Western / Islamic differences in reading

The Goethe Institute in Cairo invited German and Islamic intellectuals to participate in a discussion in the Egyptian desert oasis of Bahareyya in mid February. As Markus Meßling's report shows, there were substantial differences between the two parties: "It became clear that fundamentally different concepts underlie what it means to understand. Whereas from a European philological standpoint, reading always represents an active process from which even the Bible is not exempt, on the Egyptian side the reading of the Koran means passive comprehension of a manifest truth." ~ Frankfurter Rundschau, 05.03.2005

Note the difference, please. Both parties, represented by Western & Islamic scholars, desire to understand a body of sacred texts. Yet, both approach this goal very differently. The former see understanding as an active process (do you hear the shades of the Enlightenment?), the latter are open, receptive and submissive to the text. The former interrogate the text, the latter wait upon the text. This, in a nutshell, encapsulates the hermeneutical argument going on presently in the West. Deconstructionism has interrogated the text for a long time and has come away deciding that we can never know. So-called "pre-modern" methods of reading, however, were very much as is described of the Islamic scholars. The Bible interrogated, not the other way round.

Indeed, to my way of thinking, the Bible is read according to "levels of permission." One reads as one is given permission to read by the text itself. The text will guide the reader deeper into itself, as long as one waits in contemplative and expectant silence (hesuchia) upon the text itself. Not that this is always a slow process, familiarity and custom quickens the pace of understanding.