Contesting justice: women, Islam, law, and society

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In Contesting Justice, Ahmed Souaiaia off ers an innovative examination of the link between social justice and the Islamic interpretive and legal tradition. Th e author’s main argument is premised on the need to maintain a clear-cut distinction between what are explicitly stated legal proofs within Qur’anic texts, and those that are implicit and ambiguous and have been given meaning through human interpretation. It is the latter, i.e. implicit and ambiguous proofs that remain rooted in values of those who lived in the time of the Prophet’s Companions and have acquired immutable status, that are the subject of this study. Certain rulings within classical Islamic law that continue to thrive under the claim of settled precedents, then, must be challenged by Muslim scholars who face the urgent need to “revisit and reexamine the concepts of justice, fairness, and equality under the faculty of reason and common sense” (101–2). Persistent inequities perpetuated by such codifi ed rulings must be re-evaluated through activating the explicitly stated principles of justice and fairness in the Qur’an, according to the author. Souaiaia’s work adds to an existing body of literature by activistscholars such as Asma Barlas, Amina Wadud, Riff at Hassan, and others who have employed a multiplicity of approaches to excavate tools within the Qur’an that promote equality and social justice, particularly in relation to women. Th e author claims to make two unique contributions to the fi eld: fi rst, based on the results of statistical data collected for this study he concludes that merely increasing the numbers of women in the interpretive process does not guarantee interpretations that are more favorable toward women; second, he dismisses the idea that reinterpreting and/or re-formulating certain Islamic laws may provide the path to rectifying biases in the law, since by its very nature the law may protect the rights of some while simultaneously limiting the rights