Sharia dynamics

Over the past decades, the field of Islamic anthropology, which is considered a virgin field compared to other religious fields, has turned into a battleground among anthropologists over what the subject of this field should be, what the essence of Islam is, and what are the most important ethnographic and theoretical methods that must be used for a more accurate understanding of Islam. Islam has begun to transform or take the lead in the scene in the Middle East and the Islamic world, as a spokesperson for groups calling for its replacement instead of Western nationalist and modernist ideas. In this context, it can be said that researchers have divided into two main visions. The first sees that researchers in this field should study Muslims' ideas, feelings, and interpretations, considering them as producing local or specific Islams according to the environment in which they live. According to this view, talking about a single or essentialist Islam based on traditional texts is just a partial reading of the scene, as any new reading requires paying attention to people's speech and their blending of the religious and the everyday in their lives, in addition to the necessity of studying their interpretations and practices. The anthropologist Gabriele Marranci, author of the book "Islam Anthropology" published by Oxford University in 2008, is one of the most prominent proponents of this opinion. He believes that the Quran and the pillars of Islam will remain mute and meaningless without minds and feelings that give them form and imbue them with uniqueness through the individual's own Islamization. According to this vision, we are not today facing a single Islam in any country, but rather multiple Islams, some historical, others recreated or reshaped by revivalist movements, or by state regimes, and others by globalization, within what Olivier Roy calls the religious market, where religious teachings are dealt with as a market logic, with individuals taking what they desire from ideas and rejecting others.