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@spsuinjkt ISSN 2354-7952 RESENSIUlasan Buku dan Artikel Jurnal No. 17/Th. III/Mei 2015/Jumadil Akhir-Rajab 1436 H www.graduate.uinjkt.ac.id The Logic of Law Making in : Women and Prayer in the Legal Tradition

THE process of law making in islam is Chapter 2: ‘Preliminaries’, scantly one of the most complex legal processes. introduces the school of law, the This is due to the claim made by Muslim Judul Buku legal subject matter of the case studies, scholars that the main sources which The Logic of Law Making in Islam: Women and the scholars and ‘the undesirable’ or govern this process are divinely revealed. Prayer in the Legal Tradition makruh as a technical term. This chapter such complexity has caused great schol- in my opinion is not the best part of the Penulis ars such as Joseph schacht to see islamic book since the author fails to understand law as ‘a phenomenon so different from Benham Sadeghi the connotation of some of the Arabic all forms of law’ (Introduction to Islamic Penerbit legal terminology. Law [Oxford1969], 1). sadeghi’s book London: Cambridge University Press, 2013 Distinguishing between that which is an attempt to prove the opposite by is makruh and that which is ‘not pre- identifying islamic law with other forms Jumlah Halaman ferred’ or ghayr mustajab is an example of law. He bases his argument on the xxi + 215 here. The two terms might sound similar pretext that both its formation and de- to a non-specialist but a huge difference velopment are affected by procedures ISBN exists when the meanings are carefully and topographies common to ‘standard’ 978-1-107-00909-7 considered. human-made laws. He confirms such an Peresensi One of the questions to which one objective within various parts of his book M. Izzidien cannot find an answer in sadeghi’s book such as when discussing law and value is what is the practical and theological where he states: ‘i argue that islamic law reasons behind the attitude of Hanafi should be understood in the first instance scholars towards legal questions that as Law’. are not in harmony with the Qur’an and The book comprises eight chapters sunna? I also find some of the questions preceded by seventeen pages of helpful posed by the author rather naïve, such as preface in which sadeghi claims that his asking about the possibility of women book is ‘the first book and diachronic leading men in prayer with a partition study of scriptural hermeneutics in post or a gap separating the female leader formative positive law…in i slamic legal from men (p. 75). The idea of the studies’. This is followed by an appendix in prayer is not as simple as sadeghi and bibliography. All the following chap- sees it and a partition between men ters seem to me geared towards proving and women will not change the situa- the point mentioned above by adopt- tion. The practice of having a leader for ing the methodology of examining the men during prayer is rooted in islamic genres in which the law was developed. political and social etiquette and man- This is also evident from the way sadeghi woman social status. Added to this, if has organized his chapters. a partition existed between a female The preface provides a general Imam and the congregation it could framework for the study of a legal tradi- lead to mis-communication and total tion, islamic or not, and informs us that confusion during prayer. The Prophet’s the book does not presuppose that all Hadith explains the rule concerning the legal traditions are identical, this being Imam: ‘The Imam is made so people can due to variations in parameter from one follow him’. in other words he is like a tradition to another. it also informs us maestro who directs an orchestra to play that the book examines how certain the eighth century to the eighteenth cen- harmonious tunes. Hanafi laws, and the reasons Hanafi tury as reflected in the opinion of some (Adapted from: J Semitic Studies (Spring jurists gave for those laws, evolved from thirty jurists. 2015) 60 (1): 270-272) Hal 2 RESENSI No. 17/Th. III/Mei 2015 Mirror for the Muslim Prince: Islam and the Theory of Statecraft

AT a time when the Middle East is being to keep Hosni Mubarak from winning that torn asunder by competing Muslim groups election for another term as president. and has seen the emergence of an Islamic Judul Buku According to the author the moderate State, proclaiming a return to a Mirror for the Muslim Prince: Islam and were in favour of a multiplicity form of governance, a set of thirteen the Theory of Statecraft of parties and freely contested elections of essays, written by some of the most Editor the Egyptian parliament. Yet as anyone expert commentators on Muslim political Mehrzad Boroujerdi who followed those elections knows, the thought, is most welcome. The volume alliance between the liberal secularists and itself, edited by Mehrzad Boroujerdi, Penerbit the moderate Muslims had its sticking grew out of a conference held at Syracuse Syracuse University Press, 2013 points, notably over the place that the University in 2006, thus a half decade Jumlah Halaman Shari’a would occupy in a reformed Egypt before the Arab Spring. The editor’s xix + 465 and the attitude of the Muslims to women, introduction to this work, published in even down to the wearing of the hijab (the 2013, does make mention of the uprisings ISBN head scarf). that swept through the Arab world, but the 978–0815632894 Unfortunately, I cannot end this essays themselves do not. Nonetheless, this Peresensi otherwise quite laudatory review without is a timely work, designed to show the great Robert L. Tignor a complaint about the last essay, written diversity in Muslim thinking about the by Aziz al-Azmeh, ‘God’s Caravan: political arena and good governance. Topoi and Schemata in the History of Muslim No set of essays on Islam’s political Political Thought’. Here, I was expecting flexibility would be complete without a summing up of the volume, a clear something on the Mughals who ruled as statement of what readers should take a minority over a vast Hindu population in away from so many excellent essays that, South Asia. Muzaffar Alam in ‘A Muslim however, covered so much time, space, and State in a non-Muslim Context: the political thought. I was disappointed. Not Mughal Case’ does full justice to the series only was the essay over-written, unclear of Mughal princes who while adhering to in places, and altogether too long at 70 Muslim practices and beliefs were tolerant pages, but in places it descended into a of their Hindu subjects and went to great diatribe against the works of two scholars: lengths to understand and appreciate the Patricia Crone’s Medieval Islamic Political Hindu way of life. Of course, the great Thought and Antony Black’s The History Mughal rulers—Akbar and Jahangir— of Islamic Political Thought from the Prophet come in for great praise, but much of the to the Present. Al-Azmeh’s chief complaint chapter, not surprisingly, is devoted to is that these two works are old-fashioned Nasir al-Din Tusi whose advice for princes, Orientalism at its worst. In fact, in an Akhlaq, although written in the thirteenth earlier chapter, Crone is described as ‘the century, was widely read in Mughal India erstwhile Orientalist enfant terrible’ (p. 83), and influenced state building under the but is it legitimate to devote seventy pages Mughals. Tusi championed a philosopher/ to a very savage review of two books that king under whom many different religious have already been rather well critiqued, communities could prosper. if not often by name, then certainly by Another path-breaking chapter is their publications, especially their web-sites, content in the rest of this volume? The that of Bruce K. Rutherford, ‘What do elaborates on their political views. Much of entire volume makes eminently clear that Egypt’s Islamists Want? Moderate Islam the information that Rutherford provides Islamic political thought cannot be seen and the Rise of Islamic Constitutionalism in comes from the contested election of 2005 as something sui generis if that is indeed a Mubarak’s Egypt’. The author identifies four when, in spite of a concerted opposition position that Crone and Black represent. moderate Muslims—Yusuf al-Qaradawi, that brought together Muslim Brothers of Thriq al-Bishri, Kamal Abu al-Majd, and all stripes and liberal secularists under the (Adapted from: Journal of , Muhammad Salim al-’Awwa—and using title of Kifaya (Enough!), nonetheless failed Mar 2015)

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