Virtues of the Flesh - Passion and Purity in Early Islamic Jurisprudence

2005 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ze'ev Maghen
Keyword(s):  
Islamic Jurisprudence ◽  
Early Islamic

Encountering Ambiguity: Muʿtazilī and Twelver Shīʿī Approaches to the Qur'an's Ambiguous Verses

2016 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 91-115 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tehseen Thaver
Keyword(s):  
Eleventh Century ◽  
Arabic Language ◽  
Conceptual Approach ◽  
Islamic Jurisprudence ◽  
Primary Determinant ◽  
Linguistic Challenges ◽  
Qur'anic Exegesis ◽  
Exegetical Tradition ◽  
Qur'an Commentaries ◽  
Early Islamic

Within the broader discipline of Qur'anic exegesis, the sub-genre of the mutashābihāt al-Qurʾān (the ambiguous verses of the Qur'an) is comprised of works dedicated to the identification and explication of those verses that present theological or linguistic challenges. Yet, the approach, style, and objective of the scholars who have written commentaries on the ambiguous verses are far from monolithic. This essay brings into focus the internal diversity of this important exegetical tradition by focusing on the Qur'an commentaries of two major scholars in fourth/eleventh-century Baghdad, al-Sharīf al-Raḍī (d. 406/1016) and Qāḍī ʿAbd al-Jabbār (d. 415/1025). Al-Raḍī was a prominent Twelver Shīʿī theologian and poet while ʿAbd al-Jabbār was a leading Muʿtazilī theologian during this period; al-Raḍī was also ʿAbd al-Jabbār's student and disciple. Through a close reading of their respective commentaries on two Qur'anic verses, I explore possible interconnections and interactions between Shīʿī and Muʿtazilī traditions of exegesis, and demonstrate that while ʿAbd al-Jabbār mobilised the language of Islamic jurisprudence, al-Raḍī primarily relied on early Islamic poetry and the etymology of the Arabic language. Methodologically, I argue against a conceptual approach that valorises sectarian and theological identity as the primary determinant of hermeneutical desires and sensibilities.

Early Islamic Jurisprudence in Egypt: Two Scholars and Their Mukhtaṣars

1998 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 167-182 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan E. Brockopp
Keyword(s):  
North Africa ◽  
Islamic Law ◽  
Transition Period ◽  
Formative Period ◽  
School Students ◽  
Recent Scholarship ◽  
Islamic Jurisprudence ◽  
Legal Texts ◽  
Early Islamic ◽  
Muslim Scholars

Recent scholarship on the manuscript libraries of North Africa has substantially increased the amount of literature available for analysis of the formative period in Islamic law, particularly for the nascent Malikite school. Students of Islamic law are now in a position, for instance, to begin a re-assessment of the 9th century, the vital transition period between the ancient schools of the 7th and 8th centuries, and the establishment of the classical schools in the 10th and 11th centuries.1 Not only will these new texts make the process of establishment of the classical schools clearer, they will also provide a much stronger basis for the study of earlier centuries, throwing into question the canonical status that has been granted to early legal texts by Western and traditional Muslim scholars alike.

A DEVOTIONAL THEORY OF LAW: EPISTEMOLOGY AND MORAL PURPOSE IN EARLY ISLAMIC JURISPRUDENCE

2016 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 42-69 ◽  
Author(s):  
Omar M. Farahat
Keyword(s):  
Ad Hoc ◽  
Eleventh Century ◽  
Moral Motivation ◽  
Social Regulation ◽  
Case Formulation ◽  
Moral Purpose ◽  
Islamic Jurisprudence ◽  
Legal Opinions ◽  
The Law ◽  
Early Islamic

AbstractThe question of the sources of legal normativity continues to haunt legal theorists to this day. While it is largely uncontroversial that modern legal systems claim to produce normative propositions, whether or not there are independent reasons to obey the law remains a contested issue. Those views, as varied as they may be, appear to largely agree that the law is a social phenomenon of definite ontological presence. In this article, I argue, through an analysis of the theories of three prominent ninth- to eleventh-century Muslim jurists, that early Muslim theories of lawmaking did not incorporate any ontologically coherent concept of law. Rather, lawmaking was understood as the case-by-case formulation of legal opinions by individual jurists who were presumed to be driven by the same moral drive, and therefore occupy the same moral order, as all subjects of law. In spite of this ad hoc epistemological view, Islamic jurisprudence conceived of legal pronouncements as fully normative. The normativity of those unstructured ad hoc individual pronouncements, I maintain, is the result of the centrality of moral purpose to early Muslim theories of law. It was the presumption of a common moral drive that gave the legal system structural coherence and allowed the advancement of those pronouncements as normative claims. Whereas recent historical and anthropological work shows that moral motivation was central to the manner in which sharīʿa operated as a system of social regulation, this article argues, along the same lines, that the pietistic drive was both conceptually and structurally indispensable for the normative coherence of early Islamic jurisprudence.

