The Dilemma of the Islamic Jurist in the Modern Nation State

Volume 3|Issue 9| Summer 2014 |Articles

Abstract

This paper is based on a central thesis formulated by the author in 2008, and argues that the problems of contemporary Islamic jurisprudence arise from its relationship with the modern nation state. This constituted a break from jurisprudential heritage, a shift that has led Islamic legal scholars (fuqaha plural, singular faqih) to split into two camps: revolutionary or traditionalists. This paper proposes that this division has become clearer with the Arab revolutions and the subsequent division between the state jurist and the revolutionary jurist. The author notes how the position of state jurists, in their dealing with it as a caliphate or historical state, erases all the achievements of the modern state within which they operate. The borrowing of political discourse and language used by the regime to perform tasks where, consciously or not, the religious and the political interact is built into their role. The revolutionary jurist, in contrast, offers a new understanding of religion as protest, and is instilled with a message that calls for revolution and change, thus widening the concept of worshipping God to include working to bring about Islamic rule. In sum, both types of jurists struggle to deal with political jurisprudence under the sway of the modern nation state. This study considers the subject from three perspectives. In doing so, the author presents us with a reading of fatwas, sermons, and statements issued during the Arab revolutions in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Syria, and Yemen.

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Founding member of the Intellectual Forum on Creativity, former Visiting Researcher at the Center for Modern Oriental Studies and then the Berlin Graduate School for Transnational Studies, and Visiting Professor at Qatar University and the Islamic University in Beirut. He has published widely in Islamic studies and political thought. He was born and raised in Syria. 

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