The Intended Meaning
The author holds that there is nothing in the Wise Revelation proving that Adam and Eve committed a sexual sin in Paradise. The intended meaning of the first sin is not a bodily or sexual act, but something else that the text does not indicate in this way.
The Atom’s Structure in the Atlas
- Type of argument: Interpretive
- Argument movement: The first sin is not interpreted as a sexual sin.
- Key terms: the first sin, Adam, Eve, sexual, the revelation.
- Degree of centrality: Primary.
It offers an alternative reading of the story of the beginning, and prevents it from being burdened with a sexual meaning unsupported by the text in this conception, thereby opening a different path for interpretive understanding.
Links that help with reading
- Muhammad Shahrur Toward New Foundations for Islamic Jurisprudence
- Women, Family, and Dress
- Avoidance Does Not Equal Prohibition
Basis
- Supporting text: “There is nothing in the Wise Revelation proving that Adam and Eve committed a sexual sin in Paradise.”
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 the reading: The wording above is an analytical summary, and is not treated as a verbatim quotation unless the witness is quoted textually.
Its Function in the Book
Its function here is declarative; it establishes a result on which what follows in the argument depends.
Related to
Editorial Note
The atom challenges the common moral interpretation of the Paradise story.