Al-Muqsit

The root. Al-Muqsit comes from q-s-ṭ, a root about fairness and balance, but with a grammatical complication the name itself trades on: the plain verb qasaṭa means to act unjustly, while the fourth form aqsaṭa means the opposite, to act with justice — one of a small number of Arabic roots where the added form reverses rather than intensifies the base meaning. Qisṭ is the noun for justice or a fair share, and muqsiṭ is the active participle of the fourth form, "the one who does justice."

What it means here. Al-Muqsit is read as the one who deals out perfect equity, weighing every claim and every wrong with total accuracy and no favor — a justice that needs no appeal because no error is possible in it to begin with. It is read beside Al-'Adl, "the Just," as an intensified or active form of the same underlying meaning: where Al-'Adl states justice as an attribute, Al-Muqsit is read as naming the ongoing act of establishing it among created things.

Where it is met. The word muqsiṭūn — those who act justly — appears in the Quran several times, but describing people rather than Allah: Surah Al-Ma'idah 5:42 states that Allah loves al-muqsiṭīn, those who act with justice; Al-Hujurat 49:9 and Al-Mumtahanah 60:8 use the same word the same way, of believers commanded to deal fairly. None of these verses names Allah Himself Al-Muqsit; the title is drawn by the tradition from the root's sense of justice and from names like Al-'Adl and Al-Hakam rather than from a verse applying this exact word to Allah.