Al-Baqarah 178

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This axis gathers 4 instances of the use of this verse in Muhammad Shahrur’s books, linking it to the concepts and arguments that appear around it.

The verse text as cited

O you who believe, retaliation has been prescribed for you in cases of those killed

Brief reading

For Shahrur, the verse comes to establish the chapter of retaliation as a ruling that regulates the protection of society while keeping pardon and mitigation within the structure of punishment.

Axes

  • Legislative
  • Political and social
  • Human and ethical
  • retaliation: 3
  • retaliation in cases of those killed: 2
  • pardon: 2

Its place in the network of concepts

It is connected to the network of limits and penalties and to the idea that the ruling is inseparable from the possibility of pardon.

The verse’s role in the argument

  • Support: 3
  • Distinction: 1

Instances of use

  • Islam and Faith, p. 44: He cites it as an example of the category “has been prescribed for you” within the limits and penalties that regulate the preservation of society.
    • Concept: retaliation
    • Function of the verse here: Support
    • Textual evidence: «{O you who believe, retaliation has been prescribed for you in cases of those killed…} (al-Baqarah 178).»
  • The Messengerly Sunna and the Prophetic Sunna, p. 52: He compares the bequest to retaliation to show that it is a binding legal ruling that cannot be nullified by abrogation in his view.
    • Concept: retaliation
    • Function of the verse here: Support
    • Textual evidence: «The bequest is an obligatory legal duty … just like the prescribed ordinances such as retaliation (al-Baqarah 178)»
  • The Book and the Qur’an, p. 399: He separates it from individual crimes of murder and makes it specific to a tribal collective conflict, not to the killing of an ordinary individual.
    • Concept: retaliation in cases of those killed
    • Function of the verse here: Distinction
    • Textual evidence: «The verse of retaliation: {O you who believe, retaliation has been prescribed for you in cases of those killed …} (al-Baqarah 178), a concrete verse with its own objective circumstances»
    • Corresponding traditional reading: the exegetes and jurists
  • The Book and the Qur’an, p. 413: He uses it to affirm that the door of pardon and mitigation is part of the penal system, not that retaliation turns into open-ended revenge.
    • Concept: pardon
    • Function of the verse here: Support
    • Textual evidence: «{O you who believe, retaliation has been prescribed for you in cases of those killed…} (al-Baqarah 178). Here he clarified the maximum punishment for unlawful killing, which is execution»
    • Corresponding traditional reading: retaliation as vengeance

This page is presented within the general method of building the atlas.

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