What is meant
Shahrur divides the Sunna into two types: a messengerly Sunna connected to the pillars of the message in terms of rituals, values, and limits, and obedience to it is continuous and binding and a prophetic Sunna related to ijtihads and instructions issued in a specific historical and social context; therefore, obedience to it is separate and constrained by that context
The atom’s structure in the atlas
- Type of argument: definitional
- Movement of the argument: the Sunna is divided into a binding messengerly Sunna and a prophetic Sunna constrained by context.
- Central terms: Sunna, messengerly, prophetic, pillars of the message, context.
- Degree of centrality: primary.
This atom offers an interpretive division of the Sunna that determines its levels and functions. It regulates the relationship between text and context and prevents reducing the Sunna to a single meaning.
Links that help with reading
- Muhammad Shahrur: The Messengerly Sunna and the Prophetic Sunna
- The Sunna between Message and Prophethood
- Sunna
Basis
- Supporting text: “The text distinguishes between the messengerly Sunna as continuous obedience in the pillars of the message, and the prophetic Sunna as separate obedience tied to a specific historical and social circumstance.”
Place of the basis in the book
- Book: The Messengerly Sunna and the Prophetic Sunna.
- Location: in the middle section of the book
- Type of basis: close evidence.
- Verification marker: continuous obedience… and the station of the message
- Reading note: the passage distinguishes between obedience to the Messenger in the message and the station of prophethood, and it is close support for the atom concerned with the division of the Sunna.
Degree of documentation
- Level: synthetically documented
- Meaning of the level: the atom rests on more than one witness or on a clear composition of closely related expressions.
- Reason for classification: clearly established by more than one witness distinguishing between two types of Sunna.
- Limits of reading: the wording above is an analytical summary and should not be treated as a verbatim quotation unless the witness is transmitted word for word.
Its function in the book
Its function here is definitional; it sets out a meaning or conceptual distinction on which Shahrur relies in building the idea.
Related to
- The Sunna is divided into messengerly and prophetic
Editorial note
The Sunna is defined through its functional division.