Dead Tradition: Joseph Schacht And The Origins Of "Popular Practice"

2003 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 276-347 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ze'Ev Maghen
Keyword(s):  
Fundamental Question ◽  
Legal Issues ◽  
Primary Role ◽  
Legal Evolution ◽  
Living Tradition ◽  
Islamic Jurisprudence ◽  
Ultimate Source ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Early Islamic

AbstractThe theories of Joseph Schacht regarding the provenance and development of Islamic jurisprudence have been as widely criticized as they have been deeply influential. Schacht's detractors have, for the most part, taken issue with his modern version of intiqād al-rijāl (criticism of hadīth transmitters), by means of which he claimed to turn the previously accepted chronology of early Islamic legal evolution - Allāh→Muhammad→Companions→Followers→fiqh —on its head. However, neither critics nor supporters of Schacht are wont to inquire into a more fundamental question: if prophetic exempla and scriptural dicta are, on Schacht's view, only secondary contributors to the formation of sharī a, what then is the ultimate source of the "living tradition" and "popular practice" to which he assigns the primary role in that enterprise? This essay attempts to elicit a straightforward answer to that question from Schacht's elusive writings on the subject, and then puts that answer to the test with the help of two of the rare instances in which Schacht commits himself on this score regarding specific legal issues.

The Four Sources of Law in Zoroastrian and Islamic Jurisprudence

2005 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 291-332 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jany János
Keyword(s):  
Islamic Law ◽  
Legal Theory ◽  
Formative Period ◽  
Judicial Practice ◽  
Islamic Legal Theory ◽  
Islamic Jurisprudence ◽  
Legal Thinking ◽  
Early Islamic ◽  
Holy Book

AbstractIt is "only our lack of familiarity with Sasanian law," von Grunebaum opined (1970: 37), "that prevents us from uncovering its traces in the fiqh". And Joseph Schacht argued that Sasanian law did have an influence on Islamic law. But neither Schacht nor any other modern scholar has provided persuasive evidence for such influence. In this article I argue that the influence of Sasanian legal theory on Islamic legal theory in the formative period was minimal, at best. It is true that, like Islamic law, Sasanian law was based on four sources: (1) The Awesta or holy book of the Zoroastrians; (2) oral law; (3) the consensus of the sages; and (4) the judicial practice of the courts (kardag). However, the possibility of Iranian influence on early Islamic jurisprudence is limited by historical, cultural, geographical and chronological factors, and the evidence of the sources suggests that Sasanian legal thinking was distinctive from that of the Sunni usulis.

From Fatwās To Furü: Growth and Change in Islamic Substantive Law

1994 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-65 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wael B. Hallaq
Keyword(s):  
Social Background ◽  
Formative Period ◽  
Positive Law ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Islamic Jurisprudence ◽  
Selective Incorporation ◽  
Growth And Change ◽  
Economic Developments ◽  
Substantive Law ◽  
Early Islamic

AbstractModem Islamicist scholarship maintains that after the formative period Islamic substantive law became increasingly rigid, eventually losing touch with political, social, and economic developments. This view has remained in force despite the fact that some scholars have acknowledged that fatwās dealing with new issues were incorporated into subsequent manuals of substantive law. Against this view, I argue that primary and secondary fatwās not only were incorporated on a regular basis into these manuals, but also were instrumental in bringing about legal change by updating the corpus of substantive law. Drawing on a wide range of legal texts emanating from the Hanafi, Mālikī, and Shāfiī schools, I establish a strong connection between fatwās and their social background; define the methods and procedures by which fatwās were incorporated into positive law; and analyze the reasons for their selective incorporation. In the conclusion, I tentatively suggest that the evidence of the muftī's and the proto-mufti's activity in early Islamic times tends to undermine Schacht's thesis regarding the relatively late origins of Islamic jurisprudence.

YASIN DUTTON, The Origins of Islamic Law: The Qur⊃an, the Muwatta⊃and Madinian⊂Amal (London: Curzon Press, 1999). $80.00 cloth.

2000 ◽  
Vol 32 (4) ◽  
pp. 531-532
Author(s):  
Khaled Abou El Fadl
Keyword(s):  
Significant Contribution ◽  
Islamic Law ◽  
Muslim Community ◽  
General Sense ◽  
The People ◽  
Early Islam ◽  
Islamic Jurisprudence ◽  
Western Scholarship ◽  
Early Islamic

Yasin Dutton makes a significant contribution to our understanding of the juristic activity in early Islam. His book produces a systematic and thorough study of the methodologies and legal techniques of Malik's Muwatta⊃, and in so doing, it sheds important light on the origins of Islamic law. Dutton carefully documents Malik's reliance on the Qur⊃an and the ⊂amal (practice) of the people of Medina in formulating early Islamic legal doctrines. In this context, Dutton challenges much of Western scholarship, which tended to minimize the role of the Qur⊃an and the Prophetic sunna in the development of early Islamic jurisprudence. The Qur⊃an, sunna, and ⊂amal, Dutton argues, formed integral components of early Medinian juristic discourses. Importantly, Dutton calls for a more sophisticated understanding of the concept of ⊂amal. He distinguishes between sunna and ⊂amal and between sunna and hadith. Sunna, Dutton contends, consists of the collective inherited precedent of the Prophet. In many ways, it is the Qur⊃anic precedent as well as the interpretations and ijtih―ad of the Prophet as remembered, in a general sense, by the early Muslim community. ⊂Amal, on the other hand, is the Qur⊃an and sunna in action as well as the interpretations and ijtih―ad of the companions, successors, and successors of the successors. Therefore, in a sense, Dutton argues that all ⊂amal includes the sunna, but not all sunna includes ⊂amal.

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