Formulation of the claim
Arkoun holds that the Qur’anic discourse and the Torah narratives present a model of positive mythic expression.
Explanation
This claim belongs to Arkoun’s reading of religious discourse as a field in which story, symbol, and meaning intersect. What is meant by a positive mythic model is not denial or illusion, but rather the acknowledgment that Qur’anic discourse uses a narrative form that gives meaning the capacity to take shape and exert influence within religious consciousness.
This understanding also appears in his approach to the Torah narratives, where he does not view narrative as merely a record of events, but as a symbolic formulation that produces meaning. Arkoun therefore places Qur’anic discourse within a broader field of religious expression that operates through myth in its structural and suggestive sense.
Its place in the book’s argument
This atom falls within Arkoun’s broader thesis of deconstructing modes of religious speech and reading them historically and anthropologically, rather than limiting oneself to a literal interpretation. It is connected to what the book says about the levels of expression in sacred texts, and about the way meanings take shape within them through narrative, representation, and symbol.
Limits of the claim
This atom should not be taken to mean reducing the Qur’an to myth in a simplistic sense, nor as a final judgment on the religious value of the text. It describes a mode of expression within Arkoun’s analysis more than it offers a comprehensive definition of the Qur’an or of the Torah narratives.