101. Should certain verses in
the Quran be updated?
If the text of a book is compromised fully or partially, then the veracity of the book becomes doubtful. This was conveyed by the advocate Nani Palkhivala in the context of the Indian Constitution. He said that the Constitution had been lengthened unnecessarily by hundreds of amendments, the result of which was that in the present day no longer any sanctity is attached to the Constitution of India. In my younger days, people were very fearful of lawlessness. First of all, it was Gandhi who broke the law by Namak Satyagraha. He forgot that he was not breaking the law of salt, but the sanctity of law itself. For this reason, in Britain there is no written constitution rather laws are made only based on tradition. Similarly in the US extremely few amendments are made. The reason for this is that both the British and the American know that the Constitution signifies a sanctified code of law. If you separate sanctity from law, law is reduced to being nothing.
In India, each time there is a new government, a new bill that is passed. Palkhivala had written that the British had ruled India for two hundred years and made only 500 acts, while our governments in fifty years after Independence had made 5,000 bills! Hence no one knows how many acts and bills there are.
The Quran was given the status of a religious sanctity and its text was preserved for all eternity; had this not been the case, people would have changed the very text of the Quran.
If certain situations arise then an ‘executive order’ can be issued by the head of state and whatever changes are required should be implemented as executive order of the ruler, while the text of the Quran should not be altered.
For instance, Umar ibn al-Khattab during his time as caliph had issued an executive order of validating the utterance triple talaq in one go, thus finalizing the divorce of a man who pronounces the word ‘talaq’ to his wife thrice in one sitting. This was a temporary ruling and did not have permanent applicability. If people knew that Umar was a caliph with the power of giving out an executive order, they would have taken his ruling in the matter of divorce as applicable only to his time. But our ulema made Umar’s executive order as a part of the Shariah. This was a mistake, as Umar’s directive was different from the method of divorce prescribed in the Quran. The Quran asks a man to divorce his wife by pronouncing the word ‘talaq’ on three separate occasions over a period of three months and not instantly in one go.
The law as has been laid down in the Quran must not be changed, although there should always remain scope for interpretation. Interpretation of law does not create problem, but if you change the text, then that would be tantamount to creating problems.
Sanctity of law is more important than the law itself. This why the entire British legal system is based on tradition, there being no written Constitution. The reason is that they are aware that sanctity is very important. If sanctity is compromised, respect for law will also be gone.
