The Holy Quran with Five Volume Commentary (Vol 2) — Page 379
PT. 7 AL-MA'IDAH CH. 5 قَدْ سَأَلَهَا قَوْمُ مِنْ قَبْلِكُمْ ثُمَّ أَصْبَحُوا A people before you asked. 103 about such things, but then they became disbelievers therein. 730 بِهَا كُفِرِينَ مَا جَعَلَ اللهُ مِنْ بَحِيرَةٍ وَلَا سَابِبَةٍ وَلَا Allah has not ordained ,104 any 'Baḥīrah' or 'Sa'ibah' or وَصِيْلَةٍ وَلَا حَامٍ وَلَكِنَّ الَّذِيْنَ كَفَرُوْا يَفْتَرُونَ عَلَى اللهِ الْكَذِبَ lie وَاَكْثَرُهُمْ لَا يَعْقِلُونَ 'Wasilah' or 'Ḥām'; but those who disbelieve forge a lie against Allah, and most of them do not make understanding. 731 use of their "2:109. 6:137. as well as a suitable and flexible law minor details and seeking legislation about ever-changing details. The reader will see that this verse also incidentally refutes the allegations of those who say that the laws of Islam, being rigid and unchangeable, afford not room for the exercise of individual judgement, and that they fetter humanity for all time to hard and fast rules and are thus calculated to impede the intellectual advancement of man rather than help it. The expression, which if revealed to you would cause you trouble, means that if God or His Prophet had legislated about minor details and had not left such matters to individual discretion SO that people might formulate law concerning them according to their own judgement and their own circumstances, they would have found it troublesome and the development of man's intellect would have become seriously hampered. 730. Commentary: Unnecessary questioning about 819 on them is always to the detriment of the questioner himself. It limits his discretion and fetters his judgement, besides binding him and his co- religionists to unnecessary and irksome legislation. The Israelites are reported in the Quran to have put unnecessary questions to Moses in regard to minor details with the result that they created difficulties for themselves and became more and more perplexed and confounded and ended with breaking the commandments of God and drawing His displeasure on themselves (e. g. 2:109). 731. Important Words: بحر Bahirah) is derived from) بحيره which means, he cut or slit lengthwise; he split or clave. Baḥīrah was a name given by the pagan Arabs to a camel (or a goat) which they let loose to feed, after slitting its ears. The word may be applied both to males and females, but in practice it was only the females that were thus