Taqlid

Allah Most High chose the Muslims to be the ummah of mission (risālah), of exemplary good (khayrīyah), of the golden ‎‎mean (wasaṭīyah), and of witnessing to humanity (shahādah). Along with these responsibilities came the capacity for ‎‎renewal, for ijtihad, and for correctly interpreting the Shari'ah. As a result, there is a certain inseparable mutuality between ‎‎the ummah's roles as a median community cum civilizational witness for humanity and its other role as a moral and ethical ‎‎exemplar, and between its capability for ijtihad and effecting reform. In order to facilitate these roles, Allah endowed the ‎‎Qur'an and the Sunnah with the necessary flexibility in every aspect of Islam: its belief system, its methodology, its ‎‎Shari'ah, and its organization. Thus, it was only natural for the early generations of Muslims, both on an individual and a ‎‎community level, to offer a unique picture to the world: the complete liberation of the human mind from all forms of mental ‎‎slavery and idolatry. Further protection against Wing from this exalted position was the provision made for avoiding ‎‎mistakes, deviations, and misinterpretations: only those statements which could be proven by acceptable evidence or ‎‎supported by valid testimony were to be believed. A look at the ijtihad exercised by the Ṣaḥābah, whether they were ‎‎learned qurrā' or common people, will suffice to illustrate the amazing transformation which Islam was able to achieve. ‎‎Why do we not see this situation today? What has happened to the penetrating and enlightened mind inspired by Islam, ‎‎the one which freed our ancestors from their idols and the obstacles blocking their progress? Haw did such a mind return ‎‎to its former prison and fetters, robbed of any chance to renew and reform the ummah through ijtihad? ‎

In this paper I will analyse Shāh Walī Allāh al-Dihlawī’s (1703-1762) characterisation of the early divide in Islamic jurisprudence between the aṣḥāb al-raʾy, commonly translated as rationalists, and the ahl al-ḥadīth, the traditionalists who refused to engage in the sophisticated legal reasoning which the former had become famous for, instead vindicating the limitation of law to the evident implication of the scripture. For the sake of brevity, I will confine my analysis to the chapter “Causes of the disagreement between the ahl al-ḥadīth and the aṣḥāb al-raʾy” in al-Dihlawī’s “al-Inṣāf fī bayān asbāb al-ikhtilāf” (Fair Elucidation of the Causes of Disagreement)1. I will compare his portrayal of the conflict with present Islamicist research, examining harmony and variation. Specifically, the legal hermeneutics of both parties will be considered alongside underlying conceptions of the historical environment and course of development. As the chapter at hand further gives many clues about al-Dihlawī’s personal stance on the matter, I will review respective passages as part of the studies on the confluence and later legacy of these two parties. Considering that he is the principal figure of the traditionalist revival in 18th century India, his remarks are important to understand the link between modern Salafi literalism and the early traditionalists of the formation period. To which degree does Shāh Walī Allāh al-Dihlawī’s characterisation of the divide differ from the results of present Islamicist research, and how does his particular framing of the conflict relate to his revivalist thought?  / Term paper in "Hadith", B.A. Islamic Studies course by Olly Ackermann at FUB in winter 2019. Grade: 1,0.

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Şah Veliyyullah ed-Dihlevi'nin erken dönem ehli rey ve ehli hadis tartışmalarını değerlendirişi.

وصف شاه ولي الله الدهلوي للنزاع التاريخي بين مدرستي الرأي والحديث

Imam Ibn taymiyyah being one of the greatest scholar who was a mujtahid,muwahid as well as muhaddis. There is no aspect of Islam which is not touched by Ibn taymiyyah. So, as for the concept of Ijtihad and taqleed. Ibn taymiyyah raised the importance of ijtihad and true menaing of both taqleed and ijtihad in an era when people were loosing its value which was danger for the coming generations as ijtihad and taqleed are essential concepts in Islam which allow the scholars to take decision in the light of Quran and sunnah for new contemporary issues of the society.

