al-Qawl al-Sadid fi Ilm al-Tajwid
- Author died
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- Editions
- Dar al-Wafa
al-Qawl al-Sadid fi Ilm al-Tajwid (The Sound Saying on the Science of Tajwid) is a contemporary manual on the rules of Quranic recitation composed by the Egyptian scholar and reciter Ala Allah ibn Ali Abu al-Wafa .
Composition and Purpose
Abu al-Wafa wrote the work drawing upon nearly twenty years of teaching Quranic recitation at al-Azhar in Egypt, in Ta'if in Saudi Arabia, and at Dar al-Qur'an al-Karim and the College of Sharia at Kuwait University . The author completed the initial manuscript on Friday, 7 Dhu al-Qi'da 1418 AH (6 March 1998 CE) in al-Jahra, Kuwait . He aimed to present the rules of tajwid through a modern pedagogical approach, striking a balance between concise presentation and thorough coverage without tedious elaboration or confusing brevity .
Method and Sources
The book draws upon standard metrical texts (mutun) of recitation and their commentaries, including Sulayman al-Jamzuri's Tuhfat al-Atfal, Ibn al-Jazari's al-Muqaddima al-Jazariyya and Tayyibat al-Nashr, and al-Shatibi's Hirz al-Amani (al-Shatibiyya) .
In structuring each chapter, the author begins with an outline of the section's core elements, followed by a succinct explanation and illustrative Quranic examples . Topics are corroborated with poetic citations from classical didactic poems and conclude with discussion questions to assess student understanding . The work also includes source references for quoted Quranic verses and hadiths while avoiding digressions into unresolved scholarly disagreements . For the second edition, the author added pedagogical visual aids, including diagrams of letter articulation points (rasm makharij al-huruf) and a classification chart of vowel extensions (shajarat al-mudud) .
Contents and Structure
The book opens with an introductory section addressing the virtues of the Quran according to the prophetic Sunnah, etiquettes of recitation and listening, and legal rulings concerning touching the text or reciting while in ritual impurity . The core text is divided into nine chapters:
- Chapter 1: The fundamentals (mabadi') of the science of tajwid, the pillars and tempos of recitation (arkan wa-maratib al-qira'a), types of recitation errors (al-lahn), the seeking of refuge (al-isti'adha), and the basmala .
- Chapter 2: Rulings governing the quiescent nun and tanwin (al-nun al-sakina wa-al-tanwin), detailing throat manifestation (al-izhar al-halqi), assimilation with and without nasalization (al-idgham), inversion (al-iqlab), and concealment (al-ikhfa') .
- Chapter 3: Rulings of the quiescent mim (al-mim al-sakina), doubled letters (al-nun wa-al-mim al-mushaddadatan), and quiescent lams (ahkam al-lamat al-sawakin) in particles, verbs, nouns, and the definite article .
- Chapter 4: Vowel elongation and shortening (al-madd wa-al-qasr), covering compulsory, obligatory, and permissible lengthenings, pausing at word terminals (al-waqf ala awakhir al-kalim), and the pronominal ha (ha' al-kinaya) .
- Chapter 5: Points of articulation (makharij al-huruf) across general and specific anatomical areas, along with the classification titles of the letters .
- Chapter 6: Letter attributes (sifat al-huruf), including paired opposite qualities (such as whispering, vocalic strength, elevation, and openness), non-opposite qualities (such as whistling and echoing), and their relative phonetic strengths .
- Chapter 7: Phonetic relationships between letters (identical, proximate, homogeneous, and distant), rules of velarization and thinning (al-tafkhim wa-al-tarqiq), pausing and restarting (al-waqf wa-al-ibtida'), and orthographic pause markers .
- Chapter 8: The connective and disjunctive hamzas (hamzat al-wasl and hamzat al-qat'), letter elision and retention (al-hadhf wa-al-ithbat), and the feminine ta written with an open form (ha' al-ta'nith) .
- Chapter 9: Disjoined and conjoined script (al-maqtu' wa-al-mawsul), shortening the detached elongation (qasr al-madd al-munfasil), prostrations of recitation (sujud al-tilawa), liturgical pauses (saktat), the takbir formulas at the conclusion of recitation, practices of the early generations upon completing the Quran, and short biographical profiles of the reader Asim ibn Abi al-Najud and his transmitter Hafs ibn Sulayman .
Reception and Editions
The work was introduced by Dr. Ali Ali Luqm of the Faculty of Islamic and Arabic Studies for Girls in al-Mansura, who praised its wide scope, abundant textual examples, and consultation of twenty-eight specialized treatises in recitation along with general works in hadith, exegesis, and history .
Following the exhaustion of its first print run within a year, the author prepared a revised second edition on 29 Dhu al-Hijja 1419 AH (16 April 1999 CE) in Kafr Tannah, al-Mansura . The book came to be adopted in instructional curricula at Kuwait University's faculties of Sharia and Education, as well as in Quranic study centers across Kuwait . A third edition was subsequently published in 1424 AH by Dar al-Wafa in al-Mansura .
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