LEGAL MAXIMS AND OTHER GENRES OF LITERATURE 79

The upsurge of interest in both the maqāṣid and legal maxims is underscored, in turn, by a certain awareness that the legal theory of uṣūl al-fiqh has somehow fallen short of meeting the demands of contemporary ijtihād. Ever since Jamal al-Dīn al-Afghanni (d. 1898) and his disciple Muhammad ʿAbduh's (d. 1905) clarion call for the revival of ijtihād, Muslim scholars have continued to emphasise the need for re-interpretation and reform of aspects of Sharīʿa through ijtihād. The twentieth century marked a general disaffection with taqlīd, and witnessed the revival of ijtihād through statutory legislation, fatwā and juristic research by individuals, committees and institutions. Codification and partial reforms of the Islamic law of transactions in the renowned Ottoman Mejelle (1876) was followed, in the twentieth century, by legislative reforms of Sharīʿa family law, and the revival in recent decades of the Sharīʿa law of transactions (muʿāmalāt) in Islamic banking and finance. Yet, despite these achievements, and the rich experiences they have generated, Muslim scholars have spoken at length that the legal theory of uṣūl al-fiqh has not adequately responded to the demands of renewal and ijtihād in the era of statutory legislation. Questions have arisen, and explanations offered, yet the decades of Islamic resurgence and Islamisation of law and government have left Muslims with the impression that ijtihād has not become an engaging theme of legislation. The present writer has elsewhere addressed some of these issues, and it is not his purpose to delve into them here.² The point to be made, however, is that the legal theory of uṣūl al-fiqh is now studied mainly as an academic discipline that falls short of meeting the demands of ijtihād, or of neo-ijtihād, as per the late Noel Coulson, in the era of statutory legislation. Muslim scholars have consequently taken greater interest in the study of the maqāṣid al-Sharīʿa, a somewhat neglected chapter that was not even included in the conventional coverage of uṣūl al-fiqh, but which is now seen as a more dynamic tool of greater relevance to the concerns of ijtihād. This endorses further the renewed interest in the qawāʿid, which bear a close affinity to the maqāṣid al-Sharīʿa.