PRE-EMPTION

Arabic Shufʿah ( شفعة‎ ). Lit . “Adjunction.” The right of pre-emption is a power of po e ing property which is for sale, and is established upon the teaching of Muḥammad. It applies not to movable property but to immovable property ( ʿaqār ). This right of pre-emption appertains in the first place to the co-sharer or partner in the property; secondly, to a sharer in the immunities and appendages of the property, such as the right to water, or to roads; and thirdly, to the neighbour. ( Hidāyah , vol. iii. p. 594.) PRE-EXISTENCE OF SOULS is taught both in the Qurʾān and the Traditions. ʿĀyishah relates that Muḥammad said, “Souls before they became united with bodies were like a embled armies, and afterwards they were dispersed and sent into the bodies of mankind.” ( Mishkāt , book xxii. ch. xvi.) There is said to be a reference to this doctrine in the Qurʾān:— Sūrah vii. 171 : “And when the Lord drew forth their posterity from the loins of the sons of Adam.…” The commentator, al-Baiẓāwī, says , “ God stroked Adam’s back and extracted from his loins his whole posterity, which should come into the world until the Resurrection, one generation after another; and that these souls were all a embled together like small ants, and after they had in the presence of the angels confe ed their dependence upon God, they were again caused to return into the loins of Adam.” (See Tafsīru ʾl-Baiẓāwī , in loco .)