Ijtihad - History

History

The Qur’an commands ijtihâd and the door of ijtihad was opened by Umar ibn al-Khattab. Muslim scholar Muhammad al-Tijani writes in his first book Then I was Guided that the first Companions to open the door of Ijtihad was the second Caliph, who used his discretion vis-a-vis the Qur'anic Texts after the death of the Messenger of Allah (saw).

In early Islam it was common practice and later it integrated with early Islamic philosophy. It slowly fell out of practice in Sunni fiqh for several reasons, particularly due to the efforts of the Asharite theologians, most notably al-Ghazali whose book The Incoherence of the Philosophers was the most celebrated statement of the view that ijtihâd was leading to errors of over-confidence in judgement.

Some western scholars such as Joseph Schacht say the "closure of the door of ijtihad" had occurred by the beginning of the 10th century CE: "hence a consensus gradually established itself to the effect that from that time onwards no one could be deemed to have the necessary qualifications for independent reasoning in religious law, and that all future activity would have to be confined to the explanation, application, and, at the most, interpretation of the doctrine as it had been laid down once and for all."

Other scholars (e.g. Wael Hallaq) demonstrate that ijtihad has remained an essential part of the Sunni Muslim tradition, despite the emphasis on taqlid. Hallaq writes that a minority always claimed that a properly-qualified scholar must have the right to ijtihad at all times. Long after the 10th century the principles of ijtihad continued to be discussed in the Islamic legal literature and Asharites continued to argue with Mutazilites about its applicability to science. Al-Amidi (1233) mentions twelve common controversies about ijtihad in his book on Islamic law (usul al-fiqh), such as the question of whether the Prophet himself depended on ijtihad and whether a mujtahid should be allowed to follow taqlid. Ironically, the loss of its application in law seems to have also led to its loss in philosophy and the sciences, which some historians think caused Muslim societies to stagnate before the 1492 fall of al-Andalus.