Modern Muslim reformers redefined sharia into a private sphere of conscience

Evidence

In Safwat’s proposal for reform, the basic moral appeal is to conscience in the Kantian sense. The shari¯‘a comes to be equated with jurisprudential rules concerning marriage, divorce, and inheritance, with the resolution of disputes arising from such relationships, and also with the rules for proper worship. The consequence of that equation is not simply abridgement but a rearticulation of the concepts of law and morality. The latter comes increasingly to be seen as rules of conduct whose sanctions are essentially different from those of legal rules—that is, not subject to institutionalized, worldly punishments. This is precisely what one finds in the liberal reform lawyers who describe the shari¯‘a as “the law of personal status” (qa¯nu¯n al-ahwa¯l al-shakhsiyya), that is, as rules for regulating “the family,” a modern institution built around the married couple. — Talal Asad, Formations of the Secular, 1196

Categorization

• ADDENDUM: Parallel to the immodesty essay thread and to Cooper: how the ‘private/family’ categorization of religion replicates a secular Christian-modern template.
• XREF: Directly bridges to Melinda Cooper’s argument that secular modernity quietly privileges Christian-family norms by relegating religion to the private sphere. — connects to: The Sharia was codified to administer an empire spanning diverse peoples