Earlier today I wrote that
“It is unlawful to do X due to preservation of life (ḥifz al-nafs)” has become a cliché.
Temper it by asking what happens if we don’t do X.
People sometimes comment that I should explain some of the shorter things I write, so I thought I would take the opportunity to do that here.
The following list of maqāṣid al-sharī‘ah—overarching objectives and purposes of Islam[ic Legislation]—was extracted from Ibn ‘Āshūr’s Maqāṣid al-sharī‘ah. For more information, please consult the Arabic original or its English translation. This list is by no means exhaustive, though it does include the main ones mentioned in the book.
The maqāṣid include:
From the perspective of the Shari‘ah, the overarching purposes (maqāṣid) of medicine are the preservation of life, the body, its limbs, and considering them as necessities; warding off harms and …
(nb: I was asked something related to Dar al-Ifta and its fatwas. My reply didn’t address their question as well as it should have, but it spilled over into some …