Thread by @HusseinAboubak

In talking about Islamic Sharia, I believe it is essential to distinguish between three very different meanings of the word, Sharia the classical Islamic concept, Sharia in the popular imagination, and Sharia the symbol. The first, is the original classical concept as /1

developed in the formative Islamic era, and it is somewhat analogous to the western idea of natural law. That is, it is not a legal code but a legal worldview from which codes are derived. The understanding and the debates around this Sharia, as you imagine, are usually /2

constricted in highly educated Islamic circles. The legal systems derived from Sharia are different and internally pluralistic while externally exclusive. No variant of such systems of example grants women a full equality status. The second is the Sharia in the popular /3

imagination and popular discourse. Most Muslims use Sharia not as a legal philosophy, but as a shorthand for clear Islamic law and rulings. In popular Muslim imagination, Sharia assumes many meanings depending on the social setting, all rooted in the general idea of justice, /4

social order, right and wrong. But that doesn't mean it is infinitely elastic. The view of social order has some variations but consistent constitutive social units, Man, woman, Muslim, non-Muslim, family members, etc. The average Muslim understands Sharia not as a high /5

scholastic debate but in its most immediate manifestations; family laws, forbidden and allowed, and hudud penal practices. This view in popular Muslim discourse is warranted and natural because most people naturally only care about what immediately touches their lives. In the /6

Western popular imagination, Sharia is basically the Taliban and ISIS and here is the meeting point between Western popular imagination and Muslim popular imagination that sees Sharia as a certain legal code of a prohibitive patriarchal society. The last Sharia, the symbol, is /7

primarily political and is waved by Islamists and Islamic nativists as a symbol for Muslim authenticity, Islamic supremacy, political legitimacy, and wholly depends on the revered status of Sharia in popular Muslim imagination. Sharia the symbol of Islamic supremacy and /8

chauvinism, is suitable for use by Islamists. Indeed, no variant of sharia-based legal system did enshrine a legal order in which Muslims are not the supreme social stratum. It would be helpful to remember those three distinct meanings whenever conducting a conversation about /9

Sharia and adjust the conversation appropriately. My descriptions is by no means exhaustive. However, it should help you against the Western "expert" who studied Islam and thought he rediscovered the solar system when he learned that Islamic sharia and Islamic law are two /10

different things in theory, and is running around calling people Islamophobic. Such experts are the reason people don't understand anything.

When such experts are confronted with the fact that while they are correct in theory, this is not how the layman of Muslim societies understands Sharia. They usually have the audacity to make the point they understand what Islam is better than Muslims do.