FETWA ASSIGNMENT

The deadline is December 21st at 11:59 pm.

Requirements:

1) The petition before you has been submitted by someone potentially ignorant in the details of the law; accordingly as mufti you must contemplate all of the different scenarios that might shape the right answer. Punishments, for example, might differ if someone is married or unmarried; or, for instance, certain rules might not apply to someone who is traveling.

2) Although modern fetwas rarely do so now, you should make explicit both the logic of your argument and its grounding in the sources. Be sure to quote within your fetwa the full text of the relevant hadith and/or Qur'an verses upon which you have based your decision.

3) You are NOT responsible for knowing if the Qur'an verses you are employing are "dependent" upon another or have been abrogated by another. You are NOT responsible for knowing if your hadith have been abrogated by another, UNLESS both hadith would show up in the search engine as a consequence of your search for relevant analogous situations. If, for example, you argue that camels are like cars in your fetwa then you become responsible for all hadith that address camels (Don't get frightened; a search for "camel" produces far more "hits" than most words--as might make sense for material generated in the Arabian Peninsula more than a thousand years ago). Contact me if you have questions which hadith is, to use a term from Western law, "governing."

4) End your fetwa with the phrase muftis do: "Allah knows best."

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Hints:

A) Full-text searches are not organized by subject; accordingly, you will need to do searches for variations of words. (Keep in mind our example of a New York Times search for "African Americans" in the year 1880; likely, it would turn up few "hits" since at the time, society employed other terms)

B) Don't search all of the various collections at once, as they will contain repetitions of the same story. Keep in mind, however, as our textbook described, some hadith tell variation of stories that contain different or new details that could be useful for your fetwa.

C) Likely, the hadith will be more useful to you than the Qur'an

D) Remember that the issue the petitioner thinks is relevant may not be the one that's relevant to the law or it may not be the ONLY one that's relevant. If, for example, the question is about the details of a divorce but you know as mufti from the question that the marriage was between two parties who never should have been united, well, you need to adjust your fetwa to the relevant issue.

E) Feel free to contact me with questions; the one question I will not answer is "I can't find any relevant hadith; can you help me?" Also, I will not answer questions re: the assignment after 3 pm on the 17th. This mufti has plans for those days. I will answer, however, questions re: Bb, a death in the family that obliges an extension, or the like.

F) Keep in mind that your fetwas are close to but not exactly the same as fetwas that circulate today; because of requirement #3 above, your fetwas shouldn't be considered valid quite yet. Don't get all fundamentalist in your neighbor's face about what might be a weak fetwa; after I supply your grade, however, I can tell you what the "real" answer from a "real" mufti might have been.