Heaven on Earth: A Journey Through Shari'a Law from the Deserts of Ancient Arabia to the Streets of the Modern Muslim World

by Sadakat Kadri

Ever since 9/11, fears about the shari‘a—Islamic law—have been spreading. A word that originally conveyed nothing more sinister than a direct path to water has become associated not with salvation but with brutality and compulsion. And as the legal historian and human rights lawyer Sadakat Kadri realized when he began writing this book, we are all worse off for not knowing its true meaning.

 

In Heaven on Earth, Kadri recounts Islam’s thrilling and turbulent history with wit and precision and shows how fourteen hundred years of tradition have been turned upside down in just forty years by hard-line extremists. Traveling through more than half a dozen countries, he explores how the shari‘a is currently perceived—by scholars, critics, and ordinary believers alike.

 

Heaven on Earth is a brilliantly iconoclastic tour through one of humanity’s great collective intellectual achievements. At a time when the shari‘a is shaping political crises and the lives of more than a billion Muslims worldwide, Kadri clarifies the realities of modern Islam—and helps us anticipate how it is going to look in the future.

Genres: Islam, Religion, History, Nonfiction, Law, Middle East, Travel

384 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2011

Reviews

[Simon · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book falls into two parts. The first is historical, concentrating on the rise of Islam until about the 14th century, and thereafter skipping quickly to the present; the second is thematic, distilling the experiences of the author's extensive travels in the Islamic world, with chapters focusing on modernity, criminal law and punishment, religious tolerance, and I'm not sure exactly what the topic of the final chapter is.

The book is engagingly written and informative. I'm happy to have read it, but I wasn't as wowed by it as I had hoped to be. My main complaint is that we actually learn too little about Shari'a law. The historical part of the book is really a general history of Islam, with some special emphasis given to figures and events important to the development of shari'a. We are told of the main competing schools of interpretation of shari'a (Hanafites, Hanbalites, Malikites, and Shafi'ites), but the brief characterizations of their differences were too little for me. The thematic chapters mingle travel writing, reflections on current events, reports on conversations with various shari'a experts throughout the Islamic world, and some facts and figures. What I really missed, most of all, was some account of the details of legal reasoning in the applications, historical or current, of shari'a to specific cases. What does a fatwa look like? What kinds of reasoning go into it? What range of citations, and how are they used? Working through a few cases, with the actual texts of the fatwas, and close commentary on them, would have been invaluable. No doubt, the author felt this would have made the book too scholarly, too little entertaining. To me, it felt a bit like Hamlet without the prince.

[Aisya · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mind blown. Thank you for the enlightenment, Mr Kadri. I would recommend your book to all Malaysians of the day so that we can get out this mess soon than later.

[Jordan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm not going to lie, the book was boring as all get out and really hard to read. That said. I felt that it was kind of important to get the sweeping notions of Shari'a law in order to understand all the Fox news hoopla. I guess I am kind of behind on this, I suppose this would have better served me a year ago. Anyhoo... So here is what I have gleaned. It started out as something good and was basterdized to sever the puropses of a few. Then, through propoganda was morphed - for some - into something totally different than what it is. At the heart of it, it is a morality guide that is sometimes used in the defense of evil acts. Sound familiar??? In the even that that was too subtle, I am talking about the Bible. It's all bedknobs and broomsticks turned sticks and stones.

[Carisa · Rating 2 out of 5]

Disappointing -- the first section (of two) is not an overview of shari'a, but a general history of Islam and the environment that in which shari'a arose. It's a lot of material that's available elsewhere, when I was looking for a more systematic examination of Islamic religious law. The second section is an examination of how shari'a has been interpreted in the last three decades (Kadri argues that the way it's been implemented in Saudi Arabia and Iran is without precedent in the history of Islam), and that's more interesting, but it suffers from not having been preceded by a clearer explanation of underlying principles.

[Juliana Philippa]

April 16, 2012 - "Interpreting Shariah Law Across The Centuries" on NPR
http://www.npr.org/2012/04/16/1505609...

