The “Arab Spring” has challenged contemporary Muslim religious scholars (ʿulamāʾ) to address the popular issues of opposition to the ruler (al-khurūj ʿalá l-ḥākim). It seems that these ʿulamāʾ, from various schools of Islamic thought, are unable to reach a consensus on these matters. Their positions range from wide recognition of the right to nonviolent civil protest, e.g., protest rallies, strikes, civil unrest, etc., to the strict prohibition of all expressions of popular protest, as being foreign to Islam. This picture is even more complex when one discerns the ambivalent approaches of various religious institutions and figures, both official and private that have supported protests in certain countries, but objected to protest in others. This article investigates these religio-legal positions regarding popular protest against the ruler: What are the boundaries of the permissible and the forbidden in regard to popular protest against the ruler from the vantage point of contemporary Sunnī scholars? My central claim here is that a significant gap exists between the different current Islamic legal positions on the issue of popular protest against the ruler and its restriction. These positions are mostly derived from the general understanding of the different schools of Islamic legal thought today regarding the theory of the Muslim state, especially of the relationship between the ruler and his subjects.
al-Ahram Weekly. August 14, 2013. http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/News/3720/17/Wavering-Salafis.aspx
Asad, Talal. Genealogies of Religion: Discipline and Reason of Power in Christianity and Islam. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University, 1993.
al-Atawneh, Muhammad. Wahhābī Islam Facing the Challenges of Mo-dernity: Dār al-Iftā in the Modern Saudi State. Leiden: Brill, 2010. http://doi.org/10.1163/ej.9789004184695.i-210
al-Atawneh, Muhammad. “Reconciling Tribalism and Islam in the Writings of Contemporary Wahhābī ʿUlamāʾ.” In Facing Modernity: Rethinking ʿUlamāʾ in the Arab Middle East, edited by Meir Hatina, 211-227. Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2009.
CSS (Council of Senior Scholars [Majlis hayʾat kibār al-ʿulamāʾ]) (Saudi Arabia). “A fatwá from the Council of Senior Scholars in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia warning against mass demonstrations.” http://islamopediaonline.org/fatwa/fatwa-council-senior-scholars-kingdom-saudi-arabia-warning-against-mass-demonstrations
Davis, Eric. “Theorizing Statecraft and Social Change in Arab Oil Producing Countries.” In Statecraft in the Middle East: Oil, Historical Memory, and Popular Culture. Edited by Eric Davis and Nicolas Gavrielides, 1-35. Miami: Florida International University Press, 1991.
al-Dhāyidī, Mishārī. “Fatāwá l-muẓāharāt.” al-Sharq al-awsaṭ. March 12, 2011. http://www.aawsat.com/leader.asp?section=3&article=612175&issueno=11792
“Khalid bin Ṭalāl: ʿalá ʿulamāʾ al-Mamlakah al-khurūj ʿan ṣamtihim wa-tibyān al-ḥaqq fī aḥdāth Miṣr.” al-Akhbār 24. August 20, 2013. http://staginga24pp.argaam.com/article/detail/145551
Kostiner, Joseph. “Transforming Dualities: Tribe and State Formation in Saudi Arabia.” In Tribes and State Formation in the Middle East. Edited by Philip Khoury and Joseph Kostiner, 226-248. Berkeley: Uni-versity of California Press, 1990.
al-Nawawī, Abū Zakariyyā Yaḥyá ibn Sharaf ibn Mūrī. Sharḥ matn al-Arbaʿīn al-Nawawiyyah fī l-aḥādīth al-ṣaḥīḥah al-Nabawiyyah. 4th ed. Damascus: Maktabat Dār al-Fatḥ, 1984.
Peterson, James. “Tribes and Politics in Eastern Arabia.” Middle East Journal 31 (1977): 297-312.
Pickthall, Muhammad M. The Meaning of the Glorious Qurʾan. Revised and edited by ʿArafāt Kāmil ʿAshshī. Beltsville, MD: Amana Publications, 2006.
al-Qaraḍāwī, Yūsuf. “Mawqif al-Islām min al-dīmūqrāṭiyyah.” at al-Qaraḍāwī’s official website: http://qaradawi.net/new/all-fatawa/7234-2014-04-20-10-43-27
Vogel, Frank E. “Siyāsa: In the sense of siyāsa sharʿiyya.” In The Encyclo-paedia of Islam Second Edition, IX, 694-696.
