By Hujjat al-Islam Ali Mirzaei Qasabeh, Senior Instructor and Member of the Ijtihadi Circle for Family Jurisprudence at the Higher Seminary of Fiqh of the Household of the Prophet.

The Need for Seminaries to Engage with Social System Jurisprudence

Education in most seminaries continues in the traditional format, grounded in individual jurisprudence. However, fiqh fardi faces several shortcomings, including:

1. Neglect of Social Problem-Solving:
Because it focuses on individual rulings while overlooking social realities, individual jurisprudence (fiqh fardi) cannot adequately address collective issues. It deals mainly with personal duties, often perceiving itself as disconnected from social concerns.

2. Lack of Alignment with Reality:
By ignoring social contexts and communal needs, fiqh fardi fails to meet the genuine demands of people in society. Its rulings center on individual obligations and disregard the influence of societal factors on human behavior. Consequently, its derived laws may not align with social conditions, leading to inefficiency in producing contextually relevant rulings.

3. Misinterpretation of Sources:
Fiqh fardi can also lead to misinterpretation of religious texts. When a jurist performs ijtihad without considering social contexts, they may overlook social indicators and evidence, leading to flawed conclusions. Such misreadings can result in impractical or unrealistic rulings and interpretations that fail to address real-life needs.

4. Deriving Impractical Rulings:

The neglect of social realities in individual jurisprudence may lead to the derivation of impractical rulings. For example, in discussions on Hajj and the boundaries of the circumambulation area, juristic opinions may be issued that are impractical in application. Such derivations, instead of addressing the real needs of people, become confined to theoretical frameworks that have little relevance to the realities of life.

5. Ignoring the Individual as Part of Society:
Individual jurisprudence tends to view the person as an isolated being, disregarding the collective and social influences that shape individual behavior. This neglect can result in overlooking social responsibilities and the rules and regulations necessary to preserve social order. Consequently, individuals may fail to properly fulfill their social duties in practice.

6. Lack of Coherence and Systematic Organization:
Fiqh fardi is often organized thematically rather than systematically, without regard for overarching social systems. This results in a lack of coherence and logical organization in the structure of jurisprudential issues, potentially preventing jurists from engaging in comprehensive, macro-level analyses of social matters. Such disorganization can lead to a shortage of practical solutions for societal problems.

Remedies and Proposed Strategies

In today’s world, the need to shift the orientation of fiqh from an individual to a social-systems framework is more evident than ever. This change is not merely an intellectual necessity but a social imperative. Individual jurisprudence, with its focus on personal obligations, has overlooked social realities, a neglect that has led to serious consequences. To prevent these shortcomings, fiqh must move toward the jurisprudence of social systems.

The key remedy lies in embracing the discourse of social-system jurisprudence, that is, a jurisprudence that assumes responsibility for understanding and guiding social systems.

In his message to the 100th Year Anniversary of the Establishment of the Qom Seminary (May 8, 2025 / 1404-02-08), Sayyid Khamenei emphasized the significance of this approach. He called upon the seminary to take up the task of designing frameworks for the administration of society and to remain responsive and up-to-date with emerging issues. He also stressed the need to train morally upright and competent scholars capable of guiding society religiously and ethically. The Leader highlighted that fiqh must become an effective tool in the realization of the New Islamic Civilization, and must not be confined merely to individual or devotional rulings. With the establishment of an Islamic political order, he argued, fiqh must now engage with broader dimensions of human life — social, political, and systemic — and thus cannot remain limited to individual concerns alone.

Social Systems in the Thought of Shahid Sadr

According to Shahid Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr, a social system (nizam ijtima‘i) is an integrated and coherent set of laws and principles that regulate the four fundamental relationships of the human being — with God, with oneself, with others, and with nature — within a rational framework grounded in a foundational worldview (such as the theory of istikhlaf, or vicegerency). This system represents the practical manifestation of a social theory whose primary purpose is to establish a desirable social identity and to realize the overarching divine objectives within collective life.

Social systems consist of various subsystems that organize and manage different domains of social relations, such as the economic, political, cultural, and educational systems. Each operates according to the shared principles and values of the society. Hence, social systems must be designed in a way that serves the overarching goals of the social order and is rooted in the fundamental concepts of Islamic thought.

The first step toward this paradigm shift is recognizing and deeply understanding society as a living, dynamic organism. Human beings are born and shaped within a social context that inevitably influences their character and behavior. Therefore, the jurist must recognize that religious rulings must respond not only to the individual but also to social circumstances and collective needs. In other words, fiqh should aim to uncover laws and duties relevant to social systems while accounting for the mutual influence between the individual and society.

The next step is transforming the subject matter of fiqh: from the individual to society, and to the individual-in-society. Fiqh al-nizamāt al-ijtima‘iyyah must engage with the laws and rulings governing social institutions such as the family, the economy, and education. This approach allows the jurist to derive rulings within their social context, based on real interactions between individuals and systems. In doing so, fiqh becomes an effective tool for addressing social issues and fulfilling collective needs.

Moreover, designing a new structural framework for fiqh — one based on social systems — can lead to a major transformation in the discipline. Within this framework, fiqh should be divided into two broad sections:

1. Fiqh al-jamā‘ah (Jurisprudence of society) – dealing with laws and rulings related to social systems.

2. Fiqh al-fard fī al-jamā‘ah (Jurisprudence of the individual within society) – focusing on the rights and duties of the individual within the social context.

This division enables jurists to examine both individual and societal issues comprehensively and to derive rulings that are contextually relevant and socially grounded.

Finally, fiqh must adopt new methodological approaches in the process of derivation (istinbāt). Text-based and problem-based methodologies can help jurists address social realities more holistically and derive rulings that respond to the real needs of the community. For example, in the problem-based approach, the jurist begins with key questions related to social issues, examines the relevant scriptural sources, and extracts applicable rulings. Such methods not only enrich the scholarly depth of fiqh but also enhance the quality and practicality of its conclusions.

Through this transformation and new structural vision, fiqh can evolve into an effective means for solving social challenges and promoting public welfare and prosperity. This approach not only mitigates the limitations of individual jurisprudence but also elevates fiqh into a responsive, dynamic, and socially engaged discipline. By continuously adapting to social developments and emerging needs, fiqh can remain a living and evolving science — one that strengthens the connection between religion and social life, serving humanity and the community at large.

Therefore, fiqh must be regarded as a vital, dynamic discipline capable of responding to the demands of the age and adapting to new challenges. This requires the commitment and intellectual effort of jurists and scholars, who, by drawing upon the rich resources of the Islamic tradition and social experience, can contribute to the establishment of balanced and just social systems.