In this excerpt from the introduction toQuḍāt Qurṭuba, Khushanī (d. 361/971) reminds his readers of the gravity of the decisions that Cordoban judges, past and present, confronted in their judicial proceedings. In so doing, he buttresses his account of the history of judgeships by providing some context as to the way judges both affected and were affected by the societies in which they operated. Specifically, Khushanī notes that the seriousness with which the role of judge was perceived had a detrimental effect on society, since many avoided judgeships out of fear that they would be punished for their rulings in the afterlife and that the position would leave a mark on their piety in their current lives. In her chapter in Justice and Leadership in Early Islamic Courts, Maribel Fierro uses this source to argue that the way in which potential judges reacted to offers of judgeships or the idea of serving as judges heavily impacted their reputation and image in society, with those who refused being seen as more pious and those who accepted tending to be perceived as seeking to burnish their reputations in the eyes of those in power.
This source is part of the Online Companion to the book Justice and Leadership in Early Islamic Courts, ed. Intisar A. Rabb and Abigail Krasner Balbale(ILSP/HUP 2017)—a collection of primary sources and other material used in and related to the book.