By Maira Butt
In the imagination of some, sharia, or Islamic law, is associated with barbarity, extremism, and inflexible ancient rulings that appear to some in the West to be out of date in modern times.
But how did the legal tradition of Islam, the world’s fastest-growing religion, become so maligned? Is it incompatible with domestic law? How does it operate? What is it?
Many right-wing commentators suggest that it is operating under an insidious “parallel legal system” that should terrify all free-thinking people. But that could not be further from the truth according to those who have spent years studying its complex tenets.
What is sharia?
The dictionary definition of sharia is “the body of canonical law based on the Quran that lays down certain duties and penalties for Muslims”. The word has its roots in the Arabic word for law or religion, (“Sharia law” is therefore a tautology). Like other religions, this means there are rulings relating to how Islam is practised and how social issues are handled based on the morals and ethics of Islamic doctrine.
Dr Ikramul Hoque Miah, who completed his PhD in Islamic law at Oxford University, says: “At its simplest, sharia is the ethical and moral framework that guides Muslim practice. It asks, ‘In any given situation, what does God and his Messenger, the Prophet Muhammad require from me?’”
Fiqh — Islamic jurisprudence: by which Muslim scholars understand and apply sharia — is said to have originated at the birth of Islam with guidance provided by the Prophet.
As well as dealing with everyday conduct and ethical questions — such as “When my parents are being difficult, how should I respond?” or “If I miss dawn prayers, what should I do?” — there is a legal dimension.
In addition to commandments and prohibitions laid down in the Quran, or the example of the Prophet, Muslim jurists and rulers have asked for God’s guidance on matters pertaining to the social order including crime and punishment, taxation, contracts, marriage, inheritance and family law.
“It’s the Islamic sacred law. It is a code for Muslim life, particularly Muslim social or public life,” says Dr Sohail Hanif, chief executive of the National Zakat Foundation and a lecturer at Cambridge Muslim College.
“So, while it does address personal codes around dress and food, a lot of it is actually a public code, which deals with marriage, divorce, trade and justice. Codes for what you might call politics, governments and international relations.”
Dr Hanif, who graduated from Oxford, where he specialised in Hanafi fiqh (one of the branches of the theory or philosophy of Islamic law), gives the example of the wealthy family of a poor person being ordered by an Islamic ruling to support their poorer relative, as opposed to support being provided by the government.
“One of its distinctive features is the emphasis it gives on community,” he says. “The family is a unit of social care. [Sharia] is a much heavier civil society code. The government is not all-powerful.”
Sharia is often concerned with issues of morality and ethical conduct well outside the purview of government. This twofold nature can lead to confusion about how the system interacts with domestic law and particularly the law of the UK.
How does sharia interact with national law?
Under sharia, Dr Hanif says, Muslims are bound to the nation’s laws. “The sharia code highlights the sanctity and the inviolability of the social contract or the political contract.”
This means that whether Muslims live in an Islamic or non-Muslim country, they are subject to a binding contract with the government of their country “whereby the government promises them safety and they promise their government to abide by their public laws”.
“That’s a binding contract,” he says. “It cannot be violated. If anyone intends to violate it, they should surrender the contract, which means handing back the passport or the visa.”
However, there are exceptions: “You don’t have to obey injustice if injustice becomes a public law. The general rule is that public law is binding and inviolable.”
Dr Miah agrees. “In Britain, national law takes legal precedence. Nevertheless, sharia is about moral accountability before God, while the law of the land is about civic accountability before the state. Muslims will try to live in a way that honours both. Where there is a gap, Muslims look for ways to stay true to their faith within the framework of the law: for example, prayer times at work and school, Islamic finance options and the use of sharia councils.”
The myth of ‘sharia courts’
Although “sharia courts” are often referred to in the media, Dr Miah suggests the term is a misnomer. He operates as a mufti in his community attached to a fatwa centre. A fatwa is a legal opinion.
“A mufti acts as an interpreter of the sharia, helping a person think through their situation in light of Islamic principles.,” he says.
“These questions can be very everyday, ‘What happens if I miss a certain recitation during prayer?’ Or they can involve modern challenges, ‘Are profits from cryptocurrencies considered permissible wealth?’ In all cases, the role is to guide the questioner towards a thoughtful response grounded in their faith.”
He rejects the term “sharia courts”. “It implies a parallel legal system, which is simply not the case in Britain. A more accurate term is sharia arbitration panels or sharia councils. These are voluntary, faith-based bodies that advise on personal matters such as marriage, divorce, inheritance, or religious practice. They are not criminal courts and have no power to override or replace the authority of UK law.”
Several religious groups operate in a similar manner and Dr Miah refers to the 1996 Arbitration Act that allows parties in Britain to resolve civil disputes through mediation or arbitration.
“This is not unique to Muslims: Jewish Beth Din courts, for example, have long provided arbitration in matters such as contracts, inheritance, and religious divorce, and their work is recognised under the same legal framework. In that sense, sharia councils function in a way already familiar within British law.”
These come into play in matters such as divorce that require an individual to be religiously trained for an injunction to be valid. Dr Miah emphasises that the sharia council’s legitimacy depends on the community’s confidence. “If people reject a council’s authority, its opinions have no effect. The power of these bodies comes from the consent of those who voluntarily turn to them, not from the state.”
Muslims voluntarily engage with experts in sharia in order to navigate complex matters of ethics and faith. If the Muslim decides he or she does not want to take the religious advice provided, there is no legal consequence of doing so.
Does this create a ‘parallel legal system’?
The systems deal with different aspects of the same issues in many contexts, Dr Hanif says. For example, he distinguishes between marriage under UK law and nikah (the Islamic term for marriage) under sharia. British law does not mandate faithfulness to a partner as a part of the marriage contract; however, adultery is considered a violation of an Islamic marriage.
Another example includes a man who approached Dr Miah for advice. “He rented a property to a Muslim community to use as a mosque. Later, there were internal difficulties within the community, and the landlord needed to sell. Legally, he was free to sell to anyone: UK law imposes no restriction. But ethically and religiously, the situation is more complex, as there is a moral responsibility towards a community that has been using, and crucially, financially contributing, towards the space. Situations like this aren’t about legal rights alone; they raise questions of fairness, responsibility, and the ethical guidance the sharia provides.”
He adds: “It is important to distinguish between a legal system and a value system. Human beings do not base their activities and social expectations purely on what the law permits or prohibits. but also on principles, ethics, and community norms.
“Think about it this way. If I walk into a formal dining room wearing a pair of trainers, I am unlikely to be breaking the law, but I am certainly breaking an expected code of conduct. Here, the dining room is not operating under a ‘parallel legal system’, Instead, it is operating under overlapping sets of rules, some legal, some social, some cultural.”
He says this “legal pluralism” means that several sources of authority can coexist and interact within any given society.
“Muslim or not, all of us navigate these overlapping frameworks every day. So when people worry about a ‘two-tier system’ I would stress: Muslims live under the same legal framework as everyone else. What sharia adds is not a second legal system, but a value system: a set of ethical and spiritual commitments that guide personal conduct, just as other communities and professions have their own norms and codes alongside the law of the state.”
