Using the Maqāṣid al-Sharī'ah to Furnish an Islamic Bioethics: Conceptual and Practical Issues

The field of Islamic bioethics is currently in development as thinkers delineate its normative content, ethical scope and research methods. Some scholars have offered Islamic bioethical frameworks based on the maqāṣid al-Sharī'ah, the higher objectives of Islamic law, to help advance the field. Accordingly, a recent JBI paper by Ibrahim and colleagues describes a method for using the maqāṣid al-Sharī'ah to provide moral end-goals and deliberative mechanisms for an Islamic bioethics. Herein I highlight critical conceptual and practical gaps in the model with the hopes of fostering greater discussion about how maqāṣid al-Sharī'ah frameworks may fit within Islamic bioethics deliberation.