7 Quranic ethics that still hold today

“O you who believe, be steadfast in justice, witnesses for God, even against yourselves, your parents and your relatives.”^[2] The verse asks for fairness when it costs something. It names the three hardest cases, which are one’s own interest and the interest of one’s family, and it adds that the rich and the poor are to be treated alike, because God is nearer to both.

It goes further for enemies: “Do not let the hatred of a people lead you to injustice. Be just; that is closer to piety.”^[3] Justice is a duty of taqwā (God-consciousness) and has no exception for those one dislikes. The commentators noted that the verse was revealed to a community with real enemies, who had every reason to want an excuse.

The objection is that such a standard asks too much, since nobody can be impartial about himself. The Quran does not answer by lowering the standard. It says to give testimony as a witness before God, which makes the court a matter of conscience as well as law.

The Prophet (peace be upon him) said: “None of you truly believes until he loves for his brother what he loves for himself.”^[4] It is the Islamic golden rule, and the wording makes it a measure of faith, not a courtesy. Al-Nawawi, who placed the hadith among his forty, taught that it covers the unseen things as well as the visible: a person who wishes a neighbour’s wealth or standing to be taken away has failed the test, whatever he does in public.

Another report widens it: “The best of people is the one who is most useful to people.”^[5] The chain of this report has been judged acceptable by a number of hadith scholars, though it is not found in the two most trusted collections. The question the rule raises is who counts as “his brother”. Most scholars read it first as a fellow believer, and then as every human being, citing the Quran’s command to speak well to people (2:83) and the many reports of the Prophet’s kindness to neighbours of other faiths.

After the command to worship God alone, the Quran puts parents: “Be good to your parents. If one or both reach old age with you, do not say ‘ugh’ to them or rebuke them, but speak to them kindly.”^[6] Elsewhere it notes the mother’s labour: she carried the child “in weakness upon weakness”.^[7] A man asked the Prophet who deserved his best company, and was told three times that it was his mother, and then his father.

Notice what is not said. It does not say “when they are deserving.” The obligation is unconditional, and it remains even if the parents are not Muslim. The Quran says that if they press a child to join partners with God, he must not obey them, and in the same verse it says to keep their company in this world with kindness.^[8] Asma, the daughter of Abu Bakr, asked the Prophet whether she should keep ties with her mother, who was still a polytheist, and he told her to do so.^[9]

The hard case is the parent who is harsh or unjust. The jurists held that obedience stops at what God forbids, and that respect, support and a gentle voice continue.

“Fulfil the covenant, for the covenant will be asked about.”^[10] The Prophet listed the signs of a hypocrite: “When he speaks he lies, when he promises he breaks it, and when he is trusted he betrays.”^[11] The Quran praises those who “keep their trusts (amānāt) and their covenants”, and opens Surah 5 with a command to fulfil all contracts.^[12]

The sharpest test of the rule came in war. Hudhayfa ibn al-Yaman reports that he and his father were stopped by the Quraysh on the way to Badr and released on a promise not to fight. When they reached the Prophet and told him, he said that they should keep the promise and ask God for help against the enemy.^[13] Keeping a word given to an opponent, at the cost of two fighters in a battle the Muslims were short of men for, shows that the command admits no convenient exception.

One objection is that a promise to do wrong cannot bind. The jurists agreed, and for oaths the Quran provides expiation when keeping them would be worse than breaking them (5:89).

“Do not spy on one another or backbite one another. Would any of you like to eat the flesh of his dead brother? You would hate it.”^[14] The comparison is deliberately unpleasant. The dead brother cannot defend himself, and neither can the person who is spoken of in his absence.

The Prophet defined backbiting as saying something about your brother that he would dislike, even if it is true. If it is false, he said, it is slander.^[15] A listener who objected that what he said was in fact so was given that answer. The rule does not forbid every mention of another’s faults, and the jurists listed cases where speech is lawful or required. Al-Nawawi, drawing on the earlier scholars, named six: complaining of a wrong to someone with power to remedy it, asking a scholar for a ruling, warning others of harm, naming a person who openly commits sin, identifying someone by a well-known nickname, and seeking help to stop a wrong.^[16] A warning to a family considering a marriage is the example usually given for the warning.

“Do not consume one another’s wealth unjustly, nor pass it to the rulers to consume a portion of the wealth of others sinfully, while you know.”^[17] The Prophet cursed the giver and the taker of a bribe.^[18] The curse falls on both sides, so that the person who pays to win an unfair advantage shares the guilt of the official who accepts.

The principle is that office is a trust. A judge, an official or a witness holds power on behalf of others and may not sell it. The Prophet once sent a man to collect the zakah (the obligatory yearly charity), and on his return the man said that part of it was a gift made to him. The Prophet stood and asked why he did not sit in his father’s house and see whether any gift came to him there.^[19] A gift that arrives because of a post is a bribe by another name.

The hardest case is the person who pays only to obtain what is already his due, or to escape an injustice. Some jurists held that the sin falls on the taker alone in that situation.

“Those who consume the wealth of orphans unjustly are only consuming fire in their bellies.”^[20] The Prophet was himself an orphan, and the Quran reminds him of it: “Did He not find you an orphan and give you refuge?” and then, “So as for the orphan, do not oppress him.”^[21] The command comes from his own experience of the loss.

He said that he and the one who cares for an orphan would be as close in Paradise as two fingers, and he held his index and middle fingers together.^[22] Elsewhere the Quran tells guardians to hand over the property when the orphan reaches maturity and shows sound judgement (4:6), and to manage it with fairness meanwhile (2:220). The objection that a guardian deserves some reward is answered in the same passage: a poor guardian may take a fair amount for his work, and a rich one should abstain.