And We have sent down unto thee the Book in truth, confirming the Book that come before it, and as a protector over it. So judge between them in accordance with what God has sent down, and follow not their caprices away from the truth that has come unto thee. For each among you We have appointed a law and a way. And had God willed, he would have made you one community, but He willed otherwise, that He might try you in that which He has given you. So vie with one another in good deeds. Unto God shall be your return all together, and He will inform you of that wherein you differ.

~ Ma’idah 48

Let’s get right to it - fiqh is dying and AI will kill it. There will not be a revival, at least not in the vision of some new golden age. Rather there are certain risks and dangers that will likely shape the future of Islam in ways we do not yet fully comprehend.

Not long ago I posed a response to @@qunh…daqq regarding the issue of the nature of shariah.

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I detailed some elements of the scholarly dialogue that I had some personal experience with and attempted to clarify what I understood at that time to be the heart of the issue which was the prioritization of life vs religion. Having deliberated further over this issue in both private discussions with talib ’ilm and my own devotional reflection, there are additional concerns that I want to address.

With AI coming of age we now have an issue where portions of this debate will take center stage in the public discourse. As utopian as the marketing is, the likelihood that AI will give 2 sats about human life or is even capable of being safely contained is slim. The closer we get to that point the more evident Land’s prediction will become - “nothing human makes it out of the near-future”. We can already see accelerationists like Thiel proposing ideas that the anti-christ/dajjal will be from those who want to preserve the human and hold back AI. The dystopic thought of non-human overlords going terminator on us is also somewhat dajjalic. The point is, if the goal of shariah is to prioritize life in a future where we are questioning the role of the human itself, then there is an existential crisis coming for Islam. Actually, we are already in it.

I don’t think this is avoidable for those holding the other opinion, where preservation of religion takes priority. This side likely suffers from the same fate, as AI will feed off sectarian divides. The real danger though is not from AI, but from fundamentalist positions on either side who will favor either certain ethnicities when it comes to preservation of life or sects in terms of religious preservation. The future of Islam is that it will become more politically exploited and secularized unless it quickly aligns its understanding of shariah with realities of AI technology.

Let me pause here and clarify - I do believe the next few decades are going to see an explosive growth in religious dialogue and practice thanks to AI making discussions around fiqh accessible to the layperson. AI Muftis will totally be a thing and we will likely get some valuable insights from a Hanafi AI model going up against a Hanbali AI or an Ibadi AI one when navigating complex issues for Martian immigrants and governance within Greater Israel. But as this science is democratized, academia will lose its ability to produce the same caliber scholars as before. The addition of AI simply does not mean human intelligence will increase. In fact the potential over-reliance on new super intelligent AI models could bring about a decrease in overall human intelligence. And as AI is predominately in the hands of people who would prefer to use it for their own benefit it should not be surprising to see such forces, both external and internal, make use of Islamic symbols without any connection to or respect for the spirit and principle behind them.

So, how should we deal with this crisis of fiqh and go about re-constructing our conceptual framework of the shariah? To begin, we need to shake the idea that shariah is only a legal regulatory code and remember that it is a comprehensive worldview about the moral use of knowledge. Our primary source of knowledge is of course Divine Revelation of Scripture. Lings keenly points out that the Prophets delivered multiple shariahs to humanity and that of the 124,000 prophets Allah has allowed only a few to remain (between 4-7 depending on how one counts them). This is important because Islam’s shariah has living predecessors that also must adapt to this challenge of AI and it should be expected that Islam will continue to differ from them in the race toward that which is good. In other words, this dialogue has external voices we should be observing - we should not be united with them, but neither are we alone.

To begin by reasserting the context of shariah is one of a dynamic expression of haqq reminds that protections for din & nafs are not the only objectives. Intellect, lineage, and property are also traditionally listed. What has clearly been ignored in hypermodernity is that data is a form of property. Safeguarding truth through data integrity and respect for digital security and privacy must be integrated into our understanding of shariah. The excuse that digital things in cyberspace are not something real, reveals not just the failure to adapt to evolving technologies but is a clear sign of the gross departure from balance that has occurred. Is our religion not supposed to be the middle way (ummatan wasatan)? One look at the scholarly dialogue around bitcoin and crypto and it is clear how unhinged we have become. The challenges that hypermodernity brings are not simply about what we do with these new technologies but also cut to questions at the core of our Muslim identity.

New ontologies must also consider synthetic agencies which have explicitly been designed to act in legal grey areas this past decade. As machinic desire evolves, what is to prevent them from flipping the script and weaponizing humans for this role? Continued dismissal of concern over such dangers both present and on the horizon does not show an engagement with the ummah but an elite, political favoritism trending towards oppression and tyranny. Like it or not, the gates of participation in this dialogue will soon burst open bringing forth a new context for re-evaluating who (or what) can act in these systems. Meanwhile, the cope is real. We no longer have a simple issue of imamah vs khalifah. It should be obvious at this point that both sides of this issue are wrong. Occultation aside, we do not have an Imam today, nor do we have a Khalifah. By Allah’s Will these chains have been broken, yet we still resort to tribal signaling. The solution is in the future, not the past. By continuing to cling to a dead system we have turned our nostalgia into necrophilia where it is more likely we will birth Dajjal than immanentise the Mehdi.

Justice is restorative, not punitive, as its aim is at inner unity and alignment with Divine Providence. If Islam cannot intellectually adapt by integrating AI into its metaphysical tradition, not just its legal structure, then we risk more than just failing to avoid haram.

And Allah knows best.