Islamic law scholarship round-up

In “The Succession to the Prophet in Zaydi Theology: An Editio Princeps of a Treatise on the Imamate from the Early Sixth/Twelfth Century” (Shii Studies Review), Hassan Ansari (Institute for Advanced Study) and others argue that “the Mukhtaṣar fī l-imāma is most likely authored by Zayd b. al-Ḥasan b. ʿAlī al-Bayhaqī al-Burūghanī (d. c. 545/1150),… CONTINUE READING

Radio ReOrient interviewed Sherman Jackson (University of Southern California) about The Islamic Secular (Oxford University Press), which “provocatively challenges the assumption that the secular is external to Islam and the Islamicate.” See part 1 here and part two here. In “Aligning Islamic ethics with reproductive health policy: addressing gaps in early termination access in Saudi… CONTINUE READING

In “What Do Sources Say about Agricultural Slavery (and Why Don’t They Say More)? A Study on Legal Sources for Early Islamic Ifrīqiya” (Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient), Antonia Bosanquet (Utrecht University) “examines the evidence for agricultural slavery in early Islamic Ifrīqiya and relates it to the existing historiography on… CONTINUE READING

Jadaliyya interviewed Rosemary Admiral (University of Texas at Dallas) about Living Law: Women and Legality in Marinid Morocco (Syracuse University Press), “a history of how women encountered and navigated Islamic law in premodern Morocco.” In “Integrity of Qur’anic Legislations: A Critical Review of the Debate on Abrogation” (Comparative Islamic Studies), Ahmed Ali Salem (Zayed University)… CONTINUE READING

In Early Islamic Law in Ḥadīth Texts from Basra: The Book of Prayer and The Book of Marriage by Jābir b. Zayd (d. c. 93/712-3) (Brill), Abdulrahman al-Salmi (German University of Technology) observes that “these two authentic texts, which include Islamic law topics and ḥadīth of the Prophet, date from the last quarter of the… CONTINUE READING

In “Meat and Religious Difference in Colonial India: the Courage and Contradictions of Sayyid Ahmad Khan” (Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient), SherAli Tareen (Franklin and Marshall College) “conducts a detailed reading of the paradigmatic South Asian Muslim modernist scholar Sayyid Ahmad Khan’s (d.1898) views on Indian Muslims dining with or… CONTINUE READING

In The Logic of al-Fanari: A Study and Annotated Translation of al-Fanari’s Commentary on the Isaghuji (Lockwood Press), former PIL Fellow Aaron Spevack (Brandeis University) “delves into the 15th-century logic text by Shams al-Din al-Fanari (d. 1431), a foundational work in the Ottoman seminary tradition. Rather than offering a standard annotated translation alone, Spevack also provides… CONTINUE READING

In Mantle of the Sufi Kings: Political Sufism and the Rise of Early Modern Iran (Cambridge University Press), Hani Khafipour (State University of New York at Buffalo) “explores how loyalty, social cohesion, and power dynamics found in Sufi thought underpinned the Safavid community’s sources of social power and determination. Once in power, the Safavid state’s patronage… CONTINUE READING

In An Islamic Legal Philosophy: Ibn ʿAbd al-Salām and the Ethical Turn in Islamic Law (Cambridge University Press), former PIL Fellow and Research Editor Mariam Sheibani (Brandeis University) “argues that the rich legal history of the post-formative period and the Islamic legal philosophy that developed in it have been comparatively neglected. This innovative study traces the ethical… CONTINUE READING

Arabica 74, no. 4–5 is a special issue coordinated by recent Islamic Law Blog guest editors Eirik Hovden (University of Bergen) and Mahmood Kooria (University of Edinburgh) on “The Muḫtaṣar and Its Role in the Islamic Legal Schools.” The issue includes the below articles. In “Al-Muḥaqqiq al-Ḥillī (d. 676/1277) and His al-Muḫtaṣar al-Nāfīʿ” (Arabica), Robert Gleave… CONTINUE READING