[Tariq Mahmood · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's a must read for details on the Indian and Pakistani Muslim scene. The author is not shy to exploit his own heritage by extensively touring both India and Pakistan in his quest to understand Sharia through the ages. I particularly liked the Iranian Shiah angle and the Saudi take on Wahabism. I loved it when he topped the discussion off by covering the UK Muslim approach to Islam as well. Some bits get a bit tiresome when he goes into lengthy discussions on the finer points of Sharia but I guess it was unavoidable because he was trying to analyse law. I would highly recommend this book as it as also very nicely explains the Mutazillite philosophy as compared with the orthodox Hanbali one. The author has put life into an otherwise mundane topic by referring to British tabloid reports on some Sharia exemplary judgments (some pedophile in Malaysia) and its respect in the English people. This raises an interesting theory which a French Muslim Orientalist has shrewdly raised. Why is Islam so popular among drug addicts and sociopath new converts? Is it not because of its insistence on discipline and loyalty to God which makes it attractive to potential converts in the West? I digress, onwards to my next book as I venture into the Spanish nature.........

[Fadillah · Rating 4 out of 5]

I find this book is too academical for my liking. However, to disregard the whole thing as unreadable would be totally unfair to Mr. Kadri. He is a great author. He focused on all branches of religion and discussed matters that related with Islam in the past and the present. For some readers who are just like me (a curious Muslim whose a bit skeptical to trust local sources over their religion interpretation), this is a great start to harvest the interest in religion literature. You may find some of the subjects lacking in details and explanation. I was looking forward to read about 4 jurisprudence schools in Islam only to find that it was written inadequately. I was a bit intrigued on the part of 'the present' itself which i find Mr Kadri really wrote it in new perspective. The innovation in Islam is not a new subject yet the Islamic Scholars debating over it repetitively. The differences between shia, sunni and sufi also is discussed thoroughly in this book making it informative and engaging in the same time. I gave it 4 stars because it took me more than a week to finish it because it involved a lot terminologies that required me to understand it before i could proceed to the next page.

[Phoenix · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Spirit of Islamic Jurisprudence

The book has two foci. The first is historical development, the second looks at the current state of affairs of Islam in a political milieu. In the first Kadri provides a useful account of the differences between the major schools of Islamic jurisprudence, which generally formed around a charismatic leader and subsequently developed in reaction to each other. In the second aspect Kadri hits major hot spots - Afghanistan Iran, India, Pakistan, Sudan, Saudi Arabia and England and comments on the stigmatization of the Amadiya Muslims, but doesn't take a good look at Europe, the former Soviet Union, America or west Africa. A comparable book is Tamim Ansari's Destiny Disrupted: A History of the World Through Islamic Eyes.

The Four Sunni Mahdabs

The Hanafites, a Sunni school based in Baghdad, founded by Abu Hanifa (699-767), tended towards more lenient interpretations of the law, and are said to have developed the idea of "hilal", or loop holes, finding ways around the prohibitions against alcohol (fermented date juice) and using promisary notes to get around rules against usury. The next mahdab (school) created was that of Malik ibn Anas of Hijaz in Arabia, who argued that the Hanafites served their opinions, not God, and advocated law which more closed mirrored the actions (sunna or practice) of the Prophet and his companions - not only extending to civil matters but also to individual behaviour. This was followed by the brief existence of the rationalist Mutawalli (sp) mahdab which argued that God, being perfect, would have created a world amenable to reason, therefore reason could be trusted to determine the rule of law.

Thirdly Muhammad al Shafi'i's school, based in Cairo, attempted to steer a middle road between the first two mahdabs, borrowing Malikite reasoning but also elucidating their patterns, for example categorizing correct behaviour into 5 categories: forbidden, objectionable, permissible, commendable or compulsory. Al Sahfi'i can also be attached to the principle of progressive revelation wherein later verses of the the Quran are allowed to abrogate previous verses due to the changing needs and ability of the community to understand God's will.

