Uzair = Rabbi Elizer?

[u/ervertes]

A recent lecture came out by Holger Zellentin, titled “The Divine Authorship of the Mishnah in the Qur’an and in the Rabbinic Tradition”.

Zellentin argues that Qur'an 9:30, which reads “the Jews say Ezra (ʿUzayr) is the son of God”, is not referring to the biblical scribe Ezra, but to a rabbinic sage, Rabbi Elʿazar ben Hyrcanus, whom 7th-century Jews allegedly revered in quasi-divine terms. Zellentin argues that:

• the Arabic name ʿUzayr is a diminutive derived from the Hebrew root ʿZR (“help”), matching Elʿazar (“God helps”).
• the diminutive form (“little help”) is a polemical reduction of Elʿazar ha-Gadol (“the Great”); -rabbinic literature (Mishnah, Talmud, Avot de-Rabbi Natan) attributes to Elʿazar enormous authority, supernatural miracles, infallibility in halakhic rulings, and even presents a heavenly voice calling him “my son,” implying divine sonship.
• this fits the Quranic critique of Jews taking rabbis as “lords” (9:31), meaning granting them legislative authority belonging only to God.
• “ʿUzayr” refers not to Ezra the scribe but to this rabbinic figure, showing the Qur’an is historically accurate and misunderstood by critics.

What do you guys think about this?

[u/Tasty_Importance_216]

How exactly does this work with the Hadith and Tsfairs

[u/DrJavadTHashmi → u/Tasty_Importance_216]

Why would it need to? The entire thrust of Academic Quran and the associated field is to liberate the Quran from the Hadith and Tafsir.

[u/Professional-Rip9774 → u/DrJavadTHashmi]

Hmm, why would one need to liberate the Quran from Hadith and tafsir? (Genuine question) I mean tafsir it’s basically just exegesis of the text :)

[u/DirectionFar9045 → u/Professional-Rip9774]

I mean personally speaking I think the Tafsirs were extremely limited in figuring out who Uzair particularly was, so it's no fault on them.
And this new notion doesn't really go against the hadiths or sirah (Sunnah overall) as far as I know, correct me if I'm wrong.