Authority, Conflict, and the Transmission of Diversity in Medieval Islamic Law (Studies in Islamic Law and Society)

This book looks at ?abaq?t al-fuqah?? al-sh?fi??yah by Ibn Q??? Shuhbah (d. 851/1448) and how its author attempted to portray the development of the Sh?fi?? school of law up to his own times. The volume examines the impact of crises on the formation of the ?abaq?t genre. It demonstrates how ?abaq?t, dedicated to explicating religious authority, were used by authors to sort-out challenges to intellectual orthodoxies. It also examines in detail the ?abaq?t directly, demonstrating Ibn Q??? Shuhbah’s depiction of the development of Sh?fi?? law, the formation of intellectual sub-schools within the madhhab, the causes of legal decline, and curatives for the decline that are to be found in the great Sh?fi?? Ikhtil?f (divergent opinion) texts: the ?Az?z shar? al-waj?z by al-R?fi?? and the Raw??t al-??lib?n by al-Nawaw?.