Muhkam & Mutashabih: History, Works, and Views

The authors of the present paper first try to make a comparison between what have been mentioned about implications of muhkam and mutashabah in hadith reports and what modern and earlier scholars have stated in this regard. Then, in the light of the general tenor of the chapter 3, verse 7 of the holy Quran make a judgment that how far way they got in the passing of tow periods of athar and ray from the earlier Quranic term. The authors hold that two great contemporary scholars of the Quran, Allama Mohammad Hossein Tabatabaee and Ayatullah Mohammad Hadi Marifat, making an analysis of the exegetes and usuli's approach to this Quranic term, have achieved a pretty new definition of muhkam and mutashabih which is muh closer to the Quranic term. What have been reported in hadiths, in spite of a little disparity among them, are much closer to the Quranic term than what has become widespread among the usulis and subsequently among exegetes and scholars of the Quranic sciences.