Portal: Islamic Law
Islamic law, or the Shariah, is held to comprise the specific rulings intended by Allah for all of mankind in all times and places and delivered through Islamic scriptures (namely, the Quran and hadith). Fiqh, or Islamic jurisprudence, comprises the legal and interpretive theories through which these rulings are derived from the Quran and hadith. Norms observed and prescribed by Muhammad in these scriptures are, as a rule, taken literally and considered binding. To intentionally defy any part of Islamic law is to defy God's will, and thus to recant one's faith. Islamic law covers and immense array of topics, regulating everything from bathroom etiquette, criminal law, bedroom conduct, and imperial policy to etiquette with books, restrictions on speech, restrictions on diet, and economy. As nearly all of Islamic law derives from the hadith rather than the Quran, historians have questioned whether much of it can be historically attributed to Muhammad in actual fact. Nonetheless, the Shariah serves as a foundation, at times comprehensively and other times nominally, for numerous Muslim-majority nations. Where Muslims are not governed by Islamic law, they are obligated to conduct their own lives in accordance with it, on penalty of torturous punishment in the hereafter, alongside unbelievers.
Theory
[[File:|150px]]
Islamic law, or the Shariah, is held to comprise the specific rulings intended by Allah for all of mankind in all times and places and delivered through Islamic scriptures (namely, the Quran and hadith). Norms observed and prescribed by Muhammad in these scriptures are, as a rule, taken literally and considered binding. Islamic law covers and immense array of topics, regulating everything from bathroom etiquette, criminal law, bedroom conduct, and imperial policy to etiquette with books, restrictions on speech, restrictions on diet, and economy.
[[File:|150px]]
Islamic jurisprudence, or Fiqh (فقه), is the activity Islamic jurists engage in as they elaborate the Shari'ah, or "Islamic law"/"God's Law", based directly on the Qur'an and Muhammad's Sunnah or "way", as compiled in the hadiths. Fiqh can be described as "the human understanding of the divine laws of God as revealed to Muhammad". In this sense, the Shariah is an ideal body of laws which fiqh only ever approximates, albeit satisfactorily in the eyes of jurists. The usage of the two words in common and even technical parlance overlaps.
[[File:|150px]]
A Madh'hab (مذهب) is a school of Islamic law or fiqh (Islamic jurisprudence). Within Sunni Islam there are four mainstream schools of thought, which are accepted by one another, and the Shi'ite school of fiqh which (according to a fatwa by Al-Azhar, the most respected authority in Sunni Islam) is also now accepted by some Sunnis as a legitimate fifth school of Islamic Law. The five major schools of Islamic law agree on many things, including the death sentence for apostates.
[[File:|150px]]
The Caliph (خليفة; khalīfah) is the head of state in a Caliphate, and the title for the leader of the Islamic Ummah (body of Muslim believers) who serves as the successor to Muhammad, the founder of Islam, in all matters of political and religious decision making. The word of the caliph is, however, only legally and not theologically binding upon members of the Muslim ummah who consider him legitimate. In this sense, it is Ijma (legal concensus) which is the proper Islamic analog of the Catholic pope, rather than the Caliph.
Other articles in this section
Women
[[File:|150px]]
Adult suckling (Arabic: رَضَاعَةُ الْكَبِيرِ), or the act of breastfeeding a male adult, is mentioned in several relied-upon collections of hadiths. According to five hadiths in Sahih Muslim, Muhammad once plainly instructed the daughter (or wife -- sources are unclear) of a companion named Suhail to suckle a "grown-up" freedman named Salim so that Salim would become the daughter's mahram, or a relation whom the daughter could no longer marry, and thus render Salim's cohabitation with the family appropriate and legal.
[[File:|150px]]
Child marriage and sexual activity between adults and children are sanctioned by Islamic law and were practiced by Muhammad and his companions. As is the case within all contexts where sexual activity is permitted in Islam - namely, marriage and slavery - female consent is not required and the category of "rape" does not exist. The only restriction on sexual activity with children of any age within the contexts of marriage and slavery is that the child should not come to severe physical harm as a consequence of the encounter.
