Session Thirty, The Second Stage: Examining Whether Dignity Constitutes a Source of Rights
Session Thirty
The Second Stage: Examining Whether Dignity Constitutes a Source of Rights — Certain Instances of Natural Rights and Disagreement Concerning Them — The Limiting Conditions on Natural Rights — The First Condition — The Second Condition
February 23, 2025
Summary of the Previous Session
Up to this point, we have stated that natural rights are capable of being established with respect to the human being, and that these rights must be given due regard within the laws, particularly within divine law; in other words, divine law cannot stand in conflict with these rights, except in a respect that we shall presently set forth—namely, that divine law cannot run contrary to natural rights. This holds as a principle and a governing rule; yet certain exceptions to it can, on a particular account, be justified.
Certain Instances of Natural Rights and Disagreement Concerning Them
By way of relevance, let us indicate certain natural rights, and note that natural rights, in respect of their instances, are a matter of disagreement. The list of natural rights, from the early period in which the subject was first raised and discussed among thinkers down to today, has grown longer. At times, certain matters are cited as natural rights, yet have become the subject of dispute, with some denying them. In any case, given the new conditions—given that a fresh definition and outlook regarding the human being has emerged in the world, and given that greater freedoms have been granted to human beings—a correspondingly greater number of natural rights have naturally come to be cited for him. The axis of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is likewise this very modern conception of the human being. Among the rights named in this Declaration, however, certain rights have been cited that, from the standpoint of our religious logic, are called into question. Indeed, at times a particular matter is cited, within one country or society, as a natural right, while it is denied in many other countries; this demonstrates that such matters do not, in fact, fall within the sphere of natural rights.
Let me offer an example: one of the matters cited as a natural right is “the right to self-defense” against the aggression of others. That is, should a human being come under attack, he has the right to defend himself; this is cited as a natural right, and perhaps no disagreement exists concerning it. Disagreement does exist, however, concerning the manner in which this right is realized or exercised; for instance, is the possibility of resorting to some other course of action available to him before he resorts to defending himself? Is the possibility of notifying the police available, for instance? Does he have the right to defend himself against an attacker without notifying the police, or not? These are matters of discussion. In the United States, where the constitution is founded upon these rights, it is said that the entirety of human natural rights has been incorporated into the constitution: the right to freedom, the right to freedom of expression, the right to vote—and the right to self-defense is one among these. We have noted that the principle of this right is more or less universally accepted; yet, in American society, it has acquired a greater scope in two respects: both a broader interpretation has been given to self-defense, and a greater leniency is applied in assessing it. The fact that carrying weapons is permitted in the United States is rooted in the securing of this right to self-defense. The Second Amendment to the American Constitution makes explicit the right to keep and bear arms, regarding it as one of the branches and offshoots of this natural right. In many other countries, however, this expansive interpretation is not found, nor is such leniency applied; accordingly, no one possesses the right to carry or keep weapons. Now, if we say that a person does not possess the right to carry weapons and use them in self-defense, does this mean that this natural right has been disregarded? Certainly not; even now, in many places, the carrying of weapons is prohibited, even though everyone, to some degree, accepts the right to self-defense.
Both the principle of natural rights and the manner of their exercise, then, are a matter of disagreement; two distinct disagreements exist concerning human natural rights, and were greater attention given to this distinction, it would considerably reduce the concerns and apprehensions that some religious believers harbor regarding the recognition of natural rights.
One disagreement concerns the lengthy list of natural rights cited today in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights; these are chiefly grounded in the political philosophies of certain Western thinkers.
The other disagreement concerns the manner of exercising these rights; disagreements exist there as well. It may well be that a given right is recognized in common between Muslim and non-Muslim societies, while disagreement exists concerning the manner of its exercise. If, in the stage of establishing the right and in the stage of its exercise, differing approaches emerge—such that, for instance, one society sees the manner of exercising this right one way, and another society sees it another way—this does not mean that the right has been disregarded. It is not the case that all societies must exercise these rights by a single method and according to a single approach. Human society must, while recognizing and observing these rights, also allow for a choice in the manner of exercising them.
Some natural rights, then, are broadly speaking undeniable; yet whatever is named as a natural right need not necessarily be regarded by us, too, as a natural right. Natural right possesses certain characteristics and roots (it also, admittedly, has certain limiting conditions, which we shall set forth later) such that, with due regard for these, we naturally cannot accept it in certain instances. If we accept a minimal and most certain core of natural rights, many of our problems and difficulties are resolved. I shall point to a few examples of these.
