This third podcast in the series by the Center for Intra-Muslim Studies (CIMS) features Dr Muhammed Reza Tajri and a panel of scholars discussing how to address abuse in Muslim communities. The panel discuss the complexities of balancing the need to confront abuse with concerns about fueling Islamophobia. They explore various forms of abuse, such as spiritual and sexual abuse, and the power dynamics that contribute to them. The discussion highlights the importance of implementing safeguards, developing community-based justice systems, and exploring restorative justice approaches. The panelists also stress the need for accountability among religious leaders and suggest practical steps for communities to prevent abuse.

The Centre for Intra-Muslim Studies (CIMS) was established in 2015 to bring together Muslims from across the denominational spectrum to critically discuss ideas pertaining to Islamic theology, history, and contemporary issues affecting Muslims.

Whether or not non-Muslims are subject to Sharīʿa responsibilities has been treated in various contexts in works of uṣul al-fiqh and fiqh. Across schools of thought the prevalent view has been that non-Muslim are indeed subject to sharia responsibilities before God. This position is endorsed by Imāmī Shīʿa legal theorists such as Sharīf alMurtaḍā (d. 436/1044), Shaykh al-Ṭūsī (d. 460/1067), and ʿAllāma al-Ḥillī (d. 460/1067). Each of these considered the question within the context of the linguistic discussions of uṣul al-fiqh framed within enquiries regarding the scope of the imperative. Does the imperative include the non-Muslim and the slave as it includes the Muslim and the free person? This paper will examine how this position has been nuanced by some modern Shīʿī Uṣūlī’s, in response to an Akhbārī rejections of the prevalent view, by distinguishing between universal moral responsibilities applicable to all and particular Sharīʿa addresses only incumbent upon believers. The paper will further point to some contemporary implications of this distinction for our understanding of the nature and practice of Sharīʿa in plural contexts.

Legal and normative discourse has been integral to the fabric of Shīʿism since its inception. Revered across nearly all schools of Islam, the sixth Shīʿī Imām, Imām Jaʿfar b. Muḥammad al-Ṣādiq (d. 765), stands as a paragon of juridical scholarship. The legal doctrines elucidated by Imām Jaʿfar and his immediate successors have purportedly been meticulously preserved by eminent figures such as al-Kulaynī (d. 941), Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān (d. 974), al-Ṣudūq (d. 991), and al-Ṭūsī (d. 1067) within their respective ḥadīth collections. These compendia collectively form a coherent corpus of legalistic discourse, distinctively associated with the Jaʿfarī school of thought. Within this corpus, a specific legal persona of the Imām is presupposed, wherein the linguistic formulation of legal pronouncements is contingent upon the recipient, while the underlying legal principles remain immutable and accessible solely to the Imām. Numerous traditions assert that God has conferred upon the Imām the authority of legal guardianship (al-wilāyah al-tashrīʿiya), enabling them to legislate per divine knowledge, thus allowing flexibility in expressing their legal rulings through various linguistic forms. The embodiment of this principle becomes evident when the Imām issues divergent rulings on the same matter due to specific circumstances, illustrating the dynamic nature of legal language. By recognizing the parallels between legal guardianship and other prevalent Jaʿfarī themes such as dissimulation (taqiyya) and intellectual accommodation (kalām ʿalā qadr ʿuqūl al-nās), one can argue that the aforementioned Shīʿī corpus posits a perspective on legal principles and legal language that is characterized by realism yet subject-dependency. Within this framework, the Imām not only receives legal principles but also interprets and applies them, emphasising the nuanced interplay between linguistic expression and the application of legal principles. Due to this, the Imām embodies a ‘proto-Uṣūlī’ role, applying consistent principles but issuing varied judgments based on circumstances, akin to a 'legal demiurge' endowed with divine authority. This meta-ethical stance, akin to ‘Platonic Moral Realism’, underscores the constancy of principles amidst changing moral judgments. Such a view significantly impacts the legal language used by the Imām, with specific rulings tailored for ‘common’ followers and general principles revealed to legally ‘qualified’ ones. The rejection of analogical reasoning (qiyās), attributed to the Imām, is also rooted in the belief that only he holds the necessary knowledge for accurate interpretation, ensuring clarity in legal meaning. Viewing the Imām as a ‘Divine Jurist’ reveals disparities in Jaʿfarī legal thought before and after the Occultation, shedding light on evolving synthetic legal trends amongst later Twelver communities. This perspective highlights Imāms’ distinct stance on the relationship between legal language and meaning, affirming the adaptability of the former and the permanence of the latter.

Despite their broad agreement about the definition of belief (īmān) and about key theological doctrine, Muslim scholars in the 15th-17th century Maghrib argued fiercely over whether and how to teach that doctrine to non-elite members of society. This seminar will explain the concepts, argumentation, and stakes of these disputes and discuss several moments when "the belief of the common folk" became an especially heated issue. In doing so, it moreover offers space to reflect on the appropriateness of translating īmān as belief and on the place of belief within Islamic thought.

