Hanafi is one of the four schools (madhabs) of Fiqh or religious law within Sunni Islam. It is considered to be the school most open to modern ideas. Hanafi is predominant among Sunni Muslims in Egypt, Turkey, the Levant, Bosnia-Herzegovina, the Indian subcontinent and parts of West Africa, although students of Islam throughout the world study and may choose to observe its conclusions about Islamic practice. Hanafi is the largest of the four schools; it is followed by approximately 30% of Muslims world-wide.
The presence of four different schools of religious law within Sunni Islam should not be viewed as a schism. On the contrary, there is little or no animosity between the schools. Instead there is a healthy cross-pollination of ideas and logical debate that serves to refine each school's understanding of Islam. It is not uncommon, or disallowed, for an individual to follow one school but take the point of view of another school for a certain issue.
There are a number of online resources for answers in Hanafi fiqh, including (SunniPath.com (http://www.SunniPath.com)), which also has answers according to Shafii fiqh. You may interact with Hanafi Muslims at the forums of www.masud.co.uk, http://groups.yahoo.com/group/al-zawiya or http://www.sunniport.com
Shah Mahmoud Hanifi is an Assistant Professor of History who received a B.A. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a Ph.D. from The University of Michigan.
Dr. Hanifi’s research interests include colonialism, state formation, tribal economies, ethnic identity and relations, trans-national trade, mobile merchant communities, and nomadism.
Dr. Hanifi serves on the Executive Board and as the Treasurer for the American Institute of Afghanistan Studies, and is the faculty initiator of Greater Asian Studies at JMU.
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