al-Baqara 2:180-182 — The bequest

"When death comes to one of you, if he leaves property behind, it is written for you to make a bequest in a fitting way for parents and near relatives; this is a duty upon those who guard themselves. Whoever alters it after he has heard it — the sin is only on those who alter it. God is hearing, knowing. But whoever fears that the testator has slipped into a mistake or a sin, and puts things right between them, there is no sin upon him. God is forgiving, merciful."

As was recorded at the opening of the section, the regulations in this stretch come with the verb كُتِبَ (it was written). The verb does this work in five places in this sūra:

What the five have in common is that all of them are heavy obligations. The verb's being used in the passive (the writer is not named) also puts the source of the ruling outside dispute.

إِذَا حَضَرَ أَحَدَكُمُ ٱلْمَوْتُ — "when death comes to one of you." The same expression had occurred at verse 133 of the sūra: there death had come to Jacob and his sons had been asked what they would serve.

I record this as my own reading: the same scene is set up twice and two different subjects of bequest are given — one service, the other property. In attaching the bequest of property to a ruling, the sūra has already shown in a scene what the real subject of inheritance is.

The word in the conditional clause is striking: the word used for the property left behind is not مَال but خَيْر.

This naming recurs in the Qurʾān and was treated in the discussion of al-ʿĀdiyāt (100/8). The summary of the finding there: a person names his property not "property" but "good" — he sees what he has not as a neutral thing but as the good thing.

The same use is present at verse 215 of this sūra as well: "Whatever good you spend…" The sūra, that is, names property with the same word in two separate places: once as it is given, once as it is left.

And the condition itself sets a limit: the ruling holds for one who leaves property behind. For one with nothing to leave, no obligation arises.

The root ع-ر-ف: to know, to recognise. Maʿrūf, in the word's own logic, means what is known, recognised — that is, what the society knows as good and does not find strange.

The word returns continually in the legal sections of this sūra as a word of measure: 178 (payment after retaliation), 228-233 (the regulations on divorce and nursing), 235, 240-241. Each time, instead of a figure, a quality is set down.

This choice is worth recording. The amount of the bequest is not stated; to whom it is to be made is enumerated, but how much it will be is left to maʿrūf. Instead of laying down a fixed proportion, taking as the measure "what is known and accepted" in each situation leaves the ruling open to time and circumstance.

The same root had occurred at verse 146 in the form yaʿrifūnahu (they recognise). The two uses show the centre of the root: what is recognised needs no further proof.

The relation of this verse to the verses of inheritance that came down later (al-Nisāʾ 4/11-12) is a classical dispute and must not be concealed:

In this commentary I impose no preference and issue no legal ruling; the limit of the bequest, the permissibility of a bequest to an heir, and its proportion belong to the field of law, and there are differences among the schools.

I only recall the method I adopted at verse 106: if two verses can be reconciled, reconciling them is preferred to claiming abrogation. By this measure the second view contains less claim than the first.

بَدَّلَ — root ب-د-ل: to exchange one thing for another.

And this verb had occurred twice earlier in this sūra, in both cases in the heaviest of contexts:

The sūra names the altering of a dead man's last word with the same verb as the altering of the word of revelation. And the condition is the same: baʿda mā samiʿah — "after he has heard it." Exactly the clause min baʿdi mā ʿaqalūh ("after they had understood it") at verse 75.

فَإِنَّمَآ إِثْمُهُۥ عَلَى ٱلَّذِينَ يُبَدِّلُونَهُۥ — "the sin is only on those who alter it."

The function of this sentence is not a threat but a protection. The testator's responsibility is complete at the moment he makes his bequest; what happens afterwards is not written to his account. The particle innamā (restriction) settles this.

And the principle of verse 48 of the sūra turns here into a rule of law: the reckoning cannot be transferred — neither for nor against.

إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ سَمِيعٌ عَلِيمٌ — the choice of attributes fits the context. A bequest is a word heard; the one who alters it has heard it too. The attribute samīʿ records that the word has not been lost.

Verse 182 opens a licence in the prohibition of 181 — and this is an exact instance of the sūra's way of establishing a ruling: the ruling is laid down, it is protected, and then its exception is given.

جَنَف — root ج-ن-ف: to lean to one side, to slip. The lexicographers explain the word as an unintended inclination: swerving to the wrong side while wanting the right.

إِثْم — what is deliberate. The two words thus form a pair: error and intent.

The verse names both; the authority to correct therefore arises without regard to the testator's intention. If the outcome is unjust, what caused it does not change matters.

A note about the language and a limit: janaf (ج-ن-ف) and the word ḥanīf (ح-ن-ف) at verse 135 are close in their field of meaning — both carry the idea of "leaning to one side". But their roots are different and the lexicographers treat them separately; I make no claim that there is a derivational bond between them. All that can be recorded is this: Arabic tells both the praised and the blamed swerving with the picture of "leaning" — the difference is in the direction of the lean.

إِصْلَاح — root ص-ل-ح: to remove the defect of a thing and bring it into working order.

And what the verse does is striking: in the previous verse altering was counted a sin; here altering is permitted. Two different rulings are given for the same act, and what separates them is the purpose.

I record this as my own reading: this gives a measure for how fidelity to a text is to be understood. Faithfulness to the wording is not the preserving of the wording for its own sake; what is preserved is the justice the wording carries. If the wording of a bequest produces injustice, clinging to the wording is not counted fidelity.

And this measure is the exact reverse of the attitude criticised from the beginning of the sūra: at verse 65 the wording of the sabbath prohibition was preserved and its purpose cancelled. Here the opposite is done — the wording is altered and the purpose preserved. The same act, two opposite directions.

فَلَآ إِثْمَ عَلَيْهِ — the pattern of the licence of necessity at verse 173 is used here too: the prohibition stands, responsibility is lifted from the person. The closing attributes are the same: ghafūr and raḥīm.