SECTION 1
Fundamental Principles of Islam
1. Omniscience of Allah. 2. Qur-án a perfect guidance. 3,4. Fundamental principles. 5-7. Consequences of their acceptance and rejection.
In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful. بِسْمِ اللّٰهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ
1 I am Allah, the best Knower. المّ
and-fast line can be drawn as to the subjects which are treated in Meccan or Medinian revelations. The latest European criticism on this point inclines more to a right view than the hasty opinion of earlier critics. In his ‘New Resdarches” Hirschfeld observes: “Tf we had no other critical aid, it would frequently be quite impossible to distinguish between Medinian and later Meccan revelations. . . . Medinian addresses, like the Meccan ones, abound in declamatory, narrative, and parabolical passages.’ But I must add that many of the unwarranted conclusions of European critics are based on the rash generalizations of Oriental exegetes.
The doubt regarding vv. 285, 286, the concluding verses of the chapter, is equally groundless. V. 285 only reiterates the cosmopolitan nature of the religion of Islam, which has already heen established in the very beginning in y. 4, and then im the middle of the chapter in v. 186, a belief in the truth of all the prophets being mentioned as the very basis of the religion of Islam in ali the three places. V. 286 teaches a prayer, about the Medinian origin of which it is rather strange that a doubt should have been entertained.
I do not find any reliable report as to the Meccan origin of any portion of this chapter. Even if there were any such report, I would warn the reader to receive it with caution. The whole of the 2nd chapter thus belongs to earlier Medinian revelation, and I very much doubt the reports which refer the injunctions regarding the prohibition of usury in the concluding sections to about the closing period of the Holy Prophet's life. That portion may have been revealed at a later period than the rest of the chapter, but in view of the same prohibition having been revealed in 3: 129 it could not be so late. An analysis of the chapter leads one to the conclusion that almost the whole of it was revealed previous to the revelation of the next or the 3rd chapter.
11 The original words are alif, lám, mím. Translations of the Holy Qur-án generally leave abbreviations, like the one occurring here, untranslated, The combinations of letters or single letters occurring at the commencement of several chapters of the Holy Qur-dn, 29 in all, are called الحروف المقطعه or simply muqatta'’dt, and according to the best received opinion these letters are abbreviations standing for words. The Arabs used similar letters in their verses, as in قلت لها قفى فقالت قاف where the letter géf stands for wagaft-u, ie. J stop (AH). Another instance of the same is contdined in the verse, بالخير خيرات و ان شرفأ … ولا اريد الشر الّا ان تأ where fa stands for fasharrun, meaning théw evil let there be, and td‘ for tashd‘, meaning thou pleasest (AH). And in ordinary conversation you hear a man saying fd‘ in answer to one who says, Wilt thou come? The fd‘ in this case means فاذهب بنا i.e. then go thou with us (LL). Abbreviations are known to all languages, the only peculiarity of their use in Arabic literature being that the letters carry @ifierent meanings in different
