In my first criticism, I will grant, for argument’s sake, that Saemi’s thesis of Legal Interpretation is correct. According to this thesis, since God or the Prophet may legislate legal obligations or permissions that deviate from moral ones, Scriptural injunctions are legally obligatory or permitted. These include all the morally objectionable injunctions in the Qurʾān and aḥādīth that Saemi mentions (pp. 4, 7-8), as well as others. Suppose we now ask, “Should Muslims in Islamic societies today follow Scriptural injunctions that are morally objectionable?” Saemi’s answer is “no” because things are sufficiently different now. Take the Scriptural injunction that permits men to beat their wives:

During the time of the Prophet, when the status quo had no issue with deep misogyny and unqualified violence against women, insisting on correct moral principles that demanded gender equality and nonviolence toward women would not have been socially feasible. Since the injunction presented in Qurʾān 4:34 was more practically realistic for the time, it provided some degree of protection for women in 7th-century Arabia and possibly even a Pareto improvement for them (p. 222).⁴ But implementing this injunction today, Saemi explains, is unreasonable:

Saemi’s more general idea here is this. Keeping the planning conception of law in mind, one can argue that if there is a significant change in the structure of society, its laws may no longer be suitable in its new structure (p. 222). Still, one aspect must remain fixed, he avers. Because God is Just and Scripture is His Word, “the central message of Scripture cannot go against justice” (p. 222). Therefore,

But has our moral consciousness significantly broadened since the 7th century? True, we reject slavery in this day and age, and the treatment of women has drastically changed, but more needs to be said to show that our moral consciousness has matured appreciably since the time of the Prophet. Although slavery has been abolished, we still see wage slavery, corporate greed, and economic disparity around the world. And, while many societies now emphasize equality between men and women, offer educational opportunities for women, and provide legal protection for women against abuse, we live in a hypersexualized society. Women are constantly objectified and sexualized in modern media and culture. There is an arguable case, it seems to me, for thinking that human moral consciousness has not significantly broadened since the 7th century; indeed, some might argue that it has gotten worse since then (just think of the moral horrors of wars that occurred in the 20th century alone). Perhaps, in modernity, humanity has merely shifted its moral failings into new forms. It may well be that these failings are endemic to the human condition because of who we are.

In his reading of Ḥayy ibn Yaqẓān, Saemi explains that Ḥayy’s island is ideal and Absāl’s is nonideal (p. 213). Absāl’s nonideal island, he thinks, represents the Muslim community at the time of the Prophet Muḥammad (pp. 213-214). To speak in terms of the tale, Saemi holds that the Muslim community today has left Absāl’s island and is on a journey towards Ḥayy’s island if it is not already there. But nowhere in his tale does Ibn Ṭufayl suggest that Absāl’s island depicts a specific community confined to a particular time and place. On the contrary, after his failed attempt to teach philosophical wisdom to the people on Absāl’s island, Ḥayy realizes something about humanity’s predicament. As Ibn Ṭufayl writes (in a passage that Saemi also quotes):

Based on Hayy’s observation and what I think is the correct interpretation of Ibn Ṭufayl’s tale, I will now introduce the “Absāl’s Island” objection to Saemi’s Legal Interpretation solution: Most of the Muslim community (Ummah) has lived and continues to live on Absāl’s island. One may go further and argue that most of humanity has lived and continues to live on Absāl’s island. After all, Ḥayy’s realization toward the end of the tale concerns “the human condition” and how “most men ” behave, as opposed to Muslims alone. If this is correct, Saemi’s Legal Interpretation solution may be conscripted by some Muslim authorities and those interested in defending them to justify a present-day implementation of all the Scriptural injunctions in traditional Islam, including the morally objectionable ones Saemi discusses. Many Muslim fundamentalists and conservatives argue that society is currently in a deplorable state and that a return to traditional Islam as practiced during the time of the Prophet, with all its Scriptural injunctions, is the only way to remedy society’s woes. For example, Sayyid Qutb, one of the ideological founders of modern Islamic fundamentalism, elaborates on this general assessment about society in his work Milestones, using the theme of Jahiliyyah (pre-Islamic ignorance):

For Qutb, people today are steeped in Jahiliyyahh, comparable to the Jahiliyyahh of 7th-century Arabia. The solution for this problem facing society is Sharī’ah Law, which is as immutable as the laws governing the universe, and without which the only state available to humanity is Jahiliyyahh (Qutb, 2006, pp. 101, 106-107).

