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The new Islamic Penal Code of Iran was adopted in May 2013 and entered into force the same year in the Islamic Consultative Assembly. It consists of four books: General Provisions, Ḥudūd, Qiṣāṣ, and Diyāt.

MWNUK published this report to inform Muslim women in Britain about their rights regarding marriage and divorce. It includes case studies and answers questions they commonly receive. Written to also assist academics, policymakers, religious authorities, and other relevant organizations, the report provides a comprehensive overview of the secular and religious legal problems Muslim women may face in obtaining a divorce.

A UK family court considered whether and how UK law recognizes a marriage conducted according to Islamic law that had not been accompanied by a civil law marriage. The husband contended that the couple was never married, and the wife—petitioning for divorce—insisted that they were. The two had signed an Islamic marriage contract (nikāḥ) accompanied by a ceremony abroad, lived together and had children together, and held themselves out as married for years both abroad and in the UK. The court concluded that, on those facts and considering the UK laws on marriage—as interpreted, for the first time, through the Human Rights Act 1998 and the best interests of the child—that the marriage was “void” or “voidable.” This determination meant that the couple was not validly married under UK law but that their union was also not considered a non-marriage. Instead, as a void marriage, their union was something akin to what Islamic law would label a “defective marriage.” The court had essentially concluded that, although a marriage was not properly concluded or registered according to the law, the steps taken toward one would in some measure be recognized by the law and entitle the wife to certain legal protections upon dissolution of the union. In this case, this meant that the wife was entitled to a decree of nullity from the court, and that the wife could take advantage of certain UK civil law remedies for maintenance and child custody upon dissolution.

In this literary source purportedly recounting early episodes of judges, Abū Yūsuf (d. 182/798) issues a clever ruling for ʿAbbāsid Caliph Hārūn al-Rashīd, effectively saving his son – a prince – from an accusation of zinā (fornication or adultery) by operation of the “doubt canon,” which requires legal officials to “avoid criminal punishments in cases of doubt.” The doubt here is a judicial knowledge, rather than established evidence by a confession or witnesses. He is rewarded by being made Chief Judge (qāḍī al-quḍāt) of Baghdad.

This historical source records ʿAlī’s endowment of the land at Yanbuʿ to his heirs. Ḥimyarī (d. ca. 9th/15th c.) gives the text of the endowment as cited by Bakrī <link>, reporting that the Prophet Muḥammad gave the land to Kushd, who asked for it to be given to his nephew. ʿAbd al-Raḥmān b. Asʿad b. Zurāra then bought the land but found the area stricken with plague and contracted an eye disease there. When he returned and ʿAlī asked him where he was coming from, he answered, “Yanbuʿ, and I disliked it; would you like to buy it?” ʿAlī thus purchased the land for 30,000 dinars. When he went to it, “the first thing he did there was [discover] Bughaybigha."

In her chapter on land and leadership in early Islamic societies in Justice and Leadership in Early Islamic Courts, Intisar Rabb draws on this source to demonstrate the complexity of the ʿAlid endowments establishing their entitlement to the land.

This source is part of the Online Companion to the book Justice and Leadership in Early Islamic Courts,ed. Intisar A. Rabb and Abigail Krasner Balbale (ILSP/HUP 2017)—a collection of primary sources  and other material used in and related to the book.

This historical source records ʿAlī’s endowment of the land at Yanbuʿ to his heirs. Khuzāʿī (d. 789/1387–8) cites Mubarrad’s account of the endowment, <link>, in which ʿAlī’s companion Abū Nayzar shares a meal with ʿAlī and the latter begins to work the spring; upon realizing its strength, he calls for a pen and paper to sign over the spring as a charitable endowment “for the Medinan poor and [for] travelers,” to be administered exclusively by Ḥasan and Ḥusayn.

In her chapter on land and leadership in early Islamic societies in Justice and Leadership in Early Islamic Courts, Intisar Rabb draws on this source to demonstrate the complexity of the ʿAlid endowments establishing their entitlement to the land.

This source is part of the Online Companion to the book Justice and Leadership in Early Islamic Courts,ed. Intisar A. Rabb and Abigail Krasner Balbale (ILSP/HUP 2017)—a collection of primary sources  and other material used in and related to the book.

In this Twelver Shīʿī collection of ḥadīth, Kulaynī (d. 329/940–1)records a report about ʿAlī’s gift of some five awsāqof dates (approximately 15 kilograms) to a poor man whose custom was not to ask for handouts. In her chapter on land and leadership in early Islamic societies in Justice and Leadership in Early Islamic Courts, Intisar Rabb cites this ḥadīthas an example of how the ʿAlids gained economic independence through their ownership of the valuable land of Bughaybigha. It also indicates that the ʿAlids used the profits from the land for charitable purposes.

This source is part of the Online Companion to the book Justice and Leadership in Early Islamic Courts,ed. Intisar A. Rabb and Abigail Krasner Balbale (ILSP/HUP 2017)—a collection of primary sources  and other material used in and related to the book.

In this text, Muḥammad b. Khalaf Wakīʿ (d. 306/917) records a brief version of the proceedings of the Case of Bughaybigha: a dispute between the Umayyad caliph al-Walīd b. Yazīd (Walīd II) and ʿAlī’s great-grandson ʿAbd Allāh b. al-Ḥasan over the title to the spring of Bughaybigha and the surrounding farmland. In her chapter on land and leadership in early Islamic societies in Justice and Leadership in Early Islamic Courts, Intisar Rabb uses Wakīʿ’s account as the basis of her narrative of the events. She also cites several sources alongside the case to analyze the role of judicial knowledge as one of many disfavored legal canons in early Islamic law.

This source is part of the Online Companion to the book Justice and Leadership in Early Islamic Courts,ed. Intisar A. Rabb and Abigail Krasner Balbale (ILSP/HUP 2017)—a collection of primary sources and other material used in and related to the book.

