The Formation of New Semantic Nuances in Social Communication Ethics through Mutawatir Qiraat in Tafsir al-Azhar

Abstract

Contemporary social communication is increasingly vulnerable to misinformation, hasty judgement, negative labelling and derisive speech, making the ethics of receiving, evaluating and responding to information a pressing concern. Yet qiraat studies have focused largely on linguistic, legal and exegetical dimensions, while studies of Qur’anic communication ethics have not drawn on variant readings. This study examines how mutawatir qiraat form new semantic nuances of social communication ethics in Hamka’s Tafsir al-Azhar. The novelty lies not in the meaning of each reading, already recorded in tawjīh works, but in the synthesis of two complementary readings matched with Hamka’s exposition and organised into a layered ethical framework. Through directed content analysis, 26 communication-related verses were screened in four stages, yielding al-Ḥujurāt 49:6, Hūd 11:27, Yūnus 10:2 and al-Muʾminūn 23:67. Readings were verified against Ibn al-Jazarī’s al-Nashr, meanings drawn from four tawjīh works, and correspondence with Hamka graded as explicit, implicit or partial. The paired readings fa-tabayyanū/fa-tathabbatū, bādiʾa/bādiya al-raʾyi, la-sāḥirun/la-siḥrun mubīnun and tahjurūn/tuhjirūn form three interrelated dimensions: epistemic (verifying information and restraining action), evaluative (fair judgement and rejecting labels aimed at the messenger or the message) and responsive (openness to the message and civil speech). Hamka names both readings only in Yūnus 10:2; elsewhere the correspondence is implicit and limited to meaning. The study offers a qiraat-based layered framework of communication ethics and a replicable procedure for linking qiraat with Malay exegesis, and recommends broader corpora, comparison with other Nusantara tafsir and empirical testing in education and digital communication.