Depuis l’émergence de la discipline uṣūl al-fiqh, il existe une tension entre le taqlīd et l’ijtihād plus ou moins affirmée selon les auteurs et les époques. Cette tension a trouvé avec l’apparition du wahhabisme une expression renouvelée. L’objet de cet article est de rendre compte de la controverse entre deux penseurs musulmans contemporains et de montrer comment derrière le vif débat qu’ils conduisirent à propos de l’ijtihād et du taqlīd se trouve en jeu la définition de l’orthodoxie sunnite.

My thesis attempts to establish whether sainthood (wilaya) in Islam has been correctly defined according to the Glorious Qur’an and Prophetic Sunna. It, therefore, focuses on the commentary of the hadith of the wali by the independent mujtahid and Yemeni scholar Muhammad b. ‘Ali al-Shawkani. I have translated the first chapter of his work, Qatrul wali ‘ala hadith al-wali (The Later Clarification on the Tradition of the Wali) in which Shawkani has endeavored to give a textually based, literalist commentary on the hadith of the wali. His exposition of this hadith finally results in a critique of the widely accepted definition of wilaya held by the Sufis.

This paper is the translation and commentary on part  five of the renowned maliki ʿUṣūli manual Taqrīb al-Uṣūl ʿilā ʿIlm al-ʿUṣūl of ʿIbn Juzay al-Kalbī.In the fifth part, which is the part that we have chosen for translation, ʿIbn Juzay provides a legal analysis of the place of fatwā, imitation (taqlīd), ʿijtihād, conflict between the evidences (taʾāruḍ) and preponderance (tarjīḥ) in Islamic Law. ʿIbn Juzay starts this part by first providing a definition of ʿijtihād and the scholarly debate around it. Then he proceeds by setting out the conditions necessary for being a mujtahid and the realms of Islamic faith in which ʿijtihād is applied. After his discussion on ʿijtihād, ʿIbn Juzay delves on the issue of taqlīd (imitation), its definition, condition and the Islamic legal norm regarding it. After this, ʿIbn Juzay analyses the notion of fatwā (legal opinion) and explains the legal discourse on the qualities and conditions of being a mufti or a mustaftī (a person asking for a fatwā). The most important part of the section is that dedicated to the legal explanation of the notion of preponderance and to the various ways in which a mujtahid is supposed to act in the case when a conflict between the legal evidences occur. For ʿIbn Juzay, the legal procedure of preponderance (tarjih) can be applied in regards to different textual sources or analogies. The last section of the text is dedicated to the explanation of the various legal factors that enable that existence of the difference of opinions.

Debates about preserving, modifying and applying sharia (Islamic normative guidelines) through principles of taqlid (to follow) or ijtihad (to carry out independent interpretation) are immensely useful in thinking through a sharper definition of tradition for political theorists and historians of political thought more generally. Political theorists and historians of political thought have tended to use tradition in a range of ways without specifying key elements of the concept. Building on debates in Islamic thought related to taqlid and its relationship to ijtihad, and through a focus on the ideas of a contemporary thinker, Javed Ahmed Ghamidi, this paper proposes that tradition in political thought can be defined as a framework for knowledge production and consumption constituted of two key elements: method and sensibility. Further, the paper suggests that this definition allows us a better understanding of vibrancy in a tradition:
vehement debate, contradictions and internal contestation are not signs of decay but of vitality within a tradition. It is the severe delinking of the two elements of a tradition, method and sensibility, which has greater potential to reduce its vibrancy.

ABSTRAK: Persoalan talfiq timbul ketika masyarakat Islam mengikat diri memilih salah satu cara dalam memahami Islam dan menjadikannya penghukum mutlak bagi setiap perkara yang timbul. Pertentangan yang tercetus antara cara ini dan cara yang tidak terikat adalah pada kemutlakan cara penghukuman yang diambil, kerana usaha mencampur adukkan cara penghukuman menyebabkan kemasukan unsur luar ke dalam cara yang dipegang. Kebimbangan dilihat pada ketidakseragaman dasar dan hasil yang disebabkan oleh kepelbagaian cara yang dipakai. Kertas kerja ini akan berusaha menilai tanggapan masyarakat Islam di Malaysia terhadap persoalan talfiq dan sejauh mana pengamalannya dalam kehidupan mereka seharian. Adalah menjadi satu persepsi awal bahawa masyarakat Islam di Malaysia berada di keadaan pertama iaitu memilih mazhab Syafie sebagai pegangan penghukuman bagi semua masalah fiqh. Penelusuran ke atas sejarah dan pengamalan semasa yang akan dibentangkan oleh kertas kerja ini bakal memberikan jawapannya.

