Since the destruction of the Khilafah and the decline of the Muslims the Ummah has been subjected to host of alien thoughts that have been implanted in the Muslims under the guise Islam. Of the most dangerous of these concepts is the idea that mans intellect is a source of legislation either explicitly or implicitly through concepts such as benefit as a criteria to judge the Hukm (rule) of Allah.

This has become propagated to the Muslim Ummah and has been adopted by some within her. We should know that the Hukm Shari is defined as the Address (Khitaab) of the Legislator concerning actions of the servant. In other words for every Islamic rule we require an address (Khitaab) from Allah and this would be demonstrated from the revelation and the mind of man is not a receiver of revelation. Hence we need to go to what has been confirmed as revelation i.e. the Kitab of Allah, the Sunnah of his Messenger (saw) and those things which indicate revelation i.e. Ijma’a as Sahabah (ra) or through Qiyas with an Illah (divine reason) in the text.

It should be made clear that the Hukm of Allah can not be determined or judged through the limited mind of man. Indeed the role of the Shari’ah is to remove man from his own bias and whims to the justice and mercy of Allah. It would not be allowed to use the mind to derive a rule as the intellect is not a source of revelation and therefore it is not a source of divine rules. The Prophet (saw) was reported in a Hadith narrated by Imam Tirmidhi as saying, “Whosoever interprets the Qur’an according to his opinion, let him seek his abode in the fire”, and in another narration, “Whosoever interprets the Qur’an without knowledge, let him seek his abode in the fire”. Furthermore, it is narrated by Abu Dawud and by Tirmidhi that the Prophet (saw) has said, “Whosoever interprets the Qur’an according to his opinion, even if he get’s it right, he has indeed committed a sin”.

The Hukm of Allah (swt) is not judged by the intellect, as the right of legislation is solely for Allah (swt) alone. The mind cannot judge the rules of Allah (swt) that govern our life, nor His (swt) direction on how to establish His (swt) Deen, this is beyond the limits of the mind and is a sin.

Imam Shatibi mentions in his book al Muwafaqat fee Usul il Ahkam (Vol.2, page 25), “The objective behind the Shari’ah is to liberate the individuals from his desires in order to be a true Abd (slave) of Allah and that is the legitimate Maslaha.” He further went on to say, “Violating the Shari’ah under the pretext of following the basic objectives or values (Maqasid al-Shari’ah) is like the one who cares about the spirit without the body and since the body without the spirit is useless therefore the spirit without the body is useless too.” So we are required when deriving the Islamic methodology for establishing the Khilafah, to realise that these would form part of the Ahkam Shari’ah and therefore we would have to derive them from the Wahi i.e. the Islamic evidences. This is done through a process of Ijtihad.

As this is a new matter that has never faced the Muslims before in their history. The Muslims have never been in a situation wherein the Khilafah has been destroyed and replaced by the systems of Kufr. Therefore this requires Ijtihad as we can not follow an Ijtihad or set of Ahkam that the scholars of the past have handed down to us as none of them ever faced this issue and therefore never delivered the Hukm of Allah pertaining to the current status quo.

Therefore we are required to understand what actually is Ijtihad and what are its limitations and restrictions and also the nature of the various different ideas that are and have been presented as methodologies in the quest for the re-establishment of the Khilafah.