the Book revealed to him, whether he writes and reads it or neither writes nor reads it. As the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, said:

“This is a time when knowledge will be taken away.”

Ziyād ibn Labīd asked him, “How can knowledge be taken away when we have recited the Quran? By Allah, we will certainly continue to recite it and teach our wives to recite it.”

He replied, “I had thought you among the most knowledgeable people of Medina! Do not the Jews and Christians possess the Torah and the Gospel? Yet what benefit do they derive from them?”

This is a well-known hadith narrated by al-Tirmidhī and others.

Moreover, Allah, exalted is He, said before this:

“A group of them used to hear Allah’s words, then distort them after understanding them, knowingly.”

Those people understood it and then distorted it. They are blameworthy whether or not they memorized it in their hearts, wrote it down, and recited it both from memory and from a written text. It was therefore fitting to mention those who do not understand it: those who know it only through recitation. For Allah sent down the Quran as a mutually consistent Book with recurring themes. He sets out categories and parallels within it: its comprehensive treatment of the categories gives it its recurrent character, while its presentation of parallels makes it mutually consistent.

Even if these people write and read, they are nonetheless unlettered people among the People of the Book. Likewise, we describe someone of this kind as unlettered, unschooled, and a layman, even if he has memorized the Quran and can read a written text, when he does not understand its meaning.

Since Allah censured those who know the Book only through recitation without understanding its meanings, just as He censured those who knowingly distort words from their proper places after understanding them, this indicates that both kinds are blameworthy: the ignorant person who