To further develop the “Absāl’s Island” objection to Saemi’s Legal Interpretation solution, let’s consider Ibn Ṭufayl’s tale again and ask, “Could most of the Muslim community or humanity in general ever be on Ḥayy’s island?” According to Saemi’s understanding of the tale, this island is ideal; by ‘ideal,’ he means a place where “everybody - consisting of only two persons - wants to find the truth and live in accordance with it” (p. 213). The reference to two persons here is a reference to Ḥayy and Absāl, both of whom, in the tale’s ending, go back to Ḥayy’s island to spend the rest of their lives in religious devotion (Ibn Ṭufayl, 2009, p. 165). As Saemi correctly observes, both men want to live their lives according to the truth, but Ibn Ṭufayl’s tale provides additional details about their character. Absāl is described as a fine young man devoted to his religion in its practices and through seeking religious knowledge (Ibn Ṭufayl, 2009, p. 165). He is also “naturally a thoughtful man, fond of contemplation and of probing for the deeper meanings of things” (Ibn Ṭufayl, 2009, p. 157). When Ḥayy first encounters Absāl, he recognizes Absāl as a truth seeker (Ibn Ṭufayl, 2009, p. 158). Once the two men are able to communicate with each other and Absāl learns about Ḥayy’s life on the island, he reverentially looks at Ḥayy as a man of God and wants to serve as his disciple (Ibn Ṭufayl, 2009, p. 160-161). It isn’t at all evident that we can generalize these saintly qualities to the Muslim community or even to humanity in the present world so that we can justifiably say that Ḥayy’s island is now, or ever will be, inhabited by the masses–Muslim or otherwise. Ḥayy’s island is indeed ideal, but it is idealized fiction, like the island in another eponymous work, Utopia, by Thomas More. The word “utopia” is commonly understood to mean a perfect society, based on its etymology in the Greek eu-topos, which means a “good place”; but the word can also mean “no place” if we instead use the Greek ou-topos (More, 2003, p. xi). Given the humanist brilliance that he brings to bear on his reflections on the political climate of his time, it’s plausible to think that More deliberately played with the Greek roots of the word to create this ambiguity. It is this second sense of utopia that applies to Ḥayy’s island, given the saintly qualities required to inhabit it. Most of the Muslim community and humanity in general remain on Absāl’s island.

Ḥayy offers this advice to the dwellers on Absāl’s island:

If the masses today are “on Absāl’s island”, so to speak, Hayy’s advice applies to them. Although this advice does not advocate rigid traditionalism, Islamic fundamentalism, Islamic authoritarianism, etc., it is nevertheless consistent with the sort of outlook defended by Qutb and other Muslim fundamentalists or conservatives.⁵

The only resistance Saemi offers against those who would want to deploy his Legal Interpretation solution in a modern context is to appeal to our broadened moral consciousness. As noted earlier, this contentious claim lacks any supporting argument in his book. Perhaps this is because his discussion is aimed at “progressive Muslims” (pp. 27, 29, 102). Saemi doesn’t explain who counts as a “progressive Muslim”. Still, based on his account, it seems that to be one minimally requires refraining from taking morally controversial Scriptural injunctions at face value (102). But even this rudimentary definition would rule out large segments of the Muslim population. According to the Pew Research Center’s 2013 report “The World’s Muslims: Religion, Politics and Society”, the majority of countries in the Middle East, East and North Africa, sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, and Southeast Asia favor making Sharī’ah the law of the land (Pew Research Center, 2013, p. 9). Among these countries, there is significant support for punishments such as whipping and amputating the hands of thieves, stoning adulterers, and executing apostates (Pew Research Center, 2013, p. 52, 54-55). All of these punishments are included in Saemi’s list of morally controversial passages in the Qurʾān and aḥādīth (4, 7-8). These passages would obviously be taken at face value by segments of the Muslim population that support such punishments.

To be clear and for the record, I am on Saemi’s side. Like him, I believe that our moral consciousness has matured in significant ways since the arrival of Islam as a historical religion in the 7th century. I also emphatically agree with Saemi that Muslims today should not follow Scriptural injunctions that are morally objectionable, such as those requiring the execution of apostates or licensing wife-beating. My concern with Saemi’s Legal Interpretation solution is that his justification for confining it to 7th-century Arabia, or thereabouts on the historical timeline, rests on a contentious claim unaccompanied by supporting evidence. Most traditionalist Muslims - particularly those who endorse the implementation of morally objectionable Scriptural injunctions and would, therefore, benefit the most from hearing about Saemi’s project - will reject the view that our moral consciousness today has markedly improved when compared to the Prophet’s time around 1400 years ago. The mainstream Sunnī view is that the best generation of Muslims consists of the saḥāba (followers of the Prophet Muḥammad who met him), the tābi’ūn (those who learned from the saḥāba), and the tabi’ū al-tabi’īn (those who learned from the tābi’ūn). These three groups are collectively known as the Salaf (pious predecessors) – the earliest generation of Muslims considered the most virtuous and exemplary in their practice of Islam. The theological explanation for this view can be found in the aḥādīth literature. In one ḥādīth, the Prophet Muḥammad is reported to have said:

Many Salafi and other traditionalist Muslims maintain that solving societal problems is possible only if we return to, not deviate from, the Islamic practices of the Salaf. Skepticism about the broadening of our moral consciousness and whether we have made any real moral progress over the centuries isn’t simply a product of theological suspicions. It remains part of present-day debates among philosophers and other intellectuals (e.g., Pinker, 2011; 2018 presents a morally optimistic assessment, but it is one which Gray, 2018 strongly disagrees with).

