Aḍwāʾ al-Bayān - Muhammad al-Amin al-Shinqiti - (1/27)

Aḍwāʾ al-BayānMuhammad al-Amin al-Shinqiti

As for their proof from the Book, it is the Almighty’s statement: “Those of your women who have despaired of menstruation—if you are in doubt—their waiting period is three months; the same applies to those who have not yet menstruated” (65:4). Here the waiting period is fixed in months only when there is no menstruation, which shows that the original rule is to calculate it by menstrual cycles and that the months serve merely as a substitute when menses are absent.

Their proof from the Sunnah is the hadith that a bond-woman observes two menstrual periods as her waiting time, and the hadith, “Refrain from the prayer during the days of your qurūʾ (menses).” You will, God willing, find a full treatment of this question and the evidence marshalled by both sides under Sūrah al-Baqarah. We have already indicated that, in our judgment, reckoning the periods of purity is the weightier view, because its Qur’anic verse is clearer and the hadith that explicitly supports it is more authentic.

An illustration of the third category of issues we mentioned earlier is our explanation that the agent in the passive reading of His words, “How many a prophet was fought alongside by ribbiyyūn” (3:146), is the plural noun ribbiyyūn and not a pronoun referring to the prophet himself. The proof is His declaration: “Allah has decreed: ‘I and My messengers shall indeed prevail’” (58:21) and other similar verses. For if we were to take the agent as a pronoun for the prophet, this would imply that many prophets were killed on the battlefield, as the construction ‘how many (wa kaʾayy-in)’ entails. Yet Allah’s explicit assertion that He has decreed victory for Himself and for His messengers totally excludes such a reading. Moreover, He says: “Messengers before you were indeed denied, yet they patiently bore the denial and the harm until Our help came to them; none can change the words of Allah” (6:34). The phrase “none can change the words of Allah” plainly affirms that the messengers’ triumph is unalterable, for their victory over their opponents is exactly what the divine word “I and My messengers shall indeed prevail” conveys. Without doubt, then, this is one of His irrevocable words, as al-Qurṭubī and others have noted. He has further negated, in absolute terms, any possibility that one aided by Allah could be overcome: “If Allah supports you, none can overpower you” (3:160).

أما الكتاب فقوله تعالى: ﴿وَاللَّائِي يَئِسْنَ مِنَ الْمَحِيضِ مِنْ نِسَائِكُمْ إِنِ ارْتَبْتُمْ فَعِدَّتُهُنَّ ثَلَاثَةُ أَشْهُرٍ وَاللَّائِي لَمْ يَحِضْنَ﴾ فإنه رتب العدة بالأشهُر على عدم الحيض، فدل على أن أصل العدة بالحيض، وأن الأشهُر بدل من الحيضات عند عدمها، وأما السنة فحديث اعتداد الأمة بحيضتين، وحديث "دعي الصلاة أيام أقرائك" وسترى تفصيل هذه المسألة، وأدلة الفريقين في سورة البقرة إن شاء الله، وقد ذكرنا أن كونها الأطهار أرجح دليلًا في نظرنا، لأن آيتها أصرح، وحديثها المصرح بها أصح. ومثال المسألة الثالثة من المسائل الثلاث المذكورة بياننا أن نائب الفاعل ربيون في قوله تعالى: ﴿وَكَأَيِّنْ مِنْ نَبِيٍّ قَاتَلَ مَعَهُ رِبِّيُّونَ﴾ على قراءة البناء للمفعول بقوله تعالى: ﴿كَتَبَ اللَّهُ لَأَغْلِبَنَّ أَنَا وَرُسُلِي﴾ ونحوها من الآيات، وبيانه أننا لو قلنا: إن نائب الفاعل ضمير النبي لزم على ذلك قتل كثير من الأنبياء في ميدان الحرب، كما تدل عليه صيغة ﴿وَكَأَيِّنْ﴾ وتصريح الله تعالى بأنه كتب الغلبة لنفسه ولرسله ينفي ذلك نفيًا لا خفاء به، لاسيما وقد قال تعالى: ﴿وَلَقَدْ كُذِّبَتْ رُسُلٌ مِنْ قَبْلِكَ فَصَبَرُوا عَلَى مَا كُذِّبُوا وَأُوذُوا حَتَّى أَتَاهُمْ نَصْرُنَا وَلَا مُبَدِّلَ لِكَلِمَاتِ اللَّهِ﴾ فإن قوله تعالى: ﴿وَلَا مُبَدِّلَ لِكَلِمَاتِ اللَّهِ﴾ صريح في أنه لا مبدل لكون الرسل غالبين؛ لأن غلبتهم لأعدائهم هي مضمون كلمة ﴿كَتَبَ اللَّهُ لَأَغْلِبَنَّ أَنَا وَرُسُلِي﴾، فلا شك أنها من كلماته التي صرح بأنها لا مبدل لها، كما ذكره القرطبي وغير واحد، ونفى عن المنصور أن يكون مغلوبًا نفيًا باتًّا: ﴿إِنْ يَنْصُرْكُمُ اللَّهُ فَلَا غَالِبَ لَكُمْ﴾.