[updated for reference] The article explores al-Maturidi's understanding of faith formulated as 'expression by tongue and assent by heart' and his elaboration of this formulation as well as his views on taqlid (imitation) in his epitome Kitab al-Tawhid.

Islam, moreover, forbids us to follow any way other than that of knowledge. Allah says in the Qur’an: “Do not pursue matters of which you have no knowledge. Surely every act of hearing, of seeing, and of the heart will be enquired into” (17:36). Thus our responsibility in regard to every aspect of the divine law (shar'), be it a command or a prohibition, is that we attain knowledge of its wisdom by whatever means possible. If sure knowledge is not possible, it is our responsibility to reach an understanding based at least on the most likely possibility. This is why our scholars have not permitted taqlid except in the case of the most ignorant and incapable.

This study challenges present-day dualisms and divisions, which are reflected in socio-political and intercultural dialogue. The aim of this study is to connect the philosophical discourse of the ninth-century House of Wisdom to modern conceptions of Islam by extending the dialogical rhetoric of that discourse. This study revisits the House of Wisdom, first, to invoke an inclusive, intercultural Islamic tradition that negates the circumscription of Islam by radical views. Second, it reintroduces the liberal arts as pedagogical tools that are central to the Islamic wisdom tradition. Third, it explores the notions of Aql and Fitrah and how they prescribe Hikmah.

This collection of papers presents a reformist project calling upon Muslim intellectuals and scholars everywhere to ‎comprehend the vast breadth and depth of the crisis engulfing Muslim thought today and the necessity of solving ‎this crisis to enable the Ummah to experience a revival and fulfill its role among the nations of the world. The reader ‎will find a variety of articles dealing with this intellectual crises, these include a chapter on ijtihad’s role and history, ‎important since our intellectual problems cannot be solved without the scholars’ use of independent reasoning and ‎creativity. Another discusses imitation (taqlid) calling upon Muslim scholars and intellectuals to abandon imitation ‎and to stop favoring the past over the present when trying to solve modern problems. Another looks at human ‎rights.‎

The article is focused on the problem of Ijtihad and taqlid through the debates of Tatar 'ulama' concerning the reform of Muslim law in the section of worship (ibadah). In connection with the problem of Ijtihad and Taqlid the following issues are discussed: the question of the night prayer 'isha in the Volga-Ural region, the problem of the authority of legal sources, the question of the use of rational methods of cognition in religion as Shariah evidence. All these issues began to be widely discussed after the publication of the work of the famous writer and scholar Sh. Mardjani Nazura al-hakk in 1870. His work provoked the appearance of a number of critical essays, the most famous of which was Jaruda (1874). The analysis of the unfolding debates between Mardjani and his opponents allows to see how Muslim scholars adapted the Islamic legal tradition to the social realities of life in the Russian Empire under the conditions of modernizing traditional society.

Osmanlı coğrafyasında belli dönemlerde afyon, kahve ve tütün tüketimi gibi nevâzil meseleleri hakkında tartışmalar vâki olmuş ve söz konusu maddeler hakkında pek çok âlim tarafından risaleler kaleme alınmıştır. XVII. yüzyılın sonlarında Osmanlı Devleti’nin başşehrinde eğitim almış ve hayatının sonuna kadar yine İstanbul’da eğitim vermiş Câbîzâde Halil Fâiz Efendi de (ö. 1134/1722) söz konusu meseleler hakkında kısa bir risale kaleme almıştır. Halil Fâiz Efendi afyon, kahve ve tütün tüketimi tartışmalarının taraflarının başvurdukları fıkıh usulü konuları hakkında kaleme aldığı risalesinde içtihat ve taklidin tanımları, içtihadın tecezzii, müçtehit derecesinde olmayanın müçtehidi taklid görevi ve mukallidin halleri ile fakihlerin yeni karşılaşılan meselelerde yaptıkları içtihadın mahiyeti ve fıkıh usulü çerçevesindeki öncüllerinden bahsetmiştir. Söz konusu nevâzil meseleleri hakkındaki tartışmaların taraflarının verdikleri hükümlerin meşruiyeti ve bağlayıcılığını inceleyen Halil Fâiz Efendi, verilen hükümlerin meşru bir içtihat işleminin sonucu olsa bile âmmî kişilerin bu görüşlerden istediklerini tercih edebileceği ancak varılan hükmün içtihat sahibini bağlayacağı sonucuna ulaşmıştır. Müellif vardığı sonucu ise kısaca yer verdiği altı madde üzerine inşa etmiştir. Bu makalede risalenin müellifi Câbîzâde Halil Fâiz Efendi’nin hayatı ile eserleri kısaca ele alınacak, sonrasında el-Kelimâtü’l-usûliyye fî massi’d-duhân ve şürbi’l-kahve ve bel‘i’l-afyûn adlı risalenin muhtevası incelenecek ve analiz edilecektir. Ayrıca çalışmanın sonunda risalenin neşri yapılacaktır.

