Islamic law and international law: the terms of a relationship

The relationship between Islamic Law and other legal systems (basically western type domestic legal orders and international law) is often thought of in terms of compatibility or incompatibility. Concerning certain subject matters of choice, the compatibility of Islamic (legal) principles with the values embedded in legal systems that are regarded as characteristic of the Modern Age is tested by sets of questions: is democracy possible in Islam? Does Islam recognize human rights and are those rights equivalent to a more universal conception? Does Islam recognize or condone more extreme acts of violence and does it justify violence differently? Etc. Such questions and many more presuppose the existence of an ensemble of rules or principles which, as any other set of rules and principles, purport to regulate social behavior. This ensemble is generically referred to as Islamic Law. However, one set of questions is usually left unanswered: is Islamic Law a legal system? If it is a legal system, what are its specific characteristics? How does it work? Where does it apply? It is this paper`s argument that the relationship between Islamic Law and domestic and international law can only be understood if looked upon as a relationship between distinct legal systems or legal orders.

Islamic law in the modern world.

Incldes bibliography.

Kitāb Ghāyat al-ghawr fī dirāyat al-dawr / taʼlīf al-Shaykh al-Imām al-Zāhid Rukn al-Dīn Imām al-aʼimmah Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad al-Ghazzālī : manuscript, undated

Written in one column, 13 lines per page, in black

Salāt-i Masʻūdī : manuscript, 1298-1299 [i.e. 1881-1882]

A manuscript treatise on prayer, ablution, alms, fasting, divorce, etc. The first volume opens with a chapter on "Tawḥīd", i.e. Islamic theology. This is followed by a chapter on Abū Ḥanīfah and his school of law.

Kitāb muqaddimah ukhrá fī al-ṭalāq : manuscript, undated

Bound with: Ghāyat al-ghawr fī dirāyat al-dawr (ff. 1r-7r).

The comparative law of marriage and divorce.

"Table of authorities": p. [xi]-xix.

The Law reports. in the courts of Probate and Divorce.

Vols. for 1881-1890 have subtitle: Cases determined in the Courts of Probate and Divorce, in the Admiralty and ecclesiastical courts, and on appeal therefrom in the Privy Council, and in the Court of Appeal.

The law of divorce applicable to Christians in India (the Indian Divorce Act 1869)

Mode of access: Internet.

The Law reports of the Incorporated Council of Law Reporting. Courts of Probate, Divorce, and Admiralty, and on appeal therefrom in the Court of Appeal; ecclesiastical courts, and on appeal therefrom in the Privy Council.

Editor: 1891- A.P. Stone; 1895-1936, Frederick Pollock; 1936-1939, A.F. Topham; 1940, R.E.L. Vaughan Williams; 1941, Ralph Sutton.

How far have reforms gone in Islam?

The encounter of East and West has initiated a period of reforms in Muslim societies. Some of the legal reforms enacted by premodern and modem Muslim states have been hailed as victories for women's rights in Islam. A historical and comparative perspective on the issue reveals that this is far from being true. Reforms constitute a far more complex issue. In many Muslim countries, Islamic law remained the main reference in matters pertaining to family and personal laws. To this day, women's rights remain a sensitive issue. A look at some modem Muslim legislations regarding divorce and polygamy illustrates both the tension that exists between the duties of modem states to uphold women's rights and their alleged Islamic principles and the tension that exists between state and religion. Paradoxically, recent developments in Iran illustrate aptly that some sort of reforms of family laws may be envisioned within the strictures of an Islamic society where Islamic law rules. (C) 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.

The Mahomedan law of succession to the property of intestates: in Arabick, engraved on copper plates from an ancient manuscript

with a verbal translation and explanatory notes by William Jones.

[ Fetâvâ] : manuscript, 1132 [ca. 1720 C.E.]

A typical fatwa collection covering almost all aspects of law: prayers, ablution, alms, fasting, divorce, capital punishment, etc.