In his treatise on the land tax (kharāj), Yaḥyā b. Ādam (d. 203/818) cites a report from the ʿAlid descendant ʿAbd Allāh b. al-Ḥasan according to which ʿUmar, the second caliph, gave Yanbuʿ to ʿAlī after ʿAlī asked him about it. In her chapter on land and leadership in early Islamic societies in Justice and Leadership in Early Islamic Courts, Intisar Rabb uses this source to show the range of accounts concerning ʿAlī’s acquisition of land at Yanbuʿ, noting that ʿAbd Allāh b. al-Ḥasan had a personal investment in his version of the narrative and that he appeared in court claiming to have entitlement rights to the land.

This source is part of the Online Companion to the book Justice and Leadership in Early Islamic Courts,ed. Intisar A. Rabb and Abigail Krasner Balbale (ILSP/HUP 2017)—a collection of primary sources  and other material used in and related to the book.

The Karnataka High Court ruled that the ḥijāb is not "essential" in Islam and upheld a Government Order dated 05.02.2022, issued under sections 7 & 133 of the Karnataka Education Act of 1983. That order directs the College Development Committees all over the State to prescribe the ‘Student Uniform,’ presumably in terms of Rule 11 of Karnataka Educational Institutions Rules of 1995 (Classification, Regulation & Prescription of Curricula, etc.), which bans headscarves in classrooms. A full bench of Justices on the High Court sat to hear several petitions filed by Muslim students who attend government pre-university colleges in the region and who were alleged prejudice from the ban. The Court issued this order, restricting girls from wearing headscarves, or ḥijāb, deeming it as not “essential” in Islam arguing that “what is not religiously made obligatory therefore cannot be made a quintessential aspect of the religion through public agitations or by the passionate arguments in court,'' and as a use of religious symbols by students in governmental educational institutions that have established dress codes noting that Muslim women’s  ḥijāb goes against their “constitutional spirit of ‘equal opportunity’ of ‘public participation’ and ‘positive secularism’.”

First published in 1888, this commentary is one of the earliest Arabic commentaries on the Ottoman Code of 1869, better known as the Mecelle, which is understood as the first precolonial experiment in codifying Islamic law. Rustam Bāz was a prior member of the Shūrat al-Dawla al-ʿUthmāniyya. His commentary was published multiple times, relied upon, and was popular among law officials in Ottoman Arab world, as a practical commentary (sharḥ ʿamallī). 

On June 28, 2022, the Constitutional Court of South Africa confirmed the Supreme Court of Appeal order that the state must amend existing legislation or enact new legislation to recognize and regulate the consequences of Muslim marriages. The order declared certain provisions of the Marriage Act and the Divorce Act unconstitutional due to the persistent non-recognition of Muslim marriages, or marriages solemnized in accordance with the tenets of sharīʿa, that have resulted in the infringement of fundamental rights of parties to Muslim marriages, and Muslim women and children in particular. The Constitutional Court confirmed this order stating that “the common law definition of marriage is declared to be inconsistent with the Constitution and invalid to the extent that it excludes Muslim marriages.”

In Ayub Masih v. State (23 Aug 2022), Justice Qazi Faez Isa and Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah granted bail on an interim petition, pending trial, to the plaintiff Salamat Mansha Masih, who was arrested for “preaching and making blasphemous remarks” in April 2021. Masih was denied bail by the Sessions Judge and the Judge of the High Court, who relied on the First Information Report (FIR), which alleges that the petitioner was a preacher, and the statements of the four witnesses. Upon review, the Supreme Court declared that an “examination of the charge reveals material deficiencies ... [and] does not contain a number of prescribed requirements with regard to the framing of the charge,” casting doubt on the reliablity of the FIR and testimony from the four witnesses. Namely, the Court pointed to the misidentification of the petitioner as a preacher, and the lack of corroborating evidence for the witness testimony. Remanding the case without deciding on the merits, the Court charged the lower courts with observing the constitutional requirements for fair trials in blasphemy and other criminal law cases. Constitutional requirements of applying shari'a, alongside its fundamental rights and fair trial provisions, include consideration of the Islamic law doubt canon instructing judges to ”avoid criminal punishments in cases of doubt”), and thereby requiring heightened procedures, a beyond a reasonable doubt standard for criminal convictions. For further studies of the doubt canon, together with the heightened procedures, standards of proof, and interpretive norms requiring lenity in Islamic criminal law, see Intisar Rabb, Doubt in Islamic Law (Cambridge University Press 2015).

The Scholars at Department of Dārul-Iftā' (Wifaqul Ulama) in the United Kingdom issued this fatwā in response to a question about the permissibility of using Bitcoin, a prevalent form of cryptocurrency. The council determines its use to be ḥarām, or impermissible according to their understanding of Islamic law. They determine this on the basis that Bitcoin does not meet a number of necessary characteristics associated with valid currency: namely, it is highly volatile in nature; it carries excessive risks associated with its volatility; and it lacks of validation in the its algorithmically and thus inherently decentralized system of production and economic exchange.

Twenty-one scholars on the Syrian Islamic Council issued a fatwā on cryptocurrency that declared dealing with cryptocurrency to be religiously forbidden (ḥarām) because of the many risks associated with it, which they identify as ignorance about it, uncertainty [as to its fluctuating value], and its resemblance to gambling. They came to their decision after outlining their understanding of cryptocurrencies as goods that are intangible given that they are produced programmatically and exist on the internet. For them, this nature of digital currency bolsters the risk of loss in the event of a technical malfunction or computer hacking. Secondly, they understand cryptocurrencies to be decentralized, which creates ambiguity around its origin, authority structure, and reference points necessary for evaluating those currencies in trading and for setting pricing. That ambiguity in turn prevents any authority from controlling the flowing liquidity in the markets. Furthermore, they conclude that governments currently lack legal considerations that might aid in the oversight and control of cryptocurrency circulation. Because of these risks, they determine that trading cryptocurrency is forbidden unless so long as there are no changes in its structure or governance that can help eliminate the large degree of risk that comes with their usage currently, through proper oversight and issuance from central banks or trusted institutions.

