An Atheist Explores the Qur'an Part 89: Allah’s Office of Fair Trading. Plus: Ha ha! You’re in Hell! (The Defrauding (al-Mutaffifin))
The
Defrauding (al-Mutaffifin) 1-39
Allah’s Office of Fair Trading. Plus: Ha ha! You’re in Hell!
Welcome to the next instalment of An Atheist Explores Sacred Texts (Qur’an version).
In this series I work my way chapter-by-chapter through the Qur’an, commenting on it from the point of view of the text as literature and mythology.
For more detail, see the introductory post https://bit.ly/2ApLDy0
For the online Qur’an that I use, see here http://al-quran.info and http://quran.com
The Defrauding (al-Mutaffifin) 1-20
“Woe to the defrauders who use short measures”
The surah starts with (and is named for) people that cheat in weights and measures. And it’s not a metaphor for anything either, it would seem. It really is God becoming concerning with fair trading.
Now, I’ve mentioned this before in the Bible read-through about how odd it is that an omni-everything creator of the universe should be concerned with minor human commercial transactions. But it’s an established fact that our innate sense of morality stems from two concerns that develop very early on in childhood – that it’s wrong to deliberately attempt to harm another member of the group, and that it’s wrong to unfairly divide resources.
The evolutionary pressures of a social species on these instincts are clear – the group survives better if it doesn’t harm its own welfare and if all get a share of resources such as food. From this instinctual sense of morality stem normative rules, including laws governing fair trading. Because this sense of fairness is so viscerally felt, it makes sense that it could be attributed to being desired by a God.
That aside, we also get mention that “The record of the vicious is indeed in Sijjīn” and also “The record of the pious is indeed in Illīyūn”. What Sijjin and Illiyun are is not clear; I looked it up and some Islamic scholar think that they are considered parts of Hell and Paradise respectively, particular areas; others that they are the names of record books of deeds. Which seems the more supportable conclusion given that after each verse that mentions both Sijjin and Illiyun, we get a verse that reads “It is a written record”.
Then there’s a verse that claims that “none denies it except every sinful transgressor”. In other words, the only reason that you’d disagree with this is that you are a sinner? Are you a sinner? Do you want to be thought of as a sinner? Then you must claim that what’s written here is true. What is that? Poisoning the well? It’s an underhand rhetoric technique anyway.
The Defrauders 21-39
“You will perceive in their faces the freshness of bliss as they are served with a sealed wine”
The latter half of this surah is the by-now very familiar descriptions of what awaits in the afterlife, mainly focussing here on the faithful, who will get the “sealed wine” mentioned above, “whose seal is musk”. A musk seal? Not sure how that works, but still. Also “and whose seasoning is from Tasnīm”. What, you might ask, is Tasnim? It’s “a spring where those brought near [to Allah] drink”. This, presumably, is on top of the ginger and camphor flavours already mentioned.
The faithless, who used to laugh at the faithful and wink at each other, will be punished (for once we don’t get vivid descriptions of burning and torture), but this means that the faithful, supposedly good people, will be turned into cruel vindictive people because “today the faithful will laugh at the faithless”. With these constant mentions that those in Paradise can get to point and laugh at people being tortured in Hell, I’m sort of reminded of Georgian and Victorian mental institutions where you could pay to go and watch the inmates. And this kind of thing is, apparently, the work of a benevolent God.
Allah’s Office of Fair Trading. Plus: Ha ha! You’re in Hell!
Welcome to the next instalment of An Atheist Explores Sacred Texts (Qur’an version).
In this series I work my way chapter-by-chapter through the Qur’an, commenting on it from the point of view of the text as literature and mythology.
For more detail, see the introductory post https://bit.ly/2ApLDy0
For the online Qur’an that I use, see here http://al-quran.info and http://quran.com
The Defrauding (al-Mutaffifin) 1-20
“Woe to the defrauders who use short measures”
The surah starts with (and is named for) people that cheat in weights and measures. And it’s not a metaphor for anything either, it would seem. It really is God becoming concerning with fair trading.
Now, I’ve mentioned this before in the Bible read-through about how odd it is that an omni-everything creator of the universe should be concerned with minor human commercial transactions. But it’s an established fact that our innate sense of morality stems from two concerns that develop very early on in childhood – that it’s wrong to deliberately attempt to harm another member of the group, and that it’s wrong to unfairly divide resources.
The evolutionary pressures of a social species on these instincts are clear – the group survives better if it doesn’t harm its own welfare and if all get a share of resources such as food. From this instinctual sense of morality stem normative rules, including laws governing fair trading. Because this sense of fairness is so viscerally felt, it makes sense that it could be attributed to being desired by a God.
That aside, we also get mention that “The record of the vicious is indeed in Sijjīn” and also “The record of the pious is indeed in Illīyūn”. What Sijjin and Illiyun are is not clear; I looked it up and some Islamic scholar think that they are considered parts of Hell and Paradise respectively, particular areas; others that they are the names of record books of deeds. Which seems the more supportable conclusion given that after each verse that mentions both Sijjin and Illiyun, we get a verse that reads “It is a written record”.
Then there’s a verse that claims that “none denies it except every sinful transgressor”. In other words, the only reason that you’d disagree with this is that you are a sinner? Are you a sinner? Do you want to be thought of as a sinner? Then you must claim that what’s written here is true. What is that? Poisoning the well? It’s an underhand rhetoric technique anyway.
The Defrauders 21-39
“You will perceive in their faces the freshness of bliss as they are served with a sealed wine”
The latter half of this surah is the by-now very familiar descriptions of what awaits in the afterlife, mainly focussing here on the faithful, who will get the “sealed wine” mentioned above, “whose seal is musk”. A musk seal? Not sure how that works, but still. Also “and whose seasoning is from Tasnīm”. What, you might ask, is Tasnim? It’s “a spring where those brought near [to Allah] drink”. This, presumably, is on top of the ginger and camphor flavours already mentioned.
The faithless, who used to laugh at the faithful and wink at each other, will be punished (for once we don’t get vivid descriptions of burning and torture), but this means that the faithful, supposedly good people, will be turned into cruel vindictive people because “today the faithful will laugh at the faithless”. With these constant mentions that those in Paradise can get to point and laugh at people being tortured in Hell, I’m sort of reminded of Georgian and Victorian mental institutions where you could pay to go and watch the inmates. And this kind of thing is, apparently, the work of a benevolent God.
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