Works by Hallaq, Wael B., 1955‒ as author 38
A history of Islamic legal theories
Editions 1 Translations 2
A tenth-eleventh century treatise on juridical dialectic
Editions 1
The authenticity of prophetic hadîth : a pseudo-problem
Editions 1 Translations 1
Authority, continuity, and change in Islamic law
Editions 1 Translations 2
Caliphs, jurists and the Saljūqs in the political thought of Juwaynī
Editions 1
The development of logical structure in sunni legal theory
Editions 1
Early "Ijtihād" and the later construction of authority
Editions 1
The impossible state
Wael B. Hallaq boldly argues that the "Islamic state," judged by any standard definition of what the modern state represents, is both impossible and inherently self-contradictory. Comparing the legal,
Wael B. Hallaq boldly argues that the "Islamic state," judged by any standard definition of what the modern state represents, is both impossible and inherently self-contradictory. Comparing the legal, political, moral, and constitutional histories of premodern Islam and Euro-America, he finds the adoption and practice of the modern state to be highly problematic for modern Muslims. He also critiques more expansively modernity's moral predicament, which renders impossible any project resting solely on ethical foundations. The modern state not only suffers from serious legal, political, and constitutional issues, Hallaq argues, but also, by its very nature, fashions a subject inconsistent with what it means to be, or to live as, a Muslim. By Islamic standards, the state's technologies of the self are severely lacking in moral substance, and today's Islamic state, as Hallaq shows, has done little to advance an acceptable form of genuine Shari'a governance. The Islamists' constitutional battles in Egypt and Pakistan, the Islamic legal and political failures of the Iranian Revolution, and similar disappointments underscore this fact. Nevertheless, the state remains the favored template of the Islamists and the ulama (Muslim clergymen).
Providing Muslims with a path toward realizing the good life, Hallaq turns to the rich moral resources of Islamic history. Along the way, he proves political and other "crises of Islam" are not unique to the Islamic world nor to the Muslim religion. These crises are integral to the modern condition of both East and West, and by acknowledging these parallels, Muslims can engage more productively with their Western counterparts.
Editions 1
Islamic law: history and transformation
If we must refer to the sharῑʿa as ‘Islamic law’, then we must do so with considerable caution. The latter expression bears a connotation that combines modern notions of law with a particular brand of If we must refer to the sharῑʿa as ‘Islamic law’, then we must do so with considerable caution. The latter expression bears a connotation that combines modern notions of law with a particular brand of modern politics, both of which were largely – if not entirely – absent from the original landscape of the sharῑʿa we are considering here. Throughout the last three or four centuries European modernity has produced legal systems and legal doctrines that are almost exclusively the preserve of the equally modern nation-state. Intrinsic to its behaviour, the modern state is systemically and systematically geared towards the transformation and homogenisation of both the social order and the national citizen, features that have a direct bearing on law. To accomplish these goals the state engages in systemic surveillance, discipline and punishment. Its educational and cultural institutions, among others, are designed to manufacture the citizen who is respectful of law, submissive to notions of order and discipline, industrious and economically productive. Without the law and its tools of surveillance and punishment, no state apparatus can exist. Ergo the centrality, in the definition and concept of the state, of the element of violence, and of the state’s exclusive right to threaten its use.
Editions 1
Juristic authority vs. state power : the legal crises of modern Islam
Translations 1
Law and legal theory in classical and Medieval Islam
These studies by Wael Hallaq represent an important contribution to our understanding of the neglected field of Medieval Islamic law and legal thought. Spanning the period from the 8th to the 16th cen These studies by Wael Hallaq represent an important contribution to our understanding of the neglected field of Medieval Islamic law and legal thought. Spanning the period from the 8th to the 16th centuries, they draw upon a wide range of original sources to offer both fresh interpretations of those sources and a careful evaluation of contemporary scholarship. The first articles expound the interrelated issues of legal reasoning, legal logic and the epistemology of the law. There follows a set of primarily historical studies, which question a series of widely held assumptions, while the last items explore issues of legal theory and methodology. One particular topic concerns the role of Shafi'i as the ’master architect’ of Islamic legal theory, and Professor Hallaq would finally argue that this image is in fact false and a creation of later centuries.
