The unifying idea
This axis brings together what establishes the universality of the message and the necessity of reading the Qur’an in a way that is independent of historical conditioning and non-binding narration. It also shows that the text has an internal structure that governs understanding from within.
The theses included in the axis
- The Muhammadan message is universal
- The historical reading of the Qur’an rejects restricting its universality
- The Book is a dual structure of the definitive and the allegorical
- The Sunna and the hadith are not one and the same
The axis’s support from the atoms
- Asbab al-nuzul are intrusive historical sciences
- Interpreting the text outside its context is more dangerous than fabrication
- Abrogation diminishes the universality of the message
- Asbab al-nuzul restrict the Qur’anic text
- The authority of the text is above the grammatical rule
- There is no room for arbitrariness or addition in the Revelation
- Interpretation outside context is rejected
Method of reading
This axis is read from within the text itself: first by identifying what is fixed in the structure of the Book, then by distinguishing what is historical from what is universal. At that point, narration or external context no longer become governing authorities over the universality of the message.