What does "the narration of Hafs from Asim" mean?
Readings and narrations in the Quran - the difference between a reader and his narrator, who Asim and Hafs were, why this narration became the one most people hold, what the narrations actually differ in, the maalik/malik example in Al-Fatihah read in al-Tafsir al-Muyassar, al-Safi and al-Mizan, and how the hadith of the seven ahruf relates to it.
The line on the cover
Most printed copies of the Quran carry a small line on the cover: the narration of Hafs from Asim. Many readers pass over it for years without asking what it means. This article answers that and, at the two verses it passes through, gives the Sunni reading of al-Tafsir al-Muyassar first, then the Shia readings of al-Safi (al-Fayd al-Kashani) and al-Mizan (al-Tabataba'i).
Quotations from the three commentaries are my renderings of the Arabic.
One Quran, several ways of reciting it
The text is one, and its preservation is promised:
Indeed, it is We who sent down the Qur'an and indeed, We will be its guardian.
Al-Muyassar: We sent down the Quran to the Prophet Muhammad, and We undertake to keep it from anything being added to it or taken from it, or any of it being lost. Al-Safi: "and We will be its guardian" — against distortion and alteration, addition and loss. Al-Mizan: rather, We sent down this Reminder in stages, and We will guard it, by what it has of the quality of a Reminder and by Our full care for it. So it is a living, lasting Reminder, kept from dying and being forgotten at its root; kept from additions that would undo its being a Reminder, and from loss likewise; kept from change in its form and arrangement such that its quality as God's Reminder, making plain the truths it teaches, would change.
All three agree that the verse promises to keep the Quran from addition, loss and change. Their words on it are set out in full in How the Quran was collected.
A qira'ah — a reading — is a transmitted way of reciting that one text, carried by chain from one of the imams of recitation, who had it from his teachers, and they from theirs. The differences between readings are not differences in the book. They are differences in how it is pronounced: in the length of vowels, in the treatment of the glottal stop, in assimilation, in pauses — and, in a small number of words, in the form of the word itself, always within the written outline of the mushaf.
Reader and narrator
Each imam of recitation has two well known narrators who transmitted his reading. So one speaks of the reading of so-and-so, and the narration of so-and-so from him. That is exactly what the cover says: the reader is Asim, and the narrator from him is Hafs.
The ten canonical readings and their two narrators each:
- Nafi of Madinah — Qalun and Warsh.
- Ibn Kathir of Makkah — al-Bazzi and Qunbul.
- Abu Amr of Basra — ad-Duri and as-Susi.
- Ibn Amir of Damascus — Hisham and Ibn Dhakwan.
- Asim of Kufa — Hafs and Shu'bah.
- Hamzah of Kufa — Khalaf and Khallad.
- Al-Kisa'i of Kufa — Abu al-Harith and ad-Duri.
- Abu Ja'far of Madinah — Ibn Wardan and Ibn Jammaz.
- Ya'qub al-Hadrami of Basra — Ruways and Rawh.
- Khalaf the tenth — Ishaq and Idris.
The first seven are the famous "seven readings"; with the last three they make the ten.
Who Asim and Hafs were
Asim ibn Abi an-Najud was one of the reciters of Kufa and one of the seven imams. He died in 127 AH by the better known account.
Hafs ibn Sulayman is the more widely transmitted of his two narrators, and the narration most Muslims hold today is named after him. Asim's other narrator, Shu'bah ibn Ayyash, is also recited, but far less widely.
Why this narration became the common one
That one narration spread more than another is a fact of history, not a ruling that it is better: every canonical reading is Quran and may be recited. What happened is that this narration circulated widely, and then in the last century copies were printed in it on a very large scale — among them the Madinah mushaf issued by the King Fahd Complex for the Printing of the Holy Quran. So it became what people see in bookshops, in mosques, and on screens.
Others are still recited where they have always been recited. Warsh from Nafi is well known in Morocco, Mauritania and West Africa; Qalun from Nafi in Libya and parts of Tunisia; ad-Duri from Abu Amr in Sudan and parts of Africa.
