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The Egyptian Grant Mufti H.E Dr. Nazir Mohammed Ayyad gave opening remarks at the 10th annual international conference of the General Secretariat for Fatwa Authorities Worldwide, held in Cairo under the theme "The Making of the Competent Mufti in the Age of Artificial Intelligence." The speech discusses the opportunities, limitations, and dangers of artificial intelligence.

This is the first page of decision No. 16 dated 15 December 1929, published in al-Jarīda al-Qadāʾiyya (Le journal judiciaire). It appears in issue No. 1/26, corresponding to 4 Shaʿbān 1348 / 4 January 1930, and is preserved on page 23 of the volume held by the Harvard Law School Library at Harvard University. 

For more context on this document, see Mashal Saif's Roundtable essay “Evidence for the Laity but not the Courts: Dreams and Blasphemy in Contemporary Pakistan” here.

The Pakistani ‘ālim Hanif Qureshi has authored two books that mount a thorough defense of Mumtaz Qadri’s extra-judicial killing of Governor Salman Taseer for the alleged crime of insulting the Prophet Muhammad. The first work, published the same year that Governor Taseer was killed (2011), spans a hundred and fifty pages. It is titled The Pen Writes One Thing, the Tongue Says Another (Qalm Kuch awr Likhta hai, Zaban Kuch awr Kahti hai).[1] The second work, published in 2012, is a denser 550-page tome. Celebrating Qadri, the work is titled The Defender of the Prophet’s Honor: The Valorous Warrior Mumtaz Hussain Qadri (Muhafiz-e Namoos-e Risalat: Ghazi Mumtaz Hussain Qadri). The later work contains the entire text of the first work within it. Several dozen pages of both books are devoted to a defense of Qadri mounted via reference to the Qur’an, hadith, Islamic legal precedent and shar‘ī arguments.[2] Importantly, Qureshi also turns for validation to dreams, particularly dreams in which Muhammad himself appears.[3] While a dream or two is interspersed amongst other topics in the denser tome,[4] there is also a dedicated section on ‘true dreams’ featuring Mumtaz Qadri in both works. This section – which is the same in both works –commences with broad reflections on the significance of dreams. Leaving no doubt about the importance of Prophetic dreams, Qureshi states that it is necessary to carry out whatever the oneiric Muhammad commands the dreamer or a third-party in the dream.[5] Echoing his sermons, Qureshi writes that “numerous individuals” have seen “innumerable” divinely inspired dreams regarding Mumtaz Qadri. A handful, Qureshi explains, are narrated in the book: approximately ten dreams then follow.[6] Some showcase Mumtaz Qadri in an exalted state, surrounded by renowned religious personalities, including Sufi saints, the four rightly guided caliphs and the Prophet himself. Other dreams feature statements about Mumtaz Qadri by esteemed religious figures.[7] One gathers that these dreams circulate widely. In narrating a dream, Qureshi notes that he heard the dream from Hanif Memon, who heard it from a disciple of Syed Shahzad Ali Shah, who heard it from Syed Shah, the dreamer himself. The dream’s long chain of narration (isnād) harkens back to more traditional hadith isnāds while simultaneously highlighting the broad dissemination of dreams. Crucially, nowhere in his written works does Qureshi note that that dreams do not count as legal evidence. The impression that one receives from both of Qureshi’s books is that dreams matter.

Notes:

[1] While mounting a defense of Qadri over dozens of pages, the book also highlights the alleged inconsistency and hypocrisy of the Barelawi scholar Tahir-ul-Qadri on the matter of blasphemy.

[2] As part of his textual argument, Qureshi turns to exegetical works on the Quranic verse 4:60 to argue that a believer who extrajudicially kills a Prophet-insulter should be rewarded, not punished. See: Saif, The ‘Ulama in Contemporary Pakistan, 118-120. Qureshi also references Khomeini’s fatwa against the author Salman Rushie and devotes brief sections to arguments from the Maliki, Shafi‘i, Hanbali and Zaidi schools.

[3] The publication of dreams to convince an audience of the veracity of a matter, the correctness of a decision or the significance of an individual is not unique. For example, the view that the leader (khalifa) of the Ahmadi Muslim community occupies a divinely ordained position is reinforced through the publication of dreams experienced by Ahmadi community members. These dreams were experienced before the khalifa’s 2003 election foretold the khalifa’s leadership. Commenting on what the impact and function of such dreams, Balzani notes: “Ahmadis seeing, hearing and reading such dream material cannot but be convinced, not only as a consequence of the significance attached to dreams by their faith and by the Ahmadi hierarchy that controls all official media output, but by the sheer quality of such material.” (Marzia Balzani, “Dreaming, Islam and the Ahmadiyya Muslims in the UK,” History and Anthropology 21, no. 3: 299-300.)

[4] Mufti Muhammad Hanif Qureshi, Muhafiz-i Namus-i Risalat: Ghazi Mumtaz Hussain Qadri (Rawalpindi: Shabab-i Islami Pakistan, 2012), 169.

[5] Qureshi, Muhafiz-i Namus-i Risalat, 394.

[6] Qureshi, Muhafiz-i Namus-i Risalat, 394.

[7] Qureshi, Muhafiz-i Namus-i Risalat, 394.

Appellant Ila Alkamawa was the next door neighbor of appellee Hassan Bello’s father. When his father died, Bello offered to sell Alkamawa the late man’s house for 30,000 naira. Alkamawa told Bello that the price was too high, prompting the latter to search for an alternate buyer. A third man, Malami Yaro, agreed to purchase the home from Bello for 26,000 naira. Alkamawa brought suit in an Area Court under Islamic Law. He argued that the sale should be set aside so that he might be able to exercise his right of Shuf’ah (first refusal), which, he argued, would allow him to purchase his neighbor's home at the price Yaro had paid. On appeal, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Bello, finding that Alkamawa did not enjoy the right of Shuf’ah as applied to his neighbor's home. Such a right is not recognized by the Maliki School, the madhhab "which is applicable generally to [the] Northern States of Nigeria," the Court concluded.  

The Malaysian Supreme Court case of Che Omar bin Che Soh v. Public Prosecutor arose as an appeal of the mandatory death sentences issued to three men sentenced for either drug or firearms crimes under the Dangerous Drugs Act 1952 or the Firearms (Increased Penalties) Act 1971, respectively. In their appeal, the men argued that their mandatory death sentences were unislamic and therefore unconstitutional under Article 3 of the Malaysian constitution which established Islam as the official religion of Malaysia. Following an analysis of the constitution’s text and the historical context in which the constitution was written, the Supreme Court found that its framers could not have intended Article 3 to mean that all laws contrary to Islam would be void. Thus, the Court rejected the appellants' argument.

Following the loss of the last Muslim-controlled territory in Spain in 1491, remaining Muslims came under significant pressure to accept baptism and adopt Christian customs. In response to this situation, a North African mufti, believed to be Abu al-Abbas Ahmad ibn Abi Jum'ah al-Maghrawi al-Wahrani, wrote the Oran Fatwa in 1504. The fatwa lauds Muslims in Spain for continuing to practice their religion in the face of oppression. It also specifies ways in which Muslims may alter the ways they carry out the commands of Islam in order to ensure their survival.