Roots of Islam

The root kfr and philology: significance and biblical, post-biblical and koranic meanings

Edouard-M. Gallez, in Le texte arabe non islamique, Studia Arabica vol. XI,
éditions de Paris, 2009, p.67-87 (Symposium of Toulouse, October 22, 2007)
www.editions-de-paris.com/article.php3?id_article=246 or www.studia-arabica.net/spip.php?article310

    What is the meaning of the word « Kâfer » that we encounter so frequently in the Koran, and whose root appears no less than 520 times in various forms, but particularly verb forms? This term has acquired an offensive connotation (it is the insult reserved for Christians and Jews), but not necessarily so, and in fact the wide semantic range of all its forms can sometimes present a real puzzle to researchers!
   In reality, all the discrepancies in meaning of the root kfr can easily be explained, as long as one turns to the essential sources of the Koranic text, namely the ... Bible written in Aramaic, and to other Judeo-Christian writings (also in Aramaic). This perspective explains even the most perplexing occurrence, found only once: the passage of surah The resurrection (76:5) which says that the kâfûr is a delicious, heavenly drink. This word is rendered by camphor – the English term derived from it – yet camphor has an awful taste. Where does the error lie? We will see, at the end of this study, how this term built on the root kfr used to denote a scented thing, related to the original meaning of that root.
    Thus, philology confirms what we already knew: the Koranic text must be read in the light of the Aramean traditions, a fact also established by the German philologist Christof Luxenberg.

* cf. The site of Qumrân: an economic destination

          Before examining the sometimes paradoxical meanings of the root kfr occurring in the Koran, it is important to look at the distribution of its occurrences. It is absent, in any form whatsoever, from 40 Surah-s [1], mostly short ones: the first three are the Fâtihah, surah 12 Yusuf, and Surah 20 T’aha. The statistical breakdown alone doesn't account for this absence; given the overall ratio of 1:12 (one occurrence for every twelve verses) [2], there should be less Surah-s without the root of kfr. It is actually easy to predict where it appears, thanks to its most frequent and polemical meaning: to be a miscreant (Hamidullah) or to be godless (Blachère). Where the topic isn't directly polemical, it has almost not chance to appear, and vice versa. Surah 1 obviously is polemical and nevertheless doesn’t contain the root kfr anywhere, but on closer look it is not a real exception: the controversy is expressed in just one verse, the last one, which deserves its own special treatment [3].

        This brings us to the nub of the problem: an offensive meaning doesn’t occur at the very beginning of a story, but usually in the middle or at the end. What is the story in question? We can begin to answer this question after we compare the  expressed meaning of to be a miscreant, the most frequent meaning, with the second form of the root, in at least fourteen occurrences where its certain meaning is to absolve. In those passage, we read that God absolves faults (sometimes the text says whose faults) – and we must add 3 more occurrences where the root forms the substantive kaffarah, which definitely means expiation, a counterpart of absolving. But how can a verbal form mean that God absolves from faults, when it should in fact say, considering the form itself and 16 others according to the accepted diacritism, that God is a great miscreant? Of course, it is unthinkable to call God a miscreant or someone who would cause others to disbelieve, since the Koranic text attributes this action to demons. This is an important paradox, which increases again after we notice that in three sets of two verses, there is a deliberate play on words between the first and the second form with the aim of opposing the “good” and the “bad”, and it is always the same [to better highlight it, we will use a substituting device]. The three Surah-s in question are these: Muhammad, The Mutual Deceit, and The Interdiction:

47,1a  Those who “kafar” and prevent others to follow God’s path...
47,2d  He “kaffars” their bad actions and reforms their thoughts [4].

64,9    To the one who believes… He will kaffar his wrongdoing.
64,10  Whereas those who kafar… will be acquainted with the Fire [of hell].

66,7    O you kafarers!... You will only receive the salary of what you did.
66,8    O you believers!... Maybe your Lord will kaffar your sins…

          What was the original meaning of the root kfr, since so many divergent meanings seem to be derived from it? From what primeval story do they all originate?

          To find the answer, we must first open the Bible, where we find the narration of an extremely ancient story, also present in the Babylonian tradition (the story of Gilgamesh): the passage of the flood and Noah. Noah is mentioned 39 times in the Koran, including 3 times in Surah 71, its eponym, which alludes to the flood without mentioning the Ark. However, it is in relation to Noah’s Ark that the Hebrew verb kâfar is first used: Noah kafars the Ark with some kôfer, i.e. he covers it with bitumen (Gn 6:4). This is the fundamental meaning, which can be translated by coating: the Ark isn’t hidden or concealed, but coated by something that prevents it from being seen as it was originally.

