The Qur'an Has Not Recommended Taqlid

In the Qur'an, there is no direct command or recommendation for taqlid — following a scholar without attaining knowledge. The word taqlid and its derivatives are not used in the Qur'an either. Nevertheless, advocates of taqlid point to certain Qur'anic verses to try to prove that the Qur'an indirectly endorses taqlid (for example, see here). In what follows, we will examine those verses. But this itself raises an important question: why has such a fundamental issue not been stated explicitly in the Qur'an? That is, why do we not have a verse that says, for example, "Every Muslim must either be a mujtahid, act with precaution, or imitate" or a similar command? The last part of this section will address this question further.