In Civil Petition No.1289 of 2020, the Supreme Court of Pakistan held that a wife has a right to be maintained by her husband and that this right is absolute under Islamic law “so long as she remains faithful to him and discharges, or is willing to discharge, her own matrimonial obligations” and that a Muslim husband is bound to maintaining his wife even if she can maintain herself out of her own resources. They ordered that the petitioner, Haseen Ullah, has been “evading his legal as well as moral obligation“ to pay the agreed upon dower and maintenance to his wife, Naheed Begum, and their five minor children. For these reasons, the Supreme Court found the petition to be baseless and dismissed it with costs throughout. 

This order implements the decision from the District Court of Colorado in Smith v. Crockett, a case in which a Muslim inmate sued Colorado state prison officials on allegations that they had violated his federal constitutional and statutory rights to free exercise of religion and to a diet that confirmed to the dictates of his faith. In this case, petitioner Ray Anthony Smith, a Muslim inmate housed in a Colorado state prison, alleged a violation of his federal constitutional right to the free exercise of religion and his federal statutory right to a diet that complies with his faith. Specifically, he alleged that prison officials revoked his right to a ḥalāl diet upon observing him ordering non-ḥalāl food. Petitioner Smith submitted a request for reinstatement of his ḥalāl diet through the internal prison grievance system, which was denied. Smith initiated this federal lawsuit in 2020 alleging violations of free exercise of religion under the First Amendment of the U.S. constitution and the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (“RLUIPA”). His complaint alleges that the Colorado Department of Corrections, Dr. Muhammad Munir Chaudry, and The Islamic Food and Nutrition Council of America (IFNCA) violated his rights by the wrongful revocation of his religious diet and mislabeling of ḥalāl food products. Upon review, U.S. District Judge William J. Martinez, who adopted the recommendation of U.S. Magistrate Judge Nina Y. Wang that government officials not receive immunity but that the court dismiss Smith’s other allegations–including monetary damages against the government defendants for fraudulent misrepresentation of ḥalāl food products, and that the IFNCA and Dr. Chaudry be held liable for government actions. This order implements that recommendation and decision adopted by the district court.

In this decision, U.S. District Judge William J. Martinez adopts the recommendation of U.S. Magistrate Judge Nina Y. Wang in Smith v. Crockett, a case in which a Muslim inmate sued Colorado state prison officials on allegations that they had violated his federal constitutional and statutory rights to free exercise of religion and to a diet that confirmed to the dictates of his faith. In this case, petitioner Ray Anthony Smith, a Muslim inmate housed in a Colorado state prison, alleged a violation of his federal constitutional right to the free exercise of religion and his federal statutory right to a diet that complies with his faith. Specifically, he alleged that prison officials revoked his right to a ḥalāl diet upon observing him ordering non-ḥalāl food. Petitioner Smith submitted a request for reinstatement of his ḥalāl diet through the internal prison grievance system, which was denied. Smith initiated this federal lawsuit in 2020 alleging violations of free exercise of religion under the First Amendment of the U.S. constitution and the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (“RLUIPA”). His complaint alleges that the Colorado Department of Corrections, Dr. Muhammad Munir Chaudry, and The Islamic Food and Nutrition Council of America (IFNCA) violated his rights by the wrongful revocation of his religious diet and mislabeling of ḥalāl food products. Upon review of the record, Judge Martinez agreed with Judge Wang’s recommendation that the government officials were not entitled to immunity, as petitioner Ray Anthony Smith had made sufficient allegations to make out a prima facie claim. Also following Judge Wang’s recommendations, Judge Martinez dismissed Smith’s other allegations–including monetary damages against the government defendants for fraudulent misrepresentation of ḥalāl food products, and that the IFNCA and Dr. Chaudry be held liable for government actions.

In this paper, Muftī Faraz Adam considers whether Bitcoin can be considered currency in Islamic law by interpreting relevant classical legal texts with the aim of identifying the principles defining money in Islamic law. He identifies three necessary elements for currency to be money: that it constitute māl (wealth), taqawwum (legal value) and thamaniyya (monetary usage in exchange markets). He determines that Bitcoin constitutes wealth (māl) and has legal value (taqawwum), However, he determines that it cannot be considered to possess valid or stable monetary usage (thamaniyya) due to its volatility and associated risks. Muftī Adam further determines that this form of cryptocurrency does not pass the principle of preservation of wealth (hifẓ al-māl) that form part of the fundamental objectives of Islamic law (maqāṣid al-sharīʿa) and its associated values of justice or equity (‘adl).

In November 2021, the UAE government issued a new personal status law from Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed al-Nahayan, president of the UAE federation of seven emirates, titled Law No. 14 of 2021 Concerning the Personal Status of Non-Foreigners Muslims in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi. The law covers civil marriage, divorce, alimony, joint child custody, proof of paternity, and inheritance. Most notably, this new law allows for civil marriage, not just marriage under Islamic law. It allows expats, tourists, and non-residents to marry in Abu Dhabi and allows foreigners to follow their home countries’ laws on matters of inheritance and divorce.

The President of the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen in India, Asaduddin Owaisi, responded to a recent Karnataka High Court decision ruling that ḥijāb, or wearing a headscarf,  is not "essential" in Islam, and that state colleges could validly bar Muslim women from wearing it on their campuses. He disagrees with the Court decision on grounds that it goes against the Indian constitution's fundamental rights to freedom of religion, culture, speech, and expression. He further concludes that the decision interferes in an individual’s right to worship. More broadly, his concern lies with secular state courts making decisions on what is or is not essential religious practice, noting that such questions are between an individual and God. He concludes that the High Court's decision will force Muslim women to decide between “Allah’s command to be educated” and God’s commands that facilitate spiritual connectedness in responding to what they understand to be a religious obligation, such as wearing ḥijāb.