          That same verb, used in the intensive form [2nd form in Arabic], also means to cover someone, i.e. to cover someone's fault: it is used 93 times in this way in the Hebrew Bible to convey the meaning of absolving from sins or the precondition that leads to it, of performing the expiatory rite. The two corresponding forms of kfr sometimes occur in the same sentence, as in for example: 
    “When the priest shall make atonement on the person’s behalf for the wrong committed, the individual may be forgiven” (Leviticus 4:35).

          In the Dead Sea scrolls, mention is made 74 times – a frequent rate – of the expiatory ritual and the penitential preparation that precedes it, especially in relation to the day of atonement of Yom Kippur (kippurim); two rams are involved in that rite, one which is sacrificed, the other which is released and sent into the desert: 
    “On the 10th day of the month [of Tishri], the atonement will be done (ykwfr)… they   will be forgiven by using two rams” (1Q22, III,11 ; IV,3 – DJD I p.90.110).

Again, in the Scroll of the Temple (19 mentions), we read:
    “He will perform [by the holocaust of the first ram] the atonement for the whole assembled people… then he will go to the live ram and will confess on its head all the faults of son of Israel… and will send it to the desert…” (11Q19 XXVI, 9-13).

          This aspect of sacrificial expiation isn't present in the Koran, or maybe only through the allusion to the offering of a “perfect and unblemished cow” [5] in the eponymous Surah (Q. 2:71). But several researchers [6]] have suggested that the odd absence of any sacrificial dimension and of any mention of Jerusalem was likely to be intentional. The mention of the Al-Aqsa Mosque furnishes another surprise, as it didn't yet exist at the time of the alleged « dictation » of the Koran (it was either built because the first verse of surah The Night Journey[s.17] mentions it, or the reverse happened). Next, there is the question of the first qibla in the direction of Jerusalem, where one can't help wondering if the sacrifices in the Temple account for the establishment of the Great Feast of  ‘Aid al-kabir, when a sheep is slaughtered and whose date coincidentally also falls on the 10th day of the month [7]]. Several writings from the Dead Sea and related writings suggest that substitution practices were taking place among certain groups who were looking forward to the restoration of the Temple. Attemps to explain that Islamic ritual as an echo of the sacrifice of Abraham transposed onto Ishmael are unconvincing. So, the absence of a sacrificial notion in the Koranic text doesn't imply that it is absent from proto-Islamic history. One last point: another essential notion – which we will evoke later – is missing from the Koran, or barely alluded to [8]: the material return of the Messiah-Jesus (al-Masîh ‛Isa), yet popular Islamic traditions have kept alive this expectation.

          At any rate, if the notion of expiation to God is absent from the Koranic text, the parallel notion of compensation to a human person who has been wronged is for its part present, albeit only in three occurrences of the same surah, The Table Spread (5:45, 89,95), expressed with the substantive kaffârah. Of course, this meaning relative to a human third party was already present in the Bible, under the term of kôfer (16 times). 

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          We are now able to address the vast majority of the occurrences of the root kfr and examine their various meaning, which, as we know, are extremely polemical and negative, since the targeted groups are doomed to hell, sometimes destined to be killed first: those are the kâfirûn (mentioned 159 times including 5 in the singular), who commit acts of kufr (33 times) or some similar actions expressed with the same verb phrase (299 times), notably al-ladhina kafaru. In a context of insistence, the root sometimes takes the 2nd form (20 times), as in:
    “Those who kafar and die as kâfir-s (kuffâr, plural of kâfir), God’s curse is upon them” (Q. 2:161; 3:91).

          Among these countless occurrences, there are several whose context unambiguously imposes the meaning of being ungrateful – translators have no misgivings, although the generally accepted translation of being a miscreant or being an infidel is problematic. How are we to understand the exact meaning of the accusation of kafarring? Let us turn to the Aramaic texts of the Gospel.

