Ihya Ulum al-Din, Book 8: The Mysteries of Qur'an Recitation

The Mysteries of Qurʾān Recitation is Book 8 of al-Ghazālī’s Revival of the Religious Sciences.

You can finish the Qurʾān in a month and be unchanged at the end of it. This book explains why. Al-Ghazālī honours the Book and those who carry it, sets the outward manners of reciting — how much, how often, how fast, in what state — then turns to the recitation that happens inside: the greatness of the speech, the presence of the Speaker, the verse landing on the heart it was addressed to. The tongue is the least of the instruments.

He treats the ten inward works of recitation, the limit of personal opinion, and the veils that stand between a reader and the Book. Book 7 sent the body to the House. Book 8 brings the speech of God into the mouth and asks whether it reached anything further in.

This English is taken from the classical Arabic of the Iḥyāʾ, not rebuilt from an older translation. It can be read straight through, or studied beside the original.

Recite as you always have. Then read what you were meant to hear.