In this paper, Muftī Muhammad Abu Bakar determines that cryptocurrency is permissible under Islamic law in principle as it is treated as a good with value, as evidenced by its high market price on global exchanges and its acceptance as a form of payment at a wide variety of global merchants. He further notes that the permissibility of cryptocurrency is determined by its classification as currency in a governing legal and regulatory environment. Where jurisdictions prohibit dealing with cryptocurrency, its usage is prohibited in Islamic law as well. Muftī Abu Bakar adds that, before trading with cryptocurrency, users must consider its volatility and associated risks, given that preservation of wealth is one of the fundamental objectives (maqāṣid al-sharīʿa) of Islamic law. He concludes that, overall, it is not advisable to buy cryptocurrency for investment purposes, but to utilize it as a system of payment instead. 

In this case, petitioner Ray Anthony Smith, a Muslim inmate housed in a Colorado state prison, alleged a violation of his federal constitutional right to the free exercise of religion and his federal statutory right to a diet that complies with his faith. Specifically, he alleged that prison officials revoked his right to aḥalāl diet upon observing him ordering non-ḥalāl food. Petitioner Smith submitted a request for reinstatement of hisḥalāl diet through the internal prison grievance system, which was denied. Smith initiated this federal lawsuit in 2020 alleging violations of free exercise of religion under the First Amendment of the U.S. constitution and the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (“RLUIPA”). His complaint alleges that the Colorado Department of Corrections, Dr. Muhammad Munir Chaudry, and The Islamic Food and Nutrition Council of America (IFNCA) violated his rights by the wrongful revocation of his religious diet and mislabeling of ḥalāl food products. Upon reviewing the record, in Smith v. Crockett, U.S. Magistrate Judge Nina Y. Wang determined that the petitioner alleged actions that sufficed to make out a basic claim and recommended that government officials should not receive immunity. The Judge recommended, however, dismissal of Smith’s other allegations–including monetary damages against the government defendants for fraudulent misrepresentation of ḥalāl food products, and that the IFNCA and Dr. Chaudry be held liable for government actions.

In this video,  Sheikh Mustafa Umar approaches the question whether cryptocurrency is ḥalāl or ḥarām with hesitancy, cautioning other scholars from making any determinations without fully understanding decentralized currency. Noting that there are a wide variety of cryptocurrencies as well as varied intentions behind their usage, Sheikh Umar concludes that the cryptocurrencies might be permissible or disliked, but at this stage in its development, it is too early to say that it is impermissible (ḥarām) in Islamic law.

When asked about the permissibility of cryptocurrency, Muftī Muḥammad Taqi Usmani responded that, although he is not satisfied with it due to its speculative purposes which seem impermissible in principle,  he will have to defer his decision until a later date in the case that its use may expand into real trade. He mentions that its mass use is not likely due to the possibility of weakening economies at the hands of an elite few, so he does not encourage its usage. 

In this review and order to address noncompliant investment practices, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission determined that the New York-based robo-adviser Wahed Invest, LLC had made misleading statements on investments, breached its fiduciary duty to investors, and failed to comply with the law related to its sharīʿa advisory business. According to the SEC’s review, from September 2018 through July 2019, Wahed Invest advertised the existence of its own proprietary funds when no such funds existed, and the firm further promised investors that it would periodically rebalance their advisory accounts but did not do so. The SEC’s order also found that when Wahed Invest ultimately launched a proprietary Exchange-Traded Fund (ETF) in July 2019, it used its clients’ advisory assets to seed the ETF without prior disclosure to those clients of any conflicts of interest. The order further found that Wahed Invest marketed itself as providing advisory services compliant with sharīʿa, or Islamic law, including marketing the importance of its income purification process on its website. Despite these representations, the review board determined that Wahed Invest did not adopt and implement written policies and procedures addressing how it would assure sharīʿa compliance on an ongoing basis. Wahed Invest consented to the entry of the SEC’s order finding that the firm violated Sections 206(2) and 206(4) of the Investment Advisers Act of 1940 and Rules 206(4)-1(a) and 206(4)-7; the firm further agreed to the Commission’s cease-and-desist order, to pay a $300,000 penalty, and to retain an independent compliance consultant, among other requirements.

Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Hajj and Umrah made the decision, dated 6 June 2022, to assume full control over Ḥajj, the annual Islamic pilgrimage in commemoration of the rites of Abraham, his wife Hagar, and the would-be sacrifice of their son Ishmael. They issued the decision only weeks before Ḥajj season, to require pilgrims from Europe, America, and Australia for this year’s Ḥajj (1443H/2022AD) to petition individually rather than in groups via a new lottery system and to use their portal exclusively, rather than arrange their trips through the local groups that ordinarily lead, educate, and organize tours for Muslims in the West. The Saudi portal is meant to enable visa processing and monitor COVID-19 protocols.

In this video, Dr. Ziyaad Mahomed discusses the permissibility of cryptocurrency. After giving an overview of scholars’ rulings on the question, he determines that there is not enough known about cryptocurrency to determine whether its usage is permissible at this time. He adds that users should exercise caution when using cryptocurrency due to its volatility and the lack of Islamic legal standards on the practice. 

