stylistic patterns should constitute the primary source of instruction. The religious and pedagogical motive behind this orientation is evident: most students of Arabic in India do not seek the language for its own sake, but because it is the language of revelation; thus it is beneficial, they argue, that a connection be established between them and the Qurʾān from the earliest stages of learning.

Another body of ʿulamāʾ within the Nadwah, however, took a different route. They maintained that the sound development of the Arabic faculty can be achieved only if Arabic is first studied in and for itself, in its history and in its pre-Qurʾānic heritage, and that only thereafter should the students approach the Qurʾān as the supreme apex of this Arabic tongue. In my view, this orientation is nearer to the principles of linguistic inquiry, more closely aligned with the nature of language itself, and more conducive to attaining the desired goal, namely, an understanding of the Qurʾān grounded in knowledge rather than in mere familiarity and habituation.

The first fact that must never be absent from the researcher’s mind is that the Qurʾān did not create the Arabic language; rather, it found it fully formed prior to its revelation. The Arabs upon whom the wahy descended did not learn Arabic from the Qurʾān; rather, they learnt the Qurʾān through the Arabic they already knew and spoke. This simple truth has far-reaching consequences in the field of education. If the Qurʾān itself was revealed in a language that pre-existed it, then naturally the comprehension of that language is a prerequisite for understanding the Qurʾān, not a result derived from it.

This is not a merely theoretical deduction; the Qurʾān itself testifies to it. The Qurʾān describes itself as having been revealed “in a clear Arabic tongue” (bi-lisānin ʿarabiyyin mubīn). Such a description stands only if the addressees were already acquainted with that tongue before its revelation. Otherwise, how could the tongue be mubīn—clearly communicative—to a people unaccustomed to it? And how could the Qurʾānic challenge remain valid if the means of comparison were altogether absent? The very meaning of the challenge is that the Qurʾān addressed the Arabs in a field they mastered, yet they were unable, despite their mastery, to bring forth anything like it. Had the Qurʾān arrived in an entirely new language, unfamiliar to them, the challenge would have been devoid of meaning.

Hence it becomes evident that knowledge of pre-Qurʾānic Arabic is not a luxury but a necessity for comprehending the very nature of Qurʾānic iʿjāz. A human being cannot recognise the superiority of a thing unless he knows the level over which it has excelled, nor can he appreciate the marvel of innovation unless he knows the norm from which that innovation departs.

For this reason the early imāms of Arabic did not derive the rules of naḥw and ṣarf from the Qurʾān alone; rather, they first returned to the speech of the Arabs—their poetry, orations and proverbs. Al-Khalīl ibn Aḥmad, Sībawayh, al-Farāʾ, al-Aṣmaʿī, Ibn Jinnī and other great founders of the Arabic sciences did not proceed from the assumption that the Qurʾān is the sole source of the language; they viewed the Qurʾān as the most elevated of Arabic texts, not as the creator of Arabic out of nothingness.

It is striking that the Arabic sciences themselves historically arose upon this very basis. The major grammatical evidences in the Kitāb of Sībawayh are taken from Jāhilī and early Islamic poetry and from the speech of the Arabs in their deserts. The lexicographers would undertake journeys to the tribes so as to listen to Arabic in its natural form, before employing it to interpret the Qurʾān and the Sunnah. This shows that the scholars who were closest in time to the language and most exact in their understanding of it grasped that the path to comprehending the Qurʾānic text first passes through understanding the linguistic system within which it was revealed.

The matter becomes still clearer when viewed in the light of modern linguistics. Contemporary studies on language acquisition affirm that the learner needs exposure to a wide and varied corpus of texts and contexts in order to develop full linguistic competence. Language is not merely a list of vocabulary items or a set of rules; it is a vast network of usages, styles and cultural contexts.

Research into foreign-language teaching in Europe, America and Asia has demonstrated that restricting oneself to a single type of text generally produces a limited competence, no matter how exalted that text may be. He who learns English solely from legal documents does not possess the whole of English, and he who learns it only from scientific prose cannot encompass all its styles. Similarly, one who seeks to learn Arabic exclusively from the Qurʾān may acquire a great capacity to understand a particular dimension of the language, yet he will not grasp the complete historical and rhetorical picture from which Arabic was formed.

Indeed, some contemporary theories in cognitive linguistics hold that the comprehension of high-level texts cannot be achieved save after building a linguistic base independent of them. A reader does not perceive the artistic deviation or the rhetorical distinctiveness of a text unless he first knows the customary pattern from which the deviation occurs. This is evident in poetry, literature and all the arts. He who does not know ordinary Arabic prose cannot fathom the secret of beauty in the Qurʾānic style, and he who is ignorant of Arabic poetry cannot gauge the degree of the contrast between the Qurʾān and poetry—a contrast upon which the proofs of iʿjāz have rested since the first century.

There is, moreover, a pedagogical consideration of great importance which perhaps has not received its due attention: the books with which a person begins his learning become, over time, part of his mental habit. Frequent handling may render them study material more than objects of wonder and contemplation. Some ʿulamāʾ of the Nadwah therefore feared that, for the beginner, the Qurʾān might turn into a manual for exercises in naḥw and ṣarf, so that he becomes preoccupied with parsing its words and memorising its vocabulary at the expense of sensing its majesty, rhetorical grandeur and spiritual awe.

If, however, the student first receives the tools of the language from its natural sources, and thereafter approaches the Qurʾān once his linguistic faculty has matured and his rhetorical taste ripened, he will read the Qurʾān in an altogether different manner. The Qurʾān will not be the first Arabic text he encounters; rather, it will be the most sublime he encounters. Then the loci of iʿjāz will manifest to him with a clarity scarcely attainable for one who has known nothing beyond the Qurʾān itself.

He who reads Jāhilī poetry, Arabic orations and ancient proverbs, and then turns to the Qurʾān, feels directly that this text moves within the same linguistic system yet rises above it in a wondrous way. It employs the very words familiar to the Arabs, the constructions they were accustomed to, and the forms that flowed upon their tongues, yet it reaches with them a degree of precision, coherence, harmony and psychological impact unattained by any other speech. Only then does the meaning of iʿjāz truly reveal itself.

For these reasons I incline to the view that the second orientation advocated by some of the shuyūkh of Nadwat al-ʿUlamāʾ is not merely an educational choice among many possibilities; rather, it is closer to the scientific method in studying languages and in understanding great texts. It does not distance the student from the Qurʾān; it prepares him to return to it with deeper insight, sounder vision and a greater capacity for appreciation and comprehension. It does not diminish the standing of the Qurʾān; on the contrary, it elevates it, for it enables the reader to behold its superiority after having acquainted himself with every other facet and manifestation of Arabic.

Perhaps the greatest service that can be rendered to the Noble Qurʾān is not to make it the first book from which the student learns the rules of language, but rather to equip that student with a firm linguistic apparatus and then open to him the gates of the Qurʾān, so that he enters it furnished with the entire history, heritage and sciences of Arabic. Only then will he realise that the Qurʾān is not a mere Arabic text; it is the text that gathered all the qualities of Arabic and then transcended them to a horizon of expression which Arabs and non-Arabs alike have remained incapable of attaining through the ages.

Disclaimer: This article was translated by AI. Original post: https://t.me/DrAkramNadwi/9361