Book of Retaliation and Blood-Money for Lives and Wounds
Chapter on Intentional Homicide, Retaliatory Execution, and Those Entitled to Claim Blood
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Book of Retaliation and Blood-Money for Lives and Wounds

In the name of Allah, the Most Compassionate, the Most Merciful.
May Allah bless and grant peace to our master Muḥammad, his family, and his Companions.

Chapter on Intentional Homicide, Retaliatory Execution, and Those Entitled to Claim Blood

Allah, the Exalted, says: “Retribution (qisās) has been prescribed for you” (Quran 2:178); and He says: “And in retribution there is life for you” (Quran 2:179); and He says: “We decreed for them therein that a life be taken for a life” (Quran 5:45). He also says: “The free for the free, the slave for the slave, and the female for the female” (Quran 2:178).

According to the scholars, these verses institute equality between the noble and the lowly among the free, and between slaves of high and low monetary value, thereby abolishing the pre-Islamic custom that favoured certain classes over others.