A nine-member panel at the Federal Court of Malaysia led by Chief Justice Tengku Maimun ruled in a unanimous decision that Section 66A of the Administration of the Religion of Islam (State of Selangor) Enactment of 2003 was unconstitutional and void as the power of judicial review that it conferred was not a power that the Selangor state legislative assembly was authorized to give. The petition arose out of the High Court consideration of an application for judicial review wherein an organizational petitioner, the SIS Forum (of Malaysia), sought to challenge the validity of a fatwā [advisory Islamic law opinion].The Court stated that it is not concerned with the procedural or substantive validity of the fatwā, and was not asked to determine the courts are authorized to undertake such evaluations in the first place under clause (1A) of Article 121 of Malaysia’s Federal Constitution. The petition concerns only the question whether the Selangor State Legislative Assembly (SSLA) was authorized to enact section 66A of the ARIE 2003, conferring powers of judicial review on syariah (Islamic law) courts. The Court concluded that Selangor, a Malaysian state, cannot grant syariah courts the power to review the rulings of Islamic authorities, which is a power retained exclusively by civil courts. For further context on Islamic law in Malaysia, consult Tamir Moustafa's Constituting Religion: Islam, Liberal Rights, and the Malaysian State (Cambridge University Press, 2018).

Grand Muftī Shawky Ibrahim Allam of Egypt's Dār al-Iftā' states that all uses of cryptocurrencies, including trading, buying, selling, leasing, are religiously prohibited (ḥarām) because of their negative effects on the economy, disruption of the market equilibrium and the concept of work, and the lack of required legal protections and financial oversight for traders. The Grand Muftī also concludes that cryptocurrencies infringe on the rights of those in authority, dispossessing them of their special prerogatives in this domain, and may give rise to damages from uncertainty, ignorance, and fraud in novel banking processes, standards, and values. For him, this conclusion finds support in the general statement of the Prophet Muḥammad that "He who deceives us is not of us.” Given the high risks that cryptocurrencies pose to individuals and to government, he thus concludes that there is further support for their prohibition with reference to the Islamic legal canon of “no harm”; “lā ḍarar wa-lā ḍirār.” He came to his decision by reference to economists and other related experts.

In this excerpt from his manual on judicial practice, Abū Bakr Ahmad b. ʿAlī al-Jaṣṣāṣ (d. 370/980) discusses "different types of duties to fight based on residence: an enhanced duty existed for people in frontier lands bordering enemy territory as compared to those living in the interior." Like many medieval jurists, Jaṣṣāṣ "privileges the ruler’s authority to utilize the jihād duty" for a variety of reasons, including additional strategic objectives beyond territorial defense. He also states that if a ruler desires to offensively engage the enemy in their territory, then the obligation is on individuals. For more on jihād, read Adnan A. Zulfiqar's essay “Territory and Jurisdiction” in the Roundtable on the History of Islamic International Law on the Islamic Law Blog.

In this Media Release, Jamia Ulama-i-Hind quotes their President Maulana Mahmoud Asa’d Madani to call the Karnataka High Court order that restricts the wearing of headscarves, or ḥijāb, in colleges in the state a deep disappointment and that the “verdict would have a direct impact on religious freedom” and negative implications for the education of Muslim women who can no longer wear their headscarves in classrooms. He emphasized that the decisions regarding religious matters should be based on the opinions of authoritative figures within the tradition and that the Courts should not intervene. He urges state governments to protect the traditions of communities and appealed to the youth to avoid protests and “taking the law into their own hands.”

In his work entitled al-Ashbāh wa-l-Naẓāʾir, Ibn Nujaym (d. 969/1563), examines similar historical legal cases and fatwas through collecting substantive legal canons and interpretive legal canons that “distinguish, explain, and guide varied outcomes in cases with seemingly similar facts.” As a principal work authored early in the Ottoman Era collecting legal canons in Ḥanafī law, Muslim jurists of many schools frequently reference his work. For example, drafters of the Ottoman Code of 1869, also known as the Mecelle, primarily relied on this work to select 99 legal canons to preface a new commercial code based on Ḥanafī law that would both modernize and reform Ottoman law based on traditional or classical Islamic legal norms, through reference to legal canons.

For more, view the full print edition or see Intisar Rabb, Doubt in Islamic Law (Cambridge University Press 2015) and “Experiments in Tracking Canons across the Mecelle” (Islamic Law Blog, March 16, 2022).

When asked under what circumstances is abortion, or ijhāḍ, permissible and whether it is permissible to have an abortion if one has too many children, Allama Muḥammad Yusuf from Banuri’s Dār al-Iftā', responds that it is not permissible to terminate a pregnancy after fourth months and is only permissible if the mother’s health is at risk from the pregnancy. He adds that it is forbidden to terminate a pregnancy over financial fears of having many children, even if the fetus is less than four months.

Dr. Ali al-Qaradaghi considers the question whether cryptocurrency is a legitimate currency (ʿumla). Traditional Islamic law rulings define currency to reflect instruments with intrinsic value, such as gold or silver, or with credit value, which requires state backing. In his view, cryptocurrency has no inherent value [in the Middle East]. Rather, in his estimation, cryptocurrency’s value is in transactions. But even when it is used as credit, it has no state behind it or agreed-upon recognition [again, specifically with respect to the Middle East]. Thus, he concludes, it is not actually ḥaqq mālī (a property claim). Rather, it is a program or algorithm. He concludes on those grounds that investment in it is religiously prohibited (muḥarram) but only by means of the concept of “prohibition of the means" (taḥrīm al-wasāʾil). This is the lightest of prohibition types, because it is not prohibition for excessive interest (ribā) but to protect property (ḥifāza ʿala māl).

In response to a question on the abortion, or ijhāḍ, of a six month fetus with deformities in the thigh bones, Grand Muftī Shawky Ibrahim Allam of Egypt's Dār al-Iftā' states that scholars unanimously agree that if the age of the fetus reaches 120 days, the period when the soul is breathed into it, then it is impermissible to abort the fetus and absolutely prohibited in this case. However, he adds that if the mother’s physician decides that the survival of the fetus poses a danger to her life or health, then it is permissible to abort the fetus, prioritizing the stability of the mother’s life and health over that of the fetus.

