The Joints of the Structure: The Calls of Faith in al-Baqarah and Āl ʿImrān

Occasion: Transcription of an Isha khatira delivered on 21 June 2026 Source: A transcription of a video khatira by Dr. Ahmed Abouseif — [Watch the original video on YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ts-1BcS09kY)

We begin with another logic, the logic of the beginning of Qur'anic revelation. There are two approaches: either the reader begins with the beginnings of revelation, to see how the Lord of the worlds, glorified be He, built a Muslim society, entity, culture and life; or he begins from the start of the Muṣḥaf, because it is the final order the Lord of the worlds approved for people. If we want to combine the two approaches, how is that to be done?

From revelation to al-Fātiḥah

Let us look at the first of them, the order of revelation. The first thing revealed was "Iqraʾ" (Read), to build the dimension of knowledge in a human being. Then "al-Qalam," to build the moral dimension. Then "al-Muzzammil," to build the psychological dimension in the Muslim. Then "al-Muddaththir," to build the dimension of calling others to Allah. When these four are present, knowledge, character, tranquility and the tongue of a person calling to Allah, then the servant may praise Allah, blessed and exalted, and that is the fifth of the Qur'anic revelations: ﴿الْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ رَبِّ الْعَالَمِينَ * الرَّحْمَنِ الرَّحِيمِ﴾ (All praise is for Allah, Lord of the worlds, the Most Compassionate, the Most Merciful). Through this sequence we found ourselves at the beginning of the Qur'an, as the situation required. So "All praise is for Allah" is the key to the Qur'an, and its close is "Guide us to the straight path."

Sūrat al-Baqarah: the framework of the building

Then we are before Sūrat al-Baqarah, which, as we mentioned earlier, represents the framework of the collective building of the Muslims. It was revealed to the Prophet ﷺ at the opening of the Medinan stage, the stage in which the call moved from building individuals to building society, and so this surah came to create that context. Let me review with you what came before (forgive me, for I see new faces): Sūrat al-Baqarah can be divided into two great sections: the section on the recipient, and the section on the method of action.

As for the recipient, there are three kinds: one upon faith, one upon disbelief, and one upon hypocrisy. Either I am dealing with a believing society, a disbelieving society, or a hypocritical society. What concerns us in building the call at this stage is the believing society, the God-fearing. So we are before an address to these God-fearing people that teaches them three things.

The first: What is the nature of the human model that receives the call? How is it formed? What comes from it? What can it do in its life? So the Lord of the worlds gives us a model of the first recipient, Ādam, peace be upon him. And what were the loftiest qualities found in him? He was given all knowledge, and he was given faith in its completeness; is that not so? He was in the presence of the angels, he saw the jinn and Satan, he received the command directly from the Lord of Might, glorified be He, and the angels prostrated to him by Allah's command. Between certain faith and complete knowledge, is there anything above that? By Allah, no. And yet that mistake came from him, despite the lightness of the obligation. The obligation Ādam was charged with was not five prayers, nor paying zakāh, nor fasting days and hours and months, nor going on Ḥajj; his obligation was nothing but: do not eat from this tree. An obligation of the utmost ease. We did not find "do" among Ādam's obligations; rather, we found "do not," and it was not a prohibition of his instincts or desires, but of something very slight. And yet we saw what our Lord called disobedience: ﴿وَعَصَىٰ آدَمُ رَبَّهُ فَغَوَىٰ﴾ (And Ādam disobeyed his Lord and erred); we ask Allah for safety. What is the benefit of this? That from this human being come right action, and complete wisdom, complete knowledge and complete faith, and from him comes error, even when the obligation is light. So the nature of this being became settled in our minds.

The second kind is the one liable to disobedience, and our Lord shows us in Sūrat al-Baqarah the worst kind of recipients of the call, the Children of Israel. What did they do? They rejected the word of Allah, killed the prophets who conveyed from Allah, denied, found fault, and were insolent toward the Lord of the worlds, glorified be He; we ask Allah for safety and well-being. They kept no covenant, guarded no command, and committed to no obligation; rather, from them came what you see in Sūrat al-Baqarah. And after that our Lord showed us the best kind of recipients of this call, embodied in Ibrāhīm, upon our Prophet and upon him be blessings and peace. So we saw the basic model from which this or that can come: He showed us the worst of them and the best of them: ﴿وَإِذِ ابْتَلَىٰ إِبْرَاهِيمَ رَبُّهُ بِكَلِمَاتٍ فَأَتَمَّهُنَّ ۖ قَالَ إِنِّي جَاعِلُكَ لِلنَّاسِ إِمَامًا﴾ (And when his Lord tested Ibrāhīm with words and he fulfilled them, He said: Indeed, I will make you a leader for the people).

