In the Holy Qur’an and in Traditions from the Holy Prophet and the Imams...

In the Holy Qur’an and in Traditions from the Holy Prophet and the Imams, we have been repeatedly commanded towards profound understanding ( tafaqqah ) in the religion, and from the collective content of these sources it is to be discerned that the view of Islam is that Muslims understand Islam, in all its aspects, profoundly and with thorough insight. Of course profound understanding in religion, consisting of all the Islamic aspects, is a great blessing from God.

It is common to what relates to the principles of Islamic beliefs and the Islamic world-view or sense of values, to Islamic morals, ethics and upbringing, to all the aspects of Islamic society, to Islamic worship, to the civil ordinances of Islam, to the particular Islamic customs of the individual and of the society, and more.

However, since the second century of the Hijra, the word jurisprudence has become a term for a special area of understanding amongst Muslims that can be said to be jurisprudence in the commands of religion or jurisprudence in the deducing of the commands of religion. In other words "precise and profound deducing of the Islamic regulations of actions from the relevant sources".

The commands or regulations of Islam have not been explained by the Qur’an or by the Prophet and the Imams in such a way that each and every particularity has been expressly dealt with. Nor is such a thing possible, for events and situations occur in endlessly different forms. Instead, generalities and precepts have been laid before us in the form of a chain of principles.

A person who wants to explain the law of a certain matter to himself or others, must refer to the resources and authentic documents-and later we will clarify the nature of these-and must explain his viewpoint while bearing in mind all the different aspects of those authentic documents. And it is this that is meant by jurisprudence being joined to precise and profound understanding of all aspects.

The masters of jurisprudence ( fuqaha ) when defining jurisprudence, use the following sentence: Jurisprudence is the study of the secondary commands (i.e. not the principle matters of beliefs and moral perfection, but the commands regulating actions) of the Shari'ah of Islam gained from the detailed resources and proofs. The Principles of Jurisprudence For the study of jurisprudence, mastery of many other branches of learning are necessary as a preparation, and these consist of the following: 1.