ABSTRACT
Each of the four schools of Qur’anic exegesis can be distinguished by prototypical features specific to its approach and exegetical techniques employed in the textual analysis of the Qur’an. Although these schools were contemporary to each other and were founded by companion or early successor exegetes, there were
In the present chapter, we shall investigate the four major formative schools of exegesis that have evolved during the lifetime of the companions and early successors whose views have significantly shaped up the later generations of both classical and modern Qur’an scholars. In other words, the formative schools encompass the second and third stages of the formative phase (for more details, see Sections 5.2.1.2 and 5.2.1.3). These major schools are as follows:
(i) The school of Hijaz which subsumes the two schools of Makkah and Madinah, and
(ii) The school of Iraq which subsumes the two schools of Kufah and Basrah.
