Recent Scholarship: History of Sharīʿa

The South African newspaper Mail & Guardian recently featured a book review of Understanding Sharia: Islamic Law in a Globalised World (2018), by Raficq S. Abdullah and Mohamed M. Keshavjee. The book explores the history of sharīʿa and its role in the modern world. Here is an excerpt of the book review:

While the authors say that sharia does not necessarily represent the core of Islamic identity — which is very diverse — today’s Muslims have to study the timeless ethical principles at its base in order to contribute to solving problems confronting the world. They call on everybody to be reflective saying that extremism is “a toxic form of nostalgia for definite responses as opposed to the discomfort of asking awkward questions for which there may not be certain answers.”

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