Akar Sejarah Pemikiran al-Shâtibî tentang Rukhsah

Abstract

Al-Shatibi is known in the history of Islam as a prioner in the theory of Syari’ah. He wrote al-Muwafaqat, his magnum opus. This paper deals with this historic figure by referring to his theory concerning rukhsah; an exemption given to Muslim in performing the rites for certain and acceptable reason. The paper will look at this concept by considering the background in which it is propounded. We believe that his theory is not conceptualised out of the blue. Two key words will be used to embark on this task, namely ‘adamu al-Haraj and (tatbîq). The former is about the removing the difficulty from man, and the latter is about the application of the Syari’ah in the live of individual. By using the first concept, the paper will try to reconstruct the fact that in propounding his theory of rukhsan, al-Syatibi always keeps in mind the fact that Islam is revealed mainly to make life easy, and not vice versa. By using the second concept in the meantime, we try to show that the Syari’ah laws—rukhsah included—are revealed to apply (the application Syari’ah is not always in political context).