Intended meaning
The intended meaning is that the right to declare things lawful and unlawful, as well as to legislate, is possessed neither by any human being nor by any group in the name of religion; rather, it is among God’s exclusive attributes. Therefore, no one may monopolize this right or impose it on people as though it were a divine ruling.
The atom’s structure in the atlas
- Type of argument: legislative
- Argument movement: it denies human monopoly over the right to legislate and prohibit, and makes it exclusive to God.
- Key terms: legislation, prohibition, God alone.
- Degree of centrality: central.
It draws a decisive boundary between what humans legislate and what is attributed to God, thereby preventing religious authority from becoming an independent source of declaring things lawful and unlawful in the name of the sacred.
Reading aids
- Muhammad Shahrur Quran in Contemporary Thought
- Legislation, limits, and prohibition
- Prohibition
- Islam, for Shahrur, is a pluralistic value framework, not a coercive ritual system
Basis
- Supporting text: «No one may monopolize the right of prohibition or legislation in the name of God; for declaring lawful and unlawful is among God’s exclusive attributes».
Place of the basis in the book
- Book: The Qur’an in Contemporary Thought.
- Location: in the first section of the book, within the treatment of freedom and human rights
- Type of basis: close evidence.
- Verifying marker: no one has the right to wrest it away
- Reading note: the passage states that the forbidden is not in human hands, but passes through an exclusive divine right; therefore, it is suitable for establishing this atom.
Degree of documentation
- Level: directly documented
- Meaning of the level: the atom relies on an explicit witness close to the formulation of the claim.
- Limits of reading: the wording above is an analytical summary, and is not treated as a verbatim quotation unless the witness is transmitted 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
This atom establishes the principle of denying human guardianship over religious judgment.