"Human-Made" Rules in Islam

Recently, one of my readers has asked me to answer some questions her husband has asked of her. Based on the questions she submitted and several other e-mails she has sent to me, her husband, a European convert to Islam, appears to be a lukewarm Muslim at best. (I do realize that I'm only hearing from one-half of this couple; in fact, this woman has asked me to meet her husband face-to-face, but my schedule in the evenings and on the weekends at this time makes such a meeting very difficult to arrange.) She has asked me, instead, if I would post my answers to her questions on my blog, so I'm going to address each question separately as time permits, insha'allah.

Here is her e-mail:

Here are among the questions my husband always ask me
1) He said some of the rules in Islam are actually human-made. Some are not necessary in this modern world. For instance: the hijab for ladies, abolution before prayers, prayers with the necessary standing rules.. (sometimes I adapt the prayer accordingly like when we were on traveling). Also the importance to eat halal food ( for him only pork is haram, but all others should be halal like chicken, meat eventho it is not slaughtered by muslim)

"He said some of the rules in Islam are actually human-made."

My answer: Of course; so what? My initial thought was, the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) created a number of "rules" that we Muslims follow; he was a man, like us. Thus, yes, some of the rules in Islam were created by a man. "But," my wife says, "the Prophet (pbuh) was also guided directly by Allah (swt) and the angel Jibril; in that regard, he wasn't like other men." To which I most wholeheartedly agree. However, even if we set the Prophet (pbuh) aside as a special case (which, obviously, he was), many men - scholars, jurists, imams - over the centuries have defined and refined "the rules in Islam" (regardless of whether one classifies them under fiqh or shari'ah) that Muslims live under.

However, just because these rules are made by men doesn't invalidate them. There are several reasons for this. First, the vast majority of men who have created rules have done so based upon the guidance of the Qur'an and Sunnah. In order for any rule in Islam to be valid, there has to be justification for the rule; that justification almost always comes from the appropriate Qur'anic ayat and/or ahadith from the Prophet's (pbuh) Sunnah. Secondly, even though individual men may have different opinions regarding a specific issue, the rules Muslims follow are based upon a consensus (ijma) of opinions. Extreme opinions are noted but rejected in favor of the majority opinion; likewise, as the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) said, "My community will never agree upon an error." So a human-made rule in Islam is not necessarily invalid simply because it came from a man or men.

Two other points I'd like to raise: All these men over the centuries - the scholars, jurists and imams - who created the rules that Muslims follow, the vast majority of them have significant credentials in terms of their ability to render a judgment. To which I would ask you, what are your qualifications? Why should I trust your judgment? What do you bring to the table?

And secondly, don't you see the hypocrisy inherent in your own statement? You apparently think that something is wrong if the rules in Islam are human-made, but then you go ahead and make up your own rules! Ridiculous!

To be continued, insha'allah.

Regarding Ijtihad

After writing my Salaam 'alaikum essay and posting it on Street Prophets, I've had a number of questions asked of me in the past few days. I've felt that a number of these responses should also be reposted back here, on my blogs. This first reposting is with regard to the some questions concerning ijtihad (the original questions are in italics):


"I have been advised that there is a significant tradition in Islam of "Ijtihad" or the individual Muslim's responsibility and authority to interpret the Qur'an."

Ijtihad is a much broader concept than just trying to interpret the Qur'an. As I mentioned in a previous comment, Islam is considered by Muslims as a way of life. We try to apply Islamic principles in all aspects of our lives. For us, the means are just as important - and perhaps even more important - than the ends. And so you have a major world religion that's created an enormous corpus of law that's known as Shari'ah.

Ijtihad itself is "the process of making a legal decision by independent interpretation of the legal sources, the Qur'an and the Sunnah." But even here, ijtihad is not the first resort. The basis for Islamic law, called fiqh (pronounced "fee-kay"), is first the Qur'an, then the Sunnah (which includes the various collections of ahadith, or sayings of the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh)), then qiyas or analogies, and finally ijma or consensus of the scholars. If there is no guidance to answer a question based upon the Qur'an or Sunnah, or through qiyas, only then is ijtihad supposed to be used. But even there, a consensus (or better yet, a unanimous opinion) is sought because Muslims recognize that there are differences of opinion. In such cases, it is better to avoid the extremes and follow the middle path. (Sort of like how figure skating and diving used to be judged: toss out the high and low scores and average or total the remainder.)

In which case, the question becomes, who should be a mujtahid (one who applies ijtahid)? The traditional answer is a scholar of Islamic law, or alim. Liberal Muslims (which I am not) argue that any Muslim should be able to perform ijtahid, but I strongly disagree with this. Muhammad ibn Idris al-Shafi'i (d. 819), who founded the Shafi'i school of thought, recognized the problem of individual laymen trying to perform ijtihad, who would come up with haphazard opinions. IMO, this is exactly the problem the liberal Muslims are recreating in that perhaps 99.99999% of Muslims worldwide are not qualified to be a scholar who can perform ijtahid.