Leaving Iberia: Islamic Law and Christian Conquest in North West Africa examines Islamic legal responses to Muslims living under Christian rule  in medieval and early modern Iberia and North Africa. The fall of al-Andalus, or Reconquista, has long been considered a turning point when the first substantial Muslim populations fell under permanent Christian rule. Yet a near-exclusive focus on conquered  Iberian Muslims has led scholars to overlook a substantial body of legal opinions issued in response to Portuguese and Spanish occupation in  Morocco itself, beginning in the early fifteenth century.

By moving beyond Iberia and following Christian conquerors and Muslim emigrants into North Africa, Leaving Iberia links the juristic discourses on conquered Muslims on both sides of the  Mediterranean, critiques the perceived exceptionalism of the Iberian  Muslim predicament, and adds a significant chapter to the story of  Christian–Muslim relations in the medieval Mediterranean. The final portion of the book explains the disparate fates of these medieval legal opinions in colonial Algeria and Mauritania, where jurists granted lasting authority to some opinions and discarded others.

Based on research in the Arabic manuscript libraries of five countries, Leaving Iberia offers the first fully annotated translations of the major legal texts under analysis.

Standpoints on the Belief in Imam Mahdi: A Sunni-Shia Discussion

Scrutinising the Sunni Standpoint on the belief in Imam Mahdi by Shaykh Muhammad Umar Ramadhan

Reassessing the Mainstream Shi'i Standpoint on the belief in Imam Mahdi by Prof. AbdulAziz Sachedina

In 874 CE, the eleventh Imam died, and the Imami community splintered. The institutions of the Imamate were maintained by the dead Imam's agents, who asserted they were in contact with a hidden twelfth Imam. This was the beginning of 'Twelver' Shiʿism. Edmund Hayes provides an innovative approach to exploring early Shiʿism, moving beyond doctrinal history to provide an analysis of the socio-political processes leading to the canonisation of the Occultation of the twelfth Imam. Hayes shows how these agents cemented their authority by reproducing the physical signs of the Imamate, including protocols of succession, letters and the alm taxes. Four of these agents were ultimately canonised as “envoys” but traces of earlier conceptions of authority remain embedded in the earliest reports. Hayes dissects the complex and contradictory Occultation narratives to show how, amidst the claims of numerous actors, the institutional positioning of the envoys allowed them to assert a quasi-Imamic authority in the absence of an Imam.

Ramon Harvey revisits the Muslim theologian Abū Manṣūr al-Māturīdī (d. 333/944) from Samarqand and puts his system, and that of the Māturīdī school, into lively dialogue with modern thought. Combining rigorous study of Arabic Māturīdī texts with insights from Husserl’s phenomenology  and analytic theology, Harvey explores themes from epistemology and  metaphysics to the nature of God and specific divine attributes  (omniscience and wisdom, creative action, divine speech and the Qur’an).  His systematic treatment of these topics shows that a contemporary Islamic philosophical theology, or kalām jadīd, can be true to the past, yet dynamic in the present, and can provide original  and constructive answers to perennial theological questions.

The goal of this seminar is to discuss the invention of “religion” in the modern-colonial West as a category which ensured and reified racial hierarchies around the world and tied Christianity to whiteness whilst simultaneously positioning other religions, including Islam, at the bottom of a racial-religious hierarchy. This modern invention of ‘religion’ was also a very gendered process that enabled the production of religious hierarchies while simultaneously rationalising and justifying the privatisation of religion in an Enlightenment, post-Westphalian European context. This gendered and modern-colonial invention of religion has implications for how religion and religious actors (or actors perceived as such) are discussed, perceived, and treated within the realm of Global Politics.

Dr Joshua Ralston discusses his book "Law and the Rule of God: A Christian Engagement with Shari'a" with Dr Ali-Reza Bhojani.   In Law and the Rule of God, Joshua Ralston presents an innovative approach to Christian-Muslim dialogue. Eschewing both polemics and apologetics, he proposes a comparative framework for Christian engagement with Islamic debates on sharī'a. Ralston draws on a diverse range of thinkers from both traditions including Karl Barth, Ibn Taymiyya, Thomas Aquinas, and Mohammad al-Jabri. He offers an account of public law as a provisional and indirect witness to the divine rule of justice. He also demonstrates how this theology of public law deeply resonates with the Christian tradition and is also open to learning from and dialoguing with Islamic and secular conceptions of law, sovereignty, and justice.

Dr Anver M. Emon discusses his book "Islamic Natural Law Theories" with Dr Ali-Reza Bhojani. By recasting the Islamic legal tradition in terms of legal philosophy, Anver Emon's Islamic Natural Law Theories sheds substantial light on an uncharted tradition of natural law theory and offers critical insights into contemporary global debates about Islamic law and reform.

