Page:Christiaan Snouck Hurgronje - The Achehnese Vol II. - tr. Arthur Warren Swete O'Sullivan (1906).djvu/20

 The beginning of all learning for every properly educated Mohammedan is the recitation of the Qurān (Ach. beuët Kuruʾan). In this less stress is laid on understanding the contents of the book than on correctly intoning the Arabic sounds. This elementary instruction only gives practice to the ear, memory and organs of speech; the rules for recitation contained in the pamphlets on the science of tajwīd and impressed vivâ voce on their pupils by the teachers of the Qurān are worked out in very fine detail.

What the pupil attains in his Qurān curriculum, is the capacity to recite correctly the portions of the holy writ required for his daily prayers. He is also able eventually to chant upon occasion extracts from the sacred Book according to the strict rules of the art, by way of a voluntary act of devotion. Besides this, the non-Arab learner gains an intimate acquaintance with a strange and difficult system of sounds, and thus acquires in passing some knowledge of phonetic science.

Those who pass through the Qurān-school are able, so far as they do not speedily forget what they have learned, to read the Arabic character with the vowel sounds; but unless they extend their studies further, this does not enable them to read Malay, or even Achehnese written in Arabic character.

There are thus even among the higher classes very many persons who know little or nothing of reading; and the art of writing is still less widely disseminated. I have often heard Achehnese declare that they found it much more of a burden than a pleasure to be able to write. Personally they may seldom require to exercise their skill in writing; but every one who wants a letter or other document written betakes himself as a matter of course to his expert fellow-villager, and even seems to think he has a claim on the latter’s good-nature for the supply of the requisite stationery.

We have already noticed the part played by this elementary instruction in the education of the Achehnese. The organs of speech of the latter, like those of the Javanese, experience great difficulty in reproducing Arabic sounds. Thus all the purely Achehnese teachers who have not been grounded in the art of recitation under the strict instruction of a foreigner, diverge to a vast extent from the Arabic gamut of sounds. Their nasal pronunciation of the ʿain they have in