Warren, David. “The ʿUlamāʾ and the Arab Uprisings 2011-13: Considering Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the ‘Global Mufti,’ between the Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamic Legal Tradition, and Qatari Foreign Policy.” New Middle Eastern Studies 4 (2014): 2-32.
al-Ahram Weekly. August 14, 2013. http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/News/3720/17/Wavering-Salafis.aspx
Asad, Talal. Genealogies of Religion: Discipline and Reason of Power in Christianity and Islam. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University, 1993.
al-Atawneh, Muhammad. Wahhābī Islam Facing the Challenges of Mo-dernity: Dār al-Iftā in the Modern Saudi State. Leiden: Brill, 2010. http://doi.org/10.1163/ej.9789004184695.i-210
al-Atawneh, Muhammad. “Reconciling Tribalism and Islam in the Writings of Contemporary Wahhābī ʿUlamāʾ.” In Facing Modernity: Rethinking ʿUlamāʾ in the Arab Middle East, edited by Meir Hatina, 211-227. Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2009.
CSS (Council of Senior Scholars [Majlis hayʾat kibār al-ʿulamāʾ]) (Saudi Arabia). “A fatwá from the Council of Senior Scholars in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia warning against mass demonstrations.” http://islamopediaonline.org/fatwa/fatwa-council-senior-scholars-kingdom-saudi-arabia-warning-against-mass-demonstrations
Davis, Eric. “Theorizing Statecraft and Social Change in Arab Oil Producing Countries.” In Statecraft in the Middle East: Oil, Historical Memory, and Popular Culture. Edited by Eric Davis and Nicolas Gavrielides, 1-35. Miami: Florida International University Press, 1991.
al-Dhāyidī, Mishārī. “Fatāwá l-muẓāharāt.” al-Sharq al-awsaṭ. March 12, 2011. http://www.aawsat.com/leader.asp?section=3&article=612175&issueno=11792
“Khalid bin Ṭalāl: ʿalá ʿulamāʾ al-Mamlakah al-khurūj ʿan ṣamtihim wa-tibyān al-ḥaqq fī aḥdāth Miṣr.” al-Akhbār 24. August 20, 2013. http://staginga24pp.argaam.com/article/detail/145551
Kostiner, Joseph. “Transforming Dualities: Tribe and State Formation in Saudi Arabia.” In Tribes and State Formation in the Middle East. Edited by Philip Khoury and Joseph Kostiner, 226-248. Berkeley: Uni-versity of California Press, 1990.
al-Nawawī, Abū Zakariyyā Yaḥyá ibn Sharaf ibn Mūrī. Sharḥ matn al-Arbaʿīn al-Nawawiyyah fī l-aḥādīth al-ṣaḥīḥah al-Nabawiyyah. 4th ed. Damascus: Maktabat Dār al-Fatḥ, 1984.
Peterson, James. “Tribes and Politics in Eastern Arabia.” Middle East Journal 31 (1977): 297-312.
Pickthall, Muhammad M. The Meaning of the Glorious Qurʾan. Revised and edited by ʿArafāt Kāmil ʿAshshī. Beltsville, MD: Amana Publications, 2006.
al-Qaraḍāwī, Yūsuf. “Mawqif al-Islām min al-dīmūqrāṭiyyah.” at al-Qaraḍāwī’s official website: http://qaradawi.net/new/all-fatawa/7234-2014-04-20-10-43-27
Vogel, Frank E. “Siyāsa: In the sense of siyāsa sharʿiyya.” In The Encyclo-paedia of Islam Second Edition, IX, 694-696.
Warren, David. “The ʿUlamāʾ and the Arab Uprisings 2011-13: Considering Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the ‘Global Mufti,’ between the Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamic Legal Tradition, and Qatari Foreign Policy.” New Middle Eastern Studies 4 (2014): 2-32.
Al-atawneh, Muhammad. “Khurūj in Contemporary Islamic Thought: The Case of the ‘Arab Spring’”. Ilahiyat Studies 7/1 (Ekim 2016), 27-52. https://doi.org/10.12730/13091719.2016.71.139.