Abstract
The discussions and the debates on the nature of the concept of sunna and its conceptual, epistemological, and hermeneutical relationship with the concept of a sound ḥadīth and the Qur’ān continue to take place in modern Islamic studies. Indeed, what is striking, as will hopefully become evident in the course of reading of this chapter, is the level of continuity that these discussions in the modern context have with those of the classical period of Islam discussed in the previous chapters. In this chapter, I examine the views of several prominent modernist Muslim scholars who have developed some innovative conceptual, methodological, and hermeneutical arguments and ideas regarding the question of the relative status of the sunna and hadïth as sources of legal authority vis-à-vis the Qur’ān and their normative role in Qur’ānic interpretation. They include Javed Ghāmidī, Fazlur Rahman, Muḥammad Shahrūr, and Ghulām Parwez. I also include a brief discussion of my own understanding of the concept of sunna as based on previously published work. Given that this is the only chapter that focuses on the modern period, the discussion is aimed more at breadth rather than depth.
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Notes
M. Masud. “Rethinking sharīa: Javēd Aḥmad Ghāmidī on ḥudūd,” Die Welt des Islams, 47(3–4) (2007): 356–375, at 357.
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A. Saeed. “Fazlur Rahman: A Framework for Interpreting Ethico-legal Content of the Qur’ān,” in Modern Muslim Intellectuals andthe Qur’ān, edited by S. Taji-Farouki (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), 37–67.
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P. Clarke. “The Shahrūr Phenomenon: A Liberal Islamic Voice from Syria,” Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations, 7(3) (1996): 337–34l, at 337.
R. Nabielek, “Muḥammad Shahrūr, ein ‘Martin Luther’ des Islam,” Inamo, 23/24 (6) (2000): 73–77, 74.
Adis Duderija, “Toward a Methodology of Understanding the Nature and Scope of the Concept of Sunnah,” Arab Law Quarterly 21 (2007): 1–12.;
See for example, in reference to divorce, Adis Duderija, “The Hermeneutical Importance of Qur’anic Assumptions in the Development of a Values Based and Purposive Oriented Qur’ān-Sunna Hermeneutic: Case Study of Patriarchy and Slavery,” HAWWA-Journal of Women in the Middle East and the Muslim World, 11, 2013, 58–88.
Adis Duderija, “The Evolution in the Concept of Sunnah during the First Four Generations of Muslims in Relation to the Development of the Concept of an Authentic Ḥadith as Based on Recent Western Scholarship,” Arab Law Quarterly, 26(2) (2012): 393–437.
See for example, Adis Duderija, Constructing Religiously Ideal ‘Believer’ and ‘Muslim Woman Concepts: Neo-Traditional Sālafi and Progressive Muslim Methods of Lnterpretation (Manahij)’, Palgrave Series in Islamic Theology, Law and History ed. by Khaled Abou El Fadl (New York: Palgrave, 2011).
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Duderija, A. (2015). The Relative Status of Ḥadīth and sunna as Sources of Legal Authority vis-à-vis the Qur’ān in Muslim Modernist Thought. In: Duderija, A. (eds) The Sunna and its Status in Islamic Law. Palgrave Series in Islamic Theology, Law, and History. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137369925_11
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137369925_11
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, New York
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