Legal Logic and Equity in Islamic Law

Abstract

Islamic law is the epitome of Islamic thought, the most typical manifestation of the Islamic way of life, the core and kernel of Islam itself. The very term fickh, 'knowledge', shows that early Islam regarded knowledge of the sacred Law as the knowledge par exellence.1 This characterization of Islamic law is commonly accepted among Islamists,2 but a strange and mistaken image of the Islamic judge (qadi) persists in American legal circles. U.S. judges have offhandedly used the term qadi justice to symbolize a total denial of the law, namely, unprincipled, expedient and arbitrary lawmaking. When Judge Dobie of the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals refused to construe the words of a Virginia statute against its legislative intent, he stated,