Islamic Law and Human Rights

During recent decades a host of publications have seen the light with titles like: ‘Islam and X’ or ‘X in Islam’, where X is typically a concept with a positive connotation, such as democracy, peace, social justice, or women’s rights. Titles like ‘Islam and Human Rights’ and ‘Human Rights in Islam’ have been particularly popular. Publications with such titles are as a rule partisan and indicative of one of two attitudes: they are either incriminating or they are apologetic. In the first case the authors attempt to prove that Islam does not foster these concepts at all but, on the contrary, propagates doctrines totally contradictory to these notions. In the latter case the authors’ purpose is to demonstrate that Islam promotes or enjoins these positively valued concepts to the same extent or even more than ‘Western culture’ or Christianity and that it has done so for a much longer period. Therefore, whenever I see such a title, I become cautious, and will peruse the book or article with an attitude that is more critical than usual. These topics are fluid, and dealing with them requires special methodological care in order to avoid the traps by which they are surrounded. In this paper I will start with a critique of the methodological flaws in much of the existing literature and then suggest ways in which the topic may be approached. My intention is to contribute to the debate on Islam and human rights, not to offer ready-made solutions.