Tajweed Means :
The linguistic meaning of Tajweed is (to beautify something).
The technical meaning of Tajweed is (to give every letter its right with its description and its origination)
1. DEFINITION:
• LINGUISTIC DEFINITION: „Proficiency‟ or Betterment .(التحسٌن)
• APPLIED DEFINITION: Articulating every letter from its articulation point and giving the letter its rights and dues of characteristics. Rights of the letters ) (حق الحرفare its required characteristics that never leave it.
The dues of the letters ) (مستحق الحرفare its presented characteristics that are present in it some of the times, and not present at other times the madd, idgham.
2. ITS FORMATION
The words of the Glorious Qur’an and some said Honorable Hadiths also.
3. ITS FRUITS
It preserves the tongue from mistakes in pronunciation of the Glorious Qur’an during reciting .
4. ITS PRECEDENCE
It is one of the most honored of sciences and one of the best of them due to its relation to Allah‟s words.
5. ITS PLACE WITHIN SCIENCE
It is one of the Islamic Law sciences that are related to the Glorious Qur’an.
6. ITS FOUNDER
The rule setter from the practical point of view is the Messenger of Allah (SAWS/Allah‟s peace be upon him) because the Qur’an was revealed to him from Allah, the most High, with tajweed, and he, was instructed on it from the Trust worthy, Jibreel (A.S/May Allah‟s peace be upon him) and taught it to his companions, who then taught it to their followers and so on until it came to us by these chains.
The rule setters from the scientific point of view are the scholars of Qur’anic sciences, such as Abu ‘Ubaid Al-Qasim bin Sallaam
7. ITS PRECEPT
Knowledge of tajweed is Fardh Kifayaah ,فرض كفاٌةa group of people who are enough for the Muslim community must
know it, and its application is Fardh „Ain ,فرض عٌنrequired by all Muslims (men and women) who have the complete
Qur‟an or part of it memorized, even if only one surah.
8. REASON FOR ITS RULE
Guarding the Glorious Qur’an and preserving it from distortion. The Arabs mixed with non-Arabs after the
spread of Islam, and the Muslims feared that the Arab tongue would become corrupted with this intermixing .It
then became mandatory for rules to be put down that would preserve the recitation of the Qur’an from mistakes,
and guarantee the reader of the Qur’an integrity of pronunciation.
9. ITS PRINCIPLE
The knowledge of tajweed is contingent on four matters:
I. Knowledge of the articulation points of the letters.
II. Knowledge of the characteristics of the letters.
III. Knowledge of what rules change due to the order/sequence of letters.
IV. Exercising the tongue and a lot of repetition. What is Tajweed?(cont..)
– level’s of reading the Quran.
There are three levels of speed in reciting the Qur’an.
1-التحقيق reading the Qur’an slowly and with serenity while pondering the meaning and observing the tajweed rules, giving each letter its rights as to characteristics and articulation points, lengthening the letters of madd, which must be lengthened, and not lengthening that which is not supposed to be lengthened. It is to recite the heavy letters heavy and the light letters light ( تفخيم and ترقيق ) as required by the tajweed rules. This is the best level of reading.
2- الحدر it is a swift method of reading the Qur’an with observation of the rules of tajweed. The reader then must be careful not to cut off the lengthened letters, not to do away with the ghunnah, and not to shorten the vowels to the point that the reading is not correct.
3- التدوير It is reading at a medium level of speed between the two above levels, while preserving and observing the rules of tajweed.
The reading of Sheikh Basfar in his mu’allim (teaching) tapes would be an example of the tahqeeq, or slowest way of recitation. The recitation from his prayer tends to be faster than التحقيق the medium way, more like الحدر .