The fourth school the Hanbali is also based on a charsimatic personality, Ibn Habal, an expert in the interpretation and memorization of Hadiths and a near martryr due to his imprisonment and trial by the Caliph al-Mu'tasim. By and large this is the basis of the modern Salafist movement which is now rooted in Saudi Arabia. Notable and ironically ibn Hanbal was critical of writing and taken notes as leading to "innovation" - "Whenever a man comes along, he writes a book and abandons the hadith of the Messenger` of God" (pp 82)

Another offshoot of Islamic thought emerged at the end of the 12th century in the harsh proclamations of Ibn Taymiyya, a Malikite extremist who believed that torture was permissible and piety was a necessity in an era where the return of the Mongol armies seemed certain. His radical difference with the Malikites was the restriction that one only needed to examine the sunna of the 1st 3 generations of Muslims (Ancestors or Salafs, from which we get th Salafists) in order to make a ruling. Taymiyya's fatwas also justified the abrogation of the pact of Umar protecting the rights of Christians and Jews as these had come later under Umar II. The impact was temporary and Salafism did not take take root until the mid 1740s when a certain Muhammad al-Wahab, an admirer of Taymiyya's teachings, assumed the duty of qadi and stoned a woman to death. It would have been a minor footnote except that local Shaykh Muhammad ibn Saud took an interest in Wahab's extreme orthodoxy and today the House of Saud rules Saudi Arabia.

Shi'ite Jurisprudence

The major split between Shi'a and Sunni is over the right of succession of Ali and his family, murdered at Karbala, the husband of Fatima the daughter of the Prophet. Thus the sunna of the Companions of the Prophet could only be carried so far. The theologian Muahmmad al-Kulayni (864-941) published 1600 hadiths and a volume of sermons attributed to Ali. The resulting school known as Ja'fari held that God, being just, had understandable reasons for his law, and therefore reason could be used as the basis of shari'a. Kadri argues that Shi'ism emerged as a political force in the 15th century when the Persian Safavids reacted against their Ottoman neighbours by adopting Shi'ism as official doctrine. Kadris also notes that the Ayatollah Khomeini was a fan of al Farabi's version of Plato's Republic, and used it (including the idea of a Philosopher King/Supreme Leader - Khomeini himself) as the basis of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

The Modern Era

What stands out are the different branches of fundamentalism - Deobandi of Pakistan and India, their rival counterparts the Barelvis, the Salafists of Saudi Arabia and Hizb ut-Tahris, a semi-utopian movement with membership in 40 countries hoping to reestablish the Caliphate and covers the origins of the Muslim Brotherhood from Hassan al-Bana to Sayyid Qutb leading to the assassination of Sadat. He's also disappointed in Iranian Shi'ism, based as it is on a more rational Mutawali tradition, hoping that it might be more understanding of minorities. Initially he is surprised by the the openness of questions asked at a Q&A session at Mofid University, but power remains with the Ayatollahs - Christians, Zoroastrians and Jews are "respected" but within relegated limits - others such as the B`hai are less fortunate. There is a wider range of questions that can be asked that one would expect, but the answers fall within a narrower range. The Grand Ayatollah Araki is asked about apostasy - it is permissible, he says, as long as it is not openly expressed. "If it is only possible to accept beliefs that correspond with Islam, there is no freedom of belief" asks the student. "Apostasy is not only unprotected but unprotectable." (See pp249 for the whole exchange.)

The downside is the increase of regimes employing "hadd" and "taz'ir" penalties - amputation of limbs for theft , prison terms, lashing for adultery (zina), and death sentences for apostasy. As as of the time of writing these included: Afganistan, Iran, Libya, Mauritania (northern) Nigeria, Pakistan, Qatar, Somalia, Sudan, UAE, and Yemen. The possible upside is that the Internet has created an evangelical style revolution. Islam has never had a central authority and and a large number of groups and individuals have hung out their shingles offering advice and interpretation. Kadri believes this signals a trend towards individuals defining their own relationship and interpretation of Islam. Historically though Muslims could choose a qadi from whichever of the available schools best suited their purpose - and this is of the same cloth.

The final chapter takes critical aim at Islamophobia in the West which can be alarmist and overblown. The arguments here are not unusual, nor are they wrong. He admits that there are problem areas in Britain with 2nd and 3rd generation disaffected youth, but the real difficulties with extremists take place in Muslim countries where Muslims themselves are the victims.