For centuries, under the rubrics of dalīl al-khiṭāb, mafhūm al-mukhālafa, and al-istidlāl bi-l-ḥaṣr, Muslim legal theorists debated the validity of affirming for what is unspoken the contradictory of the ruling for what is spoken. Put differently, if revelation links a ruling to a specified attribute of a thing, does this entail (linguistically, logically, or in some other way) the opposite ruling for what lacks that attribute? Referring to a common example: Does the Prophet’s assertion that zakāt is due on free-grazing sheep (fī sāʾimat al-ghanam zakāt) entail that zakāt is not due on fodder-fed sheep? Navigating the confluence of linguistic and logical implication, uṣūlist discourse on this issue reached a considerable degree of refinement, and has inspired a number of informative studies in past decades. So far, however, some important linguistic-logical parallels seem to have escaped notice. First is the fact that propositions which link a ruling to a specified attribute may be formally rendered as conditionals, and the inference “If p then q, not-p, therefore not-q” (with a conditional major premise) constitutes the formal fallacy of denying the antecedent (aka the inverse fallacy); whereas the inference “If and only if p then q, not-p, therefore not-q” (with a biconditional major premise) is valid. Second is the fact that in some cases contextual factors dictate that propositions formulated as mere conditionals (if p then q) should be understood as biconditionals (if and only if p then q), thus allowing valid inferences of the inverse (if not-p then not-q). Third, and on top of these older, logical observations, modern pragmaticians have developed a lively discourse around “conditional perfection”: our tendency to hear conditionals as biconditionals (subconsciously “perfecting the conditional”) and thus to accept inferences of the inverse. As is too often the case with modern theorists, however, they have proceeded in evident ignorance of very rich and relevant premodern discourses. This talk therefore aims first to present select definitions, typologies, and controversies of the uṣūlist discourse on dalīl al-khiṭāb, mafhūm al-mukhālafa, and al-istidlāl bi-lḥaṣr, second to understand these with reference to their logical parallels, and third to juxtapose all this with a summary of the modern discourse on conditional perfection, suggesting (as in previous studies) how centuries of refined, premodern Islamic theorising and debate can complement and contribute to the (sometimes re-inventive) efforts of modern theorists.

Dr Cyrus Ali Zargar discusses his book "Polished Mirror: Storytelling and the Pursuit of Virtue in Islamic Philosophy and Sufism" with Dr Ali-Reza Bhojani. Islamic philosophy and Sufism evolved as distinct yet interweaving strands of Islamic thought and practice. Despite differences, they have shared a concern with the perfection of the soul through the development of character. In The Polished Mirror, Cyrus Ali Zargar studies the ways in which, through teaching and storytelling, pre-modern Muslims lived, negotiated and cultivated virtues. Examining the writings of philosophers, ascetics, poets, and saints, he locates virtue ethics within a dynamic moral tradition.

The generally perceived notion/purpose of ijtihād is to provide a  solution where there is no direct text on a particular issue. Given that  within the theories of Islamic law, it is a well-accepted fact that  an ijtihād would not necessarily negate another ijtihād on the same  issue, one may arrive at the question of sanctity in relation to the  fatwas issued as a result of different ijtihāds being carried out. This  study therefore looks at whether the body of fatwas issued are any less  in their sacredness as a result of differences and variations  in ijtihādi conclusions. The study will follow a textual analysis and  its scope falls within the broad sphere of theology.

This paper will discuss the impact of the case method on three  separate cohorts, all in the context of Islamic education. Although a  very widely used tool in higher education, the use of the case method is  rare in Islamic education, normally being superseded by a traditional  didactic or instructive style of teaching, a feature that often extends  across most age groups and even into specialised seminary learning.  Retrospective observational analysis was conducted on three separate  cohorts in the community who were exposed to the case methodology over a  period of five years. Three separate areas of growth were seen in the  cohorts in varying degrees.

1. Personal growth and mentoring of  the individual through the acquisition of key life skills such as  critical analysis, public speaking, presentation skills and ability to  collaborate with others.
2. Increasing knowledge base of the individual in a wide variety of Islamic and non-Islamic disciplines.
3. Triggers for community action following identification of critical societal issues.

Significant  areas requiring greater engagement by community leaders were also  frequently flagged up such as suppressed atheism, apostasy, child abuse,  mental health and ethical practices of Muslims. Above all, the nature  of the case method ensured cross-generational as well as cross-gender  conversations on major neglected issues affecting Muslims in the UK,  ultimately allowing participants to critically evaluate their faith in a  safe space without judgement, develop key life skills and study Islam  in context of the modern world and tackle major societal issues relevant  not only to Muslims, but society as a whole.

Averroes adopted a legal-centric epistemological framework in order  to prove #Philosophy as #Islamic. The main focus was to demonstrate to  what extent philosophy was Islamic using Averroes’ systematised  framework from his legal treatise, Kitāb faṣl al-maqāl as a rebuttal to  Muslim jurists who considered philosophy as anti-Islamic. Using  Averroes’ legal treatise, Sayyid Wajee showed how Averroes employs the  legal methodology and the principles adopted by Muslim jurists against  them, highlighting the compatibility between philosophy and Islam. Moreover, Averroes’ grounds his assertions of philosophy as an Islamic  endeavour by combining the technical jargon of the jurists with Qurʾānic  passages as a way of conclusively affirming the concept of ‘Islamic  philosophy’.

The presentation highlighted the negative attitude towards philosophy in the 12th century and this attitude persisting in the 21st century  in certain Islamic institutions. Sayyid Wajee emphasised on #Averroes  premise that the study of law which is widely accepted by Muslim  thinkers as an Islamic enterprise according to the jurists themselves,  the same sentiment should be afforded to Muslim philosophers

The presentation aimed to cover the question of whether Muslims are allowed to reside in non-Muslim majority countries under the condition of religious freedom. It encompassed an analysis of the major textual  evidence on this topic, regardless of whether they argue for  permissibility or prohibition. The focus is to engage with the seemingly  contradictory arguments considering their authenticity, historical  context and meaning, in the hope of coming close to, or advancing, the  understanding of the religious opinion on the matter. Shaykh Zaini  argued that emigration was mandatory under certain historical  circumstances experienced by early companions, then it became advisory  following the conquest of Mecca and the establishment of the religion.