The system of obligations

After this lengthy, detailed, explanatory and clarifying presentation of the types of people, the kinds of reception, the reactions, and the conduct and states that come from them, the second section of Sūrat al-Baqarah comes, in which our Lord, glorified be He, presents to us the system of legal obligations which, if we take them up, completes the path of building this collective entity, which we may then call a state, a nation, institutions and a civilization. The blessed surah closes with the words of Allah: ﴿لَا يُكَلِّفُ اللَّهُ نَفْسًا إِلَّا وُسْعَهَا﴾ (Allah does not burden a soul beyond its capacity), and then the believers stand before the Lord of the worlds, glorified be He, and apologize for the shortcomings that came from them: ﴿رَبَّنَا وَلَا تُحَمِّلْنَا مَا لَا طَاقَةَ لَنَا بِهِ﴾ (Our Lord, and do not burden us with that which we have no strength to bear), to the end of what the Lord of the worlds, glorified be He, mentioned.^[1]

The joints: the calls of faith

But every building has joints; if one of them comes loose, the whole building may collapse. And a building has complementary parts: there is a wall, there is a window, there is a door; if one of the doors goes bad we replace it, but if one of the pillars falls, that may cause the whole building to collapse. These joints are embodied in the calls of faith, where Allah charges the believers and no others. We have other calls, "O mankind" for example, and "O Children of Israel" for example, but the point where the whole matter is bound is when I speak to the trustworthy people who are, without doubt, the ones who accept the obligation.

An example of this: if I want to request something from a distant land, I say to the messenger who sets out from me: Go to such-and-such a town, look for so-and-so and tell him, "I have come to you on behalf of so-and-so," and he will respond to everything you want; is that not so? But if I have no such person there, then I have no one, no need of mine is met, and I gain no benefit from that land except at random. So who are the trustworthy people on earth in the sight of the Lord of the worlds, glorified be He? They are the people of faith. So in Sūrat al-Baqarah the Lord of the worlds charges the people of faith with eleven obligations.

We begin with ﴿يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا لَا تَقُولُوا رَاعِنَا وَقُولُوا انظُرْنَا وَاسْمَعُوا ۗ وَلِلْكَافِرِينَ عَذَابٌ أَلِيمٌ﴾ (O you who believe, do not say "Rāʿinā" but say "Unẓurnā," and listen; and for the disbelievers is a painful punishment). We have discussed this sufficiently, and we said, and Allah, exalted be He, knows best, that this obligation represents what is called sanctifying the frame of reference. There is no playing with the frame of reference, even by switching a word or changing the course of expressions. Pay attention: there is a frame of reference that you must respect in every sense of the word.

And since sanctifying the frame of reference will collide directly with people's needs and desires, for the frame of reference says: do not steal, do not commit adultery, do not insult, keep to this manner, be truthful and be trustworthy; the frame of reference dictates to me obligations that may collide with my desire and my instinct; then the Lord of the worlds calls me with another call of faith: ﴿يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا اسْتَعِينُوا بِالصَّبْرِ وَالصَّلَاةِ ۚ إِنَّ اللَّهَ مَعَ الصَّابِرِينَ﴾ (O you who believe, seek help through patience and prayer; indeed, Allah is with the patient), ﴿وَلَا تَقُولُوا لِمَنْ يُقْتَلُ فِي سَبِيلِ اللَّهِ أَمْوَاتٌ﴾ (And do not say of those who are killed in the way of Allah: They are dead). Patience in sanctifying the frame of reference may bring its holder at some stage to give his life for the sake of Allah, so we do not say he died for something else; rather, he is a martyr before the Lord of the worlds, glorified and exalted. So sanctifying the frame of reference reaches the point at which life itself is given.