The All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) in Lucknow, India responded to the Karnataka High Court’s decision that ḥijāb is not "essential" in Islam, and that state colleges are authorized to bar Muslim women from wearing it. The Board states that the High Court’s verdict contradicted Article 15 of the Indian Constitution, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of religion, gender, caste, class, or place of birth, and guarantees individual liberty to all citizens, as well as the right to identity. They thus conclude that this decision is an injustice against the constitutional freedoms of Indian citizens. The Board also expresses concern with secular state courts making decisions on what is or is not essential religious practice, stating that “it is not in the jurisdiction of the courts to decide this but that of the ulemas [sic] and scholars.” They further note that the Indian Constitution accords every individual the right to determine what is essential in their religion. On a related matter, they add that the establishment of a common Uniform Civil Code—as has been further proposed—in a multi-religious country will interfere in the fundamental rights of religious freedom, and further negatively impact the religious and individual rights and freedoms of Muslim citizens in Indian. 

The All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) in Delhi, India responded to the Karnataka High Court’s decision that ḥijāb, or wearing a headscarf,  is not "essential" in Islam, and that state colleges were authorized to ban Muslim women from wearing it on their campuses.  The General Secretary of the AIMPLB, Hazrat Maulana Khalid Saifullah Rahmani Sahab, responded that hijāb is in fact an essential and agreed-upon part of Islamic law and practice (sharīʿa) and that some form of it is obligatory, or wājib, for every Muslim woman.

Suyūṭī’s (d. 911/1505) al-Ashbāh wa-l-Naẓāʾir is a treatise collecting Shāfiʿī legal canons. It examines the similarities and differences between legal and interpretive outcomes in Islamic law in ways that show how and why one judgment or outcome is distinguished from another, and in the process highlights the substantive and interpretive legal canons that guide those legal outcomes. 

For more, view the full print edition and see The Legal Thought of Jalal al-Din al-Suyuti: Authority and Legacy (Oxford, 2017) by Rebecca Hernandez.

The UAE government issued Federal Decree Law no. 31 of 2021 amending the country’s criminal law code, with major amendments to the prior code, Federal Law no. 3 of 1987. The new law amended three major provisions of the existing Code. First, it expands the scope of the laws of rape and sexual assault by raising the age limit for statutory rape from 14 to 18, in which anyone under the age of 18 is now considered a minor, and introducing a penalty of life imprisonment for rape that may increase to capital punishment if the case matches any of the conditions outlined by the law. Second, the law partially decriminalizes out-of-wedlock sexual relationships, by reducing the penalty from one year to six months if a complaint is filed by a relative or woman’s guardian. Third, the law introduces provisions for out-of-wedlock parenting in which anyone who has a child out-of-wedlock can avoid the default minimum sentence of two years’ imprisonment if they marry, acknowledge parenthood of the child (either jointly or separately), and provide formal issuance of the baby's identification documents.

This is the first volume of al-Timurtāshī's commentary of his compendium of Ḥanafī law, Tanwīr al-Abṣār wa-Jāmiʻ al-Biḥār.

On August 3, 2022, the Sharia Court of Appeal of Kwara State in Nigeria at Ilorin decided in Mohammed v. Mohammed that a deceased man’s second and third wives were not entitled to inheritance under Islamic estate laws because he married his first wife under the secular Marriage Act. The man’s second and third wives were suing upon his death for inheritance claims under sharīʿa, but the Court held that, for those marriages to have been valid under sharīʿa, the man would have had to divorce his first wife, whom he had married under the Marriage Act and not according to norms of Islamic law. By contrast, because the deceased had married his first wife under the Marriage Act, the Court held that the law governing the distribution of his estate was the law of Kwara State, not Islamic law, or sharīʿa.

Ibn Isḥāq's Kitāb al-maghāzī, is a compilation of reports on events that occurred during or prior to the life of the Prophet Muhammad, including his military expeditions. Ibn Isḥāq “arranged [the reports] into what he deemed to be their correct chronological order and to which he added his own comments” adding a chain of narration to most reports. This excerpt is on the birth of the Prophet. 

For more on the text, see Nicolai Sinai and William Montgomery’s entry on the Prophet Muhammad in Encyclopedia Britannica. 

On September 23, 2022, the Texas Supreme Court remanded a divorce case to the trial court in which it had originally been heard, deciding that the lower court had erred in its initial judgment. The case involved two agreements that had been signed in 2008 when the couple was first married; one was an Islamic “Marriage Contract,” and the other was an “Islamic Prenuptial Agreement.” The wife sued for divorce, claiming that she had not known at the time exactly what she was signing and had assumed that the prenuptial agreement was just a copy of the marriage contract. The prenuptial agreement stated that any conflicts arising from the marriage were to be “resolved according to the Qur’an, Sunnah, and Islamic Law in a Muslim court, or in [its] absence by a Fiqh Panel,” whose decision was to be “binding and final.” The Texas Supreme Court held that the trial court had erred in determining the enforceability and validity of the prenuptial agreement, and that the conflicts arising from the marriage should be determined by a court according to U.S. law, rather  than by a so-called fiqh panel of Islamic law experts. The Court’s per curiam opinion came in response to an appeal from the Texas Fifth Court of Appeals, whose ruling can be viewed here. 

At a meeting in Lucknow on February 5, 2023, the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) passed a resolution opposing the Indian government’s proposed Uniform Civil Code. The Board noted that the proposed UCC was “neither relevant nor beneficial for a multi-religious, multi-cultural and multi-lingual country like India.” The Board further expressed concerns that the UCC would divide India along religious and cultural lines, and that it would erode safeguards around religious freedom and equality.