Diversity within Shia Islam 

Dr. Jones presented a paper on ‘Islam and Science’, which drew on  previous research on perceptions of evolution by the research team for  the project ‘Science and Religion: Exploring the Spectrum’, as well as new research being  conducted on views of Islam and science among Muslim religious leaders.  He spoke about the findings of a survey of British Muslims on science  and evolution, highlighting that British Muslims are marginally more  likely to identify with science than the wider British public but remain  both sceptical and uncertain about biological evolution. Muslims’  evolution scepticism varies significantly depending on how questions are  asked, while they are also considerably more likely to suggest that  they do not know how to respond.

This presentation looked at narratives dealing with the experiences  of female scholars within the Sunni Muslim community in the UK, with a focus on the South Asian community. The South Asian community is  responsible for setting up many of the traditional Islamic learning  institutions (darul ulums) in the UK for both male and female students.

Many  of these institutions will follow the same curriculum whereby students will study the same texts and subjects, yet female graduates often face greater challenges upon graduation. Often their education is questioned  and their opportunities to serve their communities are more limited.  This presentation highlighted some of those challenges through personal  narratives taken from various studies conducted in the UK. Finally, it called for greater community participation in creating a more accepting  space for female scholars and a more supportive community network so  that they are able to better serve their communities, and the community  is able to benefit from their knowledge and expertise.

Dr. Rajani explained the dynamics of the abovementioned Centre,  explaining how scholars from various denominations come together and  attempt to give unified responses to some of the questions and  challenges facing Muslims today. Dr. Rajani clarified the processes and  methods that the Centre employs to try and arrive at jointly agreed  opinions, which are then disseminated in the form of online statements.

Hitherto,  the Centre has produces 43 statements, ranging from jurisprudential  issues – like the permissibility of consuming stunned meat – to  theological matters – like the finality of the prophethood of Prophet  Muhammad (pbuh). The Centre’s work has shown what can be achieved when  Muslims work together despite the differences in their ideological and  even theological stances.

Providing an in-depth and extensive analysis of the concept of power as articulated by Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah (1935–2010), this case study analyses the systemic conceptualisation of power and his argumentation of sacralising Islamised power. The volume also offers a quick overview of how the concept was understood and articulated by other Shi‛ite jurists such as Ayatollah Khomeini.

Examining Fadlallah’s oeuvre, in particular his seminal book Islam and the Logic of Power [ al-Islam wa-mantiq al-quwwa ], this book focuses on the narrative itself, which played a central role in the radical transformation that occurred in the Shi‛te concept of empowerment and its recognition as a necessity. The analysis of Fadlallah’s conceptualisation and argumentation illustrates the mechanism of sacralising righteous power as well as the means of gaining it. Fadlallah reinterpreted Shi‛sm as a project of empowerment to initiate and sustain an “impulse of power” amongst the Lebanese Shi‛tes in the most critical moment of modern Lebanese history.

While the task of jurisprudence (fiqh) is to determine what people are supposed to do in their daily affairs by inference from premises that involve the divine rulings of Sharia, the science of the principles of jurisprudence (uṣūl) is intended to facilitate such transitions by providing the relevant methodological principles and rules of validity for such inferences. In that sense, the science of usūl can be regarded as the logic of jurisprudence. One of the principles that a jurist needs to rely on to derive religious (Sharia) rulings concerns the evidence at their disposal. This evidence either directly comes from the Qurʾān and the Sunna or is grounded in reason. The former comes into two varieties: linguistic evidence which involves statements of the Qurʾān and the non-linguistic variety which includes, among other things, the actions of the māʿṣūm (infallible). For linguistic evidence to fulfil its role, however, three things must be determined: (i) the prima facia meaning of the evidence and what it denotes, (ii) its reliability (ḥujjiyya), and (iii) whether evidence did, in fact, issue from the legislator. The questions that arise from the role of linguistic evidence in the process of deriving particular Sharia rulings have, however, spawned an important chapter in the science of uṣūl about the foundations of meaning. These investigations include discussions about the characterisation of meaning, its apparent arbitrary character as well as its different varieties. More fundamental questions concern the origin of meaning i.e., what renders words or expressions meaningful. Here, discussions of such concepts as convention, usage, and intention feature prominently. Although important insights are fleshed out in these uṣūlī investigations, the overall results are often fragmentary and disconnected. It is here that the contemporary analytic philosophy of language can fruitfully interact with the science of uṣūl. In this paper, focusing on the works of Mohammad Bagher Sadr, I shall try to bring some of the discussions of meaning in the philosophy of language to bear on the issues of linguistic meaning discussed in the science of uṣūl. Hopefully, investigations along these lines may result in the mutual enrichment of both disciplines.

