The Muttazilι Hanafijurist Abu l-Husayn al-Basri (d. 436/1044) has left his influ­ence on many later legal theorists, who cite his positions, even if only to refute them.[296]

Active in Baghdad, he belonged to the Basran branch of the Mu^ttazila. He was a student of ^tAbd al-Jabbar, and undeniably indebted to him, though he did not shy to hold views different from his teacher.

Anver Emon, following Gimaret, calls him a dissident among the Muttazila.^[297] [298] In al-Basri’s main work on legal theory, the Kltab al-Mu^ctamadfi usul al-fiqh, he, in contrast to tAbd al-Jabbar, deliberately does not concern himself with theological questions but presents a coherent methodology of law-finding (usul al-fiqh)? His Muttazili commitments, though, are unambiguous. Throughout his work, al-Basri exhib­its hallmarks of Muttazilism - the belief in God doing only what is good, in a continuous moral universe, confidence in human rationality, and a linguistic interpretative approach that relies on the utterances (alfaz) of Revelation. In what follows, I lay out al-Basri’s conception of ethical norms of acts, how they relate to their legal status, and the grounds on which these assessments are made. The final section addresses al-Basri’s understanding of the ^rilla, its role in legal analogy, and ways to determine it.

1

More on the topic The Muttazilι Hanafijurist Abu l-Husayn al-Basri (d. 436/1044) has left his influ­ence on many later legal theorists, who cite his positions, even if only to refute them.[296]: