Structural interrelations of theory and practice in Islamic law: A study of takhrij al-furu' 'ala al-us&dotbelow;ul literature

This study introduces and analyzes six works of Muslim jurisprudence (works of takhrij al-furu` `ala al-us&dotbelow;ul ), which address the interrelation of theoretical and practical legal reasoning in Islam. The practical aspect of Islamic law provides evaluations of human actions, covering the areas of rituals, business, family, crime, and politics. Islamic theoretical legal reasoning includes legal hermeneutics as applied to the Qur'an and the Muh&dotbelow;ammadan Tradition (Sunna) as well as a complex web of principles of legal reasoning. The works I present herein represent a type of legal literature that flourished in the later stages of Islamic juristic writing but is attested as early as the first decades of the eleventh century. These works were written by authors from a variety of geographic areas and schools of legal thought.; By introducing these works of Islamic jurisprudence, I add my voice to those who have questioned the adequacy of the two predominant modern perspectives on the study of Islamic legal history. One of these two perspectives, influential in Muslim academies, emphasizes the derivation of Islamic law from texts of the Qur'an and Sunna through a simple process of interpretation of these texts. The other perspective is represented by many Western scholars of Islam, who speak of a dichotomy between Islamic legal theory that reflects the ideals of the Qur'an and Sunna and Islamic legal practice that often falls prey to pragmatism and stratagems of jurists who were unable to faithfully apply the excessively idealistic legal theory to everyday practical questions.; My work highlights the heterogeneity of Islamic legal theory, which is rooted in theological, logical, and linguistic assumptions as well as other principles that defy simple classification. My work also suggests that the propositions of Islamic legal theory have been characterized by flexibility and practicality rather than the rigid idealism often attributed to them and provides evidence for the teleological interrelation between theory and practice in Islamic law.