Memorizing at least part of the Qur’Án was the essential, if not the sole purpose of the standard education of Muslim children in the medieval Middle East. The recitation of the Qur’Án, as well as attendance at sessions of recitation, were a central component of personal piety and of the communal liturgical calendar. Qur’Án recitation (often supported by waqf endowments) took place at daily sessions in mosques, at various ceremonies and assemblies, on graves and during funerals, in times of crisis and on festive days and special nights (such as niÒf Sha`bÁn). While the proper, ceremonial reading of the Torah had always required the written text; more specifically – a scroll written by professional scribes according to strict prerequisites of purity; reading "from memory" has absolute precedence in Muslim ritual. Early sources (such as Hasan al-Basri and Malik ibn Anas) indicate, however, that recitation by heart, rather than reading from the book, was debated among Muslims in Umayyad times. My paper will examine and illustrate medieval attitudes towards memorization and recitation of the Qur’Án and the Torah, and the meanings and functions attributed, by Jews and by Muslims, to rituals such as the initiation of boys to the study of scripture, the completion of a reading cycle, and “talismanic” reading. The source material for this study includes 12th-14th century legal works and didactic literature, biographical dictionaries, chronicles and travelogues pertaining especially to Syria and Egypt. The methods of analysis are drawn from the fields of social history, ritual studies, and comparative religion.