Sufi engagement with the Qur’an and Hadith rests on a constant movement between the outer form and the inner reality. The outward, literal, and legal meanings (zahir) are affirmed, yet they are treated as a gateway to deeper, esoteric meanings (batin) that speak to the heart and to the soul’s journey toward God. Verses and reports are read not only as statements of doctrine or law, but as signs pointing to hidden spiritual truths, especially those concerning divine love, remembrance, and nearness. In this way, scripture becomes less a static code and more a living guide to inner transformation.

This inner orientation leads Sufis to favor symbolic and allegorical interpretation (ta’wil). Stories of prophets, descriptions of paradise and hell, and even references to struggle and battle are often understood as metaphors for states of the soul, stages of the path, and the drama between the ego and the longing for God. Hadith, too, are approached as maps for purifying intention, cultivating humility, and deepening love, rather than merely as external rules of conduct. Legal and ritual prescriptions are respected, yet they are viewed primarily as means that prepare the seeker for more profound awareness of the Divine.

Another distinctive feature is the role of personal spiritual experience and realized guides in shaping interpretation. Sufis hold that saints and enlightened masters, through direct experience of God and inner unveiling, can perceive depths of meaning in the Qur’an and Hadith that remain hidden to purely formal scholarship. Their insights are transmitted through spiritual lineages that parallel the chains of transmission known in hadith studies, and their readings often emphasize verses of divine closeness and unity, interpreted in an intensely experiential sense. This reliance on inner realization and intuitive understanding can stand in contrast to approaches that depend chiefly on legal reasoning and scholarly consensus.

Finally, Sufi interpretation is suffused with a language of love, union, and beauty. Themes of God’s mercy, intimacy, and remembrance are brought to the foreground, while anthropomorphic expressions about the Divine are read as symbols of attributes and actions in the heart rather than physical descriptions. In many cultural settings, especially in Persian, Turkic, and Indian milieus, this has given rise to a rich poetic re-expression of Qur’anic and prophetic teachings, using images such as the Beloved, wine, and the tavern as veiled references to spiritual truths. Through all of this, the same sacred texts are approached as a mirror in which the seeker discovers both the depths of the soul and the nearness of the One who speaks through revelation.