A university lecturer's duty to follow working-hours instructions

A question on a lecturer objecting to being required on campus four days a week, in which Jordan's General Iftaa Department answered that he must follow administrative instructions issued by those with authority to issue them. ¹

The questioner said the university's rules set teaching staff's working hours at 40 a week, although actual presence is under 20, and that the university schedules teaching from Sunday to Wednesday and keeps Thursday for meetings and laboratories; he asked about a lecturer refusing this, and whether requiring four days of attendance from someone on a full salary is unjust. ¹

The Department answered that parties to contracts of exchange must honour their terms, citing the hadith that Muslims are bound by their conditions, unless a condition plainly contradicts the sharia by permitting the forbidden or forbidding the permitted. ¹ It said teaching loads, in hours and days, are governed by regulations applied by officials with delegated authority, so as long as an official acts within his powers and in the interest of teaching, his organisational decisions must be followed. ¹ It added that anyone who feels wronged should take the matter to the competent bodies rather than resort to defiance or quarrelling, whose harm outweighs any benefit, and concluded that the lecturer must follow the instructions so long as they accord with the laws and regulations. ¹

Jordan's General Iftaa Department published this fatwa on aliftaa.jo as no. 3813, dated 8 October 2023. ¹ The museum records this text as a historical document attributed to the body or scholar that issued it; it issues no ruling of its own.