What Is Meant
Dialectic here means a law based on opposites and contradictions, and on the mutual influence between things or meanings. It describes the relationship between opposites as a movement of interaction, not rigid stasis.
The Atom’s Structure in the Atlas
- Type of argument: methodological
- Argument movement: dialectic is a law that explains movement through opposites and mutual influence.
- Key terms: dialectic, opposites, contradictions, mutual influence.
- Degree of centrality: secondary.
This atom presents movement as an interaction between opposites, not as stillness. It helps in understanding change and transformation within cosmic and semantic laws.
Links That Help with Reading
- Muhammad Shahrur, The Book and the Qur’an
- History, Evolution, and Laws
- Dialectic and Pairing Are Two Laws for Explaining Change
Basis
- Supporting text: “Dialectic: a law based on opposites, contradictions, and mutual influence between things or meanings.”
Basis in the Book
- Book: The Book and the Qur’an.
- Location: in the middle section of the book in the discussion of the laws of destiny.
- Type of basis: near witness.
- Verification marker: opposites and contradictions
- Reading note: this location is suitable as evidence because it mentions opposites, contradictions, influence, and mutual interaction, and it is almost exactly consistent with the intended meaning.
Degree of Documentation
- Level: directly documented
- Meaning of the level: the atom rests on a clear witness close to the wording of the claim.
- Limits of reading: the wording above is an analytical summary, and should not be treated as a verbatim quotation unless the witness is quoted verbatim.
Its Function in the Book
Its function here is definitional; it fixes a meaning or conceptual distinction that Shahrur relies on in building the idea.
Related to
Editorial Note
It plays an interpretive role within the structure of general change.