SC - Islamic alchohol?

[david friedman]

The situation as I understand it was:

There were (and are) four mutually orthodox schools of law in Sunni 
Islam. In other words, members of one school of law do not regard 
members of another as heretics, but they disagree in how they 
interpret Islamic law.

On the subject of alcohol, the most tolerant of the four schools 
holds that the prohibition applies to wine (i.e. fermented grape 
juice) and to getting drunk on other things, but not to drinking 
other things. And at least one interpretation holds that "drunk" 
means "so drunk that you cannot tell the earth from the sky or a man 
from a woman." The least tolerant school holds that it is forbidden 
to drink any quantity at all of anything that, in sufficiently large 
quantities, gets you drunk.

I think my source for all of this is Hattox's book on the 
introduction of coffee; he discusses it because there was some 
dispute as to whether the prohibition applied to coffee.

Also, there is apparently a tradition according to which the Prophet 
said that date beer fermented no more than three days was permitted.

I don't know what the Shia position is.

So far as recipes are concerned, the nearest thing I know of is the 
description of how to make arrack (distilled liquor from sugar cane) 
in the _Ain I Akbari_. I don't know if the Mughals considered arrack 
permitted, or if it was being made by the Hindus, Jews, or 
Christians, or what.
David Friedman
Professor of Law
Santa Clara University
ddfr at best.com
http://www.best.com/~ddfr/