This article examines how the events of the Arab Spring have helped give birth to a new juristic subfield known as the "Fiqh of Revolution". The Fiqh of Revolution supplies legal guidance on peaceful rebellion under contemporary conditions, addressing itself to a 21st century world order shaped by new internet media and post-Cold War international human rights conventions. I argue that besides being an important source of influence for Islamist movements, the Fiqh of Revolution also illustrates broader trends in contemporary Islamic legal thought. In particular, I draw attention to the process of "secondary segmentation", whereby new legal subfields are created for the purpose of justifying and regimenting the use of utilitarian modes of juristic reasoning. Although "secondary segmentation" is an emergent trend, I suggest that it has important implications for the future evolution of Islamic legal doctrine.

This article argues that the emerging Cognitive Science of Religion (CSR) provides a valuable new perspective on colonialism. CSR argues that humans are innately inclined towards certain types of religious belief (e.g., belief in spirit beings, belief in immortal souls) and certain types of non-utilitarian morality (e.g., belief in an obligation to care for kin, belief in an obligation to avoid ‘disgusting’ substances or behaviours). These innate inclinations underlie many religious and cultural traditions transformed by colonialism, including Islam. The article suggests that colonial power operates not only by suppressing traditional non-Western institutions but also by suppressing the natural inclinations underlying non-Western traditions. This claim is developed through a study of colonial efforts to transform Egypt’s al-Azhar, the world’s most influential institution of Islamic learning and scholarship. These efforts made al-Azhar into the centre of a global Islamic reform movement, which sought to integrate Islam with a colonial scientific-utilitarian worldview.

Specialists in Islamic studies have taken virtually no interest in the influential and rapidly developing field of Cognitive Science of Religion (CSR). The present article seeks to address this problem by considering how insights from CSR can be systematically applied to reconceptualize Islamic theology, law, education, and mysticism. The article centers on what is probably CSR’s most influential and well-established idea; namely, that religion is closely linked to an evolved “mindreading” ability (i.e., a “Theory of Mind Module”). It is argued that Islamic theology employs mindreading focused on events and objects in the universe, Islamic law and education employ mindreading focused on scriptural texts and embodied practices, and Islamic mysticism employs mindreading focused on psychological experiences. The article develops these ideas through an analysis of the Arabic-language writings of Abū Ḥāmid al-Ghazālī, the famous medieval Islamic theologian, jurist, and mystic.

This book shows how hermeneutic theory and practice theory can be brought together to analyze cultural, legal, and religious traditions. These ideas are developed through an analysis of the Islamic legal tradition, which examines both Islamic legal doctrine and religious education. In terms of disciplinary orientation, the book combines anthropology and Islamicist history, utilizing both ethnography and in-depth analysis of Arabic religious texts. The book focuses on higher religious learning in contemporary Egypt, examining its intellectual, ethical, and pedagogical dimensions. Data is drawn from over two years of fieldwork inside al-Azhar University, Cairo University’s Dār al-ʿUlūm, and the network of traditional study circles associated with the al-Azhar mosque. Together these sites constitute the most important venue for the transmission of religious learning in the contemporary Muslim world. Although the book gives special attention to contemporary Egypt, it provides a broader analysis relevant to Islamic legal doctrine and religious education throughout history.

This article explores the importance of ethical discipline in resolving the ambiguities characteristic of legal interpretation. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork among religious scholars at Egypt's al‐Azhar, I demonstrate that traditional Muslim educational techniques are structured with the aim of imparting a particular set of dispositions (modelled on those of the Prophet) by enjoining meticulous and constant imitation of the Prophet's personal habits (sunna). By transforming themselves into living replicas of the Prophet, jurists believe that they acquire the ability to mirror his textual interpretations.