Over all an intelligent book. Kadri, a lawyer, reflects the style of a travel writer, which he also is, and his pov is that of a moving camera - good at capturing individual scenes but leaving the reader a bit short of gathering the whole picture. Parts of the picture are missing - we learn little of Turkey, the Murghals, North Africa other than there is that fact of the Arab Spring, or of Africa in general. What we learn about history is good, but I've found other accounts more complete . On the other hand we do get some insights into the interplay between Muslim, Greek and Christian philosophy, some useful elementary information on the various mahdabs along with a great deal of interesting anecdotal information to glue these elements together.

A minor problem - there are footnotes but the approach is non-standard. Instead of embedding superscripts in the text, there is a back section ordered by page# with a snipped of text followed by the attribution. As such it's not clear at first glance which parts of the text have attributions.

Recommended.

[Jon-Erik · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a great history of the sharia, detailing the emergence of the hadith, the four schools of Sunni jurisprudence, and the Twelver Shia. While this represents the majority of the Muslim word, important schools like the Ibadi are absent. Kadri also details the roots of some extremist Islamic thought from Hanbal to Ibn Taymiyya to Wahab through to elements of the Muslim Brotherhood to Al Qaeda. (The book was written before ISIS became a player). Fewer dots are connected in the history of Shia jurisprudence, though it is detailed as well.

Kari includes the token—sometimes gratuitous—reminders that, by comparison, contemporaneous Europeans were worse whenever we read something that sounds too awful, at least in the history. The conclusion has a similar kumbaya tone, which doesn't quite undo all of the work done in the previous chapters. Kadri, like many Western intellectuals, is capable of making criticisms of extremism in situ in other countries—he points out the utter unreality of decisions by judges in Pakistan and Iran, for example, or in his mentions of how harsh penalties were mitigated with legal fictions such as three-year-long pregnancies—when the situation turns to Muslim minorities in the West itself, somehow, anyone who is concerned is to be mocked.

For example, without further discussion, Kadri mentions on a couple of occasions the laws in Western Europe banning women from wearing the veil. Kadri assures us that most of the women subject to this law want to wear the veil and are more oppressed by the law itself. In other words, French revolutionary values in France should take a backseat to an Islamic Neo-Orthodoxy. In France. In other words, Islamic orthodoxy in Saudi Arabia should be criticized, but in France (or the US, or the UK) it should not. Similarly, when discussion arbitration laws in the US, Kadri mentions that Orthodox Jews use batei din just like Muslims might use sharia arbitration. No discussion is made about whether private courts are a good idea, just that if others are doing it, it's ok for Muslims. In other words, relativism for the West, liberalism for the East.

Frankly, I wonder if this is Kadri's real belief. This tone doesn't permeate the book until its last pages and they almost seem an afterthought. The historical portions are an honest and fair historical account of the development of the sharia—which, like many histories of Islam is colorful, vivid, and detailed from the seventh century to the thirteenth and then merely skeletal for the next 500 years.

It is critical for Westerners who want to understand more about Islam that they can't pick and choose a few verses from the Quran and seek to extract some meaning from that. The Quran is a relatively short work. But unless you understand how it's interpreted, and know something of the thousands of Hadiths that complement it, and the jurisprudential rules that make them all work together, you will be learning about the Quran only and not Islam.

This book does an excellent job of doing that work and is an excellent critique of how those rules are implemented in the East.

Edit: One concern I have with this book is its reliance on official statistics. Just because the state only performed one execution, how many people were killed extrajudicially? How many of those on religious grounds? Those may be unanswerable questions, but without those answers, the claim Kadri makes can't be made.

[Nallasivan V. · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is not so much of review but a set of related book recommendations. I bought this book out of a bookstore having never heard of it or read about it. I liked the travelogue-like prologue where the author talks to a sufi mystic and broadly introduces us to what this book tries to achieve: To trace the evolution of sharia from the prophet till about 2011-12.