Dr Zarepour demonstrated Fārābī’s interpretation of Aristotle’s work  on logical fallibilism. He showed how Fārābī’s views differs from  Aristotle on logical and theological fatalism. To reject these types of  fatalism, Fārābī argues that the truth values of future contingent  propositions are already distributed but this distribution is  indefinite. As a result, that a contingent proposition is now true does  not make it necessary in itself. Formalising Fārābī’s solutions to the  problems of logical and theological fatalism in the language of  contemporary modal logic, Dr Zarepour discussed its strength and  weakness. He also showed that although Fārābī defends these solutions,  there can be found passages in his commentary which signal that he is  not totally satisfied with them. These passages can be taken as a sign  for his implicit inclination towards a specific sort of open theism  which was later explicitly defended by some important figures of Arabic  philosophy.

Dr Amina Inloes presents "Female Scholarship and Authority in Islamic Scripture"

Dr Ali Reza Bhojani discusses "Theorising Diversity & Difference within Muslims Scholarly traditions"

Shaykh Umar Ramadhan presents "Theorising Diversity & Difference within Muslim Traditions"

Islam’s fourth caliph, Ali can be considered one of the most revered figures in Islamic history. His nearly universal portrayal in Muslim literature as a pious authority obscures centuries of contestation and the eventual rehabilitation of his character. In this book, Nebil Husayn examines the enduring legacy of the nawasib, early Muslims who hated Ali and his descendants. The nawasib participated in politics and discussions on religion at least until the ninth century. However, their virtual disappearance in Muslim societies has led many to ignore their existence and the subtle ways in which their views subsequently affected Islamic historiography and theology. By surveying medieval Muslim literature across multiple genres and traditions including the Sunni, Mutazili, and Ibadi, Husayn reconstructs the claims and arguments of the nawa¯sib and illuminates the methods that Sunni scholars employed to gradually rehabilitate the image of Ali from a villainous character to a righteous one. Nebil Husayn is Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Miami, where his research considers the development of Islamic theology, historiography, and debates on the caliphate. Husayn obtained his Ph.D. in Near Eastern Studies from Princeton University.

Why are stories told about the Khārijites? The Islamic tradition portrays Khārijism as a heretical movement of militantly pious zealots, a notion largely reiterated by what little there is of modern scholarship on the Khārijites. Hannah-Lena Hagemann moves away from the usual studies of Khārijite history 'as it really was' and instead examines its narrative function in early Islamic historiography. From the Khārijites' origins at the Battle of Ṣiffīn in 657 CE until the death of the caliph ʿAbd al-Malik b. Marwān in 705 CE, Hagemann's literary analysis provides a fresh perspective on Khārijite history and highlights the need for a serious reassessment of the historical phenomenon of Khārijism as it is currently understood in scholarship.

This book provides a detailed analysis of Islamic juristic writings on the topic of rape and argues that classical Islamic jurisprudence contained nuanced, substantially divergent doctrines of sexual violation as a punishable crime. The work centers on legal discourses of the first six centuries of Islam, the period during which these discourses reached their classical forms, and chronicles the juristic conflict over whether or not to provide monetary compensation to victims. Along with tracing the emergence and development of this conflict over time, Hina Azam explains evidentiary ramifications of each of the two competing positions, which are examined through debates between the Ḥanafī and Mālikī schools of law. This study examines several critical themes in Islamic law, such as the relationship between sexuality and property, the tension between divine rights and personal rights in sex crimes, and justifications of victim's rights afforded by the two competing doctrines.

This study of Sayf al-Dīn al-Āmidī’s (d. 631/1233) teachings on creation offers close analysis of all of his extant works of falsafa and kalām. Some of these were not known to previous scholars, yet they bear witness to key facets of the interaction between the historically inimical traditions of Hellenic philosophy and rational theology at this important intellectual moment. Al-Āmidī is seen to grapple with the encounter of two paradigms for the discussion of creation. On the one hand, Ibn Sīnā’s metaphysical concept of necessity of existence is the basis of his doctrine of the world’s pre-eternal emanation. On the other, for the mutakallimūn, the physical theory of atomism bolsters the view that God created the world from nothing. This study is of interest to scholars of Ibn Sīnā and Ash‘arism alike, as it advances our understanding of the ongoing tradition of rational theology in the Islamic world, long past Abū Ḥāmid al-Ghazālī’s (d. 505/1111) famous attack on the philosophers.

In Visions of Sharīʿa: Contemporary Discussions in Shī ͑ī Legal Theory Bhojani, De Rooij and Bohlander present the first broad examination of ways in which legal theory ( uṣūl al-fiqh) within Twelver Shīʿī thought continues to be a forum for vibrant debates regarding the assumptions, epistemology and hermeneutics of Sharīʿa in contemporary Shīʿī thought. Bringing together authoritative voices and emerging scholars, from both ‘traditional’ seminaries and ‘Western’ academies, the distinct critical insider and emic accounts provided develop a novel avenue in Islamic legal studies. Contextualised through reference to the history of Shīʿī legal theory as well as contemporary juristic practice and socio-political considerations, the volume demonstrates how one of the most intellectually vibrant and developed discourses of Islamic thought continues to be a key forum for exploring visions of Sharīʿa.

What does it mean to say that we live in a secular age? Almost everyone would agree that we - in the West, at least - largely do. And clearly the place of religion in our societies has changed profoundly in the last few centuries. In what will be a defining book for our time, Charles Taylor takes up the question of what these changes mean - of what, precisely, happens when a society in which it is virtually impossible not to believe in God becomes one in which faith, even for the staunchest believer, is only one human possibility among others.

