Who is sovereign? This is not a purely speculative or theoretical question. It has concrete implications on questions of governance and state. It is, in an age of the fetishization of the state, a subversive question. In this article, I begin with an excursion into our present state of affairs, in relation to the fetishized modern state. I go on to explain the dimensions of what we call the political space in order to identify the origins of fetishization and tughyān (transgression) and introduce the concept of exteriority (that which originates beyond a hegemonic order, or state). I then identify two dimensions of tawḥīd, God’s creative will (irāda khalqiyya) and a more neglected dimension, God’s legislative will (irāda shar’iyya). I explore the ways in which these two dimensions of tawḥīd culminate in a liberatory philosophy and a radically new conception of politics. Finally, I explore the dimensions of God’s legislative will by examining the ways in which, contrary to the self-referential nature of the modern state, the Islamic polity is other-referential in that it is contingent onto (1) the absolute sovereignty of God and (2) the creative and dynamic authority of the community through the ijtihad and shura.
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