Edited by Khaled Abou El Fadl, Ph.D. 1999.

This handbook is a detailed reference source comprising original articles covering the origins, history, theory and practice of Islamic law. The handbook starts out by dealing with the question of what type of law is Islamic law and includes a critical analysis of the pedagogical approaches to studying and analysing Islamic law as a discipline. The handbook covers a broad range of issues, including the role of ethics in Islamic jurisprudence, the mechanics and processes of interpretation, the purposes and objectives of Islamic law, constitutional law and secularism, gender, bioethics, Muslim minorities in the West, jihad and terrorism.

Previous publications on this topic have approached Islamic law from a variety of disciplinary and pedagogical perspectives. One of the original features of this handbook is that it treats Islamic law as a legal discipline by taking into account the historical functions and processes of legal cultures and the patterns of legal thought.

With contributions from a selection of highly regarded and leading scholars in this field, the Routledge Handbook of Islamic Law is an essential resource for students and scholars who are interested in the field of Islamic Law.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Chapter I: Approaches and the state of the field. Ahmad Atif Ahmad

Chapter II: What type of law is Islamic law? Khaled Abou El Fadl

Part I: Jurisprudence and ethics. Khaled Abou El Fadl, Ahmad Atif Ahmad

Chapter 1: Shariʿah, natural law and the original state. Ahmed Izzidien

Chapter 2: “God cannot be harmed”: On Ḥuqūq Allah/Ḥuqūq al-ʿIbād continuum. Wael Hallaq

Chapter 3: Balancing this world and the next: Obligation in Islamic law and jurisprudence. Omar Farahat

Chapter 4: Divine command ethics in the Islamic legal tradition. Mariam al-Attar

Chapter 5: Islamic law and bioethics.* Ayman Shabana

Part II: History and interpretation: Scholars. Khaled Abou El Fadl, Ahmad Atif Ahmad

Chapter 6: The Qurʾan and the Hadith as sources of Islamic law. Amr Osman

Chapter 7: The emergence of the major schools of Islamic law/madhhabs. Labeeb Ahmed Bsoul

Chapter 8: Qadis and muftis: Judicial authority and the social practice of Islamic law. Delfina Serrano Ruano

Chapter 9: Ijmāʿ, consensus. Ahmad Atif Ahmad

Chapter 10: Superior argument. Ahmad Atif Ahmad

Chapter 11: Maqa‐ṣid al-Shariʿah. Felicitas Opwis

Chapter 12:  Legal pluralism in Sunni Islamic law: The causes and functions of juristic disagreement. Ahmed Fekry Ibrahim

Chapter 13: Interpreting Islamic law through legal canons. Intisar A. Rabb

Chapter 14:  Ijtihād and taqlīd: Between the Islamic legal tradition and autonomous western reason. Sherman A. Jackson

Part III: History and interpretation: Society and politics. Khaled Abou El Fadl, Ahmad Atif Ahmad

Chapter 15: Legal traditions of the “Near East”: The pre-Islamic context. Lena Salaymeh

Chapter 16: The place of custom in Islamic law: Past and present. Ayman Shabana

Chapter 17: Jihad, sovereignty and jurisdiction: The issue of the abode of Islam. Ahmed Al-Dawoody

Chapter 18: Fiqh al-aqalliyyāt and Muslim minorities in the West. Said Fares Hassan

Chapter 19: Family law and succession. Irene Schneider

Chapter 20: Islamic law and the question of gender equality. Ziba Mir-Hosseini

Part IV: State and power. Khaled Abou El Fadl, Ahmad Atif Ahmad

Chapter 21: Islamic law and the state in pre-modern Sunni thought. Ovamir Anjum

Chapter 22: Concept of state in Shiʿi jurisprudence. Amirhassan Boozari

Chapter 23: Codification, legal borrowing and the localization of “Islamic law.” Guy Burak

Chapter 24: Modern Islamic constitutional theory. Andrew F. March

Chapter 25:  Islam, constitutionalism and democratic self-government. Mohammad H. Fadel

Chapter 26: Terrorism, religious violence and the Shariʿah. Ahmed Al-Dawoody