On February 6, 2023, the Senate of Pakistan unanimously passed a resolution to bring all existing laws into conformity with Islamic law, or sharīʿa, “as laid down in the Holy Quran and Sunnah.” The resolution also states that no new laws that are in contradiction with Islam shall be passed. Additionally, the Senate demanded that the Pakistani government address the vacant positions on the Federal Shariat Court and infrequent meetings of the Shariat Appellate Bench in the Supreme Court of Pakistan.

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Municipal Rural Affairs and Housing has issued a draft law forbidding any public firm from using the names of any kings of Saudi Arabia, the crown prince, or heads of states of friendly countries without the government’s permission. The law also forbids naming any public firms using the names of the Three Holy Mosques and most of the 99 Names of Allah. Public facilities may also not be named in contradiction to Islamic law. The draft bill allows for naming public facilities after heads of state of friendly countries who made outstanding contributions to supporting the position of Saudi Arabia, Islamic religious scholars, martyrs on duty, names of battles fought by the Prophet in which Muslims were victorious, and the most eminent early and contemporary Muslim scholars.

On February 2, 2023, the Majlis Agama Islam Negeri Johor (MAINJ) announced that Sultan Ibrahim of Johor had approved a fatwā on the types of events hosted by non-Muslims that Muslims are permitted to attend. The fatwā states that Muslims are prohibited from participating in religious rituals of other faiths, but they are not precluded from attending celebrations of other faiths that do not involve ritual ceremonies. Along with the issuance of the fatwā, MAINJ also issued more general guidelines on non-Muslim festivals that Muslims are permitted to attend–including ceremonies not accompanied by rituals, non-Muslim religious symbols, and religious songs contrary to the Islamic faith.

On July 23, 2018, the Congress of the Philippines enacted a law establishing the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM). This “organic law” allows for the promulgation of an autonomous Muslim government in Bangsamoro, Mindanao, and establishes the BARMM as the only Muslim-majority autonomous region in the Philippines.

On February 8, 2023, the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) filed an affidavit with the Supreme Court of India asserting that it is permissible for women to pray in mosques, provided that there is segregation of men and women within the mosque. The Board also included a note to the Muslim community at large that, when mosques are being constructed, separate women’s prayer spaces should be included in the construction plans.

On January 17, 2023, the National Assembly of Pakistan passed a bill expanding the country’s laws on blasphemy. Previously, Pakistan’s blasphemy laws subjected those who insulted the Prophet Muhammad to the death penalty. The amended blasphemy laws carry a minimum ten-year prison sentence for those deemed to have insulted any of the Prophet’s Companions or Family members, and it renders blasphemy a non-bailable offense.

Egypt’s Dar al-Iftā (Fatwa Council) issued a fatwā regarding the permissibility of cosmetic surgery to reduce nose size in instances where the size of the nose is causing physical and psychological harm. The Dar al-Ifta stated that, while plastic surgery simply for cosmetological purposes is impermissible, it becomes permissible if the purpose of the procedure is to rectify some harm, either physical or psychological, which is causing instability in one’s life.

In April 2022 [1443 AH], the Dār al-ʿUlūm al-Sharʿiyya press published The Islamic Emirate and Governmental System, authored by the Chief Justice of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, ʿAbd al-Ḥākim al-Ḥaqqānī, with a foreword by the current Taliban head, Hibatullāh Akhunzāda. The book was published in Arabic, with the intention of reaching a broad Muslim audience, beyond Afghanistan. The 312-page book discusses governance, education, laws of war (jihād), political leadership, education, and the rights and roles of women. The book opens by stating that, following the withdrawal of American-allied forces from Afghanistan, the goal of the new Islamic State is the implementation of divine law in accordance with Islamic law generally and Hanafī jurisprudence specifically. This book claims to be a manifesto encompassing the political and governance policies of the Taliban, even though it definitely represents the beliefs of al-Ḥaqqānī and his allies, rather than the philosophy of the entire Taliban movement—which has some internal variation. The book's principal assertions follow.

The book begins by defining two types of government: al-jabāya and al-hidāya. Al-jabāya refers, essentially, to the levying of taxes, while al-hidāya refers to religio-moral guidance. The author maintains that an Islamic government should be one of al-hidāya, where the government serves the role of providing advice and guidance to the people, rather than al-jabāya, wherein a government exploits the poor for the personal gain of government officials. Under a government of al-hidāya, the author asserts that the legitimate form of law is divine, not man-made.

The book acknowledges several sources of sharīʿa. Those sources include but are not limited to the Qur’ān, the ḥadīth (prophetic reports), qiyās (deductive analogical reasoning), ijmā‘ (scholarly consensus), and khayr (benevolence).

The book further establishes that the justice system of the Islamic Emirate should be in accordance only with Hanafī jurisprudence, and that no credence should be given to other schools of Islamic law that are and have historically been minoritarian in Afghanistan. The author asserts that accommodations made for religious minorities will lead to the justice system falling apart, as in the Ottoman Empire.

According to the author, citizens of the Islamic Emirate may continue to adhere to local customs (in Afghanistan: Pashtunwali or the code of the Pashtun people). Such customs may be upheld so long as they do not conflict with sharīʿa and may include wearing traditional Afghan clothes.

The head of the global Islamic state, the book asserts, should be called the Amīr al-Mu’minīn and should be appointed according to the same methods used in selecting the first Four Rāshidūn Caliphs after the death of the Prophet Muḥammad: through the formation of a council of influential and prominent people, not through democracy, which the author considers un-Islamic. Obedience to the Amīr al-Mu’minīn by the entire Islamic world is mandatory, the author asserts, and disobedience is punishable by death. As to criteria for leadership, the author maintains that the Amīr must be a man, and that women are to stay home and avoid participation in politics, for fear that their participation would compromise the political state.

The book discusses the various political institutions that form the Islamic Emirate: a Council of Ministers, the Armed Forces, and a Judiciary. It also calls for the creation of an all-male legislative body known as the Islamic Council.

