Abstract:
This study examines the role of textual standards in clarifying sacred texts through a comparative applied analysis of selected examples from the Qur’anic text, the New Testament, the Old Testament, and Hindu religious texts. It approaches sacred texts as integrated linguistic and semantic structures whose meanings are not determined by individual sentences alone, but are constructed through lexical, semantic, contextual, and pragmatic relationships among their various components. The study adopts a descriptive, analytical, and comparative approach. It examines selected Qur’anic examples through Al-Tafsir al-Kabir and Al-Asas fi al-Tafsir, focusing on the relationship between part and whole and the textual coherence between Surah al-Zukhruf and Surah al-Dukhan. It also analyzes examples from the Epistle to the Philippians, highlighting lexical chains related to joy, love, and longing and their contribution to lexical cohesion and semantic coherence. From the Old Testament, examples from the Book of Genesis are examined through pronominal reference, repetition, synonymy, and semantic relations. The study also explores selected passages from the Bhagavad Gita, focusing on intentionality and its role in the dialogical and argumentative discourse between Krishna and Arjuna. The study concludes that textual standards provide an effective framework for revealing the internal relationships within sacred texts and for clarifying their semantic and communicative structures. The analysis demonstrates that lexical cohesion, semantic coherence, reference, repetition, semantic relations, and intentionality contribute in different ways to textual unity. It also shows that these standards do not function independently; rather, they interact with one another to construct meaning and maintain textual continuity. The comparative analysis further demonstrates that, despite differences in the nature and context of the selected sacred texts, various textual mechanisms contribute to their cohesion, coherence, and communicative effectiveness.
Keywords: Textual Standards, Sacred Texts, Textual Cohesion, Coherence, Lexical Cohesion, Intentionality, Qur’anic Text, New Testament, Old Testament, Bhagavad Gita
