Mapping Change in Islamic Law, Rules and Practices

Introduction

This project launches a historical inquiry into the phenomenon of legal authority in Muslim religious law. Sharia, a term that designated, for centuries, the Muslim jurists’ law, is undoubtedly a major issue in the Muslim world and, to a different degree, in Western societies today.

Understanding Sharia

As representing God’s law in Muslim beliefs, Sharia is perceived as unchangeable, and, in Western scholarship, often as a “deontology”. MCILRaP takes a radically new approach in explaining the obvious paradox between timeless law and observable legal adaptations by studying legal casuistry, not single rules.

Legal Casuistry

In casuistry, rules are fixed as laws; and adding rules for specific or other cases limits existing rules’ application and allows for different solutions, which may be viewed as a legal change. To describe the casuistry of the jurists’ law for the first time in detail, MCILRaP creates a new method of mapping rulings “in context”.

Source Material

Thousands of law books and other juridical texts constitute relics of legal thinking in its redaction period. MCILRaP pioneers a comprehensive survey of this source material that necessarily proceeds at different analytical levels, by:

1. Widely cataloguing works according to author and subject-matter
2. The in-depth mapping of juridical rules in selected law books
3. Determining the conceptual links between juridical rules and detailed real case practices

Dataset and Tools

The project creates a dataset from original source material and devises tools for visualising legal casuistry. By its research on Islamic law, MCILRaP provides evidence for historical law developments that turned “Sharia”, formerly only Revealed Law, into a juridical rule system that lasted until the 19th century.

Cultural Impact

The centuries-long impact of Sharia law on Muslim culture is what has triggered today’s understanding of sacred Sharia laws in the Qur’an and Prophetic Tradition.

Future Directions

MCILRaP will open new paths of inquiry, create methods and data, and by this fundamentally change the study of Islamic law.