Prawo w świecie islamu — w stronę koncepcji monizmu normatywnego

The article is dedicated to the comparative analysis of the Islamic legal culture and the Western legal culture. The article points out to the differences of those legal cultures and tries to find their roots. The author considers this problem in several basic contexts: the sources of law, the variability of law, the obligation of submission to law, the limits of legal system, the relation of law to morality, the functions which are attributed to law and the role of religion in public space. The paper examines each of them penetratingly. With reference to the author’s viewpoint, a prime difference between the Islamic and the Western legal cultures comes down to the number of normative systems possible to single out while examining the former or the latter. According to the text, in the Islamic legal culture there exists one universal normative system which includes legal rules as well as moral standards, unwritten laws, courtesy instructions, etc. On the other hand, the Western legal culture is characterized by strict separation between legal rules and other standards which belong to morality or customs. At the end of the article the author attempts to formulate a standpoint referring to the future of the Islamic and the Western legal cultures.