I read about 80 pages in my first read, confused mostly by number of historical figures I need to keep track of. I gave up. And then a year later, I read Leslie Hazelton's Biography of the Prophet - The First Muslim. It is a very well written account - based on two early biographies, well informed by facts and using judicious discretion wherever the facts are hazy. By Portraying the complex socio-political realities during the prophet's time, Hazelton puts Quran into a new perspective. With the context of time and place, the moral, theological and political philosophy of Quran starts making sense.

Kadri's book picks up right where Hazelton leaves you - on the death bed of the Prophet. Though the styles of the book are different (Kadri's book is more academic, while Hazelton prefers a mix of history and speculation), the narrative they build are quite similar. In the first part of the book, Kadri narrates the complex history of the Islamic Caliphate, the sharia law, different sects of Islam et al. What comes out is the aspect of Islam many outsiders hardly know: its ambitious political experiment, starting from Prophet - the promise of a just society. The History takes us all the way till Al Quaeda and the Islamic revivalism of the last few decades.

The second part of Kadri's book deals with the nations which transformed into full scale Islamic states (Iran, Saudi, Pakistan, Sudan) in the last 50 years. Kadri travels around, speaking to people trying to figure out the reasons behind Islamic revivalism in these states. If at all, Kadri falls short marginally, anywhere in the book, it is here. Kadri is more a historian than an anthropologist. He tries to understand people's affinity towards Sharia by tying it back to history. Though this explains a lot about where certain ideas comes from, it doesn't paint a complete picture.

This is where we turn to the third book: V S Naipaul's Among the Believers (1980). Naipaul, as opposed to Kadri, is more interested in conversing with people: exploring the contemporary time and places rather than fall back to history backed explanations. Naipual turns to History only to provide more context. A second reason why Naipaul is much more effective is that he traveled to these countries when they were in the midst of the islamic revolution (1979-80). That gave Naipaul a chance to see and chronicle the socio-political turmoil of these countries. The result is a insightful account of what Kadri terms as 'Islamic Revivalism'.

I read Naipaul long before I read Kadri and Hazelton. But if you haven't read any of these books, Hazelton, Kadri and Naipaul should be the order in which you should go. Happy Reading!

[Matt · Rating 4 out of 5]

A frankly amazing and lucid illustration of Islamic culture and the role (disputes over) sharia plays in it. The first section, a history of Islam from Mohammed's inital experiences through Afghanistan in the eighties, tells a fairly familiar story, but Kadri is self-aware enough to stud his story with exmaples and anecdotes both representative and exemplary, and throughout he keeps a strong sense of narrative-- so we get chapters that cover a chunk of history, but they are organized, for example, so that we learn in one about the development of the first two main schools for interpreting the sharia, and in another, we'll focus on one man, Ibn Taymiyya, let's say, who redirects the flow of sharia, or else a chapter will kind of culminate in the emergence of al-Ghazali as a significant thinker. Throughout, it's readable and interesting and never dull.

The second section of the book addresses the role sharia plays today, now that we know the history. This, too, is interesting and well-presented, incorporating Kadri's travels in researching the book, with interview excerpts and some light travel writing. It's very good stuff, reflective and analytic in equal parts, and, to put it simply, it explains a lot. It's very good. My one quibble, though, comes in this section, where the organization seemed less clear than in the first section: I think the idea was to take the key elements of sharia and explore them by chapter-- so, in one chapter we deal with punishments, and in another, we consider what sharia says about treating those non-muslims in the world. But I'm kind of guessing here (those two are pretty easy, but in a chapter like the final one, it's harder to know. I think what I wanted was a little clearer demarcation of what belonged in these chapters-- the process felt almost too unconscious to me, and I therefore sometimes felt lost, wondering why I was being told this, even when it was very interesting.

But really, that's a very minor quibble in an otherwise remarkable book, and one I hope to add to my books sometime soon.