I bring all this up because I'm trying to say that it is not an "individual Muslim's responsibility and authority to interpret the Qur'an." This is the irony that irritates me with the so-called non-Muslim "Insta-Experts" on Islam. It takes a Muslim years and years of education and training to get to a point where he or she can competently perform ijtihad, whereas these people have little or no education or training and yet they think they're qualified to express an opinion. To analogize, this is like deciding who to see when you have a medical problem: do you visit a qualified doctor or do you go to the person who has little or no education or training? (This analogy is applicable to both the non-Muslim "Insta-Experts" and the liberal Muslims.) What makes it worse from an Islamic perspective is that providing wrong advice compounds the problem (sin) onto the person who provided the faulty information. For example, if you asked me, say, if it were all right for you to have pre-marital sex from an Islamic perspective and I said, "yeah, sure, go ahead," and you did, not only would you accrue the sin of zina (sexual activity outside of marriage), but so would I because I gave you the wrong advice. So, once more, it's better to seek information from the qualified source.


"As you noted, different schools of Islamic thought would seem to offer more ot less authoritative jurisprudence (if that is the right word) on matters of Islamic law and teaching. How do individual Muslims approach this possible tension between individual interpretation and scholarly tradition at the practical human level, i.e. do non-scholarly or non-academic Muslims have rules of thumb on such matters, at the real, practical level?"

The basic, orthodox interpretations of the Qur'an, Sunnah, and life in general as a Muslim are well known and long established; after all, we've had 1400 years to work out most of the "bugs." Media for education are numerous. Most of the primary information is taught in classrooms or through various media (books, magazines, videotapes, the Internet, and so on). When answers to specific questions are needed, Muslims can go to numerous sources. Many people will ask questions of their imams or ustaz (religious teacher). In some countries with significant Muslim populations, there may be some sort of authority that can provide guidance. For example, here in Singapore, we can ask questions to MUIS, the Islamic Religious Council of Singapore. And there are numerous sources of information on the Internet who answer specific questions. Of course, with any of these sources (especially the last), it's to our benefit to seek out other opinions (similar to seeking a second opinion from a doctor). Even my ustaz, who is an imam at one of the most important masjids here in Singapore, has told us to go ask other people if we felt uncomfortable in any way with what he tells us.

The problem for many North American Muslims, IMO, is that they don't have a lot of the educational institutions that other, more developed Muslim communities have. They have the books and magazines and the Internet to rely upon - and these are a great help - but I think they lack in terms of the qualified imams and ustazs and educational facilities for both children and adults. Still, despite this very fragmentary approach to educating individual Muslims in their deen (religion), the nice thing from my perspective is that, after praying in Allah (swt) knows how many masjids in five countries and on three continents, and having met Muslims from perhaps two dozen different countries to date, I have found there to be a strong unity of beliefs, interpretations and practices of Islam worldwide.

Ahadith: Ally or Enemy of Women?

The following is a post I wrote on Beliefnet back in October. It's one of my more controversial posts. :) The thread centered on ahadith and how it pertains to women. More specifically, "1. Do you think Hadith is equal to the Quran, or just some Hadith? Or do you even bother with Hadith? Or is Hadith not equal to the Quran, but important? 2. Do you think Hadith is helpful for women's rights in Islam and under Sharia?" My response:


Generally speaking, I don't think that that the ahadith are either an "ally or enemy of women." I think this type of discussion is part of a larger problem, namely that many Western Muslims (particularly converts, but including born Muslims as well) are not comfortable with the idea of trying to live an Islamic lifestyle, that they find it difficult - if not impossible - to wean themselves off of their Western lifestyle (and I would include myself in this category as well). I think there are several reasons for this.

One is that Western society has not developed the requisite Islamic culture and institutions that are necessary for Muslims (converts in particular) to develop their broader understanding of Islam. Muslims (especially converts) are left to fend for themselves in terms of gaining knowledge. Resources, including books for sale, madrassahs and religious teachers, are limited in their availability in the West. Moreover, their own culture continues to beckon, which Western Muslims tend to be loathe to leave.

Second, understanding of ahadith, sunnah, fiqh is more difficult to obtain because what little resources are available have virtually nothing in the way of context to explain concepts and history (as opposed to the various tafsir that are readily available to explain the Qur'an). Not understanding what the ahadith, sunnah, fiqh have to say or how they relate to modern life, some Muslims reject out of hand the second half of Allah's (swt) commandment, to obey Allah and His Messenger, focusing solely on the Qur'an.

Finally, there are some Muslims who have their own pet prejudices and rationalize their biases in ways that go against the teachings of Islam. They cut themselves off deliberately from the broader understandings of Islam, ignoring or misinterpreting ahadith, sunnah, fiqh, and then congratulate themselves afterwards for being part of "the club." From my perspective, they are contributing to the problem rather than helping to solve it.

In essence, I think the lead question has been miswritten. Instead of "Hadith: Ally or Enemy of Women?" I would ask, "Women (and Men): Ally or Enemy of Ahadith?"