This path introduces the triad that Shahrur employs in Toward New Foundations of Islamic Jurisprudence: being, process, and becoming. Its importance lies in turning philosophical terms that may seem peripheral into a central interpretive tool: there is no existence without subsistence, no subsistence without movement, and no movement without an outcome.
In the atlas, this is not a path separate from the contemporary reading, but rather a lens that helps explain why Shahrur insists simultaneously on the fixity of the text and the movement of understanding. Being defines what subsists, process defines temporal movement, and becoming defines what that movement leads to.
Path Question
How does Shahrur use the triad of being, process, and becoming to understand existence, history, and legislation without falling into rigid fixity or unbounded change?
Short Answer
Shahrur holds that understanding religion and legislation requires bringing together fixity, movement, and outcome. Being prevents existence from being reduced to change alone; process prevents it from being turned into a static form; and becoming adds the question of the end or result. Thus, the text remains fixed in its existence, while its understanding and practical legislation move within history, knowledge, and society.
Ascent Map
| Layer | Its Question | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Atoms | What does each term of the triad mean? | being, process, becoming |
| Structures | How does the triad operate in religion and legislation? | Understanding religion and legislation rests on the triad |
| Path | What is its effect on reading? | The fixity of the text and the movement of understanding and history |
Applied Example
To clarify this lens, legislation can be viewed through the theory of limits. The existence of the text and the limit that regulates the field represent what subsists and remains fixed—that is, the aspect of being. The movement of ijtihad and law within this field represents the historical process. The legal and social formulation reached by ijtihad in a particular circumstance represents the aspect of becoming, or outcome.
This example explains the function of the triad within the atlas; it is not attributed to Shahrur as his own verbatim formulation. Direct verification remains located in the related atoms and structures below.
Path Nodes
- Being
- Process
- Becoming
- Objective existence
- Knowledge
- The triad of being, process, and becoming
- The world needs becoming
- Arab society lacks becoming
- Existence can only be understood through the interconnection of being, process, and becoming
- Understanding religion and legislation rests on the triad of being, process, and becoming
Books Read Within This Path
- Toward New Foundations of Islamic Jurisprudence: the central location of the triad, where it becomes a tool for understanding religion and legislation.
- the Book and the Qur’an: adjacent to this path in relation to objective existence, knowledge, and interpretation.
- Qur’anic Narratives, vol. 2: adjacent to it in relation to patterns and open history.
Before This Path
After This Path
This path connects to existence, knowledge, and history in terms of its philosophical foundation; to legislation and limits in terms of the movement of legislation; and to Qur’anic narratives and history in terms of patterns and outcomes.
Limits of the Path
The available material establishes Shahrur’s use of the triad in explaining existence, religion, and legislation. However, extending it into a comprehensive philosophical system of history and knowledge is not established to the same degree. The links connecting it to these fields on this page are a synthesis offered by the atlas to facilitate reading, not a claim that Shahrur formulated a complete philosophical theory.
Point of Disagreement
The point of disagreement is that Shahrur borrows a broad philosophical structure and then makes it an entry point for understanding legislation. Supporters see this as a solution to the problem of stagnation, while critics may hold that the triad requires careful delimitation so that it does not become a template that imposes more on the text than it draws from it.