Ra'y

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Ra'y ( Arabic رَأي, DMG raʾy "opinion") is the independent legal finding of legal scholars in Islamic jurisprudence ( Fiqh ).

The ordinances revealed in the Koran and the statements, deeds and recommendations of the Prophet Mohammed handed down in the Sunna were insufficient for answering and solving new legal cases, a circumstance that moved the legal scholars to independent legal decisions based on their own opinion ( raʾy ). The judge either chooses the solution that seems best to him (اِستِحسان, DMG istiḥsān 'approval'), or that which corresponds to the principle of general usefulness (استصلاح / istiṣlāḥ , derived from the verbصَلَحَ / ṣalaḥa  / 'fit; be allowed ').

The pioneers in this area were the Hanafis in Iraq , who are still known today as followers of raʾy ( ahl ar-raʾy ). However, other schools of law ( madhhab ) were not entirely unaffected by this method of legal finding. Even the followers of Mālik ibn Anas , who are fondly counted among the followers of the hadīth called Ashāb al-hadīth , were extremely active in cultivating the raʾy . The opponent of the raʾy- oriented jurisprudence was asch-Schafii , the founder of Islamic legal theory through his Risāla . The answer to thousands of legal questions ( masʾala / pl. Masāʾil ), which are always introduced with the formula a-raʾayta ("do you think that ..."), takes place in Islamic jurisprudence by opinio .

literature

  • Joseph Schacht : The Origins of Muhammadan Jurisprudence. Oxford 1967
  • Joseph Schacht: An Introduction to Islamic Law. Oxford 1964