On Mon, Jan 3, 2011 at 7:39 PM, <hamilto...@aol.com> wrote: > Isn't the answer to this question, Eric, that there is no single Sharia > law? Interpretation of Sharia "law" requires a court to pick and choose > between Sharia doctrines. It is not terribly different from the wide > variety of Christian interpretations of the Bible. >
Yes and no. There is actually a distinction that is made in Islamic law between sharia and fiqh. Sharia refers to god's commands as they actually are. Fiqh refers to particular interpretations of those laws. The fiqh of a particular school of Islamic law may actually be quite fixed and ascertainable. Hence, if someone says something like "this contract should be governed by sharia law as applied in Saudi Arabia" or "sharia law according to the Habali school" the content of the rules may be pretty determinate. Furthermore, if one reads the term "sharia law" within the entire context of the writing and the contract -- which is how one is supposed to do contractual interpretation after all -- one may be able to impute a particular school's fiqh to the term. (Different schools of fiqh dominate in different countries and often countries that include sharia law by reference in legislation refer to particular schools of fiqh.) Indeed, Arabic makes a distinction between engaging in original interpretation of the Quran and other sources of Islamic law -- ijtihad -- and simply mechanically applying known rules without any interpretation -- taqlid. Hence, the analogy to varying Christian interpretations of the Bible is just that, an analogy. Depending on the the context, however, determining the content of "sharia law" may actually be about as mechanical as determining the content of UK law. > > Marci > > > In a message dated 1/3/2011 7:37:08 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, > erassb...@becketfund.org writes: > > e Eugene's other (and I take it primary -- the original post mentioned only > the Muslim identity of the arbitrators -- ) concern about entanglement, I > don't see how being knowledgeable about Sharia necessarily implicates belief > in a religion. I've learned a lot about particular aspects of Sharia > representing Muslim clients but that is not affected by whether I am a > Muslim or not. > > > > _______________________________________________ > To post, send message to Religionlaw@lists.ucla.edu > To subscribe, unsubscribe, change options, or get password, see > http://lists.ucla.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/religionlaw > > Please note that messages sent to this large list cannot be viewed as > private. Anyone can subscribe to the list and read messages that are > posted; people can read the Web archives; and list members can (rightly or > wrongly) forward the messages to others. >
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