In our discussion of the foundations of inherent dignity, we stated that these exist in the human being and can in no way whatsoever be divested. Intellect is the most important—and, in the view of some, the sole—inherent dignity of the human being, and the root of other forms of dignity is likewise, in the view of some, the intellect. By virtue of possessing intellect, the human being has been endowed with certain abilities and capacities; in the words of Martyr Muṭahharī, the intellect is the document for a number of natural rights. If we look at the functions of the intellect, and at what particular quality this instrument possesses, and indeed at why it has been given to the human being in the first place, we may, in one formulation, cite a general right termed “the right to rational thought” (ḥaqq-i taʿaqqul) belonging to the human being. One who possesses intellect must naturally have the inherent mission of the intellect preserved within him—that is, the right to ponder, the right to think; no one can bar a human being from thinking. Thinking and pondering, in their logical sense, mean the movement of the mind from the known to the unknown and from the unknown to the known, and the discovery of unknowns. This is an undeniable corollary of the intellect’s presence in the human being. The right to think, then, is a natural right; no one can divest a person of this right.
The right to learn and to acquire knowledge is likewise among the natural rights; some of these have been included in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as well, and no dispute exists concerning them.
Freedom in learning—the human being’s right to conduct inquiry in order to understand and apprehend the truth—these are rights that, given the particular nature of the intellect, certainly exist in the human being. The human being enjoys these rights; because he possesses intellect, these rights are affirmed for him, and no one can divest him of them. This does not mean, of course, that the human being may think in whatever manner he pleases, or ponder however he wishes; this is precisely the point of disagreement between our position and that of certain proponents of natural rights, a matter we shall address in the discussion of scope.
If, for instance, the human being possesses will and choice (which, admittedly, may itself be a branch of the human rational faculty), he possesses the right to choose, freedom in selection, and is accordingly responsible. God Almighty has, in essence, made punishment and reward the consequences of responsibility in the human being; He thus says: you possessed intellect, you possessed will and choice with which to choose, and you must therefore stand by your own choice—that is, you must accept the consequences and the responsibility of your choice as well. If, for instance, a person chooses the crooked path, he must accept responsibility for this choice; if a person transgresses against divine law, this was his own choosing, yet he must likewise accept the consequences of this choice and this exercise of choice.
Intellect, will and choice, and human emotions and feelings, then, are forms of inherent dignity, and certain rights are accordingly affirmed for the human being precisely on this account. The fact that, for instance, in warfare with non-believers, in dealing with the slain, with prisoners, with the survivors of war, or even with their property, or with the natural resources found within the area and theater of war, certain systems govern these matters, is entirely consonant with what has been stated. These rights, although disagreement exists as to their breadth and scope, are nonetheless recognized in principle.
We may have discussion, too, as to whether a given matter, in its very enumeration, is in fact a right at all or not. But the right to life, the right to freedom of expression, and the right to choice in its general sense—the choice of clothing, the choice of dwelling, the choice of place of study—constitute a set of natural rights affirmed for all human beings; whether unbeliever or Muslim, in whatever geographic region they may be, of whatever race they may be, these rights are affirmed for them.
Special Rights
Beyond these rights, which are rooted in human reason and in human emotions and feelings, certain rights are likewise conceivable, in particular, for those who have attained a higher form of dignity; there is no impediment whatsoever to this. For instance, if ten students are studying in a single class, they possess equal rights; yet the student who has been more diligent and serious in his studies and has obtained better results—it is a rational and accepted matter that certain advantages be granted to him; there is no difficulty in this whatsoever. Accordingly, if a human being pursues forms of acquired dignity and comes to be characterized by these forms of dignity, he may come to enjoy certain of these advantages. For instance, Islam in its true sense, faith, movement along the path of divine vicegerency, and the human being’s attainment of a station such that he becomes the object of the angels’ prostration (matters known as forms of acquired dignity) can constitute the foundation for a series of rights and privileges beyond natural rights; this holds even in this world, to say nothing of the hereafter.
We must bear in mind that the long and extensive list of natural rights put forward in the world today—such as the recognition of a right to choice for the homosexual, or for one who harbors numerous moral deviations or numerous intellectual deviations and pollutes society like a poison—is not necessarily accepted by us. We hold, rather, that certain rights, broadly speaking, are affirmed for the human being, arising from his inherent dignity.
