Formulation of the Claim
Archaeological excavation separates the Qur’an from the later tradition, and the Qur’anic event from the Islamic event.
Explanation
Arkoun proposes a reading that does not stop at the text alone, but traces what precedes it and what follows it within history. For this reason, the Qur’an is not treated as isolated from the conditions of its emergence, nor is it directly equated with the accumulation of interpretation and later tradition around it.
Within this horizon, archaeological excavation becomes a tool for distinguishing the levels that have been conflated in traditional reading: the level of revelation as presented by the Qur’an, and the level of historical reception shaped by Muslims later on. The aim is not to strip the text of its value, but to reveal the distance between it and the layers of tradition that surrounded it.
Its Place in the Book’s Argument
This atom belongs to Arkoun’s broader project, which reopens the question of the relationship between founding texts and the history of the meanings that formed around them. It is close to Arkoun’s thesis on the necessity of opening the way to a critical historical reading that does not suffice with the interpretive inheritance, but distinguishes between the founding event and its later representations.
Limits of the Claim
This claim should not be taken as a call to abolish tradition or to make a definitive break between the Qur’an and its history. Nor does it mean reducing history to only two layers; rather, it points to the need to distinguish between them within a broader critical reading.