The Four Books of Shiʿi Hadith: From Inception to Consolidation

Since their compilations in the tenth and eleventh centuries ce, the four hadith books, al-Kāfī, al-Faqīh, al-Tahdhīb, and al-Istibṣār, have left an indelible mark on Shiʿi religiosity. The present study takes as its starting point the earliest instance in which these four compilations were collectively referred to as the Four Books (al-kutub al-arbaʿa). I investigate the major developments in the period between the inception of this phrase in the fifteenth century and its consolidation as the demarcator of a unique Imami hadith corpus in the seventeenth century. Following the introduction, each section of the article focuses on a figure whose ideas contributed to this consolidation process. In the conclusion I summarize the findings of the previous sections and reflect on the notion of hadith canonicity within the context of Imami jurisprudence during the period under study.

Between Implementation and Legislation: The Shiʿi Imam Muḥammad al-Jawād’s Khums Demand Letter of 220 ah/835 ce

The Imami Shiʿa are usually treated as a community defined by belief. By analysing a letter attributed to the ninth Imami Imam, Muḥammad al-Jawād dated to the year of his death in 220/835, I show that the Imami Shiʿa were defined also by institutional structures that tied them to their Imam in his capacity as community leader. Details of transmission, form and content suggest that the letter may well be authentic, giving us a unique window onto the Imamic administration. The letter is a tax demand, encouraging payment of the khums levy upon the spoils of war and other items. My analysis suggests that the understanding of khums and ghanīma among Imamis at this time continued to be fluid, subject to the Imam’s adjustment, and that implementation influenced the elaboration of the law. Subsequently, hadith scholars and jurists were thus forced to interpret how such ad hoc, pragmatic acts fit into Islamic law, which is conceived as eternal and divine.

Rebelling against the Ruler: Egyptian Youth and Azhari Scholars’ Authority after the 2011 Uprising

Scholars have investigated statements by Azhari ʿulamāʾ (religious scholars) about the legality of protest in Egypt in 2011 and 2013 and their use of fiqh al-wāqiʿ, a jurisprudential method by which jurists consider social and political realities when issuing legal opinions. These studies focus on Islamic legal theory but do not examine the social implications of the legal. Based on textual analysis of televised statements by ʿulamāʾ and interviews with young Muslim Egyptians, I argue that, although some jurists discouraged the laity from joining the 2011 protests, religious youth were not deterred from protesting. Additionally, laypeople who are not well-versed in Islamic law grew suspicious of the shifting opinions of ʿulamāʾ on the legal status of protest, as happened in 2013. In the aftermath of the 2011 and 2013 movements, the moral capital of several Azhari scholars decreased as did the moral-legal purchase of the fatwās they issued.

Islamic Legal Reform or Re-formation? The Transmutations of Critique in Rumee Ahmed’s Sharia Compliant: A User’s Guide to Hacking Islamic Law

To say that the issue of Islamic legal reform is on the minds of most scholars and students (Muslim or otherwise) of Islamic law is hardly an exaggeration. But what does reform look like? Rumee Ahmed engages the issue in his recent book, Sharia Compliant: A User’s Guide to Hacking Islamic Law. Intended for a broad audience and aimed at catalyzing legal change from the bottom up, Sharia Compliant attempts to demystify Islamic jurisprudence and provide a blueprint for lawmaking, or “hacking” Islamic law, through reverse-engineering. In the process of his critique of Islamic law, Ahmed revises its history and method. This review argues that in lieu of reform, Ahmed argues for re-forming Islamic law. The hyphen is meant to indicate that Ahmed’s proposal amounts to a transmutation of fiqh and uṣūl al-fiqh: Islamic law is not interpreted, but arbitrarily willed; its sources (the Qur’an and Sunna), ornaments of this will, are instrumentalized to serve any desired end. In the end, Ahmed’s re-formed system undermines his hope for a democratic process of lawmaking.

Text Mining Islamic Law

Digital humanities has a venerable pedigree, stretching back to the middle of the twentieth century, but despite noteworthy pioneering contributions it has not become a mainstream practice in Islamic Studies. This essay applies humanities computing to the study of Islamic law. We analyze a representative corpus of works of Islamic substantive law (furūʿ al-fiqh) from the beginnings of Islamic legal jurisprudence to the early modern period (2nd/8th-13th/19th c.) using several computational tools and methods: text-reuse network analysis based on plain-text annotations and html tags, clustered frequency-based analysis, word clouds, and topic modeling. Applying machine-guided distant reading to Islamic legal texts over the longue-dureé, we study (1) the role of the Qurʾān, (2) patterns of normative qualifications (aḥkām), and (3) the distribution of topics in our corpus. In certain instances the analysis confirms claims made in the scholarly literature on Islamic law, in other instances it corrects such claims.