What the narrations actually differ in
Most of it is delivery: how long a vowel is held, whether a vowel is flattened toward e, whether a glottal stop is pronounced fully or lightened, whether a letter is sounded or assimilated into the next, whether there is a brief pause. None of that changes the word; it changes how the word is said.
A smaller part is a difference in the form or vowelling of a word, still within the written outline. One of the best known examples is in Al-Fatihah itself. In the narration of Hafs the word has a long vowel, maalik — owner, master:
Sovereign of the Day of Recompense.
In other canonical narrations the vowel is short, malik — king. This is what the three commentaries say at the verse.
Al-Muyassar: He alone, glorified, is the Owner of the Day of Resurrection, the day of recompense for deeds. In a Muslim's reciting this verse in every unit of his prayers is a reminder of the Last Day, and an urging to prepare for it with good deeds and to hold back from sins and wrongs. Al-Safi: "Owner of the Day of Judgement" — in the commentary attributed to the Imam: the One able to bring it about and the Judge in it with truth, recompense and reckoning. It has also been read "King of the Day of Judgement"; al-Ayyashi relates that al-Sadiq recited it so more times than can be counted. Al-Mizan: as for "Owner of the Day of Judgement": you have seen the meaning of maalik, owner, taken from milk, ownership. Malik, king, is taken from mulk, rule: the one who holds the order of a people and its management rather than the things themselves; in other words, he holds command and judgement over them. Supporting arguments have been given for each of the two readings, malik and maalik, but both senses of authority hold true of God. What language and usage know is that malik, king, is the one tied to a time: one says "the king of such-and-such an age", and does not say "the owner of such-and-such an age" except by a far-fetched turn. God has said "King of the Day of Judgement", relating Himself to the day, and He has also said "To whom belongs the dominion this Day? To Allah, the One, the Prevailing" (Ghafir 16).
Where they agree
All three agree that authority on that day is God's alone: al-Muyassar says "He alone, glorified, is the Owner of the Day of Resurrection", al-Safi "the One able to bring it about and the Judge in it with truth", and al-Mizan "both senses of authority hold true of God". Al-Safi and al-Mizan both mention the two readings.
Where they differ
They differ in how they treat the other reading. Al-Muyassar explains maalik alone and does not mention the other; al-Safi mentions malik and relates from al-Ayyashi that al-Sadiq recited it "more times than can be counted"; al-Mizan distinguishes maalik from milk and malik from mulk, affirms both senses of God, and then notes that in language and usage malik is the word tied to a time, citing Ghafir 16.
The seven ahruf are not the seven readings
A hadith recorded in both Sahih collections says that the Quran was sent down in seven ahruf. What "seven ahruf" means has been debated at length, and the standard works of Quranic sciences set out the various views.
What is not disputed is that the seven ahruf of the hadith are not the "seven readings" named after the seven imams in the list above. Those imams come generations after the hadith, and the choice to group exactly seven of them was made by scholars later. The number coincides; the thing does not.
What the verses do not say
- They do not mention the readings, the narrations or the names of the reciters; that is knowledge transmitted by chain outside the text.
- Al-Hijr 9 does not spell out the means of the keeping, among them the transmission of recitation by chain.
Counted on the mushaf
- Maalik, with the long vowel, as a description of God: in two verses — "Sovereign of the Day of Recompense", Al-Fatihah 4, and "Owner of Sovereignty", Aal Imran 26.
- "The Day of Recompense" (yawm ad-din): thirteen times in thirteen verses, three of them in Al-Infitar.
What QuranEye serves
The text here is the King Fahd Complex text in the narration of Hafs from Asim, following the printed mushaf's spelling, page boundaries and juz divisions. The typeface is the Complex's own, so what you see on screen is what you see on the page.
Sources
- Quran text: the Madinah mushaf, the narration of Hafs from Asim, King Fahd Complex for the Printing of the Holy Quran. The English is the Sahih International translation this site serves.
- al-Tafsir al-Muyassar — King Fahd Complex for the Printing of the Holy Quran.
- Tafsir al-Safi — al-Fayd al-Kashani.
- al-Mizan fi Tafsir al-Quran — al-Sayyid Muhammad Husayn al-Tabataba'i.