Taylor, long one of our most insightful thinkers on such questions, offers a historical perspective. He examines the development in "Western Christendom" of those aspects of modernity which we call secular. What he describes is in fact not a single, continuous transformation, but a series of new departures, in which earlier forms of religious life have been dissolved or destabilized and new ones have been created.

As we see here, today's secular world is characterized not by an absence of religion - although in some societies religious belief and practice have markedly declined - but rather by the continuing multiplication of new options, religious, spiritual, and anti-religious, which individuals and groups seize on in order to make sense of their lives and give shape to their spiritual aspirations.

What this means for the world - including the new forms of collective religious life it encourages, with their tendency to a mass mobilization that breeds violence - is what Charles Taylor grapples with, in a book as timely as it is timeless.

Medieval Muslim legal theorists devised increasingly complex categorisations of linguistic clarity and ambiguity. This paper traces the emergence of key terms including muḥkam, mutashābih, mujmal, and ẓāhir, which eventually crystalised in a four-fold Shāfiʿī classification and an eight-fold Ḥanafī one. Both these systems treated clarity and ambiguity not as features of the words and sentences of scripture, but as interpretive claims about the hermeneutical relationship between a text and a proposed interpretation of it. Both the Shāfiʿī and Ḥanafī systems served the same purpose, which was not to pin down meanings but to give the jurists as much interpretive power and flexibility as they reasonably could within the bounds of ordinary linguistic usage. Those legal theorists who resisted this combination of power and flexibility, including Ẓāhirīs and Akhbārīs, could not prevail against the flexible mainstream paradigm that took hold among Sunnīs and Imāmīs alike, and that still tacitly undergirds most legal discourse today. Today modern reformers and traditionalists alike exploit the vocabulary of clarity and ambiguity to support their interpretations. One highly original reformulation of these concepts comes from the Egyptian thinker Hassan Hanafi, who compounds the flexibility of the classical hermeneutic by retaining the flexible mainstream legal theorists’ analysis of ambiguity, albeit transposed into the language of twentieth-century European phenomenology, and then adding two more layers of ambiguity or subjectivity through his theory of how language relates to phenomenal reality and human action. This aspect of Hanafi’s hermeneutic has been much appreciated in some quarters, but all by itself interpretive flexibility is not the panacea some reformers take it to be, for flexibility cuts both ways: it can be used to justify reform or to uphold the status quo, and if anything is more readily amenable to the latter. As Hanafi himself illustrates, those who seek to justify the most radical reinterpretations cannot pin their hermeneutical hopes on the ambiguity of language, but are compelled to reconsider the whole theory of language and meaning on which classical legal theory rested.

New comparative perspectives on Shi'a minorities outside the Muslim worldKey features Provides comparative insights into Shi'a Muslim communities across the globe, set in Muslim minority contexts Makes an important contribution to understanding the global dynamics of contemporary Shi'a Islam Illustrates how transnational Shi'a networks operate in Muslim minority contexts Discusses the impact of events in the Middle East on Shi'a Muslim minorities across the world Case studies include an in-depth ethnographic study of the Shi'a community in Buenos Aires; insights into the unique challenges of Shi'a Muslims in Sri Lanka; the connections of Shi'a Muslims in Cambodia to Iran; and the limits of sectarian differences among Shi'a Muslims in Germany Global migration flows in the 20th century have seen the emergence of Muslim diaspora and minority communities in Europe, North America and other parts of the world. This book offers a set of new comparative perspectives on the experiences of Shi'a Muslim minorities outside the so-called 'Muslim heartland' (Middle East, North Africa, Central and South Asia). It looks at Shi'a minority communities in Europe, North and South America, Sub-Saharan Africa and East Asia and discusses the particular challenges these communities face as 'a minority within a minority'.

The modern state of Lebanon, created after the fall of the Ottoman Empire, is home to eighteen officially recognised different religious communities (or sects). Crucially, political office and representation came to be formally shared along confessional lines, and the privileges of power are distributed accordingly. One such key prerogative is exclusivity when it comes to personal status laws: the family legal affairs of each community. In this book, Morgan Clarke offers an authoritative and dynamic account of how the sharia is invoked both with Lebanon's state legal system, as Muslim family law, and outside it, as a framework for an Islamic life and society. By bringing together an in-depth analysis of Lebanon's state-sponsored sharia courts with a look at the wider world of religious instruction, this book highlights the breadth of the sharia and the complexity of the contexts within which it is embedded.

After the death of the Prophet Muhammad, different religious factions within the Muslim community laid claim to the Prophet's legacy. Drawing on research from Sunni and Shi>ite literature, Liyakat N. Takim explores how these various groups, including the caliphs, scholars, Sufi holy men, and the Shi>ite imams and their disciples, competed to be the Prophetic heirs. The book also illustrates how the tradition of the "heirs of the Prophet" was often a polemical tool used by its bearers to demand obedience and loyalty from the Muslim community by imposing an authoritative rendition of texts, beliefs, and religious practices. Those who did not obey were marginalized and demonized. While examining the competition for Muhammad's charismatic authority, Takim investigates the Shi>ite self-understanding of authority and argues that this was an important factor in the formation of a distinct Shi>ite leadership. The Heirs of the Prophet also provides a new understanding of textual authority in Islam by examining authority construction and the struggle for legitimacy evidenced in Islamic biographical dictionaries.

