Review of the English Translation
One of the better translated work under the exegesis genre of Quran, A Thematic Commentary om the Quran stands out as an easy to read companion to Ibn Kathir's translated works. Whereas Ibn Kathir's work focused more on historical artifacts and related narrations to make sense of various passages, Ghazali takes a more modern take, with his commentary making sense of the Quran's teaching in light of the 20th century and onwards.
Ghazali's take and commentary felt quite profound and grounded, and urges introspection on the stories of the Quran and how it may apply principally in our lives today. It often drew a contrast with what the modern Islamic "scholars" considers important: practice of Hadithic lesssons versus internalizing the message of the Quran. This is a necessary read for practicing Muslim societies of today, especially now more than ever, with most being part of the former group lacking virtually no reflection or thinking of their own, lest we forget the spirit of Islam.
The structure is a weak point. Repetitive ideas not handled well between chapters, even within the same chapter most times. It doesn't carry the same gravity as the Quran reiterating the same ideas in slightly different ways under slightly different contexts. The Quran has intrinsic reasons of conveying the message in that way, whereas a study of the themes of the Quran wouldn't get the same pass.
The book would have benefitted with being much longer (or more volumes, as this was originally written as three volumes) read across a longer time. Regardless, it would be more appropriate to read and reference over a long period of time. Perhaps the onus was on myself in this regard, to complete reading within the bounds of the month of Ramadan instead of taking the time to reflect on the words.
I would highly recommend this book to people who often struggle with the Quranic message. There is an epidemic that has divided the religion today largely due to heedlessness. People either index too hard on what institutions tell them without doing any reasoning of their own, or "reasonable" people are driven away because they fail to reason reading just translations of the Quran. This book would help both camps as it has helped me.