Islam in Africa 
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 Periodical article |
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| Title: | Reforms in the Islamic legal judicial system and the sharia inheritance and family law in Tunisia |
| Author: | Jones, Christina C. |
| Year: | 1993 |
| Periodical: | Jahrbuch für afrikanisches Recht |
| Volume: | 7 |
| Pages: | 3-23 |
| Language: | English |
| Geographic term: | Tunisia |
| Subjects: | Islamic law family law marriage law |
| Abstract: | An introductory part on the nature of Islamic law, the sharia, in which the author concludes that Islamic legal studies have failed to develop systematic knowledge of the concepts of 'internal morality' that are largely implicit in the Islamic legal system, is followed by an examination of concrete developments in the internal morality of modern Islamic law in Tunisia, in particular the judicial structures and influences leading up to the introduction of the Code of Personal Status of 13 August 1956. This Code, which established monogamy on Islamic principles and forbade polygamy on Islamic principles, was hailed as a milestone in modernizing Islamic law, spearheading the reopening of ''ijtihad' (judicial independence) reinterpretation of the Koran. However, an analysis of judges' decisions applying the sharia provisions of the Code of Personal Status in the first fourteen years of its existence as they relate to the law of bequests ('wasiyya'), which was added to the Code of Personal Status in 1959, indicates that ''ijtihad' did not extend to all areas of law. The Tunisian courts continued to apply a classical sharia while applying the Code of Personal Status. The introduction of the reformatory Code of Personal Status had been a matter of political expediency. Bibliogr. |