With the expansion of Islam into vast empires there grew the need for law and justice by inference and analogy in cases which were not mentioned specifically in the Statutory Law of the Qur’ān and Ḥadīth. During the early period of this development, the Muslim jurists were greatly influenced by Latin terms: ‘jurisconsults’ or ‘prudents’ were named in Arabic ‘fuqahā’ (plural of faqīh): the ‘responsa prudentium’, meaning ‘answers to legal questions’ were named ‘qiyās’ in the sense of ‘legal opinions’ based on analogical deductions from the Qur’ān and Ḥadīth. Some such ‘opinions’ by the jurists came to be accepted as ‘canons’ (Fatāwā, plural of Fatwā) – similar to what is known in Roman law as ‘jurisprudentia’ or ‘responsa’ or ‘case law’ in the West. The Roman freedom of ‘opinion’ based on equity, in spite of the rescript of Hadrian, had originated from secular concepts and did not meet the theological requirements of Islam. It was, therefore, found necessary to codify the Islamic law into a reliable system which would be more in line with the spirit and intention of the Qur’ān and Ḥadīth. The system is known in Islam as ‘law by ijtihād’. Ijtihād literally means ‘to try hard to do or achieve something’.
The institution of ijtihād has long been an issue of debate and discussion among Muslims. This is mainly due to the fear that the admissibility of the ijtihād law could be used by some unconscientious theologians to take liberties with the spirit and intention of the law of Sharīʿah to suit their convenience and transitory exigencies. Others, however, feel strongly that a total rejection of ijtihād would close the doors for Muslims to make the necessary adaptations according to the changing conditions of life. This whole disputation could be resolved without much fuss if a fundamental principle of Islamic jurisprudence were to be understood. It is that: the law by analogy and inference (ijtihād) is subordinate to the intrinsic spirit and intention of the laws of the Qur’ān and Ḥadīth – just as the Ḥadīth is subordinate to the Qur’ān. In fact the jurists of the early Islamic era followed this principle and built up juridical miscellanea which have been used for centuries and have been called case-law or ‘Juristic Rules’ (qawāʿid fiqhiyyah).
Any juristic opinion which does not conform to the Sharīʿah law, or even does not conform to its spirit and intention, would be rejected on the grounds of the above-stated principle.14
To kill animals to satisfy the human thirst for inessentials is a contradiction in terms within the Islamic tradition. Think of the millions of animals killed in the name of commercial enterprises in order to supply a complacent public with trinkets and products they do not really need. And why? Because people are too lazy or self-indulgent to find substitutes. Or to do without. It will take more than religious, moral, or ethical sermons to quell the avidity and greed of some multi-million corporations and their willing customers.
Many of the experiments that are being done in the name of research and education are not really necessary. This kind of knowledge could easily be imparted by using charts, pictures, photographs, computer simulations, dummies or the corpses of animals that have died their natural death. In other spheres animals are poisoned, starved, blinded, subjected to electric shocks or similarly abused in the alleged interests of science. Scientists generally scoff at religionists as sticklers for convention. Are scientists themselves doing any better by sticking to their primordial practices even when there are so many alternatives available now? It is very sad to see that even in the Islamic countries where Western curricula have to be followed in science subjects, similar unnecessary and inhuman experiments are being performed on animals. Those Muslim students are perhaps in ignorance of the fact that such experiments are in violation of Islamic teachings. Even if they were aware of it, it is doubtful whether they would have any sway in the matter.
Some research on animals may yet be justified, given the Traditions of Islam. Basic and applied research in the biological and social sciences, for example, will be allowed, if the laboratory animals are not caused pain or disfigured, and if human beings or other animals would benefit because of the research. The most important of all considerations is to decide whether the experiment is really necessary and that there is no alternative for it. The basic point to understand about using animals in science is that the same moral, ethical and legal codes should apply to the treatment of animals as are applied to humans.
According to Islam, all life is sacrosanct and has a right of protection and preservation. The Holy Prophet Muḥammad(s) laid so much emphasis on this point that he declared:
“There is no man who kills [even] a sparrow or anything smaller, without its deserving it, but God will question him about it.15
“He who takes pity [even] on a sparrow and spares its life, Allah will be merciful on him on the Day of Judgement.”16
Like all other laws of Islam, its laws on the treatment of animals have been left open to exceptions and are based on the criterion: “Actions shall be judged according to intention.”17 Any kind of medical treatment of animals and experiments on them becomes ethical and legal or unethical and illegal according to the intention of the person who does it. If the life of an animal can be saved only by the amputation of a part of its body, it will be a meritorious act in the eyes of God to do so. Any code of law, including religious law, which is so rigid as not to leave a scope for exceptional circumstances, results in suffering and breeds hypocrisy.
According to all religions, all life, including animal life, is a trust from God. That is why, in the case of human life, suicide is considered to be the ultimate sin. The animals, however, do not possess the freedom of choice wilfully to terminate their own life and have to go on living their natural lives. When man subjects an animal to unnecessary pain and suffering and thus cuts short its natural life, he figuratively commits a suicide on behalf of that animal and a spiritual part of his own self dies with the animal. Most problems and wrangles about the use of animals in science as well as about their general treatment would become much easier to solve if only we could acknowledge the realism of nature and learn to treat all life on earth homogeneously without prejudice and selective standards.
Take, for example, a high-security jail where cut-throats, murderers, rapists and other hardened criminals are imprisoned and compare it with a so-called research laboratory where innocent and helpless animals are cooped up in cages. By what stretch of imagination can we justify the difference in the living standards of these two places? What moral or ethical justification is there for the difference in their treatments? In the case of human prisoners you are not allowed even to prick a pin in their flesh; while the animal captives are allowed to be lacerated and hacked by surgical knives in the name of science and research most of which is for futile commercial purposes. These and many other such disparities are being allowed in our human and so-called humane societies only because of the double standards of our moral and ethical values. The real and ideal approach to this problem would be to set forth for ourselves the criterion that any kind of medical or scientific research that is unlawful on humans is unlawful on animals.
HUMAN NEEDS AND INTERESTS (AL-MAṢĀLIḤ)
It has been mentioned earlier that certain kinds of cruelties which are being inflicted on animals these days did not exist at the time of the Holy Prophet Muḥammad(s) and,