Islam is a religion that is based on the submission to the will of God as revealed most clearly in the textual tradition of the Quran and Hadith. The will of God is naturally broad, hence given to broad interpretations too.

Within the context of Islam, Muslims have had no problems embracing Islamic interpretations rendered by the four imams or other such Islamic traditions that conform to the Quran and Hadith.

Nevertheless, the hermeneutical theory and practice of Islam is often confined very narrowly to the idea of the lawful and the prohibited, ( al Halal wal Haram fil Islam ). This is when problems begin to occur as resistance to such strict interpretations of Islam are wrongfully seen as prejudiced opposition to Islam.

Reducing Islam to the 'lawful and prohibited' is an approach systematised by Yusuf Qaradawi, a methodology that has gained in currency, first in the Middle East, then in Southeast Asia, since the 1960s, when the book of the same title was first written.

In Malaysia, Qaradawi's influence has been quite deep, even among the governing Muslim elites. When Anwar Ibrahim was the president of the International Islamic University in Malaysia, he spent considerable time with Qaradawi, even expressing his support for the latter fiqh al awlawiyyat (Islamic law of priorities).