The sixth period of the historical development of Islamic law has been known as taqlid period—a period
preceded by the collapse of Baghdad at the hands of Holagu in the year of 656 AH. In the midst of a fanatical
mahzab, a muslim scholar, Ibn Rusyd, emerged as the auther of a fiqh book entitled Bidayah al-Mujtahid, also
as a jurist of anti-taqlid. There are some methods he used in performing ‘law istinbath’, yet there is no book has
explained the method. This study identifyed the methods used by Ibn Rusyd in performing the ‘law istinbath’
contained in the fiqh book Bidayah al’Mujtahid. Some findings an it are as follows: the method of ‘law
istinbath’ Ibn Rusyd used has been conducted by seeing the various opinions, propositions, methods from
various ‘imam mahzab’. Then, those opinions, propositions and methods are compared and the most suitable
one is chosen to be applied. Ibn Rusyd law istinbath method is actually an ijtihad intiqa’i that is practiced with
conducting mahzab comparison method. In resolving conflict between the propositions used, Ibn Rusyd has
used the following method: Giving priority to Al-Jam’u wal al-Taufiq rather than tarjih. If choosing to perform
the tarjih, some important things need to be noted: 1) The Sunnah with some narrators is given priority over the
sunnah with few narrators, 2) The Sunnah whose narrators are proficient in law is prioritized overthe sunnah
whose narrators are less proficient, 3) The Sunnah which is supported by other propositions is preferred over the
sunnah which has no supporting propositions, 4) The authentic Sunnah Ahad would take precedence over the
propositions of al-khitab and qiyas. 5) Dalalah manthuq is preferred over dalalah mafhum. 6) A specific
proposition would take precedence over the proposition of a general nature, and 7) The verse of a general nature
is preferred over qiyas.
Keywords: Method, Istinbath, Law