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Solo. Can religion help protect the environment? Yes, according to the Islamic scholars who gathered for the ninth annual Conference on Islamic Studies in Solo, which concluded on Wednesday.

Ahmad Syafii, a Shariah expert from the Sunan Giri Institute of Islamic Studies in Ponorogo, East Java, proposed the creation of an Islamic court, or fiqh , to deal with environmental issues.

In a presentation titled “Revitalization of Ushul Fiqh for the Conservation and Restoration of the Cosmos,” Syafii said conserving the environment was a religious issue and therefore should be addressed through the establishment of a fiqh.

Syafii said such actions were necessary “since the holy scripture says that any damage to the Earth is made by the hands of man.”

Syafii called the fiqh the bridge that links ethics to law. “The fiqh is both ethical and normative. As an ethical guideline, the fiqh has to define mashlahah [benefits] and mafsadah [detriments]. As a normative law, it is based on taklifi [defining] law that categorizes deeds as wajib [compulsory], sunnah [recommended], mubah [neutral], makruh [offensive], and haram [forbidden]. In this context, a fiqh on environmental issues is relevant in the saving of the cosmos,” Syafii said.

He said the environmental fiqh, or fiqh al-bi’ah, would drive a breakthrough in the conservation and restoration of the environment by using religious perspectives to supplement other scientific disciplines.

To develop an environmental fiqh, Syafii emphasized the need to revitalize ushul fiqh , the research methods of Islamic jurisprudence. “Ushul fiqh seeks to define experiences and come up with a theory of deed, logic, behavior and methodology of practical activity,” he said.

Strengthening ushul fiqh, Syafii said, would steer the fiqh back to its true purpose: to benefit mankind.

Syafii warned that if ushul fiqh were not revived, an environmental fiqh would suffer the fate of other courts, and become trapped in linguistic definitions and ignorant of empirical facts. “Let us not create another deductive fiqh,” he said.

Syafii urged the participants in the conference, fellow academics from Islamic universities in Indonesia, to help make the environmental fiqh a reality. He said the creation of a fiqh that is considerate, sensitive and environmentally conscious is a must.

To do this while reinvigorating ushul fiqh, Syafii emphasized that one had to look at ushul fiqh from a new multicultural viewpoint.

“We live in a diverse Indonesia, so a monocultural fiqh, that relies only on textbook law without considering cultural interests, will only create harm and internal conflict,” he said.

Dr. Eka Putra Wirman, a professor from the Imam Bonjol Institute of Islamic Studies in Padang, said revitalization of ushul fiqh and the drafting of an environmental fiqh is a critical part of redefining Islamic studies in Indonesia.