Islamic Ruling on Applying Punctuation to the Qur’an
As-salamu `alaykum. Your Eminence, Sheikh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi, please accept my warmest salams and greetings and I ask Almighty Allah to keep you safe, benefit Muslims with your vast knowledge and perpetuate benefit and goodness at your hands.At present, I am engaged in a scientific project related to the Ever-Glorious Qur’an. I want to consult you regarding an issue in order to determine whether or not to proceed.As Your Eminence is aware, the placing of dots and vowels in the mushaf(copy of the Qur’an) was a convention that occurred after the Qur’an was compiled. In addition, you know that people vary regarding the style of placing marks on the words of the Qur’an; the Turkish mushaf has its own marks, the Pakistani mushafhasits own marks, and the Moroccans, who recite the Q ur’an according to the Warsh recitation, have their own marks. Moreover, the marks that are used in our region are quite different from theirs.When I began working on my explanatory project, I thought it would be appropriate to use some modern punctuation marks [when citing some Qur’anic verses], such as commas, semicolons, parentheses, dashes and colons in cases where they would facilitate the explanation of the meaning of the Qur’anic verse and highlight subtle connotations. It is worth mentioning that you have adopted this method in some of your books. Would it be considered appropriate for me to do the same?I ask Almighty Allah to bless you, keep you safe and benefit us all by loving those who are pious.JazakumAllahu Khayran.