Hard Core, Protective Belt, and Epistemological Rigidity: A Lakatosian Framework for Reassessing Islamic Scholarship
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.22373/jpi.v6i1.34535Keywords:
Islamic Epistemology, Intellectual Rigidity, Lakatos’s Research Programme, Protective Belt, IjtihādAbstract
This article develops a conceptual framework for examining intellectual rigidity in selected strands of Islamic scholarship through Imre Lakatos’s Research Programme framework. It addresses a recurring tendency to treat historically developed products of ijtihad, including legal methodologies, theological formulations, exegetical approaches, and historiographical narratives, as though they possessed the same non-revisable status as revelation. The article draws on Lakatos’s writings, works by M. Amin Abdullah, Fazlur Rahman, Nasr Hamid Abu Zaid, and Mohammed Arkoun, as well as relevant scholarship on Islamic epistemology, usul al-fiqh, Qur’anic interpretation, and kalam. Its analysis focuses on epistemological propositions concerning the relationship between theological commitments and historically situated intellectual formulations. Lakatos’s framework is employed as an analytical adaptation, not as a direct equivalence between revelation and scientific theory. Within this framework, tawhid, the divine origin of revelation, and fundamental ethical commitments function as the limited hard core, whereas historically developed formulations in fiqh, kalam, Qur’anic interpretation, and religious historiography are examined as elements of a revisable protective belt. The article argues that intellectual rigidity may emerge when historically contingent formulations are treated as immune from critical reassessment. It proposes a Lakatosian model consisting of a limited hard core, an identifiable protective belt, and a positive heuristic guided by historical sensitivity, interdisciplinary engagement, and maqasid al-shariah. The model is intended as a conceptual instrument for assessing whether inherited formulations remain responsive to changing intellectual and social conditions.
Downloads
References
Abdullah, M. A. (1995). Falsafah kalam : di era postmodernisme. Pustaka Pelajar.
Abdullah, M. A. (1998). Preliminary Remarks On The Philosopy of Islamic Religious Science. Al-Jami’ah: Journal of Islamic Studies, 36(61), 1–26. https://aljamiah.or.id/ajis/article/view/3040
Abdullah, M. A. (2002). Antara Al-Ghazali dan Kant: Filsafat Etika Islam. MIzan.
Abdullah, M. A. (2014). RELIGION, SCIENCE AND CULTURE An Integrated, Interconnected Paradigm of Science. Al-Jāmi‘ah: Journal of Islamic Studies, 52(1), 175–203. https://doi.org/10.14421/ajis.2014.521.175-203
Al-Syāfi’ī, M. ibn I. (1940). Risālah li al-Imām Muḥammad ibn Idrīs al-Shāfi’ī. Bi-taḥqīq wa syarḥ Aḥmad Muḥammad Syākir. al-Qāhirah. Syarikat Maktabat wa Maṭba’at Muṣṭafā al-Bābī al-Ḥalabī wa Awlādih.
Arkoun, M. (1994). Rethinking Islam: Common Question, Uncommon Answers, trans. Robert D. Lee. Westview Press.
Arkoun, M. (2002). The Unthought in Contemporary Islamic Thought. Saqi Books.
Arkoun, M. (2006). Islam: To Reform or to Subvert? Saqi Books.
Asad, T. (1986). The Idea of an Anthropology of Islam. Center for Contemporary Arab Studies, Georgetown University.
Auda, J. (2008). Maqasid Al-shariah as Philosophy of Islamic Law: A Systems Approach. International Institute of Islamic Thought.
Bassam al-Jamal. (2005). Asbāb al-Nuzūl. al-Markaz al-Tsaqafi.
Hallaq, W. B. (1984). Was the Gate of Ijtihad Closed? International Journal of Middle East Studies, 16(1), 3–41. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0020743800027598
Hallaq, W. B. (2001). Authority, Continuity and Change in Islamic Law. Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511495557
Irfan Habib, S. (2008). Modern science and Islamic essentialism. Economic and Political Weekly, 43(36), 55–61. https://www.jstor.org/stable/40277927
Khir, B. M. S. (2007). Islamic Studies within Islam: definition, approaches and challenges of modernity. Journal of Beliefs & Values, 28(3), 257–266. https://doi.org/10.1080/13617670701712430
Koren, J., & Nevo, Y. D. (1991). Methodological Approaches to Islamic Studies. Der Islam, 68(1), 87–107. http://www.degruyter.com/view/j/islm.1991.68.issue-1/islm.1991.68.1.87/islm.1991.68.1.87.xml
Lakatos, I. (1968). Criticism and the Methodology of Scientific Research Programmes. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 69, 149–186. http://www.jstor.org/stable/4544774
Lakatos, I., & Musgrave, A. (1970). Criticism and the Growth of Knowledge. Cambridge University Press.
Naufala, F. N. F., & Sudjatnika, T. (2025). Pemikiran Islam Klasik dan Modern dalam Konteks Revitalisasi Peradaban Umat Islam. Jurnal Teologi Islam, 1(2), 208–215. http://indojurnal.com/index.php/jti/article/view/601
Nurfadillah, Usman, A. S., Zain, M., Fahira, J., & Rama, B. (2025). Pemikiran Modern Dalam Konteks Islam Global. Socius: Jurnal Penelitian Ilmu-Ilmu Sosial, 2(10), 319–324. https://ojs.daarulhuda.or.id/index.php/Socius/article/view/1388
Rahman, F. (1980). Tema-Tema Pokok Al-Qur’an, trans. Anas Mahyuddin. Pustaka.
Rahman, F. (1995). Islamic Methodology in History. Islamic Research Institiute.
Rippin, A. (1988a). Approaches to The History of The Interpretation of The Qur’an. Clarendon Press.
Rippin, A. (1988b). The function of asbāb al-nuzūl in Qur’ānic exegesis. Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, 51(1), 1–20. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0041977X00020188
Saeed, A. (2006). Interpreting the Qur’an: Towards a Contemporary Approach. outledge.
Sutarto, D. (2017). Epistemologi Keilmuan Integratif-Interkonektif M. Amin Abdullah dan Resolusi Konflik. JURNAL TRIAS POLITIKA, 1(2), 75–88. https://doi.org/10.33373/jtp.v1i2.1064
Syamsuddin, S. (2018). Ma’na-cum- Maghza Aproach to The Qur’an: Interpretation of Q. 5:51. Proceedings of the International Conference on Qur’an and Hadith Studies (ICQHS 2017), 137, 131–136. https://doi.org/10.2991/icqhs-17.2018.21
Waston, W. (2016). Pemikiran Epistemologi Amin Abdullah dan Relevansinya Bagi Pendidikan Tinggi di Indonesia. Profetika: Jurnal Studi Islam, 17(01), 80–89. https://doi.org/10.23917/profetika.v17i01.2102
Zaid, N. H. A. (1990). Tamhīd: al-Khithāb al-Dīny wa al-Manhaj al-‘Ilmy. In Mafhūm al-Nash (pp. 9–28). al-Markaz al-Tsaqafy.
Zaid, N. H. A. (2002). Tekstualitas Al-Quran (Cet II). LKiS Yogyakarta.
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2026 Akmal Alna
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Authors who publish in Jurnal Pemikiran Islam agree to the following terms:
- Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0) that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgment of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgment of its initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work. (See The Effect of Open Acces)
