Interdisciplinary Islamic Studies Seminar (IISS) is pleased to announce a lecture by Professor Knut Vikør (University of Bergen). Professor Vikør's field of specialization is the history of Islam. His research interests include North and West Africa in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries with a special focus on central Sahara, the history of Sufi brotherhoods, in particular the Sanusiyya, and the history of Islamic law. In all these fields, he explores the social impact and relevance of Islamic practice.

Selected publications:

Between God and the Sultan: A History of Islamic Law (London: Oxford University Press, 2005);

Sufi and Scholar on the Desert Edge. Muhammad b. 'Ali al-Sanusi and his Brotherhood (London/Evanston: Northwestern University Press 1995);

The Maghreb since 1800: A Short History (London: Hurst & Company, 2012);

The Oasis of Salt. The History of Kawar, a Saharan Centre of Salt Production (Bergen/London: University of Bergen, 1999)


Abstract

It was from the earliest times established that the formulation of Islamic legal rules was the work of the religious scholars since the Shari’a was God’s law, and “diversity of opinion is one of God’s blessings". But it was the state’s task to ensure the law was implemented, and for this purpose, the law must have a reasonably fixed and stable form. Thus, a selection of “preferred” or authoritative opinions came to be favored at each moment in time and place. With the establishment of the modern nation-states, the authority of law fell fully to the modern state. These two ways of authorizing practicable legal rules have come to be known as “canonization” for the pre-modern period, and “codification” for the laws established by state authority. In this seminar, we will look at the various methods of establishing authority for the rules that were to be practiced, and ask what continuities there may or not be between the two terms “canonization” and “codification”.

Register at https://umich.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJIsdeirqDsoE9N8yUjRpq3p9O24vuWGUSyK