he must free a slave

Now let’s look into what he must do before touching her, which according to Q58 V3 is fatahriru raqabat, translated here as to ‘free a slave’.

Let’s start with harir, its root alphabets are ha, ra and ra, and 6 forms of the word occurred a total of 15 times in the Quran. And it means heat, thirst, to become hot, to intensify, free a person, liberate, to set free and such other words that derives from it.

So how do we understand all of these meanings? Let’s start with fire. When a fire burns, it strives away, to be free, and so does the smoke that emanates from it. Hence, this is what heat and freedom have in common. When the heat is from the sun, it frees up sweat from one, and makes one dehydrated; and through that we have thirst, freedom, intensity, sweating etc.

And this is the word Allah has chosen to describe the kind of freedom the said slave must have. She or he must be as free as smoke in the skies, as free as the light from the sun et al. There mustn’t be any encumbrances or conditions to his freedom, it must be one that is absolute.

You must be wondering why I’m spending so much time explaining the character of freedom this slave must have when there aren’t really any legal slave market out there where one can go and free a slave, right? Well, bear with me. The word translated to ‘slave’ actually means ‘neck’, and when we are done with it, you’ll see how one even today can do tahriru raqabat.

Raqabat’s origin alphabets are ra, qaf and ba, and 7 forms of the word occurred a total of 24 times. And it means neck, responsibility, slave, war prisoner, an elevated place, a watch post, to watch, to observe, to guard, to pay attention and the likes.

So how did raqib come to mean slave as against ‘abd that we are used to? You see, during slavery, some slaves had cuffs around their necks, some do have around their ankle, wrist and the likes, but to have iron collars around a slave’s neck is to have really made that slave subservient, broken and truly enslaved. While anyone can put cuffs anywhere, it is the master that puts chains around a slave’s neck, and pulls him with it. Kind of like a dog leash today. To really have control of a dog or any other animal for that matter, once the leash goes around its neck, no matter how hard it fights, it is being controlled now. Same goes for the cowboy and his rope when he throws it around the beast’s neck, it is now being controlled. This is especially true of the rope around the neck of a horse, which is then used to control it.

And so from that comes the idea of being enslaved. And since with slavery, one is needed for work; with it comes responsibilities one has to attend to, keep watch over, guard, inspect and the likes. And that’s how the word for ‘neck’ has come to mean ‘slave’, responsibilities and the likes.

In Yoruba, rogbodiyọn yẹn ti wọ lọrun which means the troubles has sunk his neck is said of one that has been overwhelmed with troubles. Ọrun being the word for neck. And the word for peace of mind is ‘irọrun’ which is basically ‘ease of neck’. And the yorubas actually say tu okun lọrun ẹru which means remove the rope around the slave’s neck when they are talking about liberating a slave.

What we get from all of these is that the particular use of raqib instead of ‘abd makes sure that the idea of responsibilities placed on one’s neck, since it is eternal, the verse is able to apply anytime, anywhere. Allahu Akbar!

So, the question then is, what was the worth of a slave back then? For it is only in knowing this, that one is able to measure what the worth of freeing a slave today would be. And it is in so finding, that one is then able to seek people that life has dealt so much blows at them that o ti wọ wọn lọrun, it has sunk their necks, and made it stiff.

The average amount of a slave back in the 18th and 19th centuries was about $400, which in today’s money would be $12,000. So if there were necks to be freed today aka slaves, it would be that of a slave that’s worth $12,000. And since we don’t have necks to be freed from iron shackles today, there are necks to be freed from financial shackles, and the likes, and the amount one must give is $12,000.

Today, maybe one can give it to a mosque, bail bonds, or an NGO – there should be a tahriru raqabat NGO by the way – and request that it be given to someone that has a $12,000 debt, or one can seek someone out by one’s self if need be. I mean, in today’s world, that shouldn’t be hard, especially in America, where people have crippling student loans that ranges between $50,000 to $300,000. Now, that’s neck crushing.

I’m reminded of the slavery scheme called PayDay Loan in America. Where if one were to borrow $3,000 now, and pay a charge fee of $300; if one isn’t able to pay the $3,000 next pay day, one only has to pay the charge fee of $300 again. And of course, in most cases, the victims aren’t able to pay the amount they borrowed, so that even in 10 months when they would have collected $3,000 worth of charge fee, the victim is still expected to continue paying the said $300 until that day that they are able to bring in $3,000 and pay off their debt, which in most cases, that day never comes. And you might say why do people still patronize the payday loaners? It’s because desperate times calls for desperate measures. No one with abundance will go and seek them out for sure. The woes of unbridled capitalism, right? Anyway, my point is, seeking folks that have financial leash around their necks today, and are overwhelmed, shouldn’t be too difficult to find.

So, before one is able to ‘touch’ one’s spouse after having declared ziHar on her, this is the first hurdle, to emancipate the neck of someone drowning in life’s troubles. And if one is unable to do that because one doesn’t have employees that have $12,000 worth of debt, or find someone that has $12,000 worth of bills, or one isn’t even rich enough to afford such an amount, then the next atonement should be doable; fasting for two consecutive months. And it is only if he were too old to fast, or he is exempted from fasting for whatever reason that he can then move to the next atonement.

But we will deal with the fasting, and feeding in a later piece inshaAllah. Amin. May Allah make it easy for Muslim spouses to live in ma’ruf. Amin.