          Around the 1st century B.C., a second meaning for the root kfr had emerged in Aramaic: to cover a fact (or a word), therefore leaving something unsaid, ignoring, denying or even being ungrateful (in the case of a benefit received). This is what is conveyed by the 26 or so occurrences of that root in the Aramaic gospels. To give the main ones: 
    Lk 6:35: “… For He is good for the kafûrê’ (ungrateful ones) and the wicked”.
    Lk 8:45: “Jesus asked: ‘Who touched me ?’ Since all were kafarring (denying), Peter said:…”. 
    Lk 22:57: “[Peter] kafarred (denied): ‘Woman, he said, I do not know him’ ”.
    Mt 10:33: ‘Whoever will have kafarred me (= not spoken up on my behalf), I too will kfr him (will not speak up for him) before my Father in Heaven.’ 
    Mt 16:24: “If someone wants to become my disciple, let him kafare his soul (= deny himself)”.
    Mt 26:34.75: “This very night, before the cock crows, you will have kafarred (denied) me three times.”

          We find again the common meaning of keeping quiet or denying in at least two verses of the Koran: 
    Q. 21,94 : “[Concerning the believer,] we will not kaffar (ignore) his zeal.” 
    Q. 3,115 : “Whatever good they might do, it will not be kaffarred (denied)”.

          However, the strong and very negative connotation quickly emerge in the subsequent part of the New Testament [9], because, in those texts, leaving unsaid is the same as denying: 
    1 Jn 2:22-23: “Who is the liar, if not the one who kafars that Jesus is the Christ? The Antichrist (!), the one who kafars the Father and the Son. Whoever kafars the Son does not have the Father either.” 
    Jude 1:4: “For some people have slipped in among you unnoticed… who kafar our only Master and Lord Jesus Christ.”

          The reproach of denying takes on its strongest meaning here: that of being a renegade, a small anti-christ – the veritable Anti-Messiah, for his part, being bound to appear toward the fulfilment of times, just before the return of the Messiah-Jesus. However, even in that strong meaning, the material gesture of covering remains predominant. In the Homilies of Jacob of Sarugh dating from just over 500 A.D., we find traces of this meaning, in four occurrences:
    “The people complains to the sun that it isn't shining. Blessed be the One whose rising dispels the darkness of denial (d-kafûrûta)” (Hom. 1:347-348).

    [relating to the opposition between the light and darkness evoked further in verse 79:] “She [Jerusalem] denied (kfr-t) the Bridegroom” (Hom. 5:80).
    [relating to the darkness also evoked further in verse 301:] “You persist in your refusal (b-kafûrûta-k)” (Hom. 3:302).
    [relating to the contradiction with the Revelation:] “O kafur !” (Hom. 3:318).

          In those four occurrences, the translator of the Patrologia Orientalisrenders the root kfr in three different ways: to deny, to reject, or to be godless in the case of the invective kafur. This gives an idea of the difficulty. The idea of denying is too strong, since one can only deny what one has first embraced, which can't be what the rabbinic Jews did with the Christian faith – and this isn't the perspective of Jacob of Sarugh. The context indicates how to understand correctly: the occurrences of the root follow the image of the darkness opposed to the light and attempting to cover it. This is in fact the first meaning of the root, the one that is always implied. It suggests the action of hiding, although not completely, which elicits more criticism. This additional reproach is actually made by Jacob of Sarugh, just like the Koranic text, as we shall see next:
    “Your people's scribe hid the truth from you, and your doctors did not openly proclaim the truth. Whether conscious of it or not, they hid the truth” (Hom. 5:305-307).

    “Let the scribes of this people not present to us obscure commentaries” (Hom. 4, 248).
    “O Jew, ask those questions to your doctors… the yhûdhâyûtâ is filled with lies” (Hom. 5:339,341) [10].

          It isn’t the Jews per se that are being challenged here, but their leaders, designated by the generic term of yhûdhâyûtâ. When addressing the Jews in general, without being more specific, Jacob of Sarugh abandons his polemic severity. A similar distinction seems at play in the Koran between the very negative use of the term Yahûd and the one, more neutral, of Hûd or sons of Israel, but not to distinguish the people from their leaders, instead to denounce a particular community among the  ethnic group of the Hûd or sons of Israel (we might say “Hebrew”): the Yahûd, a term signifying primitively Judeans but later designating specifically the rabbinical community. Under the term of Yahûd, the Koran makes no distinction between the common people and their leaders: all are doomed to hell. We have to keep in mind that at that time, all Hebrews were not rabbinical. The “Nazarenes” were a group apart, who claimed to be the only true Jews and true Christians. So did those early communities which would one day found the great Khazar empire.

