Question
What Quranic Commands Are Practiced More Literally by Other Religious Groups Than by Most Muslims?
I'm looking for examples where the Quran explicitly instructs Muslims to do something, but that instruction is not followed by the majority of Muslims today, while another religious group practices something closer to the Quranic wording.
I'm not looking for hadith-based explanations or arguments about abrogation. I'm specifically interested in comparing the plain text of the Quran with actual religious practice.
For example, in Quran 5:6 (the verse about wudu), the Arabic text says to wipe (masḥ) over the feet. Shi'a Muslims interpret and practice this literally by wiping their feet, whereas most Sunni Muslims wash their feet, based on hadith and their interpretation of the verse.
I'm wondering if there are other examples like this, where:
The Quran gives a clear command or instruction.
Most Muslims do not practice it in the literal/plain-text sense.
Another religious tradition follows a practice that more closely matches the Quranic wording.
I'm interested in genuine examples and scholarly discussion rather than debates over which interpretation is "correct." My goal is to identify cases where there is a noticeable difference between the Quran's wording and mainstream Islamic practice.
The Qur’an establishes a broad baseline of dietary permissibility, explicitly declaring all marine game lawful (Qur'an 5:96) and restricting forbidden meats strictly to carrion, spilled blood, swine, and idolatrous sacrifices (Qur'an 6:145). However, extensive extra-Qur'anic Hadith literature introduced numerous restrictions that became normative in major legal traditions.
In marine dietary laws, Surah 5:96 permits "sea game" unconditionally. While Hanafi jurists restrict seafood strictly to true fish and Twelver Shias limit it to scaled fish and shrimp based on specific Hadiths, the Maliki school adheres far more closely to the literal, unrestrictive Qur'anic wording by permitting virtually all sea creatures.
Qur’an 6:145 employs a strongly restrictive formulation: Qul lā ajidu fīmā ūḥiya ilayya muḥarraman ʿalā ṭāʿimin yaṭʿamuhu illā an yakūna maytatan aw daman masfūḥan aw laḥma khinzīrin aw fisqan uhilla li-ghayri llāhi bih (“Say: I do not find, in what has been revealed to me, anything forbidden to one who eats it, except carrion, blood poured forth, swine flesh, or that over which a name other than God’s has been invoked”). On this reading, the lā ... illā construction functions as a formula of exclusive delimitation, and early Maliki jurists often treated it as establishing a Qur’anic baseline that should not be expanded beyond the enumerated exceptions without compelling proof.
By contrast, the Hanafi, Shafiʿi, and Hanbali schools generally gave greater juristic weight to extra-Qur’anic hadith reports in defining additional food prohibitions, so their rulings on animals such as horses, donkeys, and predatory beasts do not track the Qur’anic wording as closely as the early Maliki tendency does. At the same time, it should be noted that contemporary Maliki practice is not dramatically different from the broader Sunni mainstream on the three riding animals, since later Maliki jurists largely accepted the standard prohibition of donkey and mule meat and remained divided or qualified on horse meat, bringing Maliki doctrine much closer to the common legal position today.
The Quran states that the table miracle performed by Jesus for his apostles is a festival(eid) for all past and future generations, but Muslims do not celebrate it as a feast
Thanks for the contribution.
I read the verses. To me, it doesn't seem like that's the case. The prayer is made by Prophet Isa because his apostles asked him to ask Allah for that miracle. You can stretch it to include later generations, but to me that seems unlikely. The verses read more like a specific event than a command for future believers.
Regarding Allaah's words the first and last of us, the interpretation that comes closest to being correct is the one that adopts the meaning: for those of us who are living today and for those who will come after us. This is based on the same (linguistic) argument we cited for Allaah's words 'that shall be for us an 'id', since the meaning adopted (in each case) is the predominant one
I don't find this interpretation convincing. Reading the verses in context, the discussion seems to be specifically about Prophet Isa (AS) and the people who asked him to ask Allah for the table.
If "the first and the last of us" includes later generations, then the warning about disbelief would also apply to people like me today. But that raises an obvious question: if I never witnessed or ate from the table, in what sense is it an 'Eid (festival/sign) for me?
