Spring

Judicial Treatment of Religious-Only Marriages Under English Matrimonial Laws

Muhammad Zubair Abbasi — 2026-04-05

This article examines how judges of courts in England and Wales treat religious-only marriages, particularly Islamic marriages (nikāḥ). It analyses how judges have approached nikāḥ-based unions under the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973, distinguishing between valid, void, and non-qualifying ceremonies. Drawing on leading judicial authorities from the 1960s to 2025, I trace the transformation of judicial reasoning from questions of formality and jurisdiction to issues of human rights, equality, and non-discrimination. I argue that the insistence of judges on legal formalities has produced a dual system: one that privileges state-sanctioned forms of Anglican Christian and civil marriages while leaving other religious-only and humanist unions without legal protection. The article concludes that the challenge is not merely one of doctrinal classification but of reconciling multiple legal norms within a secular framework that aspires to equality, inclusion, and neutrality regarding religious practices.

The Islamic Doctrine of Takfīr (Excommunication)

Aria Nakissa — 2026-04-05

This article traces the long-term historical development of Islamic doctrine on takfīr (excommunication, declaring a self-professed Muslim to be a disbeliever). I focus on a line of influential scholars associated with the ahl al-ḥadīth and the Ḥanbalī school—Ibn Ḥanbal (d. 241/855), Ibn Taymiyya (d. 728/1328), and Muḥammad Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhāb (d. 1206/1792)—and examine how these scholars view takfīr in relation to three key topics: non-application of the sharīʿa, denial of Allah’s attributes (ṣifāt), and shirk (taking a being other than Allah as a god). In addition, I document the scholars’ varying approach to the “excuse for ignorance” (al-ʿudhr bi’l jahl) that prevents takfīr for individuals who lack knowledge of relevant Islamic teachings and examine the role of historical events and politics in shaping the development of the takfīr doctrine, with the focus of scholars’ attention shifting according to the circumstances confronting them.

Recalibrating Takāful’s Compass to Mālikī Sources

Habiba Afridi — 2026-04-05

This article revisits the tabarruʿ (donative) versus muʿāwaḍa (onerous/reciprocal exchange) distinction in the Mālikī school—a widely invoked justificatory frame for takāful (Islamic insurance)—and examines how far that distinction transposes to takāful’s constitutive contract. It traces the reception history and excavates its classical origins, bringing to light three overlooked insights: al-Qarāfī’s three-feature gharar (uncertainty) test for exchange contracts, Mālik’s tripartite taxonomy of legal dispositions, and his rationale for tolerating gharar in gratuitous contracts. The argument starts with an orientation that surfaces the paradigm-level assumptions and disciplinary priorities often latent in takāful’s doctrinal-technical debates and clarifies the article’s scope and methodological limits. It then proceeds to a logical deconstruction of the received dichotomy, then to a reconstruction of its reception pathway, and finally to a close reading of its classical Mālikī sources. Engaging al-Qarāfī’s Distinction 24 (the standard reference point for the issue) together with the canonical Mālikī text al-Mudawwana, the article proposes a constructive recalibration: shifting discourse away from a rigid, label-driven tabarruʿ–muʿāwaḍa binary toward Mālik’s tripartite scheme, guided by al-Qarāfī’s three features and more faithful to the Islamic moral-juristic economy.

Beyond Consent

Abdulrahman Alazemi — 2026-04-05

In this article, I examine how Mālikī jurists in the Moroccan Atlas confronted a recurring practice in which women renounced their Qurʾānic inheritance shares in favor of male kin through ostensibly voluntary transfers. I situate these renunciations within a moral economy of family cohesion, modesty, and communal landholding, in which women’s proprietary claims were reframed as threats to patrilineal solidarity. Against this background, I analyze how late Mālikī nawāzil developed evaluative tools for distinguishing formal compliance from legally operative riḍā (genuine consent) under conditions of social pressure. The study centers on a fatwā by Shaykh al-Kīkī (d. 1185/1772), who invokes the makhzan/sība divide to argue that consent produced in tribal settings marked by customary compulsion and weak judicial enforcement cannot be treated as legally dispositive. Through a close reading of al-Kīkī’s reasoning alongside earlier Mālikī discussions of ikrāh (coercion) and consent, I show how Maghribī jurists rendered non-physical pressures legally salient. By foregrounding the jurisprudential significance of political geography and rural legal practice, I offer an internally grounded account of how Islamic law could accommodate custom while delimiting it when it undermined protected rights.

Celebrating the Birth of the Prophet in British India

Osman Qazi — 2026-04-05

In nineteenth-century British India, the celebration of the birth of the Prophet or mawlid became a contested ritual amongst Muslim scholars. One such scholar, Aḥmad Raẓā Khān (d. 1340/1921), founder of the Barelwī movement and a Sufi shaykh of the Qādiriyya fraternity, advocated strongly for its permissibility. It was his understanding of the ritual that ultimately became a core differentiating factor between more than 200 million adherents of the Barelwī movement and the rest of the Muslims in the Indian subcontinent. Accordingly, this article examines the manner in which the mawlid was conducted in nineteenth- to twentieth-century British India, including the type of practices associated with its undertaking and key debates regarding the ritual amongst Muslim scholars (ʿulamāʾ). Situating Aḥmad Raẓā’s views in the context of these debates, and against the backdrop of the political and communal environment of the time, I examine his thought on the legal status and significance of the mawlid celebration and associated practices. I also explore how he positioned his views within the broader Islamic tradition. I base my conclusions on a detailed qualitative and, to a certain extent, quantitative analysis of Aḥmad Raẓā’s complete mawlid fatwās and treatises, which were recently gathered into a thirty-volume compendium.