much of the disagreement—indeed, the greater part of it—has sprung from this very point (1), and setting it out in full would demand a voluminous book.

One illustration is the word khamr (intoxicant): it is a comprehensive term that covers every substance which intoxicates, so it is impermissible to exclude certain intoxicants from it and declare that its ruling does not apply to them (2).

The same is true of the word maysir (gambling) when some forms of wagering are taken out of its scope; of the word nikāḥ (marriage) when something that is not a true marriage is inserted into its meaning; and of the word ribā (usury), when some of its varieties are removed and transactions that are not ribā are forced under its heading.

Likewise with the terms ẓulm and ʿadl (injustice and justice), maʿrūf and munkar (approved and disapproved conduct); their counterparts are too numerous to count (3).

The upshot is that the purpose of people’s gathering and social interaction is to help one another in birr (righteousness) and taqwā (God-consciousness), so each person assists his companion in that, both in knowledge and in action. For a servant, on his own, is neither fully able to grasp this nor to carry it out, and thus the wisdom of the Lord—glorified be He—ordained that humankind be constituted such that each part supports the other (4),