Joseph Massad’s Islam in Liberalism explores what Islam has become in today’s world, with full attention to the multiplication of its meanings and interpretations. He seeks to understand how anxieties about tyranny, intolerance, misogyny, and homophobia, seen in the politics of the Middle East, are projected onto Islam itself. Massad shows that through this projection Europe emerges as democratic and tolerant, feminist, and pro-LGBT rights—or, in short, Islam-free. Massad documents the Christian and liberal idea that we should missionize democracy, women’s rights, sexual rights, tolerance, equality, and even therapies to cure Muslims of their un-European, un-Christian, and illiberal ways. Along the way he sheds light on a variety of controversial topics, including the meanings of democracy—and the ideological assumption that Islam is not compatible with it while Christianity is—women in Islam, sexuality and sexual freedom, and the idea of Abrahamic religions valorizing an interfaith agenda. Islam in Liberalism is an unflinching critique of Western assumptions and of the liberalism that Europe and Euro-America blindly present as a type of salvation to an assumingly unenlightened Islam.

The history of the text of the Qur'an has been a longstanding subject of interest within the field of Islamic Studies, but the debate has so far been focused on the Sunni traditions about the codices of Caliphs Abu Bakr and 'Uthman b. 'Affan. Little to no attention has been given to the traditions on 'Ali b. Abi Talib's collection of the Qur'an. This book examines both Shi'i and Sunni traditions on the issue, aiming to date them back to the earliest possible date and, if possible, verify their authenticity. To achieve this, the traditions are examined using Harald Motzki's isnad-cum-matn method, which is recognised as an efficient tool in dating the early Islamic traditions and involves analysis of both matn (text) and isnad (chain of trans-mission) with an emphasis on finding a correlation between the two.

The New Testament in Muslim Eyes provides a close textual commentary on perhaps the earliest declaration of Paul’s apostleship and of his undying commitment to the risen Christ. It notes the subtleties of the Greek original against the backdrop of an exciting glimpse of Quranic Arabic parallels and differences. It asks: Does Paul qualify as a prophet of Allah (God)? The thoughts of Paul are assessed by examining his claims against the background of Islam’s rival views of Abraham and his legacy. The Arabic Quran framed and inspired the life of the Arab Apostle, Muhammad, who was sent, according to Islam, to all humanity, Jewish and Gentile alike. Pauline themes are set in dialectical tension with the claims of the Quran. Akhtar compares and contrasts the two rival faiths with regard to: the resources of human nature, the salvation of the sinner, and the status of the works of the law. Both Christians and Muslims concur on the need for God’s grace, an essential condition of success in the life of faith. The core Pauline Christian doctrine of justification by faith alone is scrutinised and assessed from a variety of non-Christian, especially Islamic, stances.

Whether Islam is compatible with human rights in general, and with the Declaration of Human Rights in particular, has been both a Muslim issue and a concern of the international community. Muslim rulers, Western analysts and policymakers, and Muslim extremists as well as conservative Muslims, have often agreed for diverse reasons that Islam and human rights cannot co-exist. In this book Aziz Sachedina argues for the essential compatibility of Islam and human rights. He offers a balanced and incisive critique of leading Western experts who ignore or marginalize the relationship of religion to human rights. At the same time, he re-examines the inherited tradition that forms the basis of conservative Muslim objections, arguing that it is culturally conditioned and therefore open to development and change. Finally, and most importantly, Sachedina delineates a fresh contemporary Muslim position that argues for a correspondence between Islam and secular concepts of human rights, grounded in sacred sources as well as Islamic history and thought.

What cannot be said about God, and how can we speak about God by negating what we say? Traveling across prominent negators, denialists, ineffectualists, paradoxographers, naysayers, ignorance-pretenders, unknowers, I-don't-knowers, and taciturns, Unsaying God: Negative Theology in Medieval Islam delves into the negative theological movements that flourished in the first seven centuries of Islam.

Aydogan Kars argues that there were multiple, and often competing, strategies for self-negating speech in the vast field of theology. By focusing on Arabic and Persian textual sources, the book defines four distinct yet interconnected paths of negative speech formations on the nature of God that circulated in medieval Islamic world. Expanding its scope to Jewish intellectuals, Unsaying God also demonstrates that religious boundaries were easily transgressed as scholars from diverse sectarian or religious backgrounds could adopt similar paths of negative speech on God.

This is the first book-length study of negative theology in Islam. It encompasses many fields of scholarship, and diverse intellectual schools and figures. Throughout, Kars demonstrates how seemingly different genres should be read in a more connected way in light of the cultural and intellectual history of Islam rather than as different opposing sets of orthodoxies and heterodoxies.

A Thematic Thirty-Part Commentary on the Noble Qur an This original work by Shaykh Ahmed Saad presents a commentary (tafsir) of each of the 30 juz of the Quran. Each juz of the Quran is of equal length, facilitating the completion of the recitation of the Quran every month (over 30 days). With this work by Shaykh Ahmed Saad, regular reciters of the Quran can gain a better understanding of the themes explored in any given juz, and pace with their recitation. In English and Arabic.

