Encyclopedia of Islamic Law: A Compendium of the Major Schools [Paperback]

Laleh Bakhtiar (Author), Kevin Reinhart (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1996

The various schools of law are compared and contrasted on all issues of the Shariah including individual worship (purification, prescribed prayer, prescribed fasting, prescribed charity and prescribed pilgrimage), economic issues including inheritance, endowments, wills and bequests, legal disability and social issues of marriage and divorce.

Editorial Reviews

Review

This work demonstrates the scope of Islamic law and the range of positions available within it. Many of the topics of Islamic law are collected and organized here, and within each section the author has systematically presented the opinions of the four Sunni schools of law - Shafii, Hanbali, Maliki, and Hanafi - together with the school of the so-called Twelver Shiah, here called the Jafari school after the most important of the latter Imams, Jafar al-Sadiq. The goal has been to point out the obvious, yet often-ignored fact of both the unity and diversity of Islamic legal thought, and specifically that the divergence between the Jafari and the Shafii, Hanbali, Maliki and Hanafi is no greater than that among the Shafii, Hanbali, Maliki and Hanafi schools. -- Professor Kevin Reinhart

About the Author

Laleh Bakhtiar, Ph.D., a well-known author on Sufism, is the first person to unearth traditional psychology which had been buried in medieval philosophy. With this work she shows that traditional psychology is alive and vibrant and should be an alternative psychology to modern schools as the stress is upon morality and ethics.

Product Details

• Paperback: 624 pages
• Publisher: Kazi Pubns Inc (October 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1567444989
• ISBN-13: 978-1567444988
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,154,085 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Makes Complex Jurisprudence Accessible to Laypeople, October 23, 2000

By 

Tron Honto - See all my reviews

This review is from: Encyclopedia of Islamic Law: A Compendium of the Major Schools (Paperback)

This is an excellent work for reviewing and familiarizing oneself with multi-faceted traditions of shari'a. Well-organized and concise, this work presents lucidly the unity and differences between the dominant Shi'a tradition (i.e., Jafari) and the four Sunni schools (i.e., Hanbali, Hanafi, Shafi'i, and Maliki).

This works focuses merely on the presentation of opinions and civil matters and religious ritual (e.g., marriage, inheritance, salaat, zakat, etc.), so anyone seeking to gain any knowledge about usul al-fiqh (legal theory/methodology) and the continuing relevance of Islamic law to modern ecomnies and states should look elsewhere. Muslims will find it practical in their daily acts of faith. Non-muslims will find it fascinating and a good reference for answering question regarding religious duties of Muslims (e.g., who is qualified to recieve the alms-tax?).

12 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Informative... But intellectually useless., August 6, 2002

By 

Souhail Charfi (UK) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Encyclopedia of Islamic Law: A Compendium of the Major Schools (Paperback)

This book is actually a direct translation of a major comparative study by the late shi`i scholar Muhammad Jowwad Maghniyyah. The original work as well as the translation simply list religious rules regarding certain cases and highlights the differences between the Sunni and shi`i scholars.

The work rarely mention the reasoning behind any legal rule and the information is very brief. For practicing Muslims, the book can be a great source of information; for non-practicing Muslims, it is useless.

The translation is not the best I have seen either, I have read better translations of the same work and this one is the worst.

For the kind of information that is contained in the book, any online resource of Islamic law (of the same calible) will be more useful and save more time.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A most needed reference book, May 28, 2001

By 

Muzaffer Muctehitzade "hacibey" (Boston, Ma USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Encyclopedia of Islamic Law: A Compendium of the Major Schools (Paperback)

Author fills a big gap in this field of comperative study of Islamic sects and suprizingly it even includes the shia't belief. As the name suggests it is all about how each school of thought consideres the Islamic law, what is their opinion on certain issues. Of course issues that are not disputed is not covered but only those that are different is covered. Author also provides some explanations behind the opinions. It is very good book for person doing comperative study and for more details you can go back to sources, Shafii's book, Muwatta or others.It is a good book for Imam's in this country where they have to answer to questions coming from variety of muslim groups contrary to in the home country it is more uniform, people are generally in same sect.