Oxford University Press has published The Rise of Critical Islam: 10th-13th Century Legal Debate (2023), by Youcef L. Soufi (University of Toronto). A description from the Press:
In a richly narrated historical study, Youcef Soufi excavates an Islamic
legal culture of critique from the 10th to 13th centuries. Focusing on
the practice of munāẓara (disputation), Soufi explores how and
why oral debates became a pervasive and revered part of the intellectual
legal landscape of Iraq and Persia. Using the life and career of
celebrated Iraqi jurist Abū Isḥāq al-Shīrāzī, he traces the
formalization of debate gatherings at the dawn of the classical legal
schools (al-madhāhib) in the early 10th century and analyzes
the wider institutional, social, and discursive conditions that made
debate an important feature of any jurist's practice.
Pushing back against claims that classical Muslim jurists sought to weed out differences of opinion, The Rise of Critical Islam
presents a community committed to the openness, fluidity, and continued
exploration of the law. Challenging the view of debate gatherings
simply as mechanisms of doctrinal resolution before codification, the
study reveals a classical culture where critical debates were part of a
continual and personal quest to discover God's law. In uncovering this
classical legal culture, Soufi invites readers to question claims about
the promise of secular critique in disciplining religious passions and
forging human solidarity.
More information is available here. An interview with Professor Soufi is available here, at New Books Network.
-- Karen Tani
