By Edmund Hayes A great body of Twelver legal doctrines is expressed through the Twelver ḥadīth corpus. A large body of these reports, like Sunnī ḥadīth, take the narrative form … Continue reading Servicing the Needs of a Community: Imamic Agency versus Local Demands
By Edmund Hayes In my first essay, I raised the question: was there an early Imāmī Shīʿī legal system? In order to think about this question, it is convenient to … Continue reading The Practical Agency of the Shīʿī Imams
By Edmund Hayes In 260/874, upon the death of the Eleventh Imam of the Twelver Shīʿa, al-Ḥasan al-ʿAskari, a crisis hit the inner circle of the Imam’s family. The Imam’s … Continue reading The Rejection of Legal Pluralism and Its Consequences
By Edmund Hayes When we speak of Shīʿī law, we usually mean the legal edifice of Twelver Shīʿīsm, which developed in the centuries following the collapse of the historical imamate … Continue reading Was There an Early Imāmī Shīʿī Legal System?
Edmund Hayes is a University Lecturer in the History of Islam at Leiden University. His research focus is the social history of early Shīʿa Islam, especially in its Imāmī and … Continue reading Welcome to our June Guest Blogger: Edmund Hayes
By Bahman Khodadadi As Muslim jurist Mohsen Kadivar observes, in traditional fiqh (Islamic law), certain punishments prescribed by sharīʿa can be carried out “by any adult Muslim (mukallaf) based on … Continue reading God’s Wish or Mortal Error? The Iranian State’s Blessing for Vigilantism
By Bahman Khodadadi As I noted in my previous essay, with the rise of Shīʿī theocracy in 1979, the newly established Islamic Republic of Iran embarked on a “sharīʿatization” project. … Continue reading Navigating Legal Impasses: Maṣlaḥa, State Decrees, and Shīʿī Jurisprudence in Post-Revolutionary Iran
By Bahman Khodadadi With the emergence of Shīʿī theocracy in 1979, the newly established state, the Islamic Republic of Iran, set in motion a “sharīʿatization” project. As part of this … Continue reading The Ascendancy of Fixed Islamic Corporal Punishments in Shīʿī Theocracy
Dr. Bahman Khodadadi is the PIL–LC Research Fellow at the Program in Islamic Law at Harvard Law School and the Library of Congress for the 2024–2025 academic year. Prior to … Continue reading Welcome to our May Guest Blogger: Bahman Khodadadi
In January we published a series of essays written by students from the Fall 2024 “Islamic Law Lab” course at Harvard Law School, convened by Professor Intisar Rabb. As part … Continue reading Islamic Law and ChatGPT: Student Essays from the Islamic Law Lab
