Oh dear, predictably, another feminist known amongst the Muslim community, has just denied Quran’s (4:176) inheritance laws apparently under the guise of not needing to take them literally due to highly speculative ‘maqasid ul sharia’ (objectives of Islamic law) argument.
https://twitter.com/AbdullaAndalusi/status/451720466257154048
Of course the ‘maqasid argument’ is a typical strategy employed by modernists/reformers to reject explicit Islamic text, in favour of finding a way to get Muslims to believe in Western Liberal and Feminist concepts.
Many modernists argue that Muslims should adapt our laws to the ‘modern context’. Why? The Prophet Muhammed (saaw) didn’t make laws that accepted his status quo. If he (saaw) did, then Muslim Arabs would still be drinking alcohol, taking interest (riba), not needing to pray 5 times a day, and not fasting (the ‘context’ of Arabia is very hot, so who would think denying oneself water for one month is welcomed by any society?).
Surely if the Prophet (saaw) intended males not to be the providers, and females therefore to get full inheritance as providing males, he (and Allah) would have said so? I mean, women did work during the Prophet’s time, owning businesses, and even supporting their families, and joining the armed forces in some circumstances. If the Prophet (saaw) could make the stubborn Pagan Arabs give up idol worship, alcohol, fornication, interest and make them accept fasting without water for one month of the year in a hot climate – you think Allah and his Prophet would have found equalising inheritance easier between a providing male, and a female without dependents? I mean, even the Byzantine Roman culture DURING the Prophet’s time equalised inheritance in such circumstances, so why didn’t Muhammed (saaw) get the Feminist memo?
The reason is, Feminism and Liberalism are based upon a set of irrational assumptions about human nature, purpose and law, which is not based upon revelation or even rational observation, and consequently leads to absurd social solutions which do not concur with Human nature. God knows more about humans and our purpose then we do, and Islamic law (when fully applied by rational thinking Muslims) solved human problems for 1,300 years in a way no other ideology has since.
The irrational problem I find with some converts is, they convert into Islam for its universal truth and guidance, but then want to change it! It’s time they learn to leave their Liberal and Feminist baggage behind and be objective and rational. I left Liberalism to become a Muslim, and that meant being prepared to accept whatever the truth was – even if it was strange to my prior cultural experience.
With time, humans don’t fundamentally change, they still remain human with the same nature, only technology changes. To justify changing Islam or the sharia just because a people may live by a different culture, is not only irrational, but something Islam has encountered before – ending up with the culture (of those converting) changing to fit Islamic law, not the other way round.
The way modernists think is simple: 1) Islam believes Muslims must be just 2) Liberalism/Feminism is ‘just’, therefore 3) Islam believes Muslims must be Liberal and Feminist.
The problem here of course, is not just that Liberalism and Feminism are actually unjust in practice, but that they have been made the ‘furqan’ (criterion) of what is justice or not. Relegating the Quran to simply being a ‘cheerleader’ for the term ‘justice’ but silent on defining it or giving solutions to create justice.
Unfortunately, due to the current dominance of Liberalism and Feminism in global culture, many people have, like sheep, succumbed to it, parroting it’s terminology and following the herd. But just because people think that what their society or culture does seems good to them, is not a justification. As God says: ‘Thus have We made alluring to each people its own doings. In the end will they return to their Lord, and We shall then tell them the truth of all that they did’ (Quran 6:108).
“As to those who believe not in the Hereafter, We have made their deeds pleasing in their eyes; and so they wander about in distraction” (Quran 27:4)
As for the Maqasid argument, Imam Shatibi (who is viewed by all as one of the greatest scholars of Maqasid) perhaps knowing how in the future unscrupulous individuals may use it to deny clear texts said:
“There are many people who interpret legal evidences in the Quran according to how their own reason (aql) sees them and not in accordance with what is understood from its form [i.e. textual meaning]. In this is a grave error (fasad kabeer) and it is goes against the purposes of the Law-Giver”
‘”Violating the Shariah under the pretext of following the basic objectives or values of Shariah (Maqasid al Shariah) is like the one who cares about the spirit without the body and since the body without spirit is useless therefore the spirit without body is useless too”
Abdullah al Andalusi 
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