          The criticism made to the scribes and doctors of hiding the truth to the simple isn't frequent, or at least as frequent any more, as it dates back to second-century (or earlier) polemics pitting Judeo-Christians against rabbinical Jews mostly in the East. We find echoes of this controversy in the West, for example in the writings of Justin [11]], Irenaeus [12]], and Origen (first half of the 3rd century) [13]]. We also find some in the Koran, for example in the surah The Family of  ‘Imrân: 
    “There is among them [the « people of the Scripture » of verse 75 – we will go back to this expression], a party who alter the Scripture with their tongue so you may think it is from the Scripture, but it is not from the Scripture. And they say, ‘This is from Allah’, but it is not from Allah! And they speak untruth about Allah, while they know (= keep in themselves ‘lm) (Q. 3:78).     
    “You make it [the Scripture given by Moses] into pages, disclosing [some of it and concealing much” (Q. 6:91b).

          The reproach is now especially about hiding the truth by keeping it quiet when one is aware of it. Commenting on that last verse, Regis Blachere indicated that the reproach of dissimulating (hafîy, to hide from someone's sight) must have been addressed to talmudic Judaism:

“The expression: You were taught that ... neither you nor your fathers [Q. 6:91c] seems to allude to talmudic teachings”.

          What does it mean? The Talmuds, the one known as the Jerusalem Talmud, the other as the Babylonian Talmud, are both constituted of a double layer of commentaries of the Bible. The first one, the mišnah, is presented as an oral teaching which was supposedly given by God to Moses and transmitted through the pharisian movement until it was put down in writing in the course of the 2nd century. Thus, in relation to the Bible, the talmudic writings act as a cover, since the Bible remains accessible but is read as if through a layer that covers it. 

          In the end, to adopt the pliability of semitic languages, we should systematically translate the root kfr by covering, instead of rendering it by contradictory approximations. This choice made the mot sense to us when we considered the 520 occurrences found in the Koranic text. The scope of the study focuses on this simple question: who covers what, and how? As far as God is concerned, the Koranic formulae are the same as the ones found in the Bible: God covers (or covers up) sins through his mercy – we already mentionned this type of occurrences. As far as men are concerned, we still need to examine the matter in further details, with the help of Jacob of Sarugh, in addition to the New Testament, which only stresses the aspect of keeping silent about the truth. We find the connotation of hiding, even falsifying, explicitely echoed by the Koranic reproach (tahrîf). Where Justin, Irenaeus and Origen (cited above) meant only one or the other connotation, the reproach issued in the Koran is more general:

“…a party of them [the sons of Israel] used to hear the words of God and then distort the Torah after they had understood it while they were knowing” (Q. 2:75).

“But do they not know that God knows what they conceal and what they say? And among them are some (ummîyûn – it means Hebrew groups [[14]] but not unlettered) who do not know the Scripture except in wishful thinking, but they are only assuming. So woe to those who write the Scripture with their own hand, then say, 'this is from God’! ” (Q. 2:77-79a). 
    “Among the Jews are some who distort words from their [proper] usages ” (Q. 4:46).
    “God shall judge between them on the day of resurrection about what [in the Book] they replaced” (Q. 2:113).
    “Cursed were those who concealed among the sons of Israel by the tongue of David and of Jesus, the son of Mary… in the punishment they will abide eternally” (Q. 5:78.80).
    “God said, ‘O Jesus,… I will rid you from those who cover, and make those who follow you superior to those who cover up, until the day of Resurrection’ ” (Q. 3:55). 
    “O people of the Scripture, why do you cover the signs of God while you yourself are their witness? O people of the Scripture, why do you wrap the truth with falsehood and conceal the truth, while you yourself know?” (Q. 3:70-71).

          Here, we must pause to make a parenthetical remark about the expression ahl al-Kitâb, tent of the Scripture, often rendered by People of the Book. According to Islamic dogmatics, this Koranic expression allegedly designates both the Christians and the Jews, and kâfer is more of an insult toward the Christians than the Jews. But in the Koran itself, this isn’t the case.

          Moreover, verses of polemic dialectic oppose the kâfirûn and the mušrikûn (those who associate), and this root šrk – also charged with a long history – was a pejorative way of designating the Christians alone [15]. Systematic and symetric oppositions between those who cover and those who associate generally stretch over several verses, but in surah The Table Spread, one opposition is actually contained in just one verse, telling the Arabs to stay away from the Jews and the Christians and to follow the true believers, i.e. those who, from the 1st century onward, have called themselves the Nazarenes:
    “You will surely find that those who are the most hostile to those who believe [i.e the true believers] are the yahûd and those who associate (al-ladîna ašrakû); 
    and you will find that the closest friends to the believers [who took refuge in Medina] are those who say, ' We are Nazarene [as Hamidullah translates it]” (Q. 5:82). 

