law of equality?
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Salaam all
Ya ayyuha allatheena amanoo kutiba AAalaykumu alqisasu fee alqatla alhurru bialhurri waalAAabdu bialAAabdi waalontha bialontha faman AAufiya lahu min akheehi shay-on faittibaAAun bialmaAAroofi waadaon ilayhi bi-ihsanin thalika takhfeefun min rabbikum warahmatun famani iAAtada baAAda thalika falahu AAathabun aleemun
Rashad Khalifa O you who believe, equivalence is the law decreed for you when dealing with murder - the free for the free, the slave for the slave, the female for the female. If one is pardoned by the victim's kin, an appreciative response is in order, and an equitable compensation shall be paid. This is an alleviation from your Lord and mercy. Anyone who transgresses beyond this incurs a painful retribution.
Qisas = just retaliation
Katl = FIGHTINGNew trans
O you who believe, just retaliation is decreed for you in FIGHTING (not resulted in murder since their punishment is hell 493, not given in this world) - the free with the free, the slave with the slave, the female with the female. If one is pardoned by his BROTHER (SINCE WE ARE ALL BROTHERS IN DEEN), an appreciative response is in order, and an equitable compensation shall be paid.Wating for your feedback,
Peace...
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Salaam all
The word is "qatla" not "qatl" nor "qitaal". It is the plural of "qateel the murderd", so the verse is talking about murdered...people?!
I have a problem with translating it as concerning people.First we already have two detailed verses (492-93) dealing with murder and manslaughter, no mention of gender nor of freedom status; but of status of faith and alliance.
Second This would be the first, and only, verse where God recognizes "slavery" and set a law for them (no law for slaves in other punishments or rewards).
Third The verse implicitly decides a different "price" for females"
FourthGod differentiates between a free and a slave male,but for females there is no distinction!
For all above reasons, I think the verse concerns animals. Arabs call an animal of good pedigre "free 7urr", the slave would be an animal for servitude. A female animal is definitely different and is mainly for reproduction and milk (if applicable).
With this understanding, the "qasaas" is understandable; You kill my she camel, you give me a she camel, e.g. But with people, how does it work (a female for a female)? If you kill my sister, shall I kill your sister or daughter?
Your feedback is most welcome.
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Peace Samia,
Sorry, no further clarifications, only gratitude to you for bringing out these fine points on an ayah that I have yet to understand...This is the first time I have heard anyone mention that it could refer to animals, and what you say makes perfectly good sense.
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Samia, that makes perfect sense. God bless you for your insightful perspective sis
Salaam
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Peace samia
and yes, very good understanding. To back it up, i'd like to know if the other words - you gave "hurr" for a pedigree animal already - but what about the working animal and the reproducing ones, are the expressions also used or are there traces of former use ?
lk
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Salaam Elke and all
but what about the working animal and the reproducing ones, are the expressions also used or are there traces of former use ?
A female animal (untha al7ayawan ), yes, in both classical and colloquial Arabic.
As for "abd" (plural abeed), I just took the meaning of the wordto obey without having the choice to disobey; or to serve without reward. Only one other verse in the Qur'aan mentioned this word with this meaning (in the singular) 1675; and even then it said "an owned slave ". Five verses mentioned the plural 3182; 851; 2210; 4146; 5029.
At first I thought of body parts untha is ear or testicule (from lisanul 3arab); hurr is face or cheek (ibid) but couldn't find any "abd" correspoding to any body part. Another reason why I abandoned the body parts is the beginning of the verse mentioning "qatla ". Also, there is another verse dealing with body parts (545).
Some one might come up with a better understanding of the verse. It just can't be about people "a soul for a soul" 545.
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Peace all,
I've been thinking more about this and have decided to post a bit that I wrote for another forum, to see what you all think about it... in my heart, Samia's animal idea is a possibility, but after reading related ayat again, the following understanding keeps tugging at my mind.
Lane's the first definition that he gives for Q-T-L is
to know or become acquainted with, to know completely, thoroughly, very well (Vol. 8, p. 238.)
If 'killing' was the first and foremost meaning in his understanding, then why did he begin with this? The derived meanings normally follow the more precise definition in any dictionary.
Now, put his definition into the ayah and it makes sense?especially in context and the positive feeling with the ayah before it?contribute towards betterment, upholding pledges, patient during good and bad, and despair.... yeah?
O ye who believe! The law of equality is prescribed to you in GETTING ACQUAINTED the free for the free, the slave for the slave, the FEMALE for the FEMALE. WHOEVER IS FORGIVEN BY HIS BROTHER for something, Follow/Overtake him--
(i.e. him having gone before; Vol 1, p. 330--in other words follow his lead and do one better),
perceiving by reflection and consideration of the effect (Vol. 5, p.29-- hasten to him (Vol. 3, p. 5) with goodliness/ pleasantness/ (acting well) (Vol. 2, p. 206). This is alleviation (Vol. 2, p. 406) from your Lord (makes you ?light?) and a Mercy. Then, whoever transgresses after that will be in grave penalty.To me, this hearkens back to the Native American practice of mediation between tribes. I don?t remember which tribe did it, but what I read was that if there was a dispute inter-tribally, they would have the members come sit together in a circle and talk and get to know one another, with the idea that once your know your ?enemy? there is no longer a need to see him as a threat or an enemy.
This, to me, goes more with the message of the Qur?an that I know and understand elsewhere. Why would we be told to be patient, etc. etc. in the ayah before, then told to go kill an innocent person? Forgive me, but neither can I follow that line of thinking at all.
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Salaam All
Salaam Ilisa
Lane's the first definition that he gives for Q-T-L is
to know or become acquainted with, to know completely, thoroughly, very well (Vol. 8, p. 238.)
If 'killing' was the first and foremost meaning in his understanding, then why did he begin with this? The derived meanings normally follow the more precise definition in any dictionary.
Yes, this is another meaning, not really derived from the first one (or maybe, by eloding to killing ignorance or lack of knowledge). We see this meaning for this verb in verse 4158 , last sentence (wa maa qataluuhu yaqeenan they did not grasp all the knowledge about this matter). This verb actually takes knowledge, news..etc as direct object.
What we have in our verse is the noun, not the verb qatlaa. Try to find the meaning of this word.In fact my concern was not with the verb (unlike you), but with the categorization of people; which is still there. Why do free men have to get acquainted with free men but not with slaves, nor with women?
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peace Ilisa, all,
Please do not take one possible meaning of a root and try to apply it in one occurrence without considering all other occurrences, especially with respect to the grammatical form of the word.
I have noticed others do this too.
Please see the following link
http//www.studyquran.co.uk/Qwrmic.htmWakas
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Peace Wakas,
I understand what you mean, I did consider the meanings in other passages, only a few though, by no means all. Thanks for the advice, it's nice to know that you guys are out there 'watching over us', ready to guide us as we trek our way along the path to better understanding!
