Religious Law in the Service of Human Rights?

During the 1990s, a period representing the peak of often novel interpretations in human rights litigation by the judges of the Egyptian Supreme Constitutional Court, Egypt’s human rights performance was better than in other Islamic states sharing a commitment to the supremacy of Shari’a law. This article argues that there is a gap between the dogmatic assertion of the communal good life defined in traditional Islamic terms and the reality of governance usually at odds with these stipulations. The peculiar practice of the Egyptian Supreme Constitutional Court in the 1990s highlighted two crucial, related questions: first, was it in principle possible to narrow that gap and align governmental action to rules derived from scripture? Second, does the highly fragmented and inconsistent character of classical Islamic law offer advantages in its adaptation to modernity? This article claims that the relative progress towards compliance with international human rights standards was due to progressive and strategically litigating judges, who used Islamic law opportunistically rather than dogmatically.