Both are two theories of western democracy. They have appeared in Europe after the bloody conflict in the Middle Ages and went on for several centuries thereafter. This is because Europe was ruled by kings and it’s political scene was dominated by the theory of “the Divine Right of kings”. This theory states that the king has the divine right to rule the people. Therefore, he has full right to control the people. Therefore, he has full right to control legislation, authority and the administration of the law. The people are his subjects and have no right except the right to obey. According to the king’s point of view they are slaves who have no opinion or will of their own and their duty is confined to obey and carryout his word. These kings oppressed people to the utmost, so people cried out everywhere and revolts broke out, but kings used to extinguish them by force. True, this force used to get rid of revolutions but it did so only temporarily, because these revolutions were carried out and backed by the whole people, especially by scholars and thinkers. Revolutions were primarily intellectual but they soon turned to be bloody. In the meantime, several theories appeared to get rid of the theory of Divine Right of Kings, which kings claimed. The most important of these theories are two: Sovereignty is the nation’s and, the nation is the source of authority.

People found that it is inevitable to abolish “The Divine Right of kings” entirely and make legislation and authority the right of the nations solely. So a new point was brought out: the people are masters, not slaves; it is they who choose the governor they want; consequently two theories arose: “Sovereignty is the nation’s” and “the nation is the source of authority”. To realize these theories the republican system was established.

The theory of sovereignty stated that the individual has a will and the ability of execution. If his will is taken away and run by someone else he becomes a slave. But if he directs his will by himself he becomes a master. The people should master their wills by themselves because they are not slaves of the king but are freemen and as long as they are the masters of their will and no one has any authority over them, they are the ones who have a right to legislation and the administration of the law.

Slavery means submission to the will of others. To liberate the people from slavery, it is inevitable that they should alone master their will by themselves. They have the right to enact the law which they want and to cancel the law which they refuse. As a result, the flames of revolutions for liberation broke out kings were removed and the “Divine Right” turned to be a thing of the past. The theory of the nation’s sovereignty was set up and applied. The people became the legislator and parliaments came to represent the people and exercise sovereignty on their behalf. For this cause, one hears them say: Parliament is the master of itself because it represents the people who alone possess sovereignty.

Sovereignty means supreme power over the will and, its direction. But if the people can exercise their sovereignty by finding representatives who legislate, they cannot practice their authority by themselves directly, therefore, they have to deputize some persons to do so. So they entrusted execution to them. Consequently, a theory was established: the nation is the source of authorities; that is, it is the one which appoints its body of authority, namely, those who take over the government and are put in charge of the execution of the law. The difference between sovereignty and authority is that former implies will and execution, that is, it includes the conduct of the will and executing. In contrast authority is concerned with execution but does not include the will. Therefore, the legislation of the nation is done by the nation’s deputies. From this we don’t say the nation is the source of legislation, but we say legislation is the nation’s because the nation practices it by itself. As for authority, the nation cannot practice it by itself because it is practically infeasible. Therefore, it is inevitable to entrust execution to some other body to practice it on its behalf. Thus, authority is not the nation but it is carried out by the governor and the judge through the nation’s authorization. So the nation is the source of authority.

This condition of the nation in the West as the master of itself opposes the condition of the Islamic nation, the latter is ordered to carry out all its acts in accordance with the Shari’a rulings. The Muslim is a slave of Allah: he does not conduct his will, nor does he carry out what he wants, but his will is conducted by Allah’s imperatives and interdictions, and he is the executor. Therefore sovereignty is not the nation’s but is due to the Shari’a, while the execution, that is authority and only authority is the nation’s. And because the nation cannot exercise its authority by itself, it has to entrust it to its deputies, and the Shari’a came to show the way to exercise authority through the Caliphate system. As a result sovereignty belongs to the Shari’a and authority the nation’s.