3 ms·

This may be referring to people who can "read" the Koran, where "read" means say the text out loud. Understanding what they're saying is a different question,

This may be referring to people who can "read" the Koran, where "read" means say the text out loud. Understanding what they're saying is a different question, and most of those people probably do not understand the Koran's language (which is a more than thousand year old version of Arabic). Alternatively, it may be referring to people who read a language written in Arabic script, but not necessarily the Arabic language. Languages that use some variety of Arabic script include Persian (Farsi and Dari), Urdu, Pashto, Western Punjabi, Uyghur and some other languages. Some of those languages use vowel diacritics, particularly Uyghur.

cool_dude85 4y ago
>most of those people probably do not understand the Koran's language (which is a more than thousand year old version of Arabic). My understanding, as a non-Muslim who doesn't speak Arabic, is that the standard Arabic is pretty conservative such that MSA, as would be commonly heard on TV or read in the news or other more formal settings, is not very far off the Arabic used in the Quran. So I think most native Arabic speakers would understand the Quran well, but may not be able to fluently speak or write it. And that many Arabic learners learn MSA along with a dialect, so many second language speakers would probably be able to productively read the Quran as well.
- nraf 4y ago
  Most native Arabic speakers will be able to understand large chunks of the Qur'an. There are some words / phrases in the Qur'an that wouldn't be used in modern Arabic that might prove challenging for those who don't engage with the Qur'an on a regular basis, but the Arabic of the Qur'an is very close to that of MSA. To most Arab speakers, both Classical Arabic and MSA are simply referred to as Fusha. There are also many non-speakers of Arabic who understand many verses and can pick up on the gist of many verses in the Qur'an.
  - jamiek88 4y ago
    MSA is Modern Standard Arabic to save others a google!

cool_dude85 4y ago

>most of those people probably do not understand the Koran's language (which is a more than thousand year old version of Arabic). My understanding, as a non-Muslim who doesn't speak Arabic, is that the standard Arabic is pretty conservative such that MSA, as would be commonly heard on TV or read in the news or other more formal settings, is not very far off the Arabic used in the Quran. So I think most native Arabic speakers would understand the Quran well, but may not be able to fluently speak or write it. And that many Arabic learners learn MSA along with a dialect, so many second language speakers would probably be able to productively read the Quran as well.

nraf 4y ago
Most native Arabic speakers will be able to understand large chunks of the Qur'an. There are some words / phrases in the Qur'an that wouldn't be used in modern Arabic that might prove challenging for those who don't engage with the Qur'an on a regular basis, but the Arabic of the Qur'an is very close to that of MSA. To most Arab speakers, both Classical Arabic and MSA are simply referred to as Fusha. There are also many non-speakers of Arabic who understand many verses and can pick up on the gist of many verses in the Qur'an.
- jamiek88 4y ago
  MSA is Modern Standard Arabic to save others a google!