The report pertains to the unseen

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Intended Meaning

For him, the report is not ordinary news, but information about the unseen or about something the informer was not present to witness. It carries either an objective truth or a probability, and therefore it is directly linked to what is unobserved.

The Atom’s Structure in the Atlas

  • Type of argument: definitional
  • Argument movement: defines the report as information about the unseen or the unobserved.
  • Central terms: report, unseen, news, unobserved.
  • Degree of centrality: central.

It links the meaning of the report to what is not present for direct observation, thus opening the way to reading it within the sphere of knowledge rather than within ordinary news alone.

Basis

  • Supporting text: “The report: information about the unseen or about something the informer was not present for, and it carries an objective truth or a probability.”

Basis Location in the Book

  • Book: Umm al-Kitab and Its Elaboration.
  • Location: in the first section of the book, within the explanation of the axis of faith in the unseen.
  • Type of basis: close evidence.
  • Marker that helps verification: faith in the unseen
  • Reading note: This passage is suitable as evidence because it explains the unseen as news that can be affirmed or denied, which is close to the intended meaning of the report.

Degree of Documentation

  • Level: directly documented
  • Meaning of the level: the atom rests on an explicit 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 textually.

Its Function in the Book

Its function here is definitional; it fixes a meaning or conceptual distinction on which Shahrur relies in building the idea.

Editorial Note

The criterion here is the absence of direct presence.

Graph View

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Muhammad Shahrur Atlas