Intended meaning
International loyalty here is a personal religious conviction based on the relationship between the human being and their Lord and it is not to be confused with political authority or the struggle for power Its domain is personal and religious, not authoritarian
The atom’s structure in the atlas
- Type of argument: definitional
- Argument movement: it makes international loyalty a personal religious conviction with no authoritarian dimension.
- Key terms: international loyalty, personal religious conviction, authority, relationship with the Lord.
- Degree of centrality: subsidiary.
This atom shifts loyalty from the sphere of political conflict to the sphere of the personal relationship with the divine Self, thereby preventing the mixing of religion and authority.
Links that help reading
- Muhammad Shahrur, Islam and the Human Being
- The Civil State, Religion, and Authority
- international loyalty
- Islam precedes the specificity of the Muhammadan message historically and conceptually
Basis
- Supporting text: «International loyalty: a personal religious conviction based on the relationship between the human being and their Lord, and it should not be confused with authority».
Place of support in the book
- Book: Islam and the Human Being.
- Location: in the final section of the book, within the discussion of international loyalty and its relation to politics.
- Type of support: close evidence.
- Marker that helps verification: personal conviction
- Reading note: this passage is suitable as evidence because it states that international loyalty is an individual conviction and should not become mixed up with the struggle for power.
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 reproduced word for word.
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.
Related to
Editorial note
The atom confines loyalty to the individual sphere without political expansion.