Pragmatism In Islamic Law: A Social And Intellectual History (middle East Studies Beyond Dominant Paradigms)
by Ahmed Fekry Ibrahim /
2015 / English / PDF
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In Pragmatism in Islamic Law, Ibrahim presents a detailed history
of Sunni legal pluralism and the ways in which it was employed to
accommodate the changing needs of society. Since the formative
period of Islamic law, jurists have debated whether it is
acceptable for a law to be selected based on its utility, rather
than weighing conflicting articulations of the law to determine the
most likely expression of the divine will. Virtually unanimous
opposition to the utilitarian approach, referred to as “pragmatic
eclecticism,” emerged among early Islamic jurists. However, due to
a host of changing institutional and socioeconomic transformations,
a trend toward the legitimization of pragmatic eclecticism arose in
the thirteenth century. Subsequently, the Mamluk authorities
institutionalized this pragmatism when Sultan Baybars appointed
four chief judges representing the four Sunni schools in Cairo in
1265 CE. After a brief attempt to reverse Mamluk pluralism by
imposing the Hanafi school in the sixteenth century, Egypt’s new
rulers, the Ottomans, embraced this pluralistic pragmatism. In
examining over a thousand cases from three seventeenth- and
eighteenthcentury Egyptian courts, Ibrahim traces the internal
logic of pragmatic eclecticism
In Pragmatism in Islamic Law, Ibrahim presents a detailed history
of Sunni legal pluralism and the ways in which it was employed to
accommodate the changing needs of society. Since the formative
period of Islamic law, jurists have debated whether it is
acceptable for a law to be selected based on its utility, rather
than weighing conflicting articulations of the law to determine the
most likely expression of the divine will. Virtually unanimous
opposition to the utilitarian approach, referred to as “pragmatic
eclecticism,” emerged among early Islamic jurists. However, due to
a host of changing institutional and socioeconomic transformations,
a trend toward the legitimization of pragmatic eclecticism arose in
the thirteenth century. Subsequently, the Mamluk authorities
institutionalized this pragmatism when Sultan Baybars appointed
four chief judges representing the four Sunni schools in Cairo in
1265 CE. After a brief attempt to reverse Mamluk pluralism by
imposing the Hanafi school in the sixteenth century, Egypt’s new
rulers, the Ottomans, embraced this pluralistic pragmatism. In
examining over a thousand cases from three seventeenth- and
eighteenthcentury Egyptian courts, Ibrahim traces the internal
logic of pragmatic eclecticism
under the Ottomans. An array of archival sources documents the
manner in which Egyptian society’s subaltern classes navigated
Sunni legal pluralism as a tool to avoid more austere legal
doctrines. The ensuing portrait challenges the assumption made by
many modern historians that the utilitarian approaches adopted by
nineteenth- and twentieth-century Muslim reformers constituted a
clear rupture with early Islamic legal history. In contrast, many
of the legal strategies
under the Ottomans. An array of archival sources documents the
manner in which Egyptian society’s subaltern classes navigated
Sunni legal pluralism as a tool to avoid more austere legal
doctrines. The ensuing portrait challenges the assumption made by
many modern historians that the utilitarian approaches adopted by
nineteenth- and twentieth-century Muslim reformers constituted a
clear rupture with early Islamic legal history. In contrast, many
of the legal strategies
exercised in Egypt’s partial codification of family law in the
twentieth century were rooted in premodern Islamic jurisprudence.
exercised in Egypt’s partial codification of family law in the
twentieth century were rooted in premodern Islamic jurisprudence.
