Do Not Make the Pure Things Unlawful

That treated, Allah — this being a Madanī sūrah, as is known — returns to masāʾil, and the rulings beginning here run from verse 87 onwards. The first discussion is one touched on at the beginning of the chapter: Sūrat al-Māʾidah concerns food, or the food spread, which has not yet been discussed; but there were many laws about what is ḥalāl and what is ḥarām, about purity, and the rest. There, much was said of what is impure; here, the discussion is: do not go to excess. For the Makkans practised many excesses and many arbitrary judgements about what is ḥalāl and what is ḥarām, and devised many different notions in that regard, which are discussed a little more below, when those verses come.

Allah says, in effect, that Islam is the dīn of moderation. There are certainly things that are harmful to you and are ḥarām — blood, for instance — and these must be avoided; and it is all for reasons of health. It is hard to see why people dispute this, and why they insist on making ḥalāl what is not ḥalāl, saying: no, it is all right, take it easy. It is for your health. Has anyone considered it in that light? It is not merely a legal question. People take it for a legal question only — whether the animal is slaughtered this way or that, or the food of the Christians or Jews, or whatever the case may be; or that even where there is some doubt, it is acceptable. In Islam there are very few things whose aṣl, whose basis, whose default position, is ḥarām. Nearly everything in the world is ḥalāl for a Muslim by default, unless there is evidence of its impermissibility and unlawfulness — with two exceptions at the least. One is inter-gender relationship. Intimacy between the genders is ḥarām by default; that is why nikāḥ is required for it to become ḥalāl — why a nikāḥ, a marriage, must take place. Otherwise it is ḥarām by default. If a person finds a plant in a forest, the only thing that will prevent him from eating it is that it is harmful — that it poses a risk to health; otherwise it is ḥalāl. But the things that are ḥarām by default, for which the ḥalāl has to be sought, are inter-gender relationship, intimacy; and, second, carrion meat, dead animals. If they are not slaughtered in the proper way they are deemed dead, and that is ḥarām by default, as the Qur'an states; a dalīl is needed to make it ḥalāl, and the way to make it ḥalāl and lawful is to slaughter it properly. So much is technically understood. But it is for health; one of the principal reasons is health.

Allah then says:

Do not make ḥarām the pure things that Allah has made lawful to you, and do not cross the boundaries. Allah does not like those who cross boundaries; so do not now go to excess. For this reason the ʿulamāʾ say that to make ḥarām what is ḥalāl is the same as to make ḥalāl what is ḥarām. Many suppose the second to be worse than the first — presumably because it is what most people do; but otherwise the two are alike, since in either case one is altering the ḥukm of the Prophet (peace be upon him) and of Allah. Allah (swt) then says wa-kulū mimmā razaqakumu Allāhu ḥalālan ṭayyibā: eat of whatever is on the earth — rather, of whatever Allah provides you, whatever Allah has sustained and provided you with, so long as it is ḥalāl and ṭayyib, pure. While, mā shāʾ Allāh, much of our industry does provide ḥalāl, so long as it is certified and known, the ṭayyib aspect is a further concern: the purity of a thing, how it is raised and reared, the food it is given, the conditions in which it is kept. That is a whole other discussion, too specific to go into here.