The Qur'an: Text and Commentary

With the suras of the late middle Meccan period, the Annunciation intervenes in contemporary history, which is shaken by the crisis of the Byzantine defeat against Sassanid Persia in 614. The suras of this period respond critically both to a Christian, messianic doctrine of redemption and to Jewish messianism. Apocalyptic expectations, ubiquitous at the time, are devalued through silence or even trivialised through irony. As a counter-image to the expected messianic ruler, the political ideal of the ›just ruler‹ is developed – while the pragmatic intention of holding up a mirror to the Byzantine emperor Herakleios shines through.
An increasingly stringent monotheism is reflected in the critical, at times even satirical, treatment of a much-discussed miracle (dormouse), which is corrected to the status of a sign. Liturgically, God’s kingship now gains special weight, whereby his rule also includes the demons, who have now transformed from ›inspiring spirits‹ into threatening forces. They can only be warded off by linguistic means, their own apotropaic formulas (sura 114) or recitation of the Qur'an (surah 72).

The suras of the late middle Meccan period thus prove to be deeply rooted in social and political reality and thus call for a new methodological approach, with primary attention to the ›embeddedness in life‹ of the Qur’anic statements.