The Ur-Muwaṭṭaʾ and Its Recensions

In this essay, I use the numerous extensive quotations from Mālik found in al-Shāfiʿī’s Kitāb al-Umm to reconstruct what might be called al-Shāfiʿī’s recension of Mālik’s Muwaṭṭaʾ and to compare this recension with the surviving complete Muwaṭṭaʾ recensions of Abū Muṣʿab al-Zuhrī, Ibn Bukayr, and Yaḥyā b. Yaḥyā al-Laythī. I present examples of the differences between the recensions, analyze one specific type of variant closely, and use my findings to suggest possible reasons for the various kinds of discrepancies. Through this analysis I both affirm Mālik’s role as the Muwaṭṭaʾ’s author and situate the nature of his authorship in the context of teaching and transmission practices and the materiality of the book in the second/eighth century.

Sexualization of Sharīʿa: Application of Islamic Criminal (Ḥudūd) Laws in Pakistan)

In 1979, General Zia ul-Haq promulgated the Hudood Ordinances to provide Islamic punishments for several offenses, but the prosecution for extra-marital sex (zinā) has been disproportionately higher. Based on the analysis of reported judgments, I argue that the higher rate of prosecutions for zinā was a direct result of new laws. Despite carrying the name “Hudood”, these Ordinances specified several taʿzīr offenses with the objective of ensuring prosecutions. By incorporating ḥadd and taʿzīr offenses for zinā, the Zina Ordinance blurred the distinction between consensual sex and rape, and thus exposed victim women, who reported rape, to prosecution for consensual sex. The Qazf Ordinance, which might have curbed the filing of false accusations of zinā, encouraged them by providing the complainants the defense of good faith. The number of zinā cases has decreased after the reform of the Zina Ordinance and the Qazf Ordinance under the Protection of Women Act, 2006.

From Ethico-Religious Exhortation to Legal Paraenesis: Functions of Qur’anic Waʿẓ

This essay examines qur’anic “exhortation” and “legal paraenesis” in light of pre-Islamic Arabic poetry and late antique biblical traditions. It analyzes the verb waʿaẓa and related forms in narrative and legal/legislative sections of suras that can be assigned to different chronological stages of the Qur’an’s textual genesis. Qur’anic exhortations initially occur in narratives about messengers sent to unbelieving peoples. The word mawʿiẓa then becomes part of the self-referential vocabulary of the Qur’an and is used to characterize the contents of Moses’ Tablets. This linguistic development anticipates a process of legal and regulatory actualization, specification, and exposition: in the Medinan period, legal discourse is framed with the verb waʿaẓa. The emerging Medinan legal paraenesis puts emphasis on social applicability, but it is neither parochial nor does it break with Meccan ethics. Instead, it connects the communication and implementation of laws, rulings, and commands to human volition in a specific social context.

The Decline of Green-Glazed Jars after the Early Abbasid Period

Green-glazed jars were manufactured in southern Iraq during the Parthian, Sasanian, and early Islamic periods. In the latter period, they were distributed in great numbers in the Near East and in coastal areas along the Indian Ocean from the Horn of Africa to China and Japan. The jars are thought to have been used chiefly for storing “date-syrup.” Around the 4th/10th century their production was significantly reduced and their prevalence greatly declined, a phenomenon that has puzzled archeologists. In this study, I identify these jars with “the green jars” (al-jarr al-akhḍar or ḥantam) mentioned in some classical Islamic texts. According to numerous Ḥadīth, the Prophet prohibited nabīdh (date-wine) in “green jars.” While many Muslim jurists held that the Prophet withdrew this prohibition and that these jars were lawful, many found the use of these jars reprehensible or even forbidden. I suggest that the Ḥadīth in which the Prophet prohibited green jars may have contributed to the decline of green-glazed jars.

Authority in the Classical Ḥanafī School: the Emergence & Evolution of Ẓāhir al-Riwāya

The madhhab in its classical form was an authoritative entity with substantive boundaries that established the outer limits of the school and its authoritative doctrine. The latter involved, among other things, confronting the plurality of opinions found within the school. In this essay, I will analyse the manner in which Ḥanafī jurists attempted to limit this plurality through an authorizing discourse that created a taxonomy of legal doctrine ranking different opinions present in the corpus juris of their school. Specifically, I will examine the most authoritative corpus in this taxonomy, namely ẓāhir al-riwāya, in five parts: the first part will investigate the concept of legal authority prior to ẓāhir al-riwāya; the second part will identify the earliest usage of the term ẓāhir al-riwāya; the third and fourth parts will analyse the popularization of this doctrine, its spread, and earliest theorization; the final part will briefly investigate what ẓāhir al-riwāya denoted.