Approaching the Sunnah : Comprehension and Controversy

by Yusuf Al-Qaradawi

The Sunnah still provides the stable moral framework the grammar that enables Muslims, by formal rules and inward sense, to know right from wrong. However, separation from the mainstream of life puts the Sunnah in danger of becoming rigid an archaism. Addressing that danger, this book explains how the Sunnah can function as the grammar of a living, adaptive language, capable of guiding (and not shying from) the mainstream. The first chapter sets out the qualities that characterize authentic application of the universality, coherence (so that different spheres of human responsibility are not split), compassionate realism, moderation, and humility. The second explains standards and procedures for determining the Sunnah in the fields of jurisprudence and moral instruction. The third chapter illustrates through detailed examples common errors in understanding the Sunnah reading hadiths singly without sufficient context, confusing legal and moral injunctions, means and ends, figurative and literal meanings... and it proposes remedies for these errors.

Genres: Islam

234 pages, Paperback

First published July 3, 2006

About the author

Yusuf Al-Qaradawi (Arabic: يوسف القرضاوي) is an Egyptian Islamic theologian. He is best known for his programme, ash-Shariah wal-Hayat ("Shariah and Life"), broadcast on Al Jazeera, which has an estimated audience of 40 million worldwide. He is also well-known for IslamOnline, a popular website he helped found in 1997 and for which he now serves as chief religious scholar. Al-Qaradawi has also published more than 80 books, including The Lawful and the Prohibited in Islam and Islam: The Future Civilization. He has also received eight international prizes for his contributions to Islamic scholarship, and is considered one of the most influential such scholars living today. Al-Qaradawi has long had a prominent role within the intellectual leadership of the Muslim Brotherhood, an Egyptian political organization, but twice (in 1976 and 2004) turned down offers for the official role in the organization. A 2008 Foreign Policy magazine poll placed al-Qaradawi at number three on its list of the top 20 public intellectuals worldwide.

Some of al-Qaradawi's views have been controversial in the West, and he is banned from entering the United States, Israel and Great Britain. In 2004, 2,500 Muslim academics from Saudi Arabia, Iraq and from the Palestinian territories condemned Qaradawi, and accused him of giving "Islam a bad name."

As of 2004, al-Qaradawi was a trustee of the Oxford University Center for Islamic Studies. He also served as a technical consultant for a multi-million dollar epic movie in English on Muhammad.

alternative spellings
يوسف القرضاوي
Yusuf Al-Qaradawi
Yusuf El-Karadâvi

Reviews

[Safaa Selwaye · Rating 5 out of 5]

the book is quite detailed and comprehensive, I do recommend it for those who seek to learn conditions of weak Hadiths and the correct usage in the light of Quran.

[Yusif Nabiyev · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tries to clarify the way to approach old scripts really good but is a bit poor with associating the written scripts (hadiths) with the modern day world.

[Muhammad Huzaifah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Buku yang membuka mata tentang cara kita mengintepretasi hadis. Beberapa isu kontroversi juga (seperti hadis larangan wanita bermusafir tanpa mahram, kedatangan dajjal dan al-Masih) disentuh dan dikupas dengan baik membuka suatu sisi pandang yang berbeza daripada apa yang biasanya diamalkan dan disebarkan dalam masyarakat.