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4 - Shiʿi Family Law under the Rule of Law? The Iranian Model and Current Approaches in the Shiʿi World

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 April 2025

By
Hannah L. Richter
Edited by
Hadi Enayat  and
Mirjam Künkler
Hadi Enayat
Affiliation:
Institute for the Study of Muslim Civilizations, Aga Khan University
Mirjam Künkler
Affiliation:
Institute for Advanced Legal Study
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Summary

Since its first codification in the early twentieth century, Iranian family law has followed the Shiʿi (Jaʿfarī) school of jurisprudence. In other parts of the Shiʿi world, the question of codifying Shiʿi family law has emerged more recently. This chapter argues that codification enhances the formal rule of law. In the past, family law codification was considered to conflict with a fundamental element of Shiʿi legal thought and religious practice, namely ijtihād, independent legal reasoning by qualified scholars, which makes for a living law. Based on a comparative analysis of Iranian family law and recent Shiʿi (draft) laws put forward in Afghanistan, Bahrain, and Iraq, this chapter discusses where modern Shiʿi family law is located between the “opposite” poles of the formal rule of law (where law is general, prospective, clear, and certain) and ijtihād. The findings indicate that, today, the two are not viewed as contradicting each other. Yet, while Iranian family law only serves as a limited model for other parts of the Shiʿi world, the comparison shows that Iran subjects Shiʿi family law to the formal rule of law more comprehensively than is the case in the other three analyzed countries.

Keywords

ijtihādcodificationpersonal status lawIranBahrainIraqAfghanistanwomen’s rightsjudicial divorcemarriage
Type
Chapter
Information
The Rule of Law in the Islamic Republic of Iran
Power, Institutions, and the Limits of Reform
 , pp. 104 - 134
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2025

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