[[File:|150px]]
The Mahr (مهر) is a contract fee paid for by the groom to the bride in an Islamic marriage (see The Meaning of Nikah). Its purpose within Islamic law, as shown through the Islamic texts themselves and the rulings of fiqh, is to compensate the woman for the privilege of consummating the marriage through sexual intercourse with her. The mahr is an obligatory part of Islamic law. In the abscence of a mahr, the marriage is not valid.
[[File:|150px]]
The traditional view of most Islamic scholars, past and present, prohibits free-mixing between men and women. Modern scholars and activists often posit that free-mixing is actually allowed in Islam, however their assertions on the matter usually lack the well-attested scriptural citations of the Islamic tradition that are marshaled by traditionalist scholars.
Other articles in this section
Non-Muslims
[[File:|150px]]
The Quran and other Islamic sources prohibit certain degrees of relationship with non-Muslims, including with the "People of the Book". Its stance appears to have evolved over time at various stages of Muhammad's prophetic career, occurring in a context when the believers had been driven out from Mecca and there was a degree of enmity between them, as recorded in such verses as Quran 60:1. Some contemporary views emphasize contextual issues and use particular verses and examples from Muhammad's life to argue that friendship with non-Muslims is permitted in some circumstances.
[[File:|150px]]
The word Dhimma in modern parlance refers to the non-Muslim persons permitted to live under the Islamic regime (The Caliphate), namely those of Abrahamic faiths, as well as the system of financial, legal, and social subjugation that must be brought to bear over them so as to bring about their humiliation, as instructed by the Quran. Included in this system are the practices of Zunar (yellow-badge practices) and Jizyah (non-Muslim tax).
[[File:|150px]]
In Islamic terminology, a kāfir is a disbeliever, or someone who rejects or does not believe in Allah as the one and only God and Muhammad as the final messenger of Allah. In the context of Islamic scriptures, "kafir" is the broadest, all encompassing category of non-Muslim, which includes all other sub-categories, such as mushriqun, or polytheists, dahriyah, or those who deny the existence of any gods outright, as well as those who would today identify as agnostics or who are simply ignorant of religious figments.
[[File:|150px]]
Traditional Islamic jurists generally dichotomized the world into the Dar al-Harb, or Abode of War, and the Dar al-Islam, or Abode of Islam. Not recognizing anything but a perpetual state of warfare, save occasionally and tactically permitted temporary treaties, with all non-Muslim political entitles, Islamic jurists tended to legislate the Muslims should operate under war-time norms whenever they entered non-Muslim lands. This could go so far as to mean that theft, slave-raiding, and, according to some, even rape was permitted in non-Muslim lands, given the assumed perpetual state of war. It is on the basis of this dichotomy that some Islamic jurists today permit Muslims to collect interest from unbelievers in Western countries, by construing it as a form of legal theft.
Other articles in this section
Crime and punishment
Error creating thumbnail: Unable to save thumbnail to destination
According to Islamic law, it is a criminal offense to speak ill of Islam, its Prophet, and its holy Scriptures (Qur'an and Hadith). Blasphemy is punishable by death. Sufficiently unorthodox perspectives constitute blasphemy just as well as only partially orthodox perspectives (that is, those perspectives that affirm some tenants of blasphemy while denying others).
[[File:|150px]]
The four Sunni schools of jurisprudence all agree that practicing homosexuality is an egregious crime that earns an especially harsh punishment, although the schools vary regarding what exactly this punishment should be. Punishments range from execution by beheading, execution by stoning, execution by being thrown off a tall building, and imprisonment until death.
[[File:|150px]]
Islamic law does not punish the murder of those who warrant execution (such as blasphemers, apostates, and those who in some manner 'spread mischief in the Earth') and differentiates between the murder of a Muslim, which merits the death penalty, and the murder of a non-Muslim, which only merits the payment of blood-money. This ruling is outlined in the Quran and, in Sahih Bukhari, Muhammad is repeatedly recorded as saying "no Muslim should be killed in Qisas (legal retribution) for killing a Kafir (disbeliever)".
[[File:|150px]]
Intoxicants (الخمر al‐khamr) such as alcohol, marijuana etc. and recreational games of chance, such as board games (especially chess), card games and other forms of gambling are forbidden under Islamic law. Notably, several hadiths in Sahih Muslim report that Muhammad himself used to consume alcoholic drinks prior to prohibiting it.
Other articles in this section
Jihad