My current research focuses on the philosophy of Islamic law, its history and practice, Islamic family law, ethics, and Sufism.

FORTHCOMING BOOK

An Islamic Legal Philosophy: Ibn ʿAbd al-Salam and the Ethical Turn in Islamic Law

Cambridge University Press • Studies in Islamic Civilization

My first book explores how medieval Muslim jurists pioneered a crucial ethical turn in Islamic law in a time of social crisis, centering the thought of ‘Izz al-Din Ibn ‘Abd al-Salam (1171-1262 CE). Living in a period marked by political fragmentation, the Crusades, and Mongol invasions, his innovative legal philosophy sought to address these crises by breaking from the dominant formalism of juristic thought towards a more ethical and socially responsive legal discourse. I show how Ibn ‘Abd al-Salam’s legal philosophy reconstituted a new theory of maslaha – the idea of the common good – alongside a hierarchy of legal maxims (qawaʿid fiqhiyya) to render the law more responsive to the crises of his day. 

Ibn ‘Abd al-Salam’s legal philosophy offers meaningful answers to perennial questions debated across legal traditions, such as: What is the source of the law’s authority? Does the law have a purpose, a morality, or an internal rationality? Ibn ‘Abd al-Salam’s unique answers to these questions offers a deep method of legal analysis probing the rationales underlying rulings and studying their outcomes and social effects. Ibn ‘Abd al-Salam prioritizes rationality, morality, and social welfare over formalistic adherence to rules.

Muslim communities suffer from a rampant culture of legalism in which legal rules are commonly treated as outward forms with no principles, purposes, morality, or social ordering behind them. While Ibn ‘Abd al-Salam’s ideas were highly influential in pre-modernity, I believe his legal philosophy can offer Muslims today a new paradigm for understanding and faithfully applying Islamic law in a meaningful way that upholds its integrity and realizes its social benefits.

Current Research Projects

  • Cambridge Companion to Islamic Law

    As the field of Islamic law continues to grow, new methodologies, subfields and sustained scholarly engagement continue to expand. Co-edited with Dr. Sohaira Siddiqui, the objective of this Companion is to capture the multifaceted growth of the field and signal future directions it can take. 

    The Companion will focus on the development of four areas in Islamic law: 1) the developing discourse of Islamic legal history, 2) the rise of socio-legal studies, 3) the study of the political and Islamic law, and finally, 4) the rise of new methodologies. Each chapter will aim to provide a critical examination of contemporary academic discourses while also providing a unique contribution to these debates and suggesting future avenues for research.

  • Mutʿa in the formation of sectarian identity, law, and morality: a digital humanities approach

    A co-authored study with Dr. Mairaj Syed exploring the role of temporary marriage (mutʿa) in the development of sectarian identities and the intersection of law and morality in early Islamic law. Through digital humanities techniques, we construct a corpus from hundreds of hadiths to examine the debate over mutʿa’s legitimacy.

    Analyzing the hadiths; geographic spread and the sectarian affiliations of their transmitters, we highlight mutʿa’s influence on sectarian identity formation and the jurisprudential tensions between law and morality in early Islam. This research showcases the value of digital humanities in historical Islamic law and hadith analysis.

  • Translation: “On Unity and Trust” Book 35 of al-Ghazali's Revival of the Religious Sciences

    A new translation of Book 35 (kitab al-tawhid wa-l-tawakkul) of al-Ghazali’s Revival of the Religious Sciences (Ihyaʾ ʿulum al-din) for the Fons Vitae series.

    This pivotal book in al-Ghazali’s most important work explores core questions in the lives of believers and their faith journey of attaining greater knowledge of God and nearness to Him. In the first half of the book, al-Ghazali expounds on key understandings underlying the spiritual station of trust in God (tawakkul). This includes the benefits of trust in God, the means of cultivating trust in God, and the realities of Divine agency and human will. The second half is dedicated to the methods of practically actualizing trust in God in the diverse states and stages of our lives.

  • Archetypes of Womanhood: Models from the Qur'an and the Prophetic Community

    This research paper explores the diverse models of womanhood presented in the Quran and in the Prophetic community. It examines the lives of the exemplary models of womanhood that God elevates, highlighting the shared foundational attributes of womanhood emphasized in their story, alongside their very diverse life trajectories. It also explores the biographies of the mother’s of the believers, underscoring their divergent interpretations of their public roles after the death of the Prophet Muhammad. Centering the diverse range of exemplary archetypes of womanhood and their life trajectories can serve as a corrective to the totalizing discourse of a single mode of ‘the ideal Muslim woman’.

    This research paper is commissioned by al-Mujadilah as part of a research working group.