And the first thing that collides with sanctifying the frame of reference is eating what is lawful or eating what is unlawful. The pursuit of food overpowers the restraints of the self; "earning a living is bitter," as we say in Egypt, and it drives you to give up some of your principles in some situations. So the third call in the noble surah comes: ﴿يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا كُلُوا مِن طَيِّبَاتِ مَا رَزَقْنَاكُمْ وَاشْكُرُوا لِلَّهِ إِن كُنتُمْ إِيَّاهُ تَعْبُدُونَ * إِنَّمَا حَرَّمَ عَلَيْكُمُ الْمَيْتَةَ وَالدَّمَ وَلَحْمَ الْخِنزِيرِ﴾ (O you who believe, eat from the good things We have provided you and be grateful to Allah, if it is Him that you worship. He has only forbidden to you carrion, blood and the flesh of swine), and the rest of the verse. And since people's dealings in the matter of food and drink, with the tricks, forgery, cheating, deception and evasions that accompany it, may carry us to the stage of collision, to the point that one of us kills his brother, His words came: ﴿كُتِبَ عَلَيْكُمُ الْقِصَاصُ﴾ (Retaliation has been prescribed for you). The matter will not pass easily; you may give your neck.

And for the sake of true upbringing, a renewed obligation comes to us for the people of faith: how do we raise this society so that it does not reach the stage of collision that brings it to the point of killing one another? ﴿يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا كُتِبَ عَلَيْكُمُ الصِّيَامُ كَمَا كُتِبَ عَلَى الَّذِينَ مِن قَبْلِكُمْ﴾ (O you who believe, fasting has been prescribed for you as it was prescribed for those before you). So He trains them not to reach out their hands to what is lawful, as training for them to reach the level of not looking at what is unlawful. That is why you see that the verses of fasting close with His words, glorified be He: ﴿وَلَا تَأْكُلُوا أَمْوَالَكُم بَيْنَكُم بِالْبَاطِلِ وَتُدْلُوا بِهَا إِلَى الْحُكَّامِ لِتَأْكُلُوا فَرِيقًا مِّنْ أَمْوَالِ النَّاسِ﴾ (And do not consume one another's wealth unjustly, or send it to the rulers in order to consume a portion of people's wealth). That is the hoped-for result of this great act of worship. All that came in the verses of fasting is an educational, training method: that we reach the point of commitment at the limit set for us, neither exceeding it nor falling short of it.

Then the verses go on to show you "O you who believe" in varying stages of teaching people to spend. At the beginning we were warned against your hand reaching out to take what is unlawful; now we are at the stage of training your hand to reach out, but in spending and giving untainted by reminders of favors or by harm to people. And when we reach the stage of spending, we spend from the best of what we have: ﴿أَنفِقُوا مِن طَيِّبَاتِ مَا كَسَبْتُمْ﴾ (Spend from the good things you have earned), ﴿وَلَا تَيَمَّمُوا الْخَبِيثَ مِنْهُ تُنفِقُونَ﴾ (and do not aim toward the bad of it, spending from that). Glory be to the All-Creating, the All-Knowing.

And the verses go on with us until they bring us to the method of dealing in life. Since we had needs for give and take, our Lord trains us: ﴿يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا إِذَا تَدَايَنتُم بِدَيْنٍ إِلَىٰ أَجَلٍ مُّسَمًّى فَاكْتُبُوهُ وَلْيَكْتُب بَّيْنَكُمْ كَاتِبٌ بِالْعَدْلِ ۚ وَلَا يَأْبَ كَاتِبٌ أَن يَكْتُبَ كَمَا عَلَّمَهُ اللَّهُ﴾ (O you who believe, when you contract a debt for a specified term, write it down, and let a scribe write it between you in justice; and let no scribe refuse to write as Allah has taught him), and the rest of the verse. This long verse imposes on us, I will not say a message, but a system, a system of discipline and a fence within which we move, so that none of us gets more than is his, and one may choose to leave some of his right. Eleven commands in Sūrat al-Baqarah represent, for the Muslim community, the joints of the life of faith; whoever holds to them holds to faith.^[2]

