مساواة
Musāwāt
Topic
The Quran teaches the equality of all people before God (49:13) and commands justice (4:135); the rules of classical law, however, did draw distinctions of status.
What it means
“O you who believe, stand firmly for justice, as witnesses for God, even against yourselves, or your parents and relatives” (4:135). The Quran says the noblest before God is the most pious (49:13). The Prophet said that no Arab is superior to a non-Arab except in piety. The Quran’s “law of retaliation” (2:178) sets equal penalty for killing.
Often misunderstood as
That Islam teaches the equality of all people in law, or that it teaches the inequality of some.
What the sources say
Classical law made distinctions between free and slave, Muslim and non-Muslim, man and woman in some matters of inheritance, witness and retaliation. Muslim thinkers hold that the principle was equality before God and justice for all, and that the particular rules were shaped by their age, and many modern scholars and states have revised them.