አመክንዮኣዊ የሸሪዓ ሕግ ምርምር (ኢጅቲሓድ)፡- ዘዴው፣ እርከኖቹ እና ዘመነኛ እድገቶቹ

Abstract

Sharia has three main sources: the first two, Quran and Sunnah, constitute a transmitted or
revealed sources of knowledge whose rules and principles are deduced from traditions. The
third source of Sharia is rational thinking referred to in the Sharia literature as Ijtihad. The
first two revealed sources of the Sharia have a generalist feature whereby their content is
dominated by broad principles of law and objectives of law, leaving the wider corpus of
specific rules to be covered by independent reasoning of scholars. This approach of the
Sharia aims at enabling the Sharia to be amenable to changing realities of a society through
the instrumentality of Ijtihad. While the introductory literature of Ijtihad provides basic
explanation of its meaning and characteristics as a source of Sharia, this paper, perhaps
being the first Amharic work on the topic, delves into technical aspects of independent
Sharia reasoning, which includes governing principles, methodology and requirements for
the proper practices of Ijtihad as developed by Sharia jurists (Mujtahids) of early and
contemporary periods. In relation to the interpretation and application of Sharia in Ethiopia
on personal matters and, recently, on interest free financial transactions, it is definitely very
important for Sharia courts, practitioners and regulators of Islamic finances to acquaint
themselves with the methodology of Ijtihad to ensure flexibility in the understanding and
application of relevant Sharia laws and realize that all juristic and scholarly exercises of
Ijtihad is directed towards the fulfillment of Sharia objectives (Maqasid) at all levels.