[Ellen · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book has been really hard to read but worth it. If you would like to know more about the basis in law for jihad or for some of the things that are happening in the Middle East now, this would be a good book to read. You may find, as I did, that you will have to reread bits a couple of times before you really comprehend how different Shari'a law is from our familiar legal systems and what has happened to the interpretations of the Qu'ran and the interpretations of the law since the Qu'ran was written. A couple of things stand out: 1. India, Pakistan, Afghanistan,Iran, Iraq and Egypt all have different interpretations of justice and what is legal and what is not. They may differ widely in fact and we in the US have yet to grasp that. TV sound bites don't even come close whether they are on PBS or Fox news to aiding us in appreciating the differences. 2. There is a difference between our legal/ethical/religious systems in that most Western religiouns believe that confession is an important part of determining responsibility for behavior. Shari'a law discourages confession of wrong-doing in order to be merciful - sort of like "don't ask, don't tell" - so that there are many "laws" which are not enforced because breaking them is rarely acknowledged. 3. Shari'a law suggests that it is better to support a corrupt ruler than to rebel against that ruler. So imagine how that impacts our attempts to "get out" of Afghanistan or anywhere in the Middle East. This alone suggests we are in a quagmire of proportions we have never been prepared to understand and it "explains" some of the things going on now in the Middle East and how awful they are for the local populations who must be torn one way and another trying to figure out how to abide by this aspect of Shari'a law. This is a fascinating book but hard, hard, hard to read as you watch the nightly news and yet, every educated person in America owes it to his country to read this book.

[Eduardo Martínez Sáez · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book is divided in two parts.

First, Kadri offers a well-structured and dynamic history of Islamic Civilisation, with a focus on the development of the Sharia. It's a very informative read, even for someone already knowledgeable in the subject. It is both rich and condensed, and offers some new interesting perspectives. The author provides an impressive bibliography as well.

Second part deals with "sharia today". It describes the author's journey across several Muslim countries. Highly interesting, as he gathers a wide range of testimonies and conflicting opinions that reflect the current status of centuries-old controversies, and the way they fit into the modern world. Sadly, this part is overcharged with the author's own commentaries, which are far less interesting. A simplistic approach prevails; insistently forcing into the plot moral values from his western uprising and training. It is upsetting, because at times it seems that he tries harder to prove, at any cost, the perfect conjunction between Islamic Law and UN's human rights, than he actually tries to understand Islamic Law itself. From a decently nonpartisan position at the beginning, it gets worse and worse to the end of he book. The bitter references to myths of refined Islamic humanists in lapis palaces and flying carpets, while European "tribespeople" were brutish and bigoted, further discredit the author. The insistence in forcing a parochial agenda instead of academically examining Islamic Law (a deeply interesting subject in its own right), impoverishes the book; and recurring to shabby propagandist mythology against the Christian Middle Ages doesn't help any of the above.

As a whole, I hold a bittersweet memory of this book. Its flaws don't overrun its many lights, though. And, specially the first part, it remains a highly useful resource for understanding Islamic Legal History. Criticism takes longer than praise.

[Justin Evans · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not really what the subtitle promised. Kadri writes very well, and seems to have a good command over the subject matter, but it really only skims the surface of actual legal matters. On the other hand, if you know very little about Islam in general, this would be an ideal one stop shop: there's plenty of stuff on the early history, some slightly convoluted/compressed bits, some very well done. I can know name the four traditional schools, at least (Hanafite, Malikite, Shafi'ite, Hanbalite) and have some idea of what they were all up to; I also know just how separate the Shiite tradition is from these Sunni schools. On the other hand, I have no idea whether the differences between those schools have any impact on contemporary Islamic thought or practice, because once Kadri makes the jump from chronological exposition to thematic discussion, he stops bothering to discuss them. The final sections are interesting, but again, I wished for a bit more depth.

In short, Kadri faced a real problem: do you just discuss the intellectual matters at hand, and leave yourself open to the problem of ignoring the actual circumstances the ideas were designed to solve? Or do you lay out the social and cultural causes while not really getting to grips with the ideas? He chose the latter, probably for the better in intellectual terms (i.e., he doesn't act as if only ideas exist) but for the worse as far as the book itself goes (because he wanted to write something inviting and short).

But it was well wroth reading, if only for the evidence he produces for his own argument: that 'fundamentalist' Muslims, from the Wahhabis to the present, lack the humility, intelligence and humanity of the men they claim to be emulating.

[Luna Hasani · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the few books out there that deserves six stars. Sadakat Kadri is a good writer and an magnificent historian. The effort he put into writing this book shows as you flip through the pages.

