A law school curriculum is a fundamental exercise in all legal systems. It is intended to provide a professional, practical training while also, ideally, acting as a transmitter of wider social, political and ethical values. It has diverse functions, so the emphasis on one or another aspect of the curriculum obviously varies over time. Some of these changes in emphasis are a matter of fashion, and therefore ephemeral, but it is hard to recognize which are passing fads until long after the unfortunate student has graduated. Essentially a curriculum defines law for public administration and private law, and the graduate is bound by the definition(s) current for his or her time.

A curriculum is a way of setting out definitions. On paper it always appears systematic and certain—such and such a subject is stated, the rules are explained and the readings are set. In reality, however, all curricula are ambiguous, because what a student learns may or may not be useful in practice. At the tertiary or university level, competing dogmas (as distinct from rules) are commonly taught, so that the interpretation and significance of a rule often becomes a matter of debate. In fact the very notion of ‘rule’ is itself debatable.

These general comments apply fully to the syariah curricula in Indonesia. To illustrate this I have chosen a rather narrow focus: first, the curriculum produced for national use by the Department of Religion; and second, the curricula used by Indonesia's State Islamic Universities (Universitas Islam Negeri; UIN), State Islamic Institutes (Institut Agama Islam Negeri; IAIN) and State Islamic Colleges (Sekolah Tinggi Agama Islam Negeri; STAIN), which incorporate but also vary the national model. These curricula set out the material that future judges and civil servants must learn. There are, of course, other paths to instruction in syariah, but the advantage of narrowing the scope is to see in some detail just what the contemporