Indonesian Journal of Islam and Muslim Societies Vol.
13, no.
, pp.
427-456, doi : 10.
18326/ijims.
Sectarian tensions.
Islamophobia, and decolonization: comparing Jasser AudaAos and Jonathan BrownAos analysis of the Hadiths concerning AishaAos marital age Muhamad Rofiq Muzakkir Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta E-mail: muhammadrofiq@umy.
Siti Sarah Muwahidah The University of Edinburgh E-mail: sarah.
muwahidah@ed.
Royan Utsany Universitas AoAisyiyah Yogyakarta E-mail: royanutsany@unisayogya.
Rohmansyah Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta E-mail: rohmansyah@umy.
DOI:10.
18326/ijims.
IJIMS: Indonesian Journal of Islam and Muslim Societies.
Volume 13.
Number 2.
December 2023: 427-456 Abstract The ongoing debate surrounding the hadiths on AishaAos age of marriage has given rise to two main positions among Muslim scholars, namely: the rejectors, those who reject the hadithsAo validity and propose the view that Aisha got married at an older age, and the defenders, those who defend them as valid hadiths and accept that Aisha consummated her marriage at the early age of nine years old.
this study, we examine this issue through the opposing arguments offered by two contemporary Muslim scholars: Jasser Auda, who represents the view of hadith rejectors, and Jonathan Brown, who represents those who accept the validity of the These two scholars have been chosen to represent these two standpoints mainly because of their novel and distinctive theoretical contributions to the ongoing debate.
Entangled in this debate is the issue of whether pre-modern reality can be assessed by using modern norms.
We employ critical analysis on the epistemological and methodological aspects surrounding the two scholarsAo interpretations of the hadiths of AishaAos age of marriage.
We argue that three significant features distinguish Auda and BrownAos dispositions.
These are: first, their different conceptions of the interplay between politics, knowledge, and second, their differing epistemological approaches to hadith science.
and third, their opposing assumptions about the universality of modern norms.
Debat berkelanjutan seputar usia pernikahan Aisyah dalam hadis telah menghasilkan dua pandangan utama di kalangan para sarjana Muslim, yaitu:
pihak yang menolak, yaitu mereka yang menggugat kesahihan hadis dan mengajukan pandangan bahwa Aisyah sebenarnya menikah pada usia yang lebih tua, dan pihak yang membela, yaitu mereka yang mempertahankan hadis-hadis ini sebagai riwayat yang sahih dan menerima pandangan bahwa Aisyah mulai tinggal bersama Nabi pada usia dini, yaitu sembilan tahun.
Dalam penelitian ini, kami mengeksplorasi masalah ini melalui argumen-argumen yang berseberangan yang ditawarkan oleh dua sarjana Muslim kontemporer, yaitu:
Jasser Auda, yang mewakili pandangan penolak hadis, dan Jonathan Brown, yang mewakili mereka yang menerima keabsahan hadis tersebut.
Kedua sarjana ini dipilih karena kontribusi teoretis mereka yang baru dan khas dalam debat yang Tersangkut dalam debat ini adalah permasalahan apakah realitas pra-modern dapat dinilai dengan menggunakan norma-norma modern.
Kami Sectarian tensions.
Islamophobia, and decolonization: .
(Muhamad Rofiq Muzakkir, et.
menggunakan analisis kritis terhadap aspek-aspek epistemologis dan metodologis yang melingkupi penafsiran kedua ulama tersebut terhadap hadis-hadis tentang usia pernikahan Aisyah.
Kami berargumen bahwa ada tiga hal mendasar yang membedakan pandangan Auda dan Brown, yaitu: pertama, perbedaan konsepsi mereka tentang hubungan antara politik, pengetahuan, dan ingatan.
pendekatan epistemologis mereka terhadap ilmu hadis.
dan ketiga, asumsi mereka yang berseberangan tentang universalitas norma-norma modern.
Keywords: Aisha.
Marriage.
Hadith.
Methodology.
Modernity Introduction Among the issues often used to discredit Islam is the question of AishaAos early age at the time of her marriage.
In the hadiths, it is reported that the Prophet married Aisha at the age of six or seven and consummated the marriage when she was nine.
This type of hadith has recently become one of the foundational texts for the discrediting of Islam by Islamophobes.
Negative views of the Prophet Muhammad, and by extension of all Muslims, continues to be amplified in various forums.
Both educated and uneducated people in the West similarly use this material to depict Islam as a misogynist religion.
The issue of AishaAos age of marriage has consequently become a source of discomfort for Muslims in the Western world.
1 According to Kecia Ali, the controversy about this issue initially mainly played out between Muslims and non-Muslims .
specially Islamophobe.
However, it then shifted to an intra-Muslim debate between those Muslims who accepted, and those who rejected the hadiths regarding AishaAos age.
A number of Muslim scholars have been trying to find ways to deal with the hadiths.
In general, the attitudes of modern scholars can be categorized into two groups: first, the defenders: those who affirm that the Prophet married Kecia Ali.
Sexual Ethics and Islam: Feminist Reflections on QurAoan.
Hadith, and Jurisprudence.
London.
England: Oneworld Publications, 2006, 135-150.
IJIMS: Indonesian Journal of Islam and Muslim Societies.
Volume 13.
Number 2.
December 2023: 427-456 Aisha at a young age, and believe that the hadiths are authentic.
the rejectors: those who reject the validity of the hadiths and put forward the view that Aisha married at an older age than the hadiths report.
This research will examine these two trends from the perspective of two prominent Muslim scholars, namely Jasser Auda and Jonathan Brown.
Each scholar has different interpretations of the hadiths surrounding AishaAos age.
Brown argues for their validity, while Auda is more inclined to negate their authenticity.
Hence, mapping and analyzing the views of these two scholars will help us understand the major trends within Muslim scholarship today, particularly in highlighting two distinctive and competing methodologies in understanding the hadiths of the Prophet.
This article examines the interpretation of the two scholars regarding the ProphetAos hadiths about AishaAos marriage, particularly the underlying paradigms and assumptions that shape their respective understandings, and their different approaches to the understanding of Islamic tradition and modernity.
This study is different from previous research which tended to put the hadiths themselves, or scholarsAo views of them, at the center of their scrutiny.
2 This article focuses more on analyzing the views of modern 3 Therefore, instead of examining the normative aspects of early marriage, the validity of the hadith, or how Muslims should understand it, we examine opposing discourses offered by two modern Islamic thinkers.
Mohd Al Adib Samuri et al.
AuHadith of AishaAos Marriage to Prophet Muhammad:
An Islamic Discourse on Child Marriage,Ay International Journal of Islamic Thought Volume 6, number 10 .
: 93Ae105, https://doi.
org/10.
24035/ijit.
Maisarah et al.
AuMinimum Marriage Age: Study of Fiqh of Four Madhabs,Ay Britain International of Humanities and Social Sciences (BIoHS) Journal Volume 1.
Number 2 .
: 149Ae58, https://doi.
org/10.
33258/biohs.
Similar research examining modern scholarsAo approach on the issue is that of Kecia Ali.
However, she just portrays an overview of existing opinions without sufficient elaboration and unpacking the methodological aspects of the debate.
See.
Kecia Ali.
The Lives of Muhammad.
Cambridge.
Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2014, particularly chapter five on AuMother of the FaithfulAy.
Sectarian tensions.
Islamophobia, and decolonization: .
(Muhamad Rofiq Muzakkir, et.
In this article, we argue that the position of Muslim scholars on the hadiths is determined by three factors, namely: first, their understanding of the interplay between politics and knowledge.
second, their epistemological methods in discerning the Prophetic tradition .
third, the paradigms they apply to the apparent universality of modern norms.
Variation of sanad and matn 4 The hadiths regarding AishaAos marriage to the Prophet at an early age have different content .
and are recounted by different chains of narrators .
The event was reported authoritatively in the texts of al-Bukhari.
Muslim.
Ahmad.
Abu Dawud.
Ibn Majah, al-SanAoani.
Ibn Abi Shaibah, al-Nasai, al-Darimi, and al-Mawsili.
The following are some representations of that variety:5 Muslim reported from Aisha that: AllahAos messenger.
PBUH, married her when she was seven years old, and she was taken to his house as a bride when she was nine, and her dolls were with her, and when he .
he Prophe.
died she was eighteen years old.
Sa.
Muslim, number 1442.
Bukhari reported from Aisha that: the Prophet.
PBUH, married her when she was six years old, and he consummated his marriage when she was nine years Hisham said: I have been informed that Aisha remained with the Prophet.
PBUH, for nine years .
, till his deat.
Sa.
al-Bukha>ri>, number 5134.
Bukhari reported that Abu Bakar ibn Abi Shaibah reported from Aisha, she said that: the Prophet of Allah.
PBUH, married me in the month of Shawwal Efforts to reconstruct the variation of sanad and matn still need to be made.
Such an effort is beyond this current work.
Here are some previous attempts to portray different versions of sanad and matn regarding the AishaAos marriage: Fahd ibn Muhammad al-Ghufayli, al-Sana> al-Wahha>j fi> Sinn AoA>isha Aoinda al-Zawa>j.
Riya>.
: Da>r al-S}ami>Aoi>, 2011, 61-90.
Mu.
ammad ibn AoAli> al-Mi.
Au Ay w.
September 28, 2017, https:// net/sharia/0/121047/.
All of the translations in this paper follow the translation from sunnah.
com, with slight adjustments from us.
IJIMS: Indonesian Journal of Islam and Muslim Societies.
Volume 13.
Number 2.
December 2023: 427-456 and consummated in Shawwal.
Therefore, which of his wives is luckier than me? Sa.
al-Bukha>ri>, number 1990.
Bukhari reported from Aisha that: I used to play with the dolls in the presence of the Prophet, and my female friends also used to play with me.
When AllahAos Messenger.
PBUH, used to enter .
y dwelling plac.
, they used to hide, but the Prophet would call them to join and play with me.
Sa.
al- Bukha>ri>, 6130.
This last hadith does not mention AishaAos age at the time of her marriage, but describes the situation after the marriage, where she still liked to play with dolls after officially becoming the ProphetAos wife.
The implication is that Aisha was still a child when the Prophet married her.
To sum up, the hadiths on AishaAos age of marriage have two variations:
some state that she was six years old, while others report that she was seven.
All sources agree, however, that the Prophet consummated their marriage when she was nine years old.
Hadith scholars have attempted to reconcile these two opposing traditions.
Ibn Hajr reconciles these by holding a view that Aisha married the Prophet before the age of seven, at the end of her sixth year.
6 Al-Nawawi opines that Aisha got married when she was six years and a few months old.
Ibn Qayyim al-Jauziyyah held the same viewpoint.
Based on the hadiths mentioned above and how the pre-modern ulamaAos understood them, we have the following information about AishaAos marital Aisha was born in the fourth or fifth year following the prophethood.
The majority of historians believe that this marriage occurred three years before the hijrah.
9 A few historians believe this marriage took place two years before the hijrah.
10 There are also two perspectives on when Aisha Abu Umar Yusuf Ibn Abd al-Barr, al-Isti>Aoa>b fi> MaAorifa al-A.
a>b, ed.
AoAli Muhammad alBijawi, 1992.
Beirut: Da>r al-Jayl, n.
), 1881-2.
Ahmad ibn AoAli Ibn H}ajar al-AoAsqalani, al-I.
a>bah fi> Tamyi>z al-S}a.
Beirut: Da>r al-Kutub Aoal-AoIlmiah, 1995.
Vi: 232.
al-Ghufayli, al-Sana> al-Wahha>j, 56.
Ibn Hajr al-AoAsqalani, al-I.
a>ba.
Vi: 231.
Ibn Hajr al-AoAsqalani, al-I.
a>ba.
Vi: 232 Ibn Abd al-Barr, al-Isti>Aoa>b, 1881.
Sectarian tensions.
Islamophobia, and decolonization: .
(Muhamad Rofiq Muzakkir, et.
began residing in the same house as the Prophet: whether this was between the first or second year of hijrah.
So, according to the hadiths and the interpretations applied by traditional scholarship, the chronology of AishaAos life until the ProphetAos death could be ordered as follows: she was born in the fourth or fifth year of prophethood.
The Prophet married Aisha in the eleventh year of prophethood, when she was six or seven years old.
Their marriage was consummated in the month of Shawwal in the first or second Hijri year and Aisha was nine years old at this time.
The Prophet passed away in the 23rd year of prophethood or the eleventh year of hijrah, when Aisha was eighteen years old.
Jasser AudaAos methodological view AudaAos view about the hadiths concerning AishaAos age of marriage is informed by his general methodological approach to understanding the ProphetAos hadiths.
We identify three critical approaches that he deployed in interpreting the hadiths about AishaAos marriage.
First, he argues that one should take the socio-political context into account when interpreting a hadith.
Auda believes the hadiths regarding AishaAos age reflect the vested interests of successive ruling dynasties, who successfully infiltrated the process of hadith transmission.
Second, employing matn criticism, he asserts that a critical sense of history is needed to reassess the sanad of these widely accepted hadiths and that scholars need to evaluate these hadith within the context of QuAoranic verses that refer to the age of female Finally, he evaluates the hadith based on traditional sanad criticism through which he finds that a narrator of the hadith is unreliable.
First.
Auda argues that to understand a hadith, one must consider the socio-political context in which it was circulated among its transmitters Ibn Abd al-Barr, al-Isti>Aoa>b, 1881-2.
Ibn Hajr, al-I.
a>ba.
Vi: 232 IJIMS: Indonesian Journal of Islam and Muslim Societies.
Volume 13.
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December 2023: 427-456 and the time when it was compiled.
Determining the validity of a hadith by merely scrutinizing a sanad is not sufficient.
He maintains, instead.
Auspecial attention should be given to the political and social biases within their respective generationsAy.
12 Auda argues that the political situation during the early period of Islam influenced the formation of Islamic orthodoxy and the curation of dominant narratives about the Prophet.
Many hadith narratives were required either to affirm, or at least not to contradict, the political interests of regional rulers.
As a result, hadith collectors .
rejected, wittingly or unwittingly, hadiths that were detrimental to contemporary rulers.
Therefore, according to Auda, in order to understand a hadith, it is not enough merely to look at its sanad and content in line with the traditional methods of hadith analysis.
It is crucial also to pay attention to any political affiliations of the narrator.
Hadith readers in the contemporary period need to continually raise questions about the political agenda behind the transmission of a given hadith, especially if its matn is problematic.
13 Auda asserts that major corrections in the field of hadith studies are required in order to address the challenges of understanding three types of hadiths in particular.
These are: hadiths that are infiltrated by the political interests of the authorities, those that demean women, and those that contain isra>Aoiliyya>t.
Auda further maintains that there is proven evidence of intervention by political authorities in editing the sanad and matn of hadiths.
Actions like this are explicitly recorded in the book of Tabaqa>t .
hich contains the biographies of hadith narrator.
For example.
Auda highlights a narrative Jasser Auda.
AuMaqasid Methodology for Re-Envisioning Islamic Higher Education,Ay Journal of Contemporary Maqasid Studies.
Volume 1.
Number 1 .
: 39, https://doi.
org/10.
52100/jcms.
Auda.
AuMaqasid MethodologyAyA Jasser Auda, al-Manhajiyya al-Maqa>.
Na.
wa IAoa>da S}iya>gha MuAoa>.
ira li al-Ijtiha>d alMuAoa>.
Da>r al-Maqa>.
id, 2021, 162.
AuMaqasid Methodology,AyA, 40.
Sectarian tensions.
Islamophobia, and decolonization: .
(Muhamad Rofiq Muzakkir, et.
by H}asan al-Basri to his student.
Yunus ibn AoUbaid, regarding his own modifications to earlier narratives about Ali Ibn Abi Talib: AuEverything I say directly that the Prophet said is at the authority of Ali Ibn Abi Talib, but I am in an era where I cannot mention AliAos name, may Allah be pleased with him.
Ay15 Auda is clear that the hadith narration pertaining to Ali Ibn Abi Talib and the Ahl al-Bayt .
he ProphetAos Famil.
has been - on numerous occasions - either edited, or omitted entirely from the hadith books.
16 Information about the hadiths has been greatly distorted by the censorship of the ruling dynasties, both Umayyad and Abbasid.
17 Crucially, he argues that the hadiths concerning AishaAos marriage to the Prophet at the age of nine, were forgeries, constructed to further the interests of the ruling Umayyad Dynasty and legitimize its enslavement of young children.
Auda adds that it is regrettable that Imam Bukhari felt obliged to accept this hadith in defense of the corrupt behavior of the Umayyad dynastyAos leaders.
Second, to refute the hadiths about the Prophet marrying Aisha when she was six years old and having intercourse with her when she was nine years old.
Auda uses the concept of Aumatn criticism,Ay positing the notion that a hadith can only be considered valid after its matn has been tested Auda explained that matn criticism should be undertaken with reference to at least three benchmarks: general principles of the Quran.
Cited from Auda.
AuMaqasid MethodologyAyA, 40 Jasser Auda.
AuJasser Auda: Maqasid Approach to Hadith Narrations- from 8th Class:
-IPSA -Cape Town Jan 2019,Ay w.
com, accessed January 22, 2023, https://w.
com/watch?v=0emJc71WO9w&t=2s Auda, al-Manhajiyyah al-Maqa>.
idiyyahA, 163-4.
Oral information was heard by Rofiq, one of the authors of this article, conveyed by Auda in iTTAos summer school in 2018 in Virginia.
See also.
Muhamad Rofiq Muzakkir.
Dekolonisasi: Metodologi Kritis Dalam Studi Humaniora Dan Studi Islam.
Yogyakarta: Yayasan Bentala, 2022, 220-33.
Initially, this was also AudaAos argument in his facebook debate between him and Brown.
It still can be read in the BrownAos account.
Jonathan Brown.
AuRe: AishaAos ageAy.
August 10, 2018.
https://w.
com/jonathanacbrown.
IJIMS: Indonesian Journal of Islam and Muslim Societies.
Volume 13.
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December 2023: 427-456 other prophetic hadiths, and the general context of Islamic history.
Arguing for the importance of historical information as a criterion for the evaluation of the validity of hadiths.
Auda asserts that having a proper sense of history is critical in order to assess Authe acceptability of narrators and narrations.
Ay19 A record of the narrators .
should not be regarded as politically neutral since in some cases, it will have been manipulated to reflect past political or dynastic interests.
Auda is of the view that any hadith interpretation should not contradict the Quran and should be evaluated in the context of the verses of the Quran.
20 He calls this method Aurevelation-centrism .
arkaziyyah al-wa.
Ay, which is an approach to hadith analysis that has the Quran at its center.
Auda also refers to this method by another term, namely haymana alQurAoa>n Aoala> riwa>ya>t al-sunna .
egemony of the Quran over the narratives of the Sunn.
Hermeneutically.
Auda posits, the Quran is higher than the hadiths and therefore must be approached as the determining criterion for the acceptability of any of the ProphetAos hadiths.
Auda maintains that generally speaking, the hadiths about AishaAos marriage have been approached only from the perspective of their sanad, even though they clearly contradict a particular verse in the Quran, namely verse sixth from surah al-Nisa: Auwabtalu> al-yata>ma> .
atta> i.
a> balaghu> al-nika>.
nd test the orphans until they are old enough to marr.
Ay.
In this verse, according to Auda, it is clearly stipulated that children can only marry when they have entered the bulu>gh .
Therefore, he continues, it is impossible for the Prophet, who is a role model for his ummah, to violate the provision in this verse.
It is also equally improbable to believe Auda.