I will conclude my first criticism of Saemi’s Legal Interpretation solution by highlighting the dilemma it faces and the difficulties presented by each of its two horns. Either (i) our moral consciousness has broadened significantly since the time of the Prophet Muḥammad, or (ii) it has not. If (i), Saemi needs to provide substantial support for this claim since it is one that many non-progressive Muslims and other thinkers (both Muslim and non-Muslim) find dubious. If (ii), why should Muslims not call for more serious attempts to implement and sustain traditional Islam and Sharī’ah Law, as someone like Qutb recommends, complete with all the classical but morally problematic injunctions? While I do not think this dilemma is intractable, an adequate response will require more discussion and argument than Saemi provides in his book.

My second criticism of Saemi’s Legal Interpretation solution is that it fails to escape the Problem of Divinely Prescribed Evil, contrary to what he maintains. Again, for the sake of argument, I will grant that the thesis of Legal Interpretation is correct. Saemi offers this explanation for how this thesis solves the Problem of Divinely Prescribed Evil:

As I shall now argue in presenting the “Illusory Solution” objection to Saemi’s Legal Interpretation solution, this explanation may give the impression of solving the problem, but all it does is relocate it. This is because God’s act of issuing legal obligations or permissions is still open to moral evaluation, as Saemi himself accepts. As he says in the passage quoted above, God’s actions in issuing legal prescriptions can be judged as just (or unjust), even when we adopt Legal Interpretation. Connected to this point is another important one. Since Saemi maintains that God’s justice in issuing legal prescriptions is contingent on “sufficient reasons”, it follows that God’s mere act of issuing them does not eo ipso constitute a successful theodicy. God must also have good reasons for issuing them. As we saw earlier, Saemi holds that the central message of the Qurʾān can never go against justice, even if we accept the planning conception of the law in dealing with societal problems (pp. 222-223). The Qurʾān is explicit on the unwavering Justice of God towards humanity, as the following verses make clear (more can be cited):

From all this, I gather that Saemi thinks God’s justice remains intact whenever He issues legal obligations and permissions that include morally objectionable actions, as was the case in 7th-century Arabia. In such a scenario, God supposedly has “sufficient reasons” for issuing legal prescriptions that have immoral elements.

Unfortunately, abandoning Moral Interpretation in favor of Legal Interpretation does not resolve the issue of inconsistency. Here is why. Let I stand for an immoral action like wife-beating. Holding that God commanded I seems to involve an inconsistency, a point that Saemi acknowledges. But suppose we see I as a (or part of a) legal, not moral, injunction, L. And suppose, furthermore, that L is teleological in nature; it has the laudable goal, G, of societal improvement. In this case, Saemi seems to think there is no moral tension or inconsistency involved in God commanding L, since God is not commanding I simpliciter; His aim in commanding L, although it includes I, is to bring about G. The coherence of this position can easily be questioned by asking why an omnibenevolent, omniscient, and omnipotent being would need to proceed in this manner. To see this, let’s limit G to the societal goal of protecting women against violence. Why would an omnipotent God need I to bring about G? It may well be that because of human limitations and the feasibility constraint on social planning, ordinary mortals hoping to reduce violence against women in 7th century Arabia could do no better than issue the sort of injunction we find in Qurʾān 4:34. But the Problem of Divinely Prescribed Evil pertains to God, not ordinary mortals. Is it reasonable to think that God, whom the Qurʾān describes as the “best of planners” (8: 30), could only plan to achieve G by channeling His omnipotence through the injunction of Qurʾān 4:34? If God is omnipotent, His power to bring about social reform easily extends beyond laws that include morally objectionable components. And, if God is also omnibenevolent, He would, through His omniscience, be aware of, and act on, morally better alternatives. A consideration of God’s omnibenevolence alone creates a separate difficulty for Saemi’s position. For even if we grant that an omnipotent God can only bring about G by commanding L (which includes the immoral element, I), we might think that God’s omnibenevolence would prevent Him from doing so. An omnibenevolent being, one might argue, would not prioritize the advancement of social goods over immoralities that affect individuals.⁶

The underlying problem with holding that God can have “good reasons” for commanding L to bring about G, despite L’s inclusion of the immoral element I, is this. Given God’s attributes of omnibenevolence, omniscience, and omnipotence, it is at least prima facie reasonable to think that God can bring about G without commanding L or that He is not morally justified in commanding L even if it is somehow necessary to bring about G. These points will, no doubt, be familiar to those aware of the standard criticisms of “greater good” solutions to the Problem of Evil (e.g., Rowe, 2006, esp. pp. 265-266). People aware of these criticisms are probably also familiar with some sophisticated replies that theistic philosophers have developed to defend “greater good” solutions (e.g., Swinburne, 2001). Since, pace Saemi, the Problem of Divinely Prescribed Evil persists even if we accept his Legal Interpretation solution, it seems prudent to examine whether this solution may benefit from a supporting “greater good” (or other) theodicy. Because Saemi thinks–incorrectly, in my judgement–that the Problem of Divinely Prescribed Evil dissipates if we accept his Legal Interpretation solution, it is understandable why he does not take up the task of theodicy in his book. If I am correct, however, this is a gap that needs to be addressed.