Scoring

Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) said “You should not be envious of anyone except (of) the one upon whom Allah bestows the (knowledge) of the Qur’an and he studies and practices it throughout the day and the night; and the other one (you should be envious of, is the one) whom Allah gives wealth and he spends it in the cause of Allah, throughout the night and the day.”  Narrated by Bukhari and Muslim

Many people work hard to earn money wishing that once they earn it, in the near or the distant future, they would spend it in the cause of Allah. Their work and intention are indeed highly commendable, and, as the above Hadith mentions, they are to be envied. But, much fewer people take the time to study the Qur’an, although it costs no or little money and its rewards are great and instant.

IslamiCity recognizes all of you, children and youth who entered this competition, for taking the time to learn the Qur’an. You are indeed a minority who sets a role model to our community and who deserves to be envied by other Muslims.

IslamiCity also congratulates the parents and the teachers of the children and youth for their commitment to teach them the Qur’an. It is our responsibility when raising our children, to make sure that we engrave the Qur’an in their hearts, making sure they understand its meanings, apply its teachings, and be inspired by its wording. We should let them reach the point of being gleeful when listening to Allah’s words.

IslamiCity tried to enthuse our precious children and youth to study Allah’s book by starting this contest. We observed in the scoring of the entries three main guidelines:

1.   Reading (Qiraat) Category: Perfecting (mastering) the reading process without committing mistakes in reciting the words and/or verses.

2.   Adaa (Performance) Category: Perfecting (mastering) the performance process. This category is a combination of both acquired skills that a person gains through proper training in addition to other qualities that are a gift from Allah (swt) (such as someone’s voice) that He alone gives to whomever He chooses.

3.   Tajweed (Recitation) category: Perfecting (mastering) the art of reciting the Qur’an by respecting the correct outputs of the alphabets, phonetics, timing, and applying all the rules of Tajweed.

By doing this, the judges distinguished between just beautiful recitation and a 100% correct recitation, since a reciter can have a perfect voice with nice harmony but without applying the proper tajweed rules, while in other cases, a person may recite 100% correctly without putting his/her heart into the reading process.

The judges also divided the contestants according to their ages into three separate groups, and they evaluated the readings separately. The scores were then added up to get the final results. The differences in the grading between the judges don’t affect the final results because of the consistency in grading among each judge.

The winner is the contestant that accumulated the highest score. All of our participants did their best and we appreciate their effort in taking the time to participate in the contest. IslamiCity will send to each participant a complementary gift and a certificate in addition to the prizes for certain categories and contestants. May Allah reward them, every time a visitor views their recitation online, for each letter they read and for each time they inspire others to learn and live by the Qur’an. Ameen.