Āl ʿImrān: steadfastness after completion

We have moved on from Sūrat al-Baqarah, which built the building with us until it reached completion, and now we are before Sūrat Āl ʿImrān, which teaches us how to remain steadfast after reaching completion. Constructing a building, as we mentioned earlier, is no harder than maintaining it. You built a building; what is your plan for it? How long do you want it to last? You built it to stand for a period of time: how long? A hundred years? Fifty? A hundred thousand? So what is your aim in building the society of Islam: that it die after a day, or that it remain until the Day of Judgment? That it remain until the Day of Judgment. So how do you maintain it? Do you know what maintenance is? You have two basic supports, the first of them the first wing of the bird of the Muslim nation. Let us call Sūrat al-Baqarah "the nation that flies," and its first wing is the religious frame of reference. And the second: ﴿اللَّهُ لَا إِلَٰهَ إِلَّا هُوَ الْحَيُّ الْقَيُّومُ * نَزَّلَ عَلَيْكَ الْكِتَابَ بِالْحَقِّ﴾ (Allah, there is no god but He, the Ever-Living, the Sustainer of all. He has sent down to you the Book in truth); then He presents to you the story of ʿĪsā, peace be upon him, not only from the beginning of ʿĪsā's birth, but from the birth of ʿĪsā's mother and her mother's pregnancy with her, so He brings you the matter from its foundation, so that concepts are not confused for you as you deal with the question of the oneness of God.

The second matter we are speaking of: ﴿يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا اتَّقُوا اللَّهَ حَقَّ تُقَاتِهِ وَلَا تَمُوتُنَّ إِلَّا وَأَنتُم مُّسْلِمُونَ﴾ (O you who believe, fear Allah as He should be feared, and do not die except as Muslims). Consider: if I said to you, "Do not leave me except as a student of this school," that would mean that something could come from you that takes you out of the bounds of being a student altogether. So what takes me out of the bounds of Islam? ﴿وَلَا تَمُوتُنَّ إِلَّا وَأَنتُم مُّسْلِمُونَ﴾ (and do not die except as Muslims). So we will receive from Allah a command which, if we do not carry it out, our Islam is not complete: ﴿اتَّقُوا اللَّهَ حَقَّ تُقَاتِهِ وَلَا تَمُوتُنَّ إِلَّا وَأَنتُم مُّسْلِمُونَ﴾ (fear Allah as He should be feared, and do not die except as Muslims). What is the command? And where is the flaw? ﴿وَاعْتَصِمُوا بِحَبْلِ اللَّهِ﴾ (And hold fast to the rope of Allah); if the rope of holding fast comes apart, our Islam is diminished. So if the nation of Islam is found disputing in this crooked way, they are not upon the completeness of Islam. We do not take away from them the designation of the testimony of faith; they are Muslims by the testimony, but in the science of principles there is what is called, for example, "some measure of faith" (*muṭlaq al-īmān*) and "faith in its fullness" (*al-īmān al-muṭlaq*). What is meant by these two expressions? Some measure of faith: you have a share of it, thirty percent, ninety, ten; you have faith. As for faith in its fullness, it is that you reach its completeness. So what degree of Islam do we have? Among people are those who are Muslims by the two testimonies, and among people are those who are Muslims to the level of *iḥsān* before the Lord of the worlds, glorified and exalted. Then our Lord says: ﴿يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا اتَّقُوا اللَّهَ حَقَّ تُقَاتِهِ﴾ (O you who believe, fear Allah as He should be feared). And this is the second call in Āl ʿImrān.

As for the first call in Āl ʿImrān: ﴿يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا إِن تُطِيعُوا فَرِيقًا مِّنَ الَّذِينَ أُوتُوا الْكِتَابَ يَرُدُّوكُم بَعْدَ إِيمَانِكُمْ كَافِرِينَ﴾ (O you who believe, if you obey a party of those who were given the Book, they will turn you back, after your belief, into disbelievers). We spoke there about the choice of the word "obey." The one who obeys someone: I obey you; why do I obey you? Either because I cannot resist what you command me, so I obey you reluctantly, against my will; or because I am convinced and enamored of what you give me, so I obey you willingly. So what is your position toward the People of the Book? Did they force you to obey, so you obeyed them, in which case you are overpowered? Or did you chase after them and obey them willingly, convinced by what they have? Then what kind of mind do you have?