Setiap bidang ilmu ada disiplinnya yang perlu dikuasai. Sindrom palatao menyebabkan ramai orang yang bercakap tanpa kapasiti yang sesuai. Natijahnya menghasilkan kecelaruan pemikiran dalam masyarakat umum.  Umpamanya ijtihad atau fatwa hanya bagi mereka yang mempunyai keahlian dan kelayakan yang cukup. Justeru mereka yang tidak punya kelayakan (atau muqallid), perlu untuk berpegang dengan pandangan hukum para muftinya. Nah, jikalau terasa lebih alim dan layak dari para mufti, sangat berbahaya kerana pengaruh demonisasi telah menyerap kuat dalam diri. Tegasnya, jangan timbulkan kepanikan sosial dengan menyanggah pandangan hukum pihak berautoriti.

Hicrî IV. yüzyıldan itibaren açık bir şekilde teorisi oluşturulmaya başlanan taklîd ile ilgili usûl âlimleri tarafından bir çok soru ündeme getirilmiş, farklı yaklaşımlar içerisinde cevaplanmaya çalışılmıştır. Taklîd, hakkında gerçekleştirilen teorik tartışmalar bir tarafa İslâm toplumlarında yaşanagelen tarihî ve sosyal bir olgu olarak da kendini göstermiştir. Bu nedenle taklîd, hem yüzyıllar boyunca müslüman toplumlarının tabi oldukları ilkelerin daha iyi anlaşılabilmesi hem de günümüzde nasıl hareket edilmesi gerektiğine dair ileri sürülen bir çok teklifin daha sağlıklı bir şekilde tartışılabilmesi açısından incelenmesi gereken kavramlar arasında yer alır. Ayrıca taklîd İslâm oplumlarının bilgi ve amel ile ilişkisini düzenleyen avramlardandır. Bu makalede taklîdin bilgi ve amel değeri usûlcülerin bakış açısıyla genel bir yaklaşımla ortaya konulmaya çalışılacaktır.

          A lot of questions were brough to the agenda about the imitation that its theory was clearly initiated to be formed from the forth century A.H. and tried to be answered in different approaches by the Muslim scholars on Islamic legal theory. Other than the theoretical debates held on about the imitation, the imitation has shown itself as a historical and social phenomenon which has survived in the Islamic community. Therefore, the imitation stands among concepts that have to be examined in terms of the principles, that muslim communities has been subject to them for centuries, can be understood in a better way as well as a lot of offers, that put forward about how to act today, can be debated in a healthy manner. Also the imitation is one of the concepts that regulate the relationship of Islâmic community with knowledge and deeds. In this article, the epistemological and practical value of the imitation will be put out from the perspective of Muslim scholars on Islamic legal theory with a general approach.

