Expanding the Islamic Legal Imagination

This white paper explores how artificial intelligence (AI)-particularly generative and multimodal systems-disrupts and reconfigures foundational assumptions in Islamic legal reasoning. Drawing from classical jurisprudence, theological discourse, and epistemological traditions, the paper proposes the framework of fiqh al-khay¯al al-s.in¯a¯ı (jurisprudence of artificial imagination) to interpret AI not merely as a tool but as an epistemic and ethical provocation. Through sections on ijtih¯ad, non-human knowledge, agency, structural justice, and analogical logic, the paper engages historical precedents involving jinn, angels, and dreams alongside contemporary debates on automation, personhood, and algorithmic reasoning. It urges scholars to reimagine Islamic law as a dynamic, responsive tradition capable of interrogating AI’s moral consequences and computational metaphors, while affirming human interpretive authority and divine ethical anchoring. The paper concludes with a call to cultivate interdisciplinary institutions, legal innovation, and theological humility as Muslims enter a new phase of jurisprudential imagination in the age of machines.

The paper can be accessed here.