AuMaqasid MethodologyAyA, 40.
Jasser Auda.
AuMaqasid Approach to Hadith Narrations,Ay.
AuAishaAos Critique of Authentic Hadith Content,Ay .
March 1, 2017, https://w.
net/portal/aishascritique-authentic-hadith-content/?lang=en&highlight=Aisha marriage&highlight=Aisha al-Manhajiyyah al-Maqa>.
idiyyah, 162.
Sectarian tensions.
Islamophobia, and decolonization: .
(Muhamad Rofiq Muzakkir, et.
that nine years old was the legal age of marriage at the time of the Prophet.
He further argues that we have no evidence that fourteen centuries ago nine-year-old girls were considered psychologically and physiologically mature enough to be capable of sexual intercourse.
Auda continues to apply his matn criticism method, comparing the hadiths about AishaAos marriage and examining where these contradict several other hadiths.
Auda compares the hadiths about AishaAos marriage with the hadith which states that Aisha witnessed the migration of her father.
Abu> Bakr, to H}abashah, which occurred in the fourth year after the prophethood began.
22 Also, the hadiths at hand contradict the narrative that Aisha participated in the Battle of Uhud.
If one follows the traditional calculation, then she must have been only nine years old when she joined the battle.
Furthermore, according to him, there is also a narrative that states that before marrying the Prophet.
Aisha was engaged to Jubair ibn MutAoim ibn AoAdi.
Logically speaking, according to Jasser, it would have been impossible for this engagement to take place when Aisha was not yet 6 years old.
Adopting the matn criticism approach.
Auda argues that the hadiths about AishaAos marriage at the age of nine also contradict the report of Ibn Ishaq, the historian whom hadith scholars reject because of his alleged tashayyuAo (Shiite tendenc.
Ibn Ishaq states that Aisha was the nineteenth person who converted to Islam in the first year of prophethood.
24 In this year, even AoUmar ibn Khattab had not converted to Islam yet.
This would Jasser Auda.
AuAisha Married Mohammad at Age 16.
Not 9Ay.
November 1, 2016, https://w.
net/aisha-married-mohammad-at-age-16-not9/?lang=en&highlight=Aisha Jasser Auda.
Reclaiming the Mosque: The Role of Women in IslamAos House of Worship.
Swansea.
United Kingdom: Claritas Books, 2017, 35-9.
Jasser Auda.
AuHow Old Was Aisha When She Married the Prophet (S)?,Ay .
March 1, 2017, https://w.
net/old-aishamarried-prophet-s/?lang=en.
Auda.
Reclaiming the MosqueA, 35-9.
Auda.
Reclaiming the MosqueA, 35-9.
Auda.
AuHow Old Was AishaAyA IJIMS: Indonesian Journal of Islam and Muslim Societies.
Volume 13.
Number 2.
December 2023: 427-456 indicate that Aisha was already a teenager when the Prophet married her in the second year after the migration, or the fifteenth year of the It further implies that Aisha was already born when the Prophet Muhammad began his mission as a messenger of God.
Third.
Auda also employs sanad criticism to evaluate the history of Aisha aAos early marriage.
From the sanad perspective, the hadiths about the Prophet marrying Aisha when she was six or seven years old are also In the sanad, there is a narrator named Hisham bin AoUrwah whom Auda deems trustworthy early on in life, but whose later work .
fter he migrated to Kufa and got closer to the rulers ther.
is regarded as unreliable.
Auda claims that Hisham suffers from amnesia: he cannot remember what he did or said.
He is also referred to as a mudallis .
narrator who likes to hide the deficiencies of a hadit.
by some hadith critics.
Auda regrets the fact that al-Bukhari endorsed the hadiths narrated by Hisham, accepting them largely because of HishamAos status as the son of the famous ta>biAoi> scholar AoUrwah ibn Zubayr, a student of Aisha herself.
Finally.
Auda ensures that his methodology in viewing and assessing the hadiths about AishaAos marriage was purely based on the shariah paradigm, and the traditional fiqh framework.
He explicitly rejects the possibility that his opinions are influenced by modern Western sensibilities, arguing:
AuI have to add that my view is not based on a bias to any particular western or eastern Aoculture,Ao legal or social, but is purely based on the understanding .
of the narrations and the rules of fiqh of marriage in Islam and its higher objectives .
If marriage is about achieving the objectives of Aomutual love and mercy,Ao as the Quran asserts .
, how can marrying a 6- or 9-year-old girl achieve mutual love and mercy?Ay27 Auda.
Reclaiming the MosqueA, 35-9.
Auda.
AuHow Old Was AishaAy.
Auda.
AuHow Old Was AishaAyA.
Muzakkir.
Dekolonisasi: Metodologi KritisA, 220-33.
Auda.
Reclaiming the MosqueA, 39.
Jasser Auda.
AuHow Old Was AishaAy.
Sectarian tensions.
Islamophobia, and decolonization: .
(Muhamad Rofiq Muzakkir, et.
Jonathan BrownAos methodological view Three aspects shape BrownAos views on this issue: first, his views on the hermeneutic relationship between the Quran and the hadiths, especially his skepticism of criticism of matn.
second, his method in criticizing the hadith sanad.
and third, his decolonial critiques on the universality of modern Western norms.
Firstly, criticizing the proponents of matn criticism, who advocate evaluating hadiths in accordance with their relationship to the QurAoanic verses.
Brown proposes a distinctive view of the positions and relations of the two.
While it is true that ontologically the Quran is more authoritative than the hadiths, he argues that hermeneutically the hadiths are superior.
It is impossible for Muslims to understand the Quran without the help of For this reason, efforts to evaluate hadiths with reference to the Quran are not always appropriate.
The Quran demands that the hadiths outline its broad legal rules, not the other way around, where the hadiths require the Quran to serve as a hermeneutically evaluative framework.
The main issue that Brown criticizes is the QurAoan-based matn hadith critique, put forward by figures such as Auda.
Brown argues that there are no objective criteria for determining the extent to which a hadith entirely contradicts the Quran.
Evaluation of the two so far has only relied on the subjectivity of scholars.
In fact, according to Brown, often people who claim a hadith has contradicted the Quran are not aware of their own subjective bias in understanding the hadith and the verses of the Quran Therefore, he argues, rather than quickly claiming contradictions, a Muslim scholar should first try to reconcile the varying contents .
of similar hadiths, especially if a rejected hadith has a reputable chain of Oral information, which was heard by Rofiq, one of the authors of this article, conveyed by Brown in iTTAos summer school in 2018 in Virginia.
See Muzakkir.
Dekolonisasi: Metodologi KritisA, 220-33.
