Ahmed El Shamsy - The Canonization of Islamic Law

The Canonization of Islamic Law tells the story of the birth of classical Islamic law in the eighth and ninth centuries CE. It shows how an oral normative tradition embedded in communal practice was transformed into a systematic legal science defined by hermeneutic analysis of a clearly demarcated scriptural canon. This transformation was inaugurated by the innovative legal theory of Mu ammad b. Idr s al-Sh fi (d. 820 CE), and it took place against the background of a crisis of identity and religious authority in ninth-century Egypt. By tracing the formulation, reception, interpretation, and spread of al-Sh fi s ideas, Ahmed El Shamsy demonstrates how the canonization of scripture that lay at the heart of al-Sh fi s theory formed the basis for the emergence of legal hermeneutics, the formation of the Sunni schools of law, and the creation of a shared methodological basis in Muslim thought.

Ahmed El Shamsy is an Assistant Professor of Islamic Thought in the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations at the University of Chicago.

No one truly knows the secrets of those who have gone before us, for only the Knower of the hidden is acquainted with them. All we can do is reason from the known to the unknown. Yet many an inference accords with a hidden truth; were it not so, little could be known.

Ma m d Mu ammad Sh kir, Qa iyyat al-shi r al-j hil , 58

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I never chose this topic. I stumbled upon it quite by accident, via the chance discovery of a manuscript (al-Buway s Mukhta ar ) that distracted me from the research project on legal maxims that I had been pursuing. What was intended as a semesters digression turned into nearly a decades exploration of the origins of Islamic law and its institutions. In that time, I have received inspiration, feedback, and support from innumerable people, many of whom I have forgotten to thank here. The questions and hypotheses that animate this book emerged and were refined in conversations with Bilal Aybakan, Murteza Bedir, Eyyp Said Kaya, Kevin Reinhart, Gregor Schoeler, Himmet Ta kmr, and especially Aron Zysow. In addition, I have benefited from the opportunity to discuss my research at a number of venues, most importantly at the collegial annual gatherings of the American Oriental Society. I gratefully acknowledge the generous advice of Peri Bearman, the developmental guidance of Bud Bynack, the research assistance of Kh lid Abduh, and the instruction in Sh fi law given to me by Shaykh Na r al-D n Sha b n, which laid the foundation for everything I have since learned about the subject. Roy Mottahedeh, Aron Zysow, Intisar Rabb, Khaled El-Rouayheb, Andreas Grke, and two anonymous reviewers provided useful comments on drafts of the manuscript or of parts of it. Finally, I thank my wife and editor, Hanna Siurua, for her merciless but constructive prodding, criticism, and suggestions, all of which have immeasurably improved this book in both form and content.