When a person is asked to imagine a particular instance connecting
faith with clothing, which of the followings would first come to mind: a
Jewish man with a kippah on the head; a Hindu man with a turban and
long beard; or a Muslim woman with a Hijab? Would we picture a Muslim
and a non-Muslim in the same way? What would a Muslim who lives in
a non-Islamic community look like? Or a Christian living in a Buddhist
community? Or a person of faith in a faithless community? Given our
current social and political context, the question of religious identity arises
with increasing urgency. One of the reasons for this urgency has been
spurred by the recent crisis of Muslim refugees and the difference that
they inject in our societies. This difference finds itself exacerbated by the
very nature of the Islamic faith and its emphasis on Ummah, or community.
The question of the Many and the One moves into a social context.
Can Muslims retain their specificity while at the same time becoming
more integrated? Is the Western value of individualism irreconcilable with
the Islamic idea of Ummah? Do certain Islamic values, such as Jihad, present a threat to Westerners?
This study aims to address these vital concerns by examining the different
approaches according to the Quran, especially what the main Islamic
resource, the holy Quran, says about the question of religious identity.
My aim here is to reach both Westerners and those Muslims who have
made their home in the West. To the first group, I intend to sketch out a
concise idea of the Quranic worldview in order to provide a clearer understanding of some of Muslim terminology which have been misused.
To the second group, I hope to refresh their faith and knowledge of the
Quran. I will explain and analyze three fundamental and relevant concepts:
Taqlid, Jihad and Hijra as to hopefully illuminate some of the issues
mentioned above.

Why did the famous North Indian modernist and founder of the Muhammadan Anglo-Oriental College in Aligarh, Sayyid Aḥmad Khān (d. 1315/1898), lash out against emulation (taqlīd) in Islamic law (fiqh)? The usual explanation is that he wanted to shift religious authority away from the religious scholars (ʿulamāʾ) toward ordinary Muslims. Countering this claim, I argue that his goal and that of his followers and associates at Aligarh was not primarily to 'democratize' Islamic knowledge by doing away with the traditional edifice of Islamic law in general and the four established Sunni legal schools in particular. Rather, Sayyid Aḥmad Khān and his associates attacked taqlīd because, in their view, it failed to yield reliable, certain knowledge (yaqīn). Drawing on Urdu writings , I demonstrate that these modernist thinkers did not engage with the inner logic of Islamic law but rather measured it according to higher, theological, and philosophical standards. In their quest for certainty, they were inspired both by a scientific worldview as well as colonial conceptions of law.

Get the full paper here: https://brill.com/view/journals/ils/aop/article-10.1163-15685195-00260A15/article-10.1163-15685195-00260A15.xml

[This is a Russian translation of my contribution to an international symposium in Kazan on the occasion of the 200th birthday of the famed Tatar scholar, Shihabaddin Mardjani (Shihab al-Dīn al-Marjānī)]

This paper explores the influence of Shihabaddin Mardjani on Ḥanafī scholars in the Middle East and South Asia. It examines the impact of Mardjani’s discussion of ijtihād and taqlīd in his famous work, Nāẓūrat al-Ḥaqq on four specific scholars. Much scholarship on Mardjani has focused on his important role as an innovative Tatar Muslim thinker of the Volga-Ural region. This paper, however, shifts attention to his stature as an influential transregional Ḥanafī thinker by outlining the impact of his work on Muslim scholars writing in the Middle East and South Asia. Though they were first taken up by the “dissident” ḥadith-centric Ḥanafism of ʿAbd al-Ḥayy al-Laknawī, Mardjani’s ideas on ijtihād and taqlīd later became naturalized within mainstream Ḥanafī thinking by the Egyptian mufti Muḥammad Bakhīt al-Muṭīʿī, and by the critic of Modernism, Muḥammad Zāhid al-Kawtharī. Later, Mardjani's discussion was incorporated into a textbook written by Mufti Taqī al-ʿUthmānī of Pakistan, further embedding it in the dominant expression of Ḥanafism.

В этой статье автором исследуется влияние Шихабаддина Марджани на ученых-ханафитов Ближнего Востока и Южной Азии, а именно идей об иджтихаде и таклиде из его известного произведения «Назурат ал-хакк». До настоящего времени большинство исследований о Марджани были сосредоточены на его роли в качестве передового татаро-мусуль-манского мыслителя Поволжья и Урала. В данной статье автор сосредоточивает свое внимание на роли
Марджани как влиятельного трансрегионального ханафитского мыслителя через анализ влияния его работ на мусульманских ученых Ближнего Востока и Южной Азии. Изначально подхваченные «диссидентским» хадис-центричным ханафитом Абдалхаем ал-Лакнави, идеи Марджани об иджтихаде и таклиде позже легли в основу преобладающего направления мысли среди ханафитов, сформулированного египетским муфтием Мухаммадом Бахит ал-Мути‘и и критиком модернизма Мухаммадом Захид ал-Каусари. Далее эти идеи были включены в учебник, написанный пакистанским муфтием Таки ал-Усмани, который воспринимается сейчас как доминирующее выражение ханафитской традиции.