IJIMS: Indonesian Journal of Islam and Muslim Societies.
Volume 13.
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) based on the criteria of leading hadith scholars.
Secondly.
Brown makes a methodological objection to the criticism of sanad submitted by Auda and his ilk.
He argues that the objectorsAo analyses of the hadiths on AishaAos marriage have been very partial and that they have not attempted to reconstruct the entirety of the sanad.
The hadiths about the age of AishaAos marriage were, in fact, narrated by many mukharrijs through many chains and different matns, making it impossible for them to have been falsified.
He argues that critics of AishaAos marriage hadith, such as Auda, ignore this fact.
They tend to focus only on one sanad, especially on the narrator Hisham ibn AoUrwah.
According to Brown, even if HishamAos report is neglected, this hadith still has many other chains.
The disappearance of HishamAos report does not necessarily undermine other reports that Aisha married the Prophet at the age of nine.
It is true if we dismiss HishamAos narration, said Brown, we then have no supporting reports from the reputable collection S}a.
al-Bukha>ri>.
However, there are other narratives from other collections, e.
AoAbd al-Razzaq al-SanAoani .
ompiler of the book of al-Musanna.
Muslim, al-Nasai.
Ibn Majah, and al-Mawsili .
ompiler of the book Musnad al-Maw.
ili>), which have not been transmitted through Hisham ibn AoUrwah.
31 In fact, of all the existing sanads, the most robust chain belongs to al-SanAoaniAos version, which contains fewer narrators and Jonathan A.
Brown.
AuThe Rules of Matn Criticism: There Are No Rules,Ay Islamic Law and Society Volume 19.
Number 4 .
: 356Ae96, https://doi.
org/10.
1163/156851912x639923.
Jonathan Brown.
AuRe: AishaAos ageAy,.
see also.
Brown.
AuAge of Hazrat Aisha,Ay https:// com/watch?v=NxIXLFWmQ8I&t=973s It should also be noted that AoUrwah.
AishaAos niece from her sister Asma, is not the only narrator of hadiths about AishaAos marriage.
Besides himself, other narrators also received this news from Aisha directly, namely: al-Aswad ibn Yazid.
Ibn Abi Malikah.
Abu AoUbaidah, dan Abu Salamah ibn AoAbd al-Rahman.
See.
AoAla Ibrahim AoAbd al-Rahim.
AuSinn Umm al-MuAomini>n AoA>ishah Aoinda Zawa>j al-Nabiy S}allalla>hu Aoalaihi al-Sala>m,Ay accessed January 21, 2023, https://salafcenter.
org/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/ , 2.
Sectarian tensions.
Islamophobia, and decolonization: .
(Muhamad Rofiq Muzakkir, et.
which scholars of hadith call the silsilah dhahabiyyah or gold chain.
The narrators of this sanad are MaAomar, al-Zuhri.
AoUrwah, and Aisha herself.
Brown said that even if this hadith is analyzed by the rigorous hadith authentication methods used by Western scholars, as exemplified by Harald MotzkiAos version of the isnad cum matan, its validity can still be proven.
Thirdly.
Brown argues that those who object to these hadiths, including Auda, fail to recognize their own intrinsic biases and do not acknowledge that they have adopted an anachronistic way of thinking, imposing modern normativity to judge historical events.
Brown continues that the most appropriate way to examine whether a modernity bias underpins the thinking of a modern scholar is to look at the interpretations of previous scholars: have they problematized these hadiths? If they have not, and the modern objection stands alone, then it is clear that contemporary scholars are interpreting Islamic history through an alien and inappropriate system of values.
34 According to Brown, throughout the history of pre-modern fiqh and hadith scholarship, this hadith has never been questioned by Muslim If this hadith is problematic, he argues, then it does indeed merit further discussion, or at least, it will fall into the category of mukhtalaf al-.
hose hadiths whose meaning is dispute.
Brown points out that the pre-modern fiqh books also discuss the legality of parents marrying off their young children without their consent.
The four mainstream fiqh schools consider this practice permissible.
However.
Jonathan Brown.
AuRe: AishaAos ageAy,.
Brown.
AuAge of Hazrat Aisha,Ay https://w.
com/watch?v=NxIXLFWmQ8I&t=973s This method is much more stringent because it examines the validity of hadith by combining tracing the chain of narration .
and changes of the wording of hadith .
from one generation of transmitters to the next generation.
For further information, read Harald Motzki.
The Origins of Islamic Jurisprudence: Meccan Fiqh before the Classical Schools.
Leiden.
Boston: Brill, 2002.
Brown himself said that even though matn criticism had been practices of early scholars of Islam, in modern times it has become more salient.
Brown.
AuThe Rules of Matn Criticism:
There Are No RulesAyA, 395.
IJIMS: Indonesian Journal of Islam and Muslim Societies.
Volume 13.
Number 2.
December 2023: 427-456 for jurists, allowing a marriage contract to occur did not automatically allow for an immediate sexual relationship.
According to pre-modern jurists, parents were allowed to delay consummation until they thought their child was of an appropriate age.
35 Brown claims that this constitutes proof of the validity of the hadiths on AishaAos early marriage.
The hadiths around AishaAos marriage.
Brown argues, became problematic and the subject of debate when Muslims encountered Western modernity through colonialism.
Brown writes: AuAit was a modern Western opprobrium that brought the problematic precedent of the ProphetAos marriage with Aisha to the fore.
Ay36 Concerning the modernity bias from the West.
Brown found that the person who first challenged this hadith was the Oxford academic and Orientalist.
David Margoliouth.
In his 1905 book.
Muhammad and the Rise of Islam.
Margoliouth called this marriage an Auill-assorted unionAy.
Margoliouth himself was influenced by the culture of marriage in the United Kingdom.
In 1275, a law in England had forbidden girls from marrying under the age of twelve.
In other European countries, in pre-modern times, child marriage at an early age was not considered Brown also notes that within Western Orientalist scholarship, which contains many polemical works attacking Islam, this hadith has never been 37 Polemical Christian scholars, such as John of Damascus .
Matthew of Paris .
, and even Voltaire .
, who always tried to find reasons to attack Islam, did not find anything problematic in this hadith.
The polemicists, for example, criticized the ProphetAos marriage to Zaynab bint Jahshi, ex-wife of Zaid ibn HaHarithah, but did not touch Jonathan Brown.
Misquoting Muhammad: The Challenge and Choices of Interpreting the ProphetAos Legacy.
London Oneworld, 2016, 141.
Brown.
Misquoting MuhammadA, 143.
Brown.
Misquoting MuhammadA, 144.
Sectarian tensions.
Islamophobia, and decolonization: .
