Law and Governance in Islamic Societies

Law and Governance in Islamic Societies is a translation from Arabic of two lectures by Abd al-Wahāb Kallāf (d. 1956). The materials were originally published in Arabic in two different books. One was published in 1971 under the title Khulāsat Tārīkh al-Tashrī` al-Islāmī. The other was published nearly ten years later under the title al-Sulutāt al-thalātha fī al-islām.

This revised translation is based on the Arabic text of al-Sulutāt al-thalātha fī al-islām, which was published in 1980, but also checked against some of Kallaf's ideas published in his other works, including `Ilm uṣūl al-fiqh, al-ijtihād wa-'l-taqlīd, and fiqh al-siyāsa al-shar`iyya.

About the author: 

Abdul Wahhab Khallaf (1888 - 1956) is one of the most prominent jurists and expert in modern Sunni Islamic thought.

Born Abd al-Wahhab Abd al-Wahid Khallaf in the city of Kafr al-Zayyat in March 1888. He received a traditional religious education that led to his completion of the memorization the Qur'an. He joined al-Azhar in 1900. He completed his studies at the Sharia School in 1915 and was one of the first students to join the prominent institution since it was founded in 1907.

Abdul-Wahhab Khallaf became a Sheikh and worked at al-Azhar's Sharia Judiciary School immediately after his graduation, and he remained there until the start of the 1919 Revolution. During the revolution, he moved to take a judicial position in the Sharia courts (1920). He was appointed director of mosques in the Ministry of Endowments in 1924, and to the Courts Inspection Department in 1931.

In 1936, he was appointed to a professorship of Islamic law position at Cairo University, and he remained affiliated with the institution until his passing due to illness in 1956.