FIQH

understanding, later a body of law, Islamic jurisprudence. Islamic law as interpreted by scholars (furqaha, jurists), the science of elaborating on the Shar'ia. The main developments took place in the second century A.H., and since then has developed into many different schools or systems, some of them conflicting. Four main schools (madhab, pl. madahib) developed around the four cities of Mecca, Medina, Basra and Kufa.

- usul al Fiqh, set of techniques used for this purpose. Used ``to determine precisely which source materials the founders of the local Fiqh had consulted in deriving each clause, hukm (pl. ahkam) of the Law. The work was to involve the indentification of materials, their authentication as either Qur'an or Sunna and finally the definition of the relative primacy that the founders of the madhab had accorded in their derivation of the Law to each of the two primary sources.'' (John Burton, The Collection of the Qur'an, p. 9) It consists of :
  1. qiyas, analogical deduction.
  2. ra'y, subjective opinion.
  3. istehsan, moral or social preference.
  4. istidlal, inference.
  5. maslaha al-mursaleh, public interest.
  6. ijma', consensus of opinion
  7. several other methods of deductive reasoning

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