(Muhamad Rofiq Muzakkir, et.
on the issue of AishaAos marriage at all.
Demonstrating the infiltration of modern Western views into Muslim scholarship.
Brown reveals the historicity of criticism against the hadiths of AishaAos marriage.
He claims that the first person to challenge the practice of child marriage in the Muslim world was Huda Sharawi, founder of the Egyptian Feminist Union.
In 1923, after returning home from an international conference on women in Italy.
Sharawi persuaded the Egyptian parliament to enact a law limiting the age of marriage.
It was after SharawiAos intervention in the marriage culture in Egypt, that the ulama>A began to problematize this hadith.
39 The first Muslim intellectual to challenge this hadith was the well-known historian and writer AoAbbas Aqqad .
in his work entitled al-Siddi>qa bint al-Siddi>q which other scholars later followed.
What AoAqqad did not realize, according to Brown, who himself was quoting Egyptian hadith expert A.
mad Shakir, was that he had unknowingly fallen into the trap of modernity.
Modern scholars who reject the hadiths failed to reflect on the sociological reality that Western norms are continuously evolving.
Many Western values shifted during the era of industrialization and urbanization.
41 AoAqqad.
Brown wrote.
Auexemplifies how history, and in this case, the scripture of hadith, can be reread in consonance with compelling social forcesAy.
42 AoAqqad and other objectors to the hadiths have failed to acknowledge that there are no universally agreed values regarding the criteria of good and right.
Both are dependent on place and time.
43 What is considered good or normal in one period Brown.
Misquoting MuhammadA, 144.
Brown.
AuAge of Hazrat AishaAy.
Brown.
Misquoting MuhammadA, 145.
AoAbbas AoAqqad.
Al-S}iddi>qa Bint Al-S}iddi>q.
Cairo: Da>r al-MaAoa>rif li al-T}iba>Aah wa al-Nashr, 1953, 63.
Brown.
Misquoting MuhammadA, 147.
Brown.
Misquoting MuhammadA, 147.
Brown.
AuAge of Hazrat AishaAy.
IJIMS: Indonesian Journal of Islam and Muslim Societies.
Volume 13.
Number 2.
December 2023: 427-456 and place may be regarded as anomalous elsewhere.
Many practices that were considered acceptable in a peasant society that lived in pre-modern times became unmentionable after modernization swept through society, and vice versa.
Brown points out that in pre-industrial societies, from India.
China.
Eastern Europe, or even the pre-modern Western world, it was common for girls to marry at a very young age.
Generally, they were married immediately after the menarche.
According to American Child Bride .
, for example, up until the twentieth century it was legal for girls as young as ten to be married in Georgia.
44 This demonstrates how Western social standards are subject to ongoing change and therefore cannot be used as a benchmark for judging non-Western Therefore.
Muslims must be conscious not to use the present-time normative lens to read historical facts in the past.
Decolonizing Islamic thought is crucial for this reason.
According to the decolonial paradigm, before attempting to study the past and comprehend Prophet MuhammadAos hadiths.
Muslims must first recognize the internalized biases of modernity in their own behavior and mental patterns.
Thus.
BrownAos methodological contribution can be categorized into three elements, namely: his reconstruction of the networks of sanads and matn as a means of authenticating the hadiths - which includes his resistance to the use of unverified historical narrations as a benchmark for evaluating the validity of AishaAos marriage hadiths.
His analysis of the historicity of objections about the hadiths both among Muslims and non-Muslims.
Finally, he introduces the idea of decolonizing hadith scholarship, by inviting Muslims to dismantle the biases inherent in the apparent universality of Western culture and civilization.
Brown.
AuAge of Hazrat AishaAyA Sectarian tensions.
Islamophobia, and decolonization: .
(Muhamad Rofiq Muzakkir, et.
Paradigms underpinning Auda and BrownAos perspectives Jasser Auda and Jonathan Brown represent two different ways of understanding and approaching the hadiths regarding AishaAo age.
In this section, we try to unpack the different assumptions underpinning their respective arguments.
We identify three paradigmatic assumptions that shape the way these two scholars interpret the hadiths and approach the problematic issue of AishaAos early marriage.
These are their differing conceptions of the interplay between politics, knowledge, and memory.
AudaAos reformist vs BrownAos traditionalist epistemological approach.
and their opposing positions regarding the universality of modern norms.
We compare how each scholar builds their dispositions regarding AishaAos age using these paradigms.
The interplay between politics, knowledge, and memory As outlined earlier.
Auda believes that historical political regimes played a significant role in the process of canonizing the hadiths into the existing collections we have today.
He argues that rulers exerted pressure on hadith narrators to transmit only those hadiths that aligned with their own political interests.
He believes that scholars in the formative period of the Islamic orthodoxy were themselves inevitably enmeshed within the sociopolitical structures surrounding them and under the hegemonic control of their rulers.
Their production of knowledge, including hadiths, would necessarily therefore, have reflected the ideological hegemony of their age.
For Auda, the task of contemporary Muslim scholars is to be mindful of the specific historical context in which such knowledge was produced and of the embedded biases that result.
However.
AudaAos views also need to be considered in the context of his own frustration with contemporary politics and the authoritarianism he sees today in his home country of Egypt.
He is deeply concerned about the ruling elite which has co-opted everything from government infrastructure.
IJIMS: Indonesian Journal of Islam and Muslim Societies.
Volume 13.
Number 2.
December 2023: 427-456 the judiciary, ministries, and the military, to the media and academia.
As a result, academics have either voluntarily, or by force, adjusted their own discourses, religious and otherwise, to fit the political agenda of the ruling government.
The realities of the present-day ruling hegemony, which has been the main focus of his intellectual works, especially since the failure of the Arab Spring, have shaped and moulded AudaAos scholarly It could be argued therefore, that Auda is projecting some of his own frustration at the corruption of public life in the Arab world, and in particular in Egypt, into his analysis of Islamic history, especially the history of hadith formulation in the early period of Islam.
Brown actually demonstrates some similarity with Auda on the issue of the relationship between politics and the hadiths, but they are mostly of dissenting opinions.
On the one hand.
Brown affirms that in the past, political interests were one of the causes of hadith forgery and that individual rulers abused their power, leading to the fabrication of hadiths.
However, on the other hand, he sees that this practice was not exclusively the prerogative of the ruling class.
While Auda limits ultimate responsibility for hadith forgery to the ruling elites, for Brown, marginalized historical groups were also equally responsible, as they sought to advance their own political interests.
One clear example being the many fabricated hadiths that began to emerge after the conflict between MuAoawiyah and AoAli in the early period of Islam.
Brown argues that fanatical supporters from both sides were equally involved in such forgeries and that due to their political interests, both the powerful and the powerless were involved in the creation of fake hadiths.
