Intended Meaning
The intended meaning is that the enduring is what neither perishes nor is consumed, and this quality is ascribed to God alone, not to time. Time, however, is not the locus of baqa’; rather, it is viewed as duration without baqa’.
The Atom’s Structure in the Atlas
- Type of argument: definitional
- Argument movement: baqa’ belongs to God, not to time.
- Key terms: baqa’, God, time.
- Degree of centrality: subsidiary.
This atom confines baqa’ to what does not perish or be consumed, and returns it to God alone. It distinguishes between temporal duration and true baqa’.
Links for Reading
- Muhammad Shahrur, The Book and the Qur’an
- The Book, the Qur’an, and the Mother of the Book
- God
- Kufr and shirk are contextual concepts, not tools of power
Basis
- Supporting text: “The enduring: what neither perishes nor is consumed, and is ascribed to God, not to time.”
Basis in the Book
- Book: The Book and the Qur’an.
- Location: early in the book, within the treatment of the relationship between time and the structure of meaning in language.
- Type of basis: proximate evidence.
- Marker that helps verification: temporal factors
- Reading note: this passage is suitable as support because the witness links meaning to time and development, which supports the idea that baqa’ is attributed to God, not to time.
Degree of Documentation
- Level: directly documented
- Meaning of the level: the atom is based on an explicit witness close to the wording of the claim.
- Limits of reading: the formulation above is an analytical summary and should not be treated as a verbatim quotation unless the witness is quoted textually.
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
Editorial Note
A useful atom for clarifying the distinctions between divine attributes and time.