A study and an explanation of Jurjāni's theory of order in Fakhr al-Rāzi's Tafsir Mafātih al-Qayb, Surat Al-An’ām

During the 2th to 5th centuries, the rhetorical and literary discussions of the Qur'an, under the influence of discursive and religious approaches, have attracted the interest of a number of scholars and rhetoricians, and considerable works were written in that era. The apogee of these works resulted in the emergence of theory Nazm (order) outlined by Jurjāni, Iranian linguist, who has explained it in books called Asrār al-Balāga and Dalā’il al-I’jāz. During the 6th century which is regarded as one of golden periods of interpretation among Iranians, this theory indicated has gained a wide reputation and some exegetes, inspired by this theory, engaged in the linguistic and rhetorical interpretation of the Qur'an. One of the most important exegetes of this century is Imam Fakhr al-Rāzi who has written Mafātih al-Qayb; one of whose fundamental features is its linguistic and rhetorical discussions. In this paper, the authors have tried to investigate and explain his influence from Jurjāni's theory of order. Accordingly, after introducing this theory from Jurjāni and Fakhr al-Rāzi's point of view, the authors have examined six important issues of theory of order (namely priority and posteriority, omission and mention, disconnection and connection, Hasr and Ghasr (horismus), emphasis and definition and Tankir) in the interpretation of Surat Al-An’ām mentioned in Mafātih al-Qayb and they have come to this conclusion that Fakhr al-Rāzi, in addition to being influenced by the theory of order and inspired by Jurjāni, himself has also made innovations in expressing rhetorical implications.