Wudu in the Anthropocene: Reclaiming Ṭahārah–Najāsah as an Islamic Epistemology of Pollution in Indonesia's Environmental Fatwas, 2011–2023
Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: This study asks whether an older, more granular epistemic resource within classical fiqh — the doctrine of ṭahārah–najāsah (ritual purity and impurity), with its finely graded taxonomy of contamination (najis mukhaffafah, mutawassiṭah, and mughallaẓah) — has likewise been mobilised. Using directed qualitative content analysis of the complete corpus of MUI's five national environmental fatwas issued between 2011 and 2023 (on environmentally sound mining, endangered-species conservation, waste management, forest and land fires, and general environmental protection), this study finds that all five rely exclusively on maqāṣid-based reasoning (khalīfah, amānah, maṣlaḥa, darʾ al-mafāsid) and that none invokes technical ṭahārah–najāsah vocabulary, despite its structural affinity with the graded, threshold-based logic of contemporary pollution governance. Building on this empirical finding, the study proposes fiqh al-ṭahārah al-bīʿiyyah (environmental purity jurisprudence) as a complementary, embodied register that could translate abstract maqāṣid principles into graded, everyday ritual practice aligned with SDG 6, 12, 13, 14, and 15.
Language: English
Subfield: Religious studies
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
OpenAlex ID: W7214901042