Sayed Hossein gives a book review on his book Durūs fī ʿilm al-Rijal (the science of hadith narrators).

Muslim scriptural text seems to pose contemporary challenges as to how its reader may mitigate tension between what text says and what it means. This tension defines the hermeneutical problem represented in the potential opposition between language and meaning, such opposition which Muslim jurists, and Arabic philologists for that matter, sought to resolve by referring to the idea of ‘context’. Particularly in juristic literature, Muslim scholars tend to use the word ‘context’ in two meanings: 1) ‘context’ in the sense of the linguistic context of the scriptural text; that is to read a text semantically and thematically according to its language-use and in connection with the surrounding texts which come before and after (aka sawābiq and lawāḥiq), where syntactical structure and speech arrangement are detrimental in the meaning-making process, and 2) ‘context’ as referring to the specifics of a given situation, where a text is read in connection with its speaker’s (authorial) intent and its surrounding historical and cultural circumstances. Based on these two meanings, ‘context’ can be classified into two types: context of language and context of situation, to borrow Malinowski’s term for the latter type. This paper seeks to demonstrate that the Muslim jurists relegated ‘context of situatio’ to an ancillary but instrumental role in determining meaning, as they do not seem to envisage the possibility of meaning beyond text or outside the context of language-use. It is possible however, I argue, to redeem a space within classical Islamic tradition, where ‘context of situation’ can be said to play an equally active role in the meaning-making process, hence balancing/reconciling the notion of language with the notion of meaning. Toward that end, the current paper seeks to expand the idea of ‘context’ to include another type of ‘context’, i.e., the context of interpreting religious text in connection with concrete reality. That is, a text – to be intelligible – is to be understood in connection with the way the text applies to a concrete situation. With this, the paper shall refer to three types of ‘context’: context of language, context of situation, and context of application. The paper shall draw on perspectives not only from classical Islamic knowledge but also from the philosophy of language and philosophical hermeneutics that may inform discussions on the attempt to develop such hermeneutics of application from within Islamic tradition. As it proceeds to situate its argument within Islamic tradition and modern knowledge, this paper will make references to 1) classical Islamic scholars such as al-Shāṭibī, Ibn al-Qayyim, and other philologists and jurists from Islamic tradition and 2) modern scholars of language and hermeneutics such as Firth, Wittgenstein, Malinowski, and Gadamer from modern times.

In Islamic Legal Orthodoxy, Stewart explores the process by which Shiite jurists participated in the mainstream of Islamic jurisprudence and were influenced by Sunni legal doctrines. He identifies three main reactions to Sunni legal definitions of othodoxy and the concept of consensus on which it was based. The Akhbaris rejected Sunni legal consensus and juristic authority for a scripture-based system; many Shiite outwardly accepted the ground rules of Sunni legal consensus and joined the Shafii school of jurisprudence; a third option was to adopt the concept of consensus to create a fifth, Shiite, legal system.
The development of the Sunni legal system effectively set the ground rules for the marginal sects negotiation of their identity with respect to Islamic legal orthodoxy. Accordingly, Shiite jurists developed a legal institution that is structurally similar to the four Sunni madhhabs and even today serves as means to position themselves in the Muslim world. Stewart points to an underlying tension in Shiite intellectual history between assimilationist and nativist impulses in the debate over consensus, dissmulation (taqiyyah) and the lives of certain Shiite scholars who lived and studies among Sunnis.

This book takes a fresh look at the foundations of modern Islam. Scholars often locate the origins of the modern Islamic world in European colonialism or Islamic reactions to European modernity. However, this study focuses on the rise of Islamic movements indigenous to the Middle East, which developed in direct response to the collapse and decentralization of the Islamic gunpowder empires. In other words, the book argues that the Usuli movement as well as Wahhabism and neo-Sufism emerged in reaction to the disintegration and political decentralization of the Safavid, Ottoman, and Mughal empires.
The book specifically highlights the emergence of Usuli Shi‘ism in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The long-term impact of the Usuli revival was that Shi‘i clerics gained unprecedented social, political, and economic power in Iran and southern Iraq. Usuli clerics claimed authority to issue binding legal judgments, which, they argue, must be observed by all Shi‘is. By the early nineteenth century, Usulism emerged as a popular, fiercely independent, transnational Islamic movement. The Usuli clerics have often operated at the heart of social and political developments in modern Iraq and Iran and today dominate the politics of the region.

The Akhbārī School dominated the intellectual landscape of Imāmī Shiʿism between the Seventeenth and early Nineteenth Centuries. Its principal doctrines involved a reliance on scripture (primarily the sayings or akhbār of the Shiʿite Imams) and a rejection of the rational exegetical techniques which had become orthodox doctrine in Imāmī theology and law. However, the Akhbārīs were not simple literalists, as they are at times portrayed in secondary literature. They developed a complex theory of exegesis in which texts could be interpreted, whilst at the same time remaining doggedly committed to the ability of the revelatory texts to provide answers to theological and legal questions arising within the Shīʿī community. This book is the first in-depth study of the intellectual development and historical influence of the Akhbārī School.