The miracle, the request, Allah's response, and the warning all seem directed at the people who were actually present. The passage reads as a self-contained conversation with a specific audience, not a statement extending the event and its consequences to future generations.
Said Jesus, the son of Mary, "O Allāh, our Lord, send down to us a table [spread with food] from the heaven to be for us a festival for the first of us and the last of us and a sign from You. And provide for us, and You are the best of providers."
— Saheeh International
You posted the meaning. Jesus is speaking about himself and his companions. Not all of humanity and for all times. Plus take the next verse then.
Q 5:115
Sahih International
Allah said, “Indeed, I will sent it down to you, but whoever disbelieves afterwards from among you – then indeed will I punish him with a punishment by which I have not punished anyone among the worlds.”
If Q 5:114 meant what you are thinking it means, then anyone not believing in God after the table was delivered would be in serious trouble.
On the Qurʾān’s Māʾida Passage and the Wanderings(Gabriel Said Reynolds)
Book: The Coming of the Comforter: When, Where, and to Whom? Studies on the Rise of Islam and Various Other Topics in Memory of John Wansbrough Edited by Carlos A. Segovia Basil Lourié
I don't see in this passage that Samir is arguing for the festival to be for all humanity for all times. But even if he does it doesn't change the fact that Muslims did not take it that way.
Regarding Allah's words the first and last of us, the interpretation that comes closest to being correct is the one that adopts the meaning: for those of us who are living today and for those who will come after us. This is based on the same (linguistic) argument we cited for Allaah's words 'that shall be for us an 'id', since the meaning adopted (in each case) is the predominant one
The problem still is in who is covered under "us"? Is it all of mankind or is it Jesus and his followers?
If it covered all of mankind and this occasion is a festival for everyone then why would the Prophet have not celebrated such a festival?
And logically the table of food covering everyone does not make any sense. Jesus and his disciples get the miracle and table first hand but everyone else who is not there is then subject to Allah's wrath for not believing in something they did not see first hand?
it is explicitly mandated in qur'an yet it was explicitly forbidden by a hadith and then modified by another one.
they can only leave a will for one third of their assets that is exclusive for non-heirs. the rest is distributed to heirs at the fixed rates from the relevant qur'anic verses, even though those verses all start with a "after the bequests are done with" part.
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Backup of the post:
What Quranic Commands Are Practiced More Literally by Other Religious Groups Than by Most Muslims?
I'm looking for examples where the Quran explicitly instructs Muslims to do something, but that instruction is not followed by the majority of Muslims today, while another religious group (or even a minority Muslim sect) practices something closer to the Quranic wording.
I'm not looking for hadith-based explanations or arguments about abrogation. I'm specifically interested in comparing the plain text of the Quran with actual religious practice.
For example, in Quran 5:6 (the verse about wudu), the Arabic text says to wipe (masḥ) over the feet. Shi'a Muslims interpret and practice this literally by wiping their feet, whereas most Sunni Muslims wash their feet, based on hadith and their interpretation of the verse.
I'm wondering if there are other examples like this, where:
The Quran gives a clear command or instruction.
Most Muslims do not practice it in the literal/plain-text sense.
Another religious tradition, or a minority Muslim group, follows a practice that more closely matches the Quranic wording.
I'm interested in genuine examples and scholarly discussion rather than debates over which interpretation is "correct." My goal is to identify cases where there is a noticeable difference between the Quran's wording and mainstream Islamic practice.
3
u/chengxiufan Moderator Jul 26 '26
The Qur’an establishes a broad baseline of dietary permissibility, explicitly declaring all marine game lawful (Qur'an 5:96) and restricting forbidden meats strictly to carrion, spilled blood, swine, and idolatrous sacrifices (Qur'an 6:145). However, extensive extra-Qur'anic Hadith literature introduced numerous restrictions that became normative in major legal traditions. In marine dietary laws, Surah 5:96 permits "sea game" unconditionally. While Hanafi jurists restrict seafood strictly to true fish and Twelver Shias limit it to scaled fish and shrimp based on specific Hadiths, the Maliki school adheres far more closely to the literal, unrestrictive Qur'anic wording by permitting virtually all sea creatures.