Another difference in BrownAos perspective from AudaAos is that the Auda published a book discussing authoritarianism in the Arab World.
See Jasser Auda, al-Dawla al-Madaniyyah: Na.
wa Taja>wuz al-Istibda>d wa Ta.
qi>q Maqa>.
id al-Shari>Aa.
Beirut.
Cairo.
Da>r al-Bai.
aAo: al-Shabkah al-AoArabiyyah li al-Ab.
a>th wa al-Nashr, 2015.
Jonathan Brown.
Hadith: MuhammadAos Legacy in the Medieval and Modern World.
London:
Oneworld Academic, 2018, 71-4.
Sectarian tensions.
Islamophobia, and decolonization: .
(Muhamad Rofiq Muzakkir, et.
former believes that despite the coercion of rulers, the scholars .
still retained agency and acted objectively in their selection of hadiths.
Here he differs from Auda, who sees hadith scholars as being easily manipulated and coerced into acting in the interests of the ruling class.
For Brown, this is an unfounded claim.
He believes that the hadith scholars actively attempted to act as objectively as possible and attempted to avoid being co-opted by powerful elites.
According to Auda, affiliation with the ahl al-bayt .
he household of the Prophe.
has often been behind the marginalization or rejection of a hadith Brown, on the other hand, considers this to be an exaggeration, pointing out that Sunni hadith scholars have faithfully transmitted hadiths from Shia narrators, even those with pro-Shia content.
This is because they see the information they bring as being historically objective, and do not bring sectarian interests to bear on their scholarship.
47 He mentions the Sunni hadith collector Muslim, who accepted hadiths from a Shi>Aite named AoAdi ibn Thabit, who narrated the hadith: AuOnly a believer loves AoAli, and only a hypocrite hates himAy.
48 Brown cites this as an example of the sectarian inclusivity of the hadith collectors.
It worth noting, however, that other scholars have argued that sectarian sentiment has influenced the transmission and interpretations of the hadiths, including the ones about AishaAos age.
49 According to Joshua Brown.
Hadith: MuhammadAos LegacyA, 151.
Brown.
Hadith: MuhammadAos LegacyA, 153.
For example, see Yasmin AminAos article that discusses how scholars from different schools of thoughts and jurisprudence approach the hadith of AishaAos marital age and the issue of child marriage.
Yasmin Amin.
AuRevisiting the Issue of Minor Marriages: Multidisciplinary Ijtiha>d on Contemporary Ethical Problems,Ay in Islamic Interpretive Tradition and Gender Justice, ed.
Nevin Reda and Yasmin Amin.
Processes of Canonization Subversion and Change.
McGill-QueenAos University Press, 2020, 314Ae64, https://doi.
org/10.
2307/j.
See also Ayatullah Muhammad Husayn Husayni al-Qazwini.
AuHow Old Was AAoyshah When She Married The Prophet Muhammad?,Ay Al-Islam.
June 4, 2015, https://w.
al-islam.
org/articles/howold-was-ayshah-when-she-married-prophet-muhammad-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-husayni-al.
IJIMS: Indonesian Journal of Islam and Muslim Societies.
Volume 13.
Number 2.
December 2023: 427-456 Little .
, the core of this tension lies in the competing claims made for Fatima and Aisha as representing the epitome of Muslim womanhood in ShiAoi and Sunni discourses respectively.
This tension started as early as the 7th-8th century CE, with the emergence of the fa.
a>il report about Aisha among proto-Sunni Muslims in Kufah.
50 Sunni Muslims tend to highlight AishaAos special status as the only virgin and young wife of the Prophet.
51 AishaAos marriage at an early age is an important part of this Conversely.
ShiAoi Muslims tend to emphasize the centrality of Fatima.
She is spiritually exalted as one of the Five Infallibles (Ahl al-Kis.
and the progenitor of the Ahl al-Bayt.
52 However, despite these sectarian valences, it is important to point out that sectarian identity does not always dictate a scholarAos interpretive preference.
There are Sunni scholars, such as Jasser Auda, who reject the notions of AishaAos early marital age, while a prominent Shia scholar such as Muhammad Baqir al-Majlisi .
1110/1.
affirmed the hadith concerning AishaAos early marriage age.
See Joshua J.
Little.
AuThe Hadith of AoA>AoiahAos Marital Age: A Study in the Evolution of Early Islamic Historical MemoryAy.
Ph.
Thesis (Abridge versio.
Oxford.
UK.
University of Oxford, 2022, 264Ae65.
Accessible at https://ora.
uk/objects/uuid:1bdb0eea-3610-498b9dfd-cffdb54b8b9b.
For sectarian tension surrounding the centrality of Fatima and Aisha see also a lecture by Amina Inloes.
AuComparing Models of Femininity: Fatimah Al-ZahraAo and AAoishaAo,Ay May 11, 2012, https://w.
al-islam.
org/media/comparing-models-femininityfatimah-al-zahra-and-aisha.
Denise Spellberg explains the Sunni-ShiAoi sectarian tension and the historical formation of the discourse regarding AishaAos special attributes in great details in Denise A.
Spellberg.
Politics.
Gender, and the Islamic Past: The Legacy of AoAAoisha Bint Abi Bakr.
New York: Columbia University Press, 1994, 31Ae32, 39Ae40, 47Ae48.
Asif M BasitAos article provides succinct outlines the ShiAoi-Sunni sectarian tension surrounding the contestations of AoA>ishaAos age, see Asif M.
Basit.
AuThe Age of Aisha (R.
: A Modern Question for Medieval Times,Ay Alhakam.
June 18, 2022, https://w.
org/age-of-hazrat-aisha/.
Al-Majlisi.
Muhammad Baqir.
AuWives of the Prophet Ae Their Number and a Brief Account of Them.
Ay Al-Islam.
January 30, 2013.
https://w.
al-islam.
org/hayat-al-qulubvol-2-allamah-muhammad-baqir-al-majlisi/wives-prophet-their-number-and-brief.
See also Muhammad Baqir al-Majlisi.
MirAoa>t al-AoUqu>l fi> AoAkba>r AoA>l al-Rasu>l vol.
24 Tehran.
Iran: DaAor al-Kutub al-AoIslaAomiyyah, 1983, 235.
Sectarian tensions.
Islamophobia, and decolonization: .
(Muhamad Rofiq Muzakkir, et.
Epistemological methods in studying hadiths The next diverging paradigms that influence the discourses of Auda and Brown relate to their method of reading intellectual history, including methods of hadith science.
Auda adheres to a reformist paradigm and believes that pre-modern traditions cannot become a determining factor in authenticating the hadiths of AishaAos marriage.
