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Usulism (Arabic:الأصولية,romanized: al-ʾUṣūliyya) is the majority school ofTwelverShiaIslam in opposition to the minorityAkhbarism. The Usulis favor the use ofijtihad (reasoning) in the creation of new rules ofjurisprudence; in assessinghadith to exclude traditions they believe unreliable; and in considering it obligatory to obey amujtahid when seeking to determine Islamically correct behavior.
Since the crushing of the Akhbaris in the late 18th century, it has been the dominant school of Twelver Shi'a and now forms an overwhelming majority within the Twelver Shiadenomination.
The nameUsuli derives from the termUṣūl al-fiqh (principles of jurisprudence). In Usuli thought, there are four valid sources of law: theQuran,hadith,ijma' and'aql. Ijma' refers to a unanimous consensus. Aql, in Shia jurisprudence, is applied to four practical principles which are applied when other religious proofs are not applicable:[1]: 284–5 bara'at (immunity),ihtiyat (recommended precautions),takhyir (selection), andistishab (the presumption of continuity in the previous state).
The term Usuli is also sometimes used to refer more generally to students ofusul especially among early Muslims, without regard to Shia Islam. Students/scholars of theprinciples of fiqh are distinguished from scholars offiqh itself, whose scholars are known asfaqīh (pluralfuqahā').[2]
The Usuli believe that theHadith collections contained traditions of varying degrees of reliability, and that critical analysis was necessary to assess their authority. In contrast, the Akhbari believe that the sole sources of law are theQur'an and the Hadith, in particularthe Four Books accepted by the Shia: everything in these sources is in principle reliable, and outside them, there was no authority competent to enact or deduce further legal rules.
In addition to assessing the reliability of the Hadith, Usuli believes the task of the legal scholar is to establish intellectual principles of general application (Usul al-fiqh), from which particular rules may be derived by way of deduction. Accordingly, Usuli legal scholarship has the tools in principle for resolving new situations that are not already addressed in Quran or Hadith (seeijtihad).
An important tenet of Usuli doctrine isTaqlid or "imitation", i.e. the acceptance of a religious ruling in matters of worship and personal affairs from someone regarded as a higher religious authority (e.g. an 'ālim) without necessarily asking for the technical proof. These higher religious authorities can be known as a "source of imitation" (Arabicmarja taqlid مرجع تقليد, Persianmarja) or less exaltedly as an "imitated one" (Arabic مقلَدmuqallad). However, his verdicts are not to be taken as the only source of religious information and he can be always corrected by other muqalladeen (the plural of muqallad) which come after him. Obeying a deceased muqallad is forbidden in Usuli.[3]: 225
Taqlid has been introduced by scholars who felt that Quranic verses and traditions were not enough and thatulama were needed not only to interpret the Quran andSunna but to make "new rulings to respond to new challenges and push the boundaries of Shia law in new directions."[4]
By their debates and books,Al-Mufid,Sayyid-al Murtada, andShaykh al-Tusi in Iraq were the first to introduce theUṣūl al-fiqh (principles of Islamic jurisprudence) under the influence of theShafe'i andMu'tazili doctrines.Al-Kulayni, inRey, andal-Sadduq, inQom, were concerned with a traditionalist approach. The second wave of the Usuli was shaped in the Mongol period whenal-Hilli introduced the termmujtahid, meaning an individual qualified to deduce ordinances on the basis of authentic religious arguments. By developing the theory of theusul, al-Hilli introduced more legal and logical norms which extended the meaning of theusul beyond the four principal sources.Amili was the first scholar to fully formulate the principles ofijtihad.
These traditional principles ofShi'a jurisprudence were challenged by the 17th-centuryAkhbari school, led byMuhammad Amin al-Astarabadi. A reaction against Akhbari arguments was led in the last half of the 18th century byMohammad Bagher Shafti andMuhammad Baqir Behbahani.[1]: 284–285 He attacked the Akhbari and their method was abandoned by Shia.[1]: 230 The dominance of the Usuli over the Akhbari came when Behbahani led the Usuli to dominance and "completely routed the Akhbaris atKarbala andNajaf", so that "only a handful of Shi'iulama have remained Akhbari to the present day."[3]: 127
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