          It is therefore unthinkable that the expression ahl al-kitâb would imply both Jews and Christians [16]], but, by designating the Hebrews as a whole, it does include different, even antagonistic groups. This is reinforced by verse s.3:113, which Regis Blachere thinks that it refers to a Judeo-Christian sect, hard to define exactly:
    “They are not all the same; among the people of the Scripture is an upright (ummatun qâ’imatun) community, reciting the verses of God during the night and prostrating [in prayer]” (Q. 3:113).

          The text continues: “The latter are among righteous. And whatever good they do, it will never be covered up” (Q. 3:114b-115): here again is the verb kafara, with a polemic hint toward the others who, for their part, do cover up and therefore will go to hell (v.116). The “people of the Scripture” then are those to whom God “gave the Scripture”, the Hebrews as a whole, as we read in surah 29:46-47, with this precision:
    “Among those are some who believe. Only the coverers reject our verses” (Q. 29:47).

          This is very clearly put. Christians, for their part, are not considered legitimate holders of the Scripture, but instead as robbers of an inheritance, who do not know, to the point of associating a child to God:
    “Glory to the Lord of heaven and earth, Lord of the Throne, [who is] above what they describe.
Let them therefore converse vainly and amuse themselves, until they meet the Day that awaits them” (Q. 43:82-83).

          It isn’t the Christians that verses 10:95 and 17:103 recommend that they be consulted: “Ask those who have recited (qara’a) the Scripture before you” ! However, one shouldn’t go to just anybody:
    “O sons of Israel [v.40]… do not be the first to be its coverers… 
Do not dress up the truth with falsehood. Do not keep the truth secret while you know!” (Q. 2:41-42).

          In a certain way, the Koranic text echoes the polemic that took place especially during the 2nd century among the Jewish communities who didn’t recognize Jesus as the Messiah – the Yahûd – and those who did, particularly the Nazarenes. This polemic is sometimes subtle, as evidenced for instance by verses 256b-257 of surah The Cow, involving the tâghût or rebellious angels:
    “The right course has become clear from the wrong. Whoever covered the tâghût (the verb kafara is very ironic here, see Q. 4:51.60) and believes in God, has grasped the most trustworthy handhold with no break in it. God is the one who hears and knows. God is the ally of those who believe: 
He brings them out from darkness into light. But those who cover, their allies are the tâghût: they take them out of the light into darkness” (Q. 2:256b-257).

          This indicates that the coverers were at first in the light, until they covered what they were supposed to believe in the Scripture concerning the Messiah Jesus.

          Many other verses containing the root kfr would deserve to also be mentioned, but we have to limit ourselves to the essential. The above diagram presents the historical derivations of that root down to its 520 Koranic occurrences. Regardless of their nuances or uses, even when they are meant to be ironic, all the terms find their meaning and coherence in the framework of this history rooted in the biblical and Syro-Aramaean world.

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In conclusion, we wish to go back, as promised, to the anecdoctal occurrence of kâfûr mentioned at the beginning: what connection does it have to the delicious heavenly drink? To answer this question, one must remember that Noah coated his ark with bitumen, and that, in Ancient Times, the best-known source of bitumen was just east of the Dead Sea. But the region west of the Dead Sea was almost the only one where balsam trees grew, whose sap gave off an exquisite perfume. Bitumen was actually used to stabilise that perfume, before it was poured into expensive glass flasks. Archeologist are very familiar with that region where this coveted activity mainly took place: Qumrân. This is how the word bitumen eventually came to designate the wonderful perfume itself, used, among other things, in the service of the Temple and embalming. This substance is lost today. It is first evoked in the Song of Songs, and Late Aramaic conserves its trace: when the basalm tree seemingly disappeared in the aftermath of the two Jewish wars, the word kûfrâ or kûpru’ remained, but to designate hennah (a red dye preparation derived from a plant, used for hair or skin). At the same time, the Jews did not lose the memory of what used to be the most sublime perfume to ever have existed on earth, a celestial perfume so to speak. The Koranic text corroborates this.

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Special non-islamological bibliography:

Discoveries of the Judean Desert (JDJ)
Costaz Louis, Dictionnaire syriaque-français / Syriac-English, Beirut, 2004 edition
Sader Jean, Le lieu de culte et la Messe syro-occidentale selon le “de oblatione” de Jean de Dara, in Oriens Christiana Analecta 223, Rome, 1983
Köbert R., Vocabularium syriacum, Roma, Pont. Inst. Biblicum, 1956
Concordance syriaque du Nouveau Testament

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