مركزّية الأخلاق في الفكر المقاصديّ عند العزّ بن عبد السّلام: دراسة دعوى الأخلاق التحسينية

(The Centrality of the Maqasidic Thought of al-ʿIzz bin ʿAbd al-Salām: Study on the Assumption of Akhlaq under the Tahsiniyyah (Embellishments) Category)

Abstract

Abstract

The prophetic mission has a moral message, hence came the Islamic law to secure the interests of people in this world and the hereafter. Despite the close relationship between morals and interests, most scholars of Islamic jurisprudence - both in the past and in the present - are accustomed to placing good morals within the maqāsid taḥsiniyyah (ameliorative objective of the jurisprudence); at the third place is in the jurisprudic categorisation of the objectives of the Syarīʿah. This categorisation had resulted in some confusion among some contemporary writers since it implies that this a displacement of the lofty position that the moral values occupy ​​in the Syarīʿah. In relation to this, the study aims to prove the centrality of the ethical dimension in the Sharīʿah in general, and in the discipline of Sharīʿah objectives in their three categories (ḍaruriyyah, ḥājiyyah, taḥsiniyyah) in particular from the view of the jurisprudence scholar Imam Al-ʿIzz bin ʿAbd al-Salām, who composed an outstanding ethical system according to the framework of the objectives of the Sharīʿah in his book entitled “The Tree of Knowledge, Conditions and Commendable Sayings and Actions.” (Syajarat al-Maʿārif wa al al-Aḥwāl, wa Ṣālih al-Aqwāl wa al-Aʿmāl). The study elaborates on the jurisprudic and methodologocal concepts of ameliorative morals to solve their issues as viewed by the Islamic jurisprudence scholars who continously argue that Sharīʿah is meant predominantly to bring dignity and virtues in addition to uproot evil and vice. Hence, where there is an interest that need to be defended and promoted, there is always a virtue that is intended from it.

Keywords: Morals, ameliorative morals, interest, vice, purposes, Al-ʿIzz bin ʿAbd al-Salam.