On education, the book maintains that the educational system should include mandatory education in madrasas, and optional non-Islamic education. The author states that a co-educational system is forbidden (ḥarām), but that education of women itself is not necessarily prohibited (ḥarām). According to the author, a woman’s education should occur within the home and should be carried out by her family members. Further, he maintains that women should pursue careers that are suitable for them, such as medicine, caretaking, home sciences, and teaching; and they are to interface only with other women and girls in those professions.

The book specifically discusses women’s roles in society. It requires women to fully cover themselves in ḥijāb and stipulates that they should not engage in any pursuit that would require them to be alone for longer than three days. Finally, the author notes that women should not travel long distances without a male guardian, and that they should not unnecessarily leave their residences.

Overall, the book’s claims are seldom backed with references, and the sources employed by the author are not listed.

The Karnataka High Court passed an interim order in the petitions challenging the ḥijāb ban in colleges in the state. The petitions call into question the Government Order dated 05.02.2022, issued under sections 7 & 133 of the Karnataka Education Act of 1983. That order directs the College Development Committees all over the State to prescribe the ‘Student Uniform,’ presumably in terms of Rule 11 of Karnataka Educational Institutions Rules of 1995 (Classification, Regulation & Prescription of Curricula, etc.). A full bench of Justices on the High Court sat to hear several petitions filed by Muslim students who attend government pre-university colleges in the region and who were alleged prejudice from the ban. The Court issued this interim order, restricting girls from wearing headscarves, or ḥijāb, deeming it a use of religious symbols by students in governmental educational institutions that have established dress codes, and it request that the government reopen the educational institutions and allow the students to return to the classes at the earliest.

This amicus brief was filed before the Supreme Court concerning the case of Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization. It was submitted by over 50 faith based organizations, including Muslim Advocates, a Muslim American organization. It argues that abortion is permitted under certain circumstances until approximately 19-20 weeks gestation by many schools of Islamic thought. It cites various scholars of Islamic law to say that, among Muslims, "there is no universally agreed-upon moment when a fetus becomes a person,” however "the predominant view is that a fetus acquires personhood 120 days from conception.”

In this panel titled “Crypto Conundrum in Islamic Finance: Digital Assets and Shariah Compliance,” Dr. Mohamed Ali El Gari and  Dr. Mohd Daud Bakar consider the question whether cryptocurrency is permissible from an Islamic legal perspective. Dr. Bakar opines that cryptocurrency is an asset and not considered currency because it does not fulfill three conditions: use as a valid medium of exchange, stable stock value, and known unit of measurement. Although he acknowledges that cryptocurrency is in use as a medium of exchange, the electronic product currently lacks a stable stock value and known unit of measurement. However, he adds that if cryptocurrency comes to be backed by gold or silver, it could be deemed to be a rival to traditional currency and thus be understood as valid currency. Dr. El Gary opines that cryptocuruency can be permissible only if it is possible to establish that that it qualifies as wealth (māl) or as an asset according to the Islamic law (sharī'a). Doing so requires determining the presence of three conditions: the currency must be in use with a societal desire to normalize its usage, its use must be permissible under normal circumstances, and its must have a value assigned to it in habitual and customary practice. Applying these criteria to cryptocurrency, he concludes that it does meet all three conditions and thus determines that, while it is permissible to use because it is fungible, all the rules restricting the use of money under the rules of excessive interest (ribā) must apply. He further notes that one must be cautious in its use due to cryptocurrency’s speculative nature, which could border on gambling, but that this is not sufficient to say that it religiously impermissible (ḥarām) at presence. Collectively, the panel advises that those who are not very knowledgeable on the cryptocurrency and its attendant issues are to avoid it.  

Saudi Arabia's General Presidency of Islamic Research and Iftā respond to questions on abortion and the usage of ultrasound technology to determine the stage of a pregnancy. They state that although a fetus is recognized as the creation of a human being after 80 days based on the positions of Shaykh Muḥammad Ibn ʿUthāymīn and Shaykh ʿAbdul-ʿAzīz Ibn Bāz, with that marking the beginning of postpartum, if ultrasound technology identifies what appears to be an image of a human being prior to day 80, the fetus should still be recognized as the creation of a human being. They continue that if a pregnancy is past 80days, but ultrasound technology does not show a human image, then it is not considered a pregnancy.

The Mawsūʿa fiqhiyya [Encyclopedia of Islamic Law] (Kuwait 1998) documents several mainstream positions in classical Sunnī Islamic law on abortion. 

Holding: To prevail in a disparate-treatment claim, an applicant need show only that his need for an accommodation was a motivating factor in the employer’s decision, not that the employer had knowledge of his need. 

Judgment: Reversed and remanded, 8-1, in an opinion by Justice Scalia on June 1, 2015. Justice Alito filed an opinion concurring in the judgement. Justice Thomas filed an opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part.

Facts: Respondent (Abercrombie) refused to hire Samantha Elauf, a practicing Muslim, because the headscarf that she wore pursuant to her religious obligations conflicted with Abercrombie’s employee dress policy. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) filed suit on Elauf’s behalf, alleging a violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which, inter alia, prohibits a prospective employer from refusing to hire an applicant because of the applicant’s religious practice when the practice could be accommodated without undue hardship.

Procedural Posture: The EEOC prevailed in the District Court, but the Tenth Circuit reversed, awarding Abercrombie summary judgment on the ground that failure-to-accommodate liability attaches only when the applicant provides the employer with actual knowledge of his need for an accommodation.

Sources: Opinion Syllabus; SCOTUSblog Case Page (with further reviews and commentary on the U.S. law implications of this case).

At Sistani.org, Ayatollah Sistani, states leading Shīʿī positions in response to varied questions on circumstances surrounding abortion, or isqāṭ al-janīn.