Sadakat Kadri undertakes a very objective approach to explain the evolution of Shari'a law. The book starts by talking about the early stages of Islam, when Muhammad, peace be upon him, received his first revelation and how he transferred the Arabian Peninsula. Then it swiftly turns to explain the events that occurred after the death of the prophet, and the different approaches of the four rightly guided caliphs. Next, it details how the Shari'a transformed during Omayyad, Abbasid, Mameluke and Ottoman caliphates and talks about the different schools of thought that emerged. This concludes part one of the book.

In the second part, the author turns to talk more about the present of Shari'a law, and how figures like Ibn Taymiyya played a role into transforming many people's understanding of Islam in ways no one can deny. Militant Islam does not fail to occupy most of the second part of the book, with its belief in practices like execution of blasphemers and apostates. Kadri explains how alien such beliefs are to the tolerant message of God.

You can read all about Sunnism, Shiism, Sufism, conservatism, extremism and liberalism; in less than 300 pages. The journey ends by saying in reference to extremism, that "mortals can only fail when they play God in the here-and-now."

Amazing read. Highly recommended.

[Robert · Rating 5 out of 5]

I first saw this book advertised for the FirstReads giveaway, although I did not win, the title intrigued me enough that I went to Amazon and ordered it anyway. While law in general is not a subject particularly known for its thrilling subject matter, sharia has entered the American conscious more in recent years as the country has become more involved in the Islamic world. One prominent example that comes to mind is Oklahoma's recent ballot measures on whether to ban the use of "foreign law" in U.S. state courts. As a body of law, sharia operates on the assumption that the Qur'an is central to any Muslim society, with accompanying hadith and the decisions of scholars to aid the process. The author uses his personal experiences to show how this can both reflect the prevailing attitudes of the society it is practiced in, and how it can be subject to abuse. Although perhaps not as detailed as some academic efforts, I enjoyed it as a work written in a lively style that makes the subject much more accessible than one would originally anticipate. Kudos to the cover designer as well.

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a ton of history and information crammed into 300 pages. I felt like I would have benefited greatly from having some sort of name chart or graph to keep all the historical names sorted out. I'm not good with names anyway so it was hard to remember who came from which group. All that aside, this book is very informative and explains things in such a clear matter that I finally feel like a have a grasp on why some things are. It really goes a long way to explaining why some things have happened and why some groups believe the things they do. It might even be a good book to include in some school classes so people don't just believe what the media tells them and actually start understanding a very large group of the population.

This review is thanks to a free book received from GoodReads First Reads.

[J · Rating 4 out of 5]

A meticulously researched history of the practice and interpretation of Islam, this is not some dry legal tome but a story, written with the sly, dry humor associated with the British. The author is a Western-trained lawyer with Muslim roots. He explores Islam from the revelations of Muhammad to the development of the various competing schools of ijtihad to how Shari'ah law is interpreted and applied in the modern world. I had expected this last part to be more comprehensive but, as I think the author ably demonstrates, there are not books enough to thoroughly explore the variations around the world today. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in learning more about the intricacies of Shari'ah, or even just about the origins and history of Islam.

[Charles Selden · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you would like to better understand the Muslim culture, this book is an important contribution. The author is a London lawyer with Muslim roots and a clear-headed understanding of the historical and intellectual sources of the Muslim extremists. If nothing else, read Chapter 8.

It should be required reading for the 2016 presidential candidates--and the reporters who cover them. The Muslim world is 1.3 billion, or about the size of the Catholic world. Kadri travelled widely, read thoroughly to prepare for this important book.

[Jacabaeus · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting intellectual history and analysis of the shari'a (and Islamic law by proximity) that is also one part travelogue. The first half of the book covers the development and history of the shari'a and the second half is a non-rigorous analysis of the shari'a and Islamic law. The book falls flat in two respects: first, when trying to blend in the travelogue elements; and second, the lack of rigour in its analysis. While the travel pieces are interesting they do stick out like a sore thumb and aren't blended in well. With regard to the analysis, the book is not an academic text and doesn't try to hold itself out to be one, but it does fall in to that vein, and as such there are certain expectations to be met and this book falls just short of meeting them. With regards to the complaints of other reviewers that it doesn't actually set out the law, the book in no way makes any representations that it intends to do so. Further, the author is in no way qualified to set out the shari'a. If readers are looking for a text in English that sets out the shari'a I would recommend them to look at Wael Hallaq's and Noel Coulsons texts on the subject.

