When Bayān Speaks, Burhān Whispers, and ’Irfān Sleeps: An Al-Jabirian Epistemological Audit of Islamic Environmental Texts and Their Unspoken Alliance with the SDGs (2014–2025)

Supriyanto Supriyanto; Kholid Mawardi; Zein Muchamad Masykur

doi:10.55927/fjmr.v5i9.199

Authors

Supriyanto Supriyanto Universitas Islam Negeri Prof. K.H. Saifuddin Zuhri Purwokerto
Kholid Mawardi Universitas Islam Negeri Prof. K.H. Saifuddin Zuhri Purwokerto
Zein Muchamad Masykur Universitas Islam Negeri Prof. K.H. Saifuddin Zuhri Purwokerto

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.55927/fjmr.v5i9.199

Keywords:

SDGs, Islamic Philosophy, Environment, Islamic Epistemology, Eco-Fatwa

Abstract

Islamic environmental normativity has expanded rapidly, yet little is known about the epistemological architecture the ways of knowing on which its texts are built. This study operationalises Muhammad Abed al-Jabiri’s tripartite epistemology (bayānī, textual; burhānī, demonstrative; ’irfānī, intuitive) as a directed content-analysis coding frame and audits six Islamic environmental texts issued between 2014 and 2025: four fatwas of the Indonesian Ulema Council on wildlife, waste, forest burning, and rivers, lakes and seas the Islamic Declaration on Global Climate Change (2015), and Al-Mizan: A Covenant for the Earth (2024). Coding 571 argumentative units yields three findings. First, the fatwas are bayānī-dominant but exhibit a demonstrative turn: the bayānī share falls monotonically from 69.5% (2014) to 39.8% (2025) while the burhānī share rises from 30.5% to 59.1%, propelled by explicit citation of global marine-pollution science and national statistics. Second, ’irfānī reasoning is nearly absent from fatwas (0–1.1%) but carries the motivational weight of the transnational texts (17.5% of the Declaration’s units; 12.1% of the Covenant’s). Third, engagement with the Sustainable Development Goals is almost entirely latent: only Al-Mizan names the goals, even as every text substantively aligns with goals on health, water, consumption, climate, and life on land an unspoken alliance.

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