as we have already explained. A number of jurists have held that it is obligatory on rational grounds, and that revealed law merely confirms what reason already requires concerning it. Even had no revealed law prescribed it, reason’s requirement would have sufficed. The correct view, however, is that reason does not itself establish prohibition or permissibility.

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Only those given to denial and deviation have opposed issuing rulings by analogy. Some of them maintain that it is impossible and cannot be prescribed by revealed law. Dāwūd and his son say that it is not impossible, and that, had revealed law prescribed it, it would have been permissible, but that no revealed law has prescribed it.

Some of them claim that every eventuality is explicitly addressed in the Book. Anyone who goes this far is no longer worth debating, for he obstinately rejects the truth and denies what is self-evident. If, as a concession, we do engage him, we present him with cases such as the proportional reduction of inheritance shares, the assessment of compensation for bodily injuries, the valuation of destroyed property, a grandfather’s sharing an inheritance with brothers and sisters, a garment blown by the wind into a dyer’s vat, or a dinar falling into a man’s brazier, and similar cases. We then demand that he produce an explicit text from the Book addressing them. There is no doubt that he will be unable to do so.

The more discerning among them acknowledge that explicit texts do not encompass the rulings for every eventuality. They maintain that some matters have been passed over in silence, with no ruling from Allah concerning them, and that the Book and Sunnah make clear that Allah has established no ruling concerning matters left unaddressed.

Anyone who makes this claim faces one of two alternatives. Either he judges such cases according to his own desires when they arise, thereby falling into something worse than what he condemns in us—for we do not judge them according to our desires, but according to the evidence of revealed law. Allah Most High has forbidden judging according to desire, saying:

“Do not follow desire, lest it lead you astray from Allah’s path.” [Sād: 26]

He also says:

“And restrained his soul from desire” [al-Nāziʿāt: 40], “then Paradise will indeed be his refuge.” [al-Nāziʿāt: 41]

Or he refrains from judging such cases, which leads to the nullification of legal rulings and the outbreak of war and fighting. This is invalid by consensus.

Some of them say that whatever is not addressed by an explicit text remains subject to reason’s judgment of prohibition or permissibility, each according to his own position. This is false, since on that basis it is impossible to