Muslim Law
INTRODUCTION
Total and unqualified submission to the will of Allah is the fundamental tenet of Islam: Islamic law is therefore the expression of Allah’s command for Muslim society and, in application, constitutes a system of duties that are incumbent upon a Muslim by virtue of his religious belief. Known as the Shari’a (literally, “the path leading to the watering place”), the law constitutes a divinely ordained path of conduct that guides the Muslim toward a practical expression of his religious conviction in this world and the goal of divine favour in the world to come.
Muslim Family Law (MFL), which includes all matters of inheritance for Muslims, is an integral part of a rich, complex and highly sophisticated system of Islamic jurisprudence (commonly known as Shari’a) that can be traced back to the 8th and 9th centuries C.E.Sharia is the fundamental religious concept of Islam. Significant theological and jurisprudential differences existed from the very beginning not only between Sunni and Shi’a Muslim jurists, but also among the different schools of thought of each tradition, and indeed within the same school of thought (Madhahib, sing. Madhhab). The early jurists not only accepted serious disagreement and difference of opinion, but in fact expressly described them as a sign of the grace of God. It is true that those jurists probably assumed that there ought to be one valid interpretation of Qur’an and Sunna (traditions of the Prophet) leading to the formulation of body of Shari’a principles. In this light, the notion of an immutable body of principles of Shari’a as universally binding on all Muslims for eternity was utterly inconceivable to the early jurists, notwithstanding subsequent claims that such a body of principles exists. This appreciation of traditional Shari’a as a historically conditioned interpretation and understanding of Islam is crucial for the possibilities of alternative modern formulations of MFL that would be fully consistent with modern
Total and unqualified submission to the will of Allah is the fundamental tenet of Islam: Islamic law is therefore the expression of Allah’s command for Muslim society and, in application, constitutes a system of duties that are incumbent upon a Muslim by virtue of his religious belief. Known as the Shari’a (literally, “the path leading to the watering place”), the law constitutes a divinely ordained path of conduct that guides the Muslim toward a practical expression of his religious conviction in this world and the goal of divine favour in the world to come.
Muslim Family Law (MFL), which includes all matters of inheritance for Muslims, is an integral part of a rich, complex and highly sophisticated system of Islamic jurisprudence (commonly known as Shari’a) that can be traced back to the 8th and 9th centuries C.E.Sharia is the fundamental religious concept of Islam. Significant theological and jurisprudential differences existed from the very beginning not only between Sunni and Shi’a Muslim jurists, but also among the different schools of thought of each tradition, and indeed within the same school of thought (Madhahib, sing. Madhhab). The early jurists not only accepted serious disagreement and difference of opinion, but in fact expressly described them as a sign of the grace of God. It is true that those jurists probably assumed that there ought to be one valid interpretation of Qur’an and Sunna (traditions of the Prophet) leading to the formulation of body of Shari’a principles. In this light, the notion of an immutable body of principles of Shari’a as universally binding on all Muslims for eternity was utterly inconceivable to the early jurists, notwithstanding subsequent claims that such a body of principles exists. This appreciation of traditional Shari’a as a historically conditioned interpretation and understanding of Islam is crucial for the possibilities of alternative modern formulations of MFL that would be fully consistent with modern