Al-Baqarah 282

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This verse recurs in Shahrur’s project because, for him, it represents the clearest model of regulation in transactions and of safeguarding rights through writing and witness. It is central for him because it shows how documentation is built on precision and justice, not on impression or laxity.

The verse as cited

O you who believe, when you contract a debt for a specified term, write it down … and call to witness two witnesses from among your men …

Brief reading

Shahrur uses the verse to highlight that debt safeguards financial rights through writing and attestation, and that witness here means presence and direct observation of the contract. He also works through the details of the wording so as to give the terms a precise function in documentation and in preventing undercutting.

Axes

  • Legislative
  • Methodological
  • Linguistic and semantic
  • Witness: 3
  • Financial right: 2
  • Writing down: 2
  • Documentation: 2
  • Giving witness: 2
  • Transaction witness: 1
  • Right: 1
  • Decisive verses: 1
  • Invitation and witness: 1

Its place in the network of concepts

The verse is connected to witness, documentation, writing down, and financial right. It is central because it provides his project with a practical model for reading legal rulings in light of preserving rights, and it links language and justice in transactions.

The verse’s role in the argument

  • Support: 4
  • Foundation: 3
  • Example: 2
  • Distinction: 1

Summary of its presence in the atlas

  • A model for writing and witness in transactions.
  • Connected to the preservation of financial rights.
  • Provides his reading with an example of precise documentation.

Places of use

  • Islam and Human: He takes it as an example that the witness is the person present who hears and sees the contract, and he also derives from it the equality of women’s testimony with men’s in some historical contexts.
    • Concept: Transaction witness
    • Function of the verse here: Support
    • Textual evidence: “We find this clearly in His saying تعالى: { O you who believe, when you contract … and call to witness two witnesses from among your men … } (al-Baqarah 282).”
  • Islam and Faith, p. 77: He uses it to affirm the prohibition of causing loss and undercutting in transactions as part of the system of justice.
    • Concept: Right
    • Function of the verse here: Support
    • Textual evidence: ”{… and let him not diminish anything from it …} (al-Baqarah 282).”
  • Islam and Faith, p. 77: He uses it to affirm the obligation not to diminish rights in documented transactions.
    • Concept: Financial right
    • Function of the verse here: Support
    • Textual evidence: ”- {… and let the one who bears the right dictate, and let him fear God, his Lord, and not diminish anything from it …} (al-Baqarah 282).”
  • The Book and the Qur’an, p. 43: He presents it as a practical example of the verses of the Message that he includes within the Mother of the Book.
    • Concept: Decisive verses
    • Function of the verse here: Example
    • Textual evidence: “An example of the decisive verses is His saying تعالى in Surat al-Baqarah 282, beginning with { O you who believe } and ending with { and God is knowing of all things }.”
  • Drying Up the Sources of Terrorism, p. 19: He cites it as an example of the meaning of “write” as writing down and recording, not as an obligatory legislative act in the juristic sense.
    • Concept: Writing down
    • Function of the verse here: Example
    • Textual evidence: ”- { O you who believe, when you contract a debt for a specified term, write it down … } (al-Baqarah 282)”
  • Drying Up the Sources of Terrorism, p. 57: He makes it a basis for presence-based witness in contracts and in buying and selling, not for the concept of the slain one in battle.
    • Concept: Documentation
    • Function of the verse here: Foundation
    • Textual evidence: “{And call to witness two witnesses from among your men …} (al-Baqarah 282).”
  • Drying Up the Sources of Terrorism, p. 59: He uses it to argue that the function of witnesses is to give living testimony when called, not to die in battle.
    • Concept: Giving witness
    • Function of the verse here: Support
    • Textual evidence: “Thus the duty of the witnesses is, as God تعالى says: {and let not the witnesses refuse when they are called} (al-Baqarah 282).”
  • Drying Up the Sources of Terrorism, p. 295: He uses it to distinguish the present witness from the knowledgeable witness, linking both to the context of contracting and proof.
    • Concept: Witness
    • Function of the verse here: Foundation
    • Textual evidence: “Whoever is present and hears a sale contract between two parties to the sale is a witness, not a shahid, according to His saying تعالى: {And call to witness two witnesses …} (al-Baqarah 282).”
  • Towards New Foundations for Islamic Jurisprudence, p. 60, 78: He builds on it to establish the semantic rule that “if ma” negates dispensation and excuse, that is, it obliges witnesses to respond when called.
    • Concept: Invitation and witness
    • Function of the verse here: Foundation
    • Textual evidence: “Then it was revealed: {and let not the witnesses refuse when they are called} (al-Baqarah 282) … thus the function of ‘ma’ here is to negate dispensation and excuse.”

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

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