<Articles>The Multiple Expressions of Divine Command in the Sources of Shariah (Islamic Law): A Study on Methodologies of Textual Interpretation in ʻIlm Uṣūl al-Fiqh

The Shariah/Islamic Law derives from its two major sources, namely, the Qur’an, the sacred book of Islam, and the Sunna, the Prophetic tradition, contained in the collections of Hadith (Prophetic sayings), both in Arabic, through the interpretations of specialized jurists. They contributed to the systematization of two branches of legal sciences in Islam, ʻIlm al-Fiqh and ʻIlm Uṣūl al-Fiqh. The most crucial part was the articulation of the five categories of legal rulings (ḥukm sharʻī, pl.: aḥkām sharʻīya) which were finally formulated in the current set of categories in the early sixth century A.H. or the early twelfth century C.E. Legal interpretation is an act of “finding” a rule out of the designated texts in the two sources in Arabic through methodologies of interpretation. ʻIlm Uṣūl al-Fiqh is a domain of such methodologies, and ʻIlm al-Fiqh is a domain of the rules as the end results of interpretation. This article focuses on the Divine Command in the two sources in Arabic, examining in particular how the wording of the ordering or forbidding is expressed. It also clarifies that, despite a conventional expectation that a Divine ordering results in obligations upon Muslims and that a Divine forbidding results in prohibitions against them, various ways of interpretation actually produce more subtle and appropriate consequences