The Opinions Of The ‘ulamaa In Respect To Working With Shar’u Min Qablinah
The ‘Ulamaa have differed in respect to the Hujjiyah (legal validity as a source) of the Shar’u Min Qablinaa that has been mentioned in our Share’ah without denial or affirmation (support). Are we addressed by it or not? Their opinions in regards to this are as follows:
1 – The majority of the Ahnaaf, the Maalikiyah and some of the Shaafi’iyah in addition to Ahmad in one view attributed to him, upheld that the Shar’u Min Qablinaa that is mentioned in our Sharee’ah without Inkaar (denial or rebuke) and without Ta’yeed (support) is also a Shar’a for us and that we are bound to follow it. To support their opinion, they used the Qawl of Allah Ta’Aalaa as evidence:
They are those whom Allah had guided. So follow their guidance (Al-An’aam 90).
In addition to His Qawl (swt):
He has ordained for you of religion what He enjoined upon Nuh and that which We have revealed to you, [O Muhammad], and what We enjoined upon Ibrahim and Musa and Isa - to establish the religion and not be divided therein (Ash-Shooraa 13).
And by the Qawl of the Messenger (saw):
If any of you misses a prayer due to sleep or forgetfulness (carelessness) then he must pray it as soon as he remembers (Muslim).
As after stating this he (saw) recited the Qawl of Allah (swt):
And establish prayer for My remembrance (TaHa 14).
Which was an address to Mousaa (as).
It is for that reason that the Hanafiyah deduced the killing of the Muslim for the non-Muslim based on His Qawl (swt):
And We ordained for them therein a life for a life (Al-Maa’idah 45).
This is whilst the Aayah is discussing the Yahood and what Allah (swt) had made obligatory upon them in the Tawrah. In addition, Ibn Katheer spoke in his Tafseer about the Ijmaa’ (consensus) upon acting in accordance to the dictates of this Aayah.
2 – Another group including the Ashaa’irah, Mu’tazilah, Shee’ah, Ahmad in another opinion attributed to him, Ibn Hazm, some of the Ahnaaf and the majority of the Shaafi’iyah including Al-Ghazaaliy, Al-Aamadiy and Ar-Raaziy in addition to others from the scholars of Usool, held that the Shar’u Min Qablinaa is not a Shar’a for us and even if it has been mentioned in the Qur’aan. They deduced that from the Qawl of Allah (swt):
And to each of you we provided a Shir’ah and Minhaaj (Al-Maa’idah 48).
Therefore, every Ummah has an independent Sharee’ah and specific Minhaaj (method/way) and the Sharee’ahs of the previous nations did not possess the attribute of generalness or comprehensiveness like our Sharee’ah. Each of them had been specific to the Qawm (people) that their Sharee’ah had been revealed upon and as such they did not represent a Shar’a for us.
They also used as evidence the approval of the Messenger of Allah (saw) provided to Mu’aadh Ibn Jabal when he sent him as a judge to Al-Yaman (Yemen). That is because he did not instruct him to take anything from the previous Sharaa’i in the case where he did not find the Hukm in the Kitaab and the Sunnah. Rather he approved of the undertaking of Ijtihaad and commended him in respect to taking this direction.