The intimates

Then comes the third call, which is the subject of our talk, and with it we close with a couple of words: ﴿يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا لَا تَتَّخِذُوا بِطَانَةً مِّن دُونِكُمْ لَا يَأْلُونَكُمْ خَبَالًا وَدُّوا مَا عَنِتُّمْ قَدْ بَدَتِ الْبَغْضَاءُ مِنْ أَفْوَاهِهِمْ وَمَا تُخْفِي صُدُورُهُمْ أَكْبَرُ﴾ (O you who believe, do not take as intimates those other than yourselves; they will not spare you any ruin. They wish you would suffer; hatred has already appeared from their mouths, and what their breasts conceal is greater). Our Lord makes clear to us what is behind the garments and the reality of what souls, breasts and hearts contain, and brings out for us what is in the depths, so that the mirror becomes our window into the depths of the other side, and your Lord uncovers for you what is hidden in them. So what prevents you from yielding to Allah, glorified be He?

Let us take the word *biṭānah* (intimates); it occurs in this form in the Noble Qur'an only once, here. Its root is present: ﴿بُطُونِ أُمَّهَاتِكُمْ﴾ (the wombs of your mothers), and *baṭn*, the outward and the inward, is present. But what does *biṭānah* mean? It is a word expressing people who have clung to you until they reached the point of being one flesh with you. Do you know the lining of a jacket? You have an outside that you change, but on the inside there is a lining, always soft, fitting your body perfectly, covering it from within. And usually the lining of a jacket has pockets in which you put your wallet and money; you put in it what you want to hide from people, not what you want to show them. So our Lord tells us that there is a stage of the Muslim community clinging to its enemy to the point that they make them intimates, hiding their secrets with them, and they become their source of security: ﴿لَا تَتَّخِذُوا بِطَانَةً مِّن دُونِكُمْ﴾ (do not take as intimates those other than yourselves), meaning from others. The principle is that our intimates should be from among us, of our own kind, except that we have lost trust among ourselves. Why? Because the bond of holding fast, mentioned in the previous verse, has come apart.

We will continue next week, if Allah wills.

Supplication

I ask Allah, exalted be He, to give us and you insight into what He, Mighty and Majestic, intends in His Book, and to establish us upon what He wants for us and from us in His commands, glorified be He. I ask Allah, the Most High, the All-Powerful, to grant us sincerity in word and deed, to favor us with the blessing of truthfulness in the faith we claim, and to set our bodies where He wishes to see them. O Allah, amīn, O Lord of the worlds.

--- ^[1]: Editor's documentation: Sūrat al-Baqarah, verse 286 (both parts of it), and the speaker ended the quotation with "to the end of what He mentioned." ^[2]: Editor's documentation: The calls mentioned from Sūrat al-Baqarah: verse 104 (Rāʿinā), 153 (patience and prayer), 172–173 (the good things), 178 (retaliation), 183 (fasting) and then 188 (﴿وَلَا تَأْكُلُوا أَمْوَالَكُم…﴾, And do not consume your wealth…), 267 (spending), 282 (debt); and in Sūrat Āl ʿImrān: verses 2–3 (the oneness of God), verse 100 (obedience), verses 102–103 (God-fearing and holding fast), and verse 118 (intimates); ﴿بُطُونِ أُمَّهَاتِكُمْ﴾ (the wombs of your mothers) is in Sūrat al-Naḥl, verse 78; ﴿وَعَصَىٰ آدَمُ رَبَّهُ فَغَوَىٰ﴾ (And Ādam disobeyed his Lord and erred) is in Sūrat Ṭā-Hā, verse 121; and ﴿وَإِذِ ابْتَلَىٰ إِبْرَاهِيمَ…﴾ (And when his Lord tested Ibrāhīm…) is in Sūrat al-Baqarah, verse 124. Verse 178 does not contain the phrase ﴿كَمَا كُتِبَ عَلَى الَّذِينَ مِن قَبْلِكُمْ﴾ (as it was prescribed for those before you) (it is in verse 183); the speaker conflated them, so it has been removed from the body. The calls with "O you who believe" in Sūrat al-Baqarah number eleven, as the speaker said, and they are in verses 104, 153, 172, 178, 183, 208, 254, 264, 267, 278 and 282; he did not detail all of them in this khatira.