Three Interpretations of the Moral Good and Bad in Islamic Philosophy and Theology and Their Impact on Legal Hermeneutics

Abstract In the Islamic moral discourse, the Muʿtazilī theologians are generally known to deem moral good ( ḥusn ) and bad ( qubḥ ) to be real and related to the action itself independently of the revelation. They also admit that the human intellect is capable of grasping moral principles. This position, however, was opposed by Ashʿarī theologians who consider good and bad to be recognizable only through revelation, as well as by philosophers who believe that ethical propositions carry a social normative function, and, hence, must be endorsed by a sufficient proportion of the population to be truly deemed ethical through praised opinions. According to Ibn Sīnā (Avicenna, d. 428/1037), the existence of a given proof is not a sufficient criterion for a moral proposition to be true. After discussing these three views in the Islamic tradition, this paper looks at the impact of theological and philosophical views on legal hermeneutics ( uṣūl al-fiqh ), which has received little scholarly attention. The scope of my investigation is limited to Shīʿī uṣūl al-fiqh of the last century. More specifically, I shall focus on Ākhūnd al-Khurasānī (d. 1329/1911), a proponent of Muʿtazilī moral theory, as well as al-Muḥaqqiq al-Iṣfahānī (d. 1361/1942), a proponent of the philosophers’ position. In so doing, I argue that while some Shīʿī jurists have explicitly endorsed the theory of essential and rational goodness and badness, others defended Ibn Sīnā’s theory on moral propositions. Finally, I conclude that while Shīʿī jurists did not explicitly endorse the Ashʿarī position, one can observe some resonance with the epistemological claim of the Ashʿarī approach in their legal hermeneutics without necessarily endorsing the theory of divine and legislative goodness and badness. This leads me to underline the impact of both philosophical and theological doctrine on Islamic legal hermeneutics.