Abstract

Studies have demonstrated the therapeutic effects of listening to music, such as the potential of enhancing creativity and helping maintain thriving levels of energy, and its detrimental effects, such as the potential of causing rapid changes in emotions, leading to depression and becoming a form of escapism whereby an individual avoids problems they are facing. In view of this, what is the status of music in the Sharia? Is it permissible to listen to?

This article delineates how the different hermeneutical frameworks in Shiite scholarship derive Sharia regulations on music from evidence mentioning ghināʾ. The first section outlines Mullā Muḥsin al-Fayḍ al-Kāshānī’s (d. 1680) utility of the Akhbārī framework in his derivation of the regulation of the permissibility of ghināʾ; the second section presents Sayyid Abū Qāsim al-Khūʾī’s (d. 1992) utility of the orthodox Uṣūlī framework in his derivation of the regulation of the prohibition of ghināʾ; and the final section summarises the utility of the Existential framework in the derivation of its regulation on music.