[H · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is very informative, illuminating and exceptionally well-written. I have learnt so much about the history of Islam, the emergence of different jurisprudential schools and Islamic factionalism, and the evolution of Sharia law. Ideas about the Sharia have been demonstrably changing for almost the last fourteen hundred years and the author traces back how much of this has been crafted by men from an attempt to decipher the law throughout the centuries and how this dramatically impacts today's modern world.

There were several concepts and terms (especially the Arabic ones) that I found quite difficult to grasp that a side research was deemed necessary (Read: Google). The author did jump through so many historical figures that I struggled to navigate through although the shifts in time period were consistent and linear, but overall it is readable. It did take me a while to finish this book so I would recommend you to take your time to absorb every detail of it because this is indeed a remarkable piece of work.

[David Williams · Rating 4 out of 5]

If, like me, you've been both fascinated (in a rubber-necking kind of way) and saddened by the demonization of Muslims by freedom-loving Americans, you've likely noticed that a fair number of Americans believe that our Constitution is about to be supplanted by Sharia law. Among the charlatans who sought to profit from post-9/11 fears, Sharia proved to be a godsend. Even the most bigoted and xenophobic of Americans know that vocalizing uncoded prejudice is no longer acceptable in polite company. However, Sharia provided the canard onto which the profiteers could direct the fearful, yet polite Americans, who had lost their capacity to distinguish between the acts of the few and actions of the many. Needless to say, Sharia is far more complex than a FB meme or the opinions of a biased blogger can convey. There is considerable debate among Muslims as to how it should be applied, if at all. This debate has persisted for 1,500 years and will likely continue. Similarly, much of the so-called encroachment of Sharia into the legal systems in America and Europe are limited to the resolution of family disputes, a privilege already extended to other religions. To be sure, there are bad eggs within Islam, but, just like our mothers taught us, we shouldn't judge the many based on the actions of the few. That would be like suggesting that I have something in common with Roy Moore just because we both claim to be Christians.

[Steve Slocum · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the best books I've ever read in terms of clearing up misconceptions about Muslims. The fear of shari'a is used as a political tactic to affect election outcomes in the US, Canada, and Europe. To the point that there is actual legislation in several US states expressly forbidding any form of Shari'a in their states.

Kadri demonstrates his writing skill by making a book about law interesting and enjoyable. He covers the whole picture of shari'a, from its inception to its various evolutions, helping the non-Muslim reader to understand that shari'a is truly the codification of the deep social justice roots of Islam.

He doesn't leave out the deviant versions that are obsessed with violent punishments, but traces them to their origins.

[Ain Atila · Rating 4 out of 5]

“And though the ideological assault of Islam spans on a broad range from tabloid racism to rationalist humanism, Islamophobia is as good a word as any to describe it. Every Muslims thereby becomes a potential wife-beater, honour-killer, or suicide bomber. The fact is the people who suffer most are themselves Muslims.”

A very detailed about the journey of shariah law through the ages. A heavy and academical book too.

4/5 ⭐️

[hissi · Rating 5 out of 5]

These are one of the books that I need to own and study. I love the writing style. And how Islamic history is traced from the first words spoken to our prophet (recite) to the making of our modern sharea. I haven't finished it but I will once I get my hands on a copy that is mine. So I can note and study from.

[Liz Wager · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a fascinating, thoughtful, yet wonderfully readable book. Highly recommended.

[M. Ilyas Suri · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well researched solid works

[Abdul · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sadakat Kadri traces the history of Sharia Law in this excellent book.

[arkan · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent read that gives you a lucid and realistic perspective on the Muslim world.

[Laurent Szklarz]

If you want to understand Islam, or at least curious about it, from its origin to today, this book will enrich you . I really enjoyed it .