Editions 1
The logic of legal reasoning in religious and non-religious cultures
Editions 1
Logic, formal arguments and formalization of arguments in Sunnī jurisprudence
Editions 1
Non-analogical arguments in Sunni juridical Qiyās
Editions 1
On inductive corroboration, probability and certainty in Sunnī legal thought
Editions 1
On Orientalism, self-consciousness and history
Translations 1
On the origins of the controversy about the existence of mujtahids and the gate of ijtihad
Editions 1
Origins and evolution of Islamic law
Editions 1 Translations 1
The primacy of the Qurʾān in Shāṭibī's legal theory
Editions 1
The qāḍī's dīwān (sijill) before the Ottomans
Studies on Ottoman society and law through the so-called court sijills have lately proliferated, surpassing in volume all previous studies based on other archival sources, including tax and land regis Studies on Ottoman society and law through the so-called court sijills have lately proliferated, surpassing in volume all previous studies based on other archival sources, including tax and land registers. The comparatively massive size of these sijills, and the fact that their majority did survive, even in a good state, have led some scholars to the conclusion that only the Ottoman qāḍīs kept records of their court proceedings in a systematic fashion, and that they were the first to establish the sijill as a formal institution. Even those who do not share this view of a uniquely Ottoman achievement seem in no sense clear as to the pre-Ottoman history of this important institution. My purpose in this article, therefore, is to attempt to unravel some important aspects of the sijill's history, including the less consequential issue of the terminological confusion which has engulfed it in modern scholarly discourse.
Editions 1
The quest for origins or doctrine ? : Islamic legal studies as colonialist discourse
Translations 1
Restating Orientalism : a critique of modern knowledge
Since Edward Said’s foundational work, Orientalism has been singled out for critique as the quintessential example of Western intellectuals’ collaboration with oppression. Controversies over the imbri
Since Edward Said’s foundational work, Orientalism has been singled out for critique as the quintessential example of Western intellectuals’ collaboration with oppression. Controversies over the imbrications of knowledge and power and the complicity of Orientalism in the larger project of colonialism have been waged among generations of scholars. But has Orientalism come to stand in for all of the sins of European modernity, at the cost of neglecting the complicity of the rest of the academic disciplines?
In this landmark theoretical investigation, Wael B. Hallaq reevaluates and deepens the critique of Orientalism in order to deploy it for rethinking the foundations of the modern project. Refusing to isolate or scapegoat Orientalism, Restating Orientalism extends the critique to other fields, from law, philosophy, and scientific inquiry to core ideas of academic thought such as sovereignty and the self. Hallaq traces their involvement in colonialism, mass annihilation, and systematic destruction of the natural world, interrogating and historicizing the set of causes that permitted modernity to wed knowledge to power. Restating Orientalism offers a bold rethinking of the theory of the author, the concept of sovereignty, and the place of the secular Western self in the modern project, reopening the problem of power and knowledge to an ethical critique and ultimately theorizing an exit from modernity’s predicaments. A remarkably ambitious attempt to overturn the foundations of a wide range of academic disciplines while also drawing on the best they have to offer, Restating Orientalism exposes the depth of academia’s lethal complicity in modern forms of capitalism, colonialism, and hegemonic power.
Editions 1
"Takhrīj" and the construction of juristic authority
Editions 1
The use and abuse of evidence: the question of provincial and Roman influences on early Islamic law
Editions 1 Translations 2
Relationships with other works 1
Uṣūl al-Fiqh and Shāfiʿī’s Risāla revisited
In an article published in 1993, I argued that Muḥammad Ibn Idrīs al-Shāfiʿī (d. 204/820) was not, as commonly thought, the architect of uṣūl al-fiqh and that this discipline emerged only after the ma In an article published in 1993, I argued that Muḥammad Ibn Idrīs al-Shāfiʿī (d. 204/820) was not, as commonly thought, the architect of uṣūl al-fiqh and that this discipline emerged only after the main battles over what became the Sunnite sources of the law were won. I had dated the emergence of writings on uṣūl al-fiqh to the last part of the third/ninth century and the first half of the fourth/tenth, pointing to Ibn Surayj (d. 306/918) and his students as amongst the earliest exponents of this type of literature. The article contributed to the rise of a considerable controversy in the field, in which a number of critics reasserted earlier origins of the discipline. In this writing, I reply to some of these critics, while confirming the main conclusions of that article and expanding and refining its arguments. In light of new evidence, empirical and interpretive, I maintain that uṣūl al-fiqh proper arose slightly later than my initial estimate. I also provide an analytical description of this theoretical science and situate it within a periodizing schema that charts its development from its prehistory down to the present.
Editions 1
Relationships with other works 1
Was al-Shafi‛i the master architect of Islamic jurisprudence ?
Editions 2