İslam toplumlarının bilgi ve amel ile ilişkisini düzenleyen kavramlardan biri olarak taklîdin bilgi ve amel değeri genel bir bakışla bir başka makalede incelenmişti. Söz konusu makalede azınlığı oluşturan “mutlak taklîd taraftarları”nın karşısında büyük çoğunluğun taklîde karşı olduğu ortaya konulmuş, bazı durumları bu yaklaşımlarından istisnâ etmeleri dolayısıyla büyük çoğunluk “istisnâlı red taraftarları” olarak ifade edilmişti. Burada istisnâlı red taraftarlarının diğer bir ifadeyle büyük çoğunluğun karşı çıktığı ve geçersiz olarak değerlendirdiği taklîdden meşruiyet açısından istisnâ ettiği durumlar ele alınacaktır. Bu çerçevede tarafları ve konusu açısından taklîdin bilgi ve amel değeri usûlcülerin bakış açısıyla ortaya konulmaya çalışılacaktır.

    The epistemological and practical value of the imitation, as one of the concepts that regulate the Islamic societies’ relationship with knowledge and deeds, was examined in another article with an overview. In the article, it was set forth that the great majority of scholars opposed the imitation against “absolute imitation supporters” who were in the minority. The great majority of scholars were stated as “exceptionally rejection supporters” because of their exception in some cases of their rejection of the imitation. Herein, it is examined the cases the cases that exceptionally rejection supporters, i.e. the great majority, exempted from the imitation which they oppose and deem as invalid in terms of legitimacy. In this framework, it is presented the epistemological and practical value of the imitation in terms of the parties and subjects from muslim jurists’ point of view.

The Muslim mind experienced a crisis of thought when, during the early centuries of the Islamic era, ijtihad began to be ‎viewed as limited to legal matters rather than as a methodology for dealing with all aspects of life. This limited ‎understanding engendered a malaise that allowed taqlid to attain such prominence and respectability that its cancerous, ‎constricting, and irrelevant fiqh spread throughout Muslim life. Had ijtihad retained mote of its lexical meaning and ‎creativity, and had fiqh been considered only one of its uses, perhaps Muslims would have overcome many of the problems that confronted them. However, this particularization of ijtihad confined the Muslim mind, and taqlid ‎eventually led to the paralysis of its creative abilities.‎

It is generally agreed that taqlid is not allowed in the case of fundamental beliefs, such as the existence of God and His ‎attributes. The reason for this is that such questions are to be answered by the individual on the basis of his/her own ‎knowledge and conviction, while taqlid represents reliance on the knowledge of others. Another reason for this is that ‎there is only one truth in such matters, and all who call themselves Muslims must recognize, know, and believe in these ‎articles of faith. Anything else would be heresy and disbelief.‎

This is an overview of reviews of In a Pure Muslim Land (UNC Press, 2019 and (for the South Asian edition) Speaking Tiger, 2019), published in academic journals as well as newspapers up to June 2020.

https://uncpress.org/book/9781469649795/in-a-pure-muslim-land/
https://www.speakingtigerbooks.com/shop/non-fiction/in-a-pure-muslim-land/

This collection of papers presents a reformist project calling upon Muslim intellectuals and scholars ‎everywhere to comprehend the vast breadth and depth of the crisis engulfing Muslim thought today ‎and the necessity of solving this crisis to enable the Ummah to experience a revival and fulfill its role ‎among the nations of the world. The reader will find a variety of articles dealing with this intellectual ‎crisis, these include a chapter on ijtihad’s role and history, important since our intellectual problems ‎cannot be solved without the scholars’ use of independent reasoning and creativity. Another discusses ‎imitation (taqlid) calling upon Muslim scholars and intellectuals to abandon imitation and to stop ‎favoring the past over the present when trying to solve modern problems. Another looks at human ‎rights.‎