The Method of Jurisprudential Understanding of the Customary Subjects

Customary subjects have a major part in the Islamic jurisprudential subjects that their methodological understanding plays a significant role in the inference of Islamic jurisprudential rulings. Applying the jurisprudential approach in the process of understanding customary subjects is significant. In this sense, it is necessary to explore the aspects of the subjects which have been under consideration by experts in field of "Cognition"; The aspects which are effective in the inference of jurisprudential ruling. The jurisprudential understanding of the customary subjects includes, at least, the identification of stages such as type, concept, criteria, and examples of which this article attempts to draw these steps systematically. The findings of this paper indicate that the first step in recognizing the subjects of the Islamic rulings is to determine their type through a clear definition of customary subjects. Accordingly, customary subjects fall into two distinct categories: the textual (Manṣūs) and non-textual (Ghayr Manṣūs) that the recognition of their stages and types requires specific method and rules. To distinguish between types of subjects, this paper introduces two principles: the Originality of non-transmission (Aṣālat ʿAdam al-Naql) and the Originality of non-qualification (Aṣālat ʿAdam al-Taqyyīd), as well as thirteen important points, to recognize their concept. At the end, the method of identifying non-textual subjects is discussed.