The formative schools of exegesis

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’ān 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:

The school of Ḥijāz which subsumes the two schools of Makkah and Madīnah, and

The school of Iraq which subsumes the two schools of Kūfah and Baṣrah.