Islam: A Guide for Jews and Christians - Electric Scotland

GOD’ S WAY t 173
Note: The categorization of foods stands somewhat obliquely on that
of human acts. Some foods are indeed forbidden (haram) to Muslims
by reason of their substance, like pork (Quran 2:167) or wine (5:92),
or, in the case of meats, by the manner of their preparation, if they are
scavenged, for example, or not properly slaughtered. Foods that meet
these latter criteria are termed halal, “kosher,” and so permitted.
Here, as elsewhere in Islamic law, circumstances condition the obligation:
where ritual slaughter is impossible, Muslims may use Jewish
butchers, and where no other nourishment of any type is available,
they may eat nonhalal foods.
tracts and their dissolution, hence matters of marriage and divorce,
slavery and emancipation, and so on.
The categories envisioned by Ghazali as the matter of Islamic
ethics is a rather notable narrowing of the field of moral activity—
the matter submitted to the muftis for their opinion was, of course
much broader—and what widened Muslim moral sensibility was
its inclusion of the very typical Arab notion of adab, a kind of
social etiquette that included both a style and a body of information.
Adab was what was expected in a polite society; what actually
occurred was adat, the community’s customs or manners.
Thus, throughout Islamic history, consideration of the morality of
the muamalat has had a powerful sociological constituent, one
that took account of both adab and adat in determining how a
Muslim should act in given circumstances.
A Society of Law—and Lawyers
The qadi was a functionary, a government functionary to be sure,
appointed to resolve issues between individual Muslims, to settle,
either by the consent of the parties or the power of the state, civil
and criminal disputes between plaintiffs and defendants. Cases
were adjudicated on the basis of equity or according to what were
understood as the principles of Islamic law. That latter was some-