The pre-modern scholars were all trapped in their own history and have been unable to appreciate the necessity of a more rigorous critical methodology in understanding For Auda, even if previous scholars have accepted the validity of a hadith, this alone does not necessarily become a standard of truth and According to him.
Muslims in the modern era, can come up with new opinions about this hadith that differ from, or even correct, previous opinions.
AudaAos reformist tendency differs radically from BrownAos traditionalist According to his paradigm, truth cannot be obscured in history and only to be revealed to us in the modern era.
His position requires jurists to seriously engage with the historical opinions expressed by their predecessors because theological truths must have been expressed within This traditionalist paradigm rejects the reformist tendencies of scholars like Auda, who selectively ignore those classical norms contained in the fiqh and shara.
hadith books, but formulate ideas derived from earlier normative sources such as the Quran and the hadith.
For traditionalists like Brown, an examination of tura>th or intellectual legacy, that traces the responses of Muslim scholars throughout history is imperative.
The way in which factual authenticity was perceived and verified in the past is an important consideration for formulating normative views today.
Another important consideration, which impacts each writerAos approach to intellectual history, is their view on how reliable conventional hadith criticism, especially sanad, is.
Based on his reformist paradigm.
Auda IJIMS: Indonesian Journal of Islam and Muslim Societies.
Volume 13.
Number 2.
December 2023: 427-456 believes that sanad criticism is not enough.
While a text may be considered .
, according to traditional hadith rules, this in itself is no guarantee of its reliability as an authentic hadith that describes actual historical fact.
Auda therefore, proposes the possibility of disregarding sanad criticism, substituting modern methodologies of historical analysis instead.
He suggests that rigorous historical analysis may be more reliable than the technicalities of the science of sanad.
This is different from Brown, who still respects the established traditional methodology of hadith science.
For him, hadith sanad criticism is more reliable.
In his work he even criticizes modern methods of contemporary historical criticism, especially those coming from Orientalists.
54 He believes that modern methods are based on skepticism, modern sensibility, and a rejection of scholarly authority.
It is BrownAos belief in the traditional method of sanad criticism that enables him to master the subtleties of hadith science and demonstrate that the hadiths about AishaAos marital age have multiple chains, not just one, as Auda claims.
Brown traces the history of the hadith and shows that every narrative corroborates the other, making the information contained within them epistemologically Here he differs significantly from Auda, who is already trapped in skepticism from the beginning.
His pessimism over the unreliability of sanad has made Auda unable to appreciate that the network of hadiths about AishaAos marriage is not, as he claims, a simple narrative provided by one questionable narrator in the form of Hisham ibn AoUrwah.
The universality of modern norms The third paradigmatic foundation of these two figures is related to the issue of cultural relativism, namely the extent to which modern values are Although Auda denies that he works under a Western paradigm, he appears not to problematize modernity.
He does not see modernity Brown.
Hadith: MuhammadAos LegacyA, 226-76.
Sectarian tensions.
Islamophobia, and decolonization: .
(Muhamad Rofiq Muzakkir, et.
as a distinctive temporal entity, apart from Islamic civilization.
55 Neither does he see modernity as the result of the imposition of Western values on others.
For Auda, the benchmark for determining whether a view is influenced by Western assumptions is simply whether a scholar cites Western works or not.
In other words.
Auda only looks at the superficial attribution of an idea, not its inner or philosophical dimension.
Nor does he explicitly address the issue of the assumed universality of norms.
This is exemplified by his repeated emphasis that it was not possible in the past for marriage at the age of nine to be acceptable.
Brown explicitly affirms the importance of questioning the universality of contemporary Western cultural practices.
He states that discomfort among certain parties, including Muslims, regarding the hadith around AishaAos marriage actually derives from their adoption of Western norms.
Therefore, he argues, when Muslims reject this hadith, they are actually unwittingly operating within a modern Western paradigm.
Brown emphasizes the importance of examining the possible bias of modernity in interpreting historical events.
This is similar to Dipesh ChakrabartyAos ideas in AuProvincializing Europe,Ay which call for the parochialization of certain modern norms that originate from Western society.
56 When these ideas are applied to the field of hadith studies.
Brown refers to them being tantamount to the decolonization of the understanding of the hadith.
For him, attempting to understand the hadiths through the lens of a universalized modern culture is equivalent to placing Western values at the summit of human history and achievement.
The paradigm that Brown This is particularly the argument of Wael Hallaq in his book The Impossible State: Islam.
Politics, and ModernityAos Moral Predicament: Islam.
Politics, and ModernityAos Moral Predicament.
New York: Columbia University Press, 2014, 3.
Reforming Modernity: Ethics and the New Human in the Philosophy of Abdurrahman Taha.
New York.
NY: Columbia University Press, 2019, 82-84.
Dipesh Chakrabarty.
Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical Difference.
Princeton.
Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2000.
Brown.
AuRe: AishaAos AgeAyA IJIMS: Indonesian Journal of Islam and Muslim Societies.
Volume 13.
Number 2.
December 2023: 427-456 adheres to always harbors suspicion towards modern norms, especially if they lack roots in the past.
Conclusion The issue of AishaAos marriage has been a controversial topic since the modern era.
It is not unreasonable to say that it will be a perennial source of debate within the Muslim community, given that modernity has become an inherent part of the Muslim identity.
Modernity brings with it numerous sensibilities that are not always aligned with the traditional norms of the In this article, we have explained how scholars of Islam debate how best to understand the hadith about AishaAos marriage at the age of nine.
We have explained the general arguments of both critics and defenders of this hadith.
Methodological issues related to the formulation of these arguments range from the question of how to authenticate historical narration, to whether traditional methods of authentication are truly They include a consideration of the extent to which historical narratives can be used to evaluate the validity of hadiths, and whether politics, and in particular, sectarian interests, have been important in shaping Islamic orthodoxy and the narration of hadiths in the formative period of Islam.
We discuss these topics through the discourse of Jasser Auda and Jonathan Brown, who represent two different schools of thought and explain the distinctions, interventions, and theoretical contributions they have each made to this issue.
We explicitly do not take a stance on the validity of the hadith themselves.
Instead, we analyze these academicsAo respective methodologies and unpack their underlying paradigms.
Three factors are primarily responsible for shaping their respective discourse:
their views of the interplay between politics and knowledge, of Islamic intellectual history, and of the universality of modern norms.
This valuable Sectarian tensions.
Islamophobia, and decolonization: .
(Muhamad Rofiq Muzakkir, et.
research lies at the intersection of, and therefore potentially contributes to, the fields of hadith studies and the sociology of knowledge.
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