Qur'anic Commentary: An Integrative Paradigm (QuCIP)

QuCIP was a research project running from October 2018 to March 2026 and supported by a Consolidator Grant of the European Research Council.

The aim of QuCIP was to deliver crucial groundwork for the first historical-critical commentary on a sizable portion of the Qur'an in English, covering Surahs 1 and 2. The project aimed at exemplifying an integrative exegetical approach capable of addressing three core dimensions of the Qur'an: its close yet theologically selective engagement with antecedent (Jewish, Christian, and ancient Arabian) concepts and traditions; the complex compositional structure especially of extended Qur'anic compositions like Surahs 2 and 3; and the intricate processes of literary growth and redactional expansion by which the latter have been shaped. Pre-modern Islamic scholarship on the Qur'an were critically scrutinised as a valuable repository of close scriptural reading. A first milestone of the project was an exegetical dictionary of key Qur'anic terms. This dictionary and the project team's other publications on the Qur'an's compositional grammar, on Qur'anic law in its late antique context, and on aspects of the Qur'an's early reception history then provided the basis of the PI's commentary, to be published in January 2027.