Var'yash I.I. The Formation of Islamic Law: Thoughts of a Medievalist

Abstract: The article’s research is focused on the history of the formation of the sharia and the particularities in the development of Islamic law in the 7th‒10th centuries. At the heart of this study lies the heuristic component of the formative process and becoming of the law, as well as the role of the intellectual elite in the development of the legal doctrine of the sharia. Behind the origination of the sharia’s legal system stood predominantly judges and legislators, and not political powers, the sanction of which never became a mandatory facet. The article traces the principles of cognitive and practical activities of the Islamic intellectuals in the sphere of law at the very early stages of the sharia’s formation up to the period of the establishment of doctrinal schools. The history of the sharia’s formation is very rarely the focus of individual scientific studies by historians-Westerners, which prevents the creation of a synthesis of the methodological works that exist in Eastern and Medieval studies. The formulation of such a synthesis would give a wide-ranging, possibly adapted within the framework of the established Western European historical tradition, understanding of the foundations of Islamic law and to focus research attention on the subject currently relevant to Medievalists. The article’s novelty lies in its method of research, described above. The author comes to the conclusion that Islamic law originated from an epistemological search of such a method that would lay the foundation for lawmaking. The Islamic legislators' found method created the base for the interrelation between law and religion in the Islamic intellectual space.

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