The Limiting Conditions on Natural Rights
The last matter I wish to address—and one that may well constitute the answer to your question—is this: do natural rights, even within the sphere of their most certain core, possess no limiting condition whatsoever, and are they absolute? That is, is the human being, for instance, free in every circumstance, with his right to freedom being absolute? Is his right to life absolute? Is his right to choice absolute? Or are these, rather, qualified by certain limiting conditions? We are looking at natural rights from a broad, overarching vantage point; that disagreement exists in some particular instance is not our present concern. Is the totality of natural rights, which, as we have said, is affirmed for both unbeliever and Muslim alike, entirely without limiting condition, or must certain restrictions be applied to it?
In our view, restriction is applied to natural rights from two directions; that is, natural rights are, in fact, subject to two limiting conditions. These two conditions are important, and neither is in any way incompatible with the inherent character of dignity.
The First Condition
The first condition is the non-violation of the natural rights of others, whether individual or collective. Should a natural right come to entail the violation of another’s natural right, then this right is no longer affirmed. When we say that natural rights cannot be divested or altered, and that no person, government, or law can divest them, we mean this to hold under ordinary and natural conditions, and absent any conflicting or competing claim (lawlā al-muʿāriḍ wa al-muzāḥim). But should a person seek to conduct himself in a manner that endangers the security of the people, that threatens people’s lives, or that seeks to deceive and to advance his ends through falsehood, then the right to life and the right to freedom carry no meaning for him in that instance. No rational person, throughout history, and even today, would permit a human being, by means of his own natural right, to create chaos and disrupt order. I am not here concerned with the abuses to which these titles are put; for instance, when the Israelis say that, in order to establish order in the Middle East region, we must unjustly kill fifty thousand people, this is mere pretext and abuse. We are speaking, rather, of an ordinary set of circumstances, in which someone wishes to administer a society and enact a law, or in which a law already exists and must take this limiting factor on natural right into consideration—namely, the non-violation and non-transgression of the rights of others. Should the rights of others come under violation, then, in this instance, that person’s own right is certainly divested by way of penalty, so that he may not transgress against others or cause others harm and distress. It may even be that, were a given individual considered in isolation from any collective or society, no impediment or difficulty whatsoever would attend his exercise of this natural right, since no transgression against others is involved. But when we examine his right with due regard for the collective, we find that the matter is now suspended between an individual right and a social right; in this instance, the social right certainly takes precedence. This is something about which no one harbors any doubt.
All rational people, then, recognize this first restriction, and no one denies it.
The Second Condition
The second condition, which warrants further discussion, consists in the interests and divine purposes (aghrāḍ-i ilāhī) that God has had in view for the human being, and for the attainment of which He has created this world and the human being; this is of great importance. This, too, is a limiting factor. … If God has created the human being so that the human being might attain felicity, so that he might attain the station of divine vicegerency, and so that he might acquire various forms of dignity, then his natural right is naturally restricted accordingly. This constitutes an important point of divergence. Is the human being free to think however he pleases and to direct his mind in whatever direction he wishes? Is he free, for instance, to entertain impure thoughts? It is true that these do not reach the stage of action, yet when the matter of freedom of thought is raised, can we regard the human being as utterly unconstrained and unrestrained in this domain? Can we say that you are free to create whatever impure image you please? Certainly this is not so; this, then, constitutes a restriction. … Whatever, in some manner, entails human corruption is incompatible with divine wisdom and with the divine purpose. A further restricting factor upon natural rights, then, is this: natural rights are affirmed for the human being only to the extent that they do not conflict with these divine purposes, forms of wisdom, and aims. This, too, returns to our outlook on the human being—to what sort of being we take the human being to be. The conception held by Muslim and non-Muslim thinkers regarding the human being differs; each holds a different view as to what characteristics the human being possesses, what capacities he bears, and how these capacities ought to be brought to flourishing.
We thus have two restricting factors here: first, transgression against and conflict with the rights of others, whether individual or social; second, the preservation of the forms of wisdom and the interests that God has had in view for the human being.
We are not, for the moment, concerned with the narrow or expansive interpretations that may be given to divine wisdom; someone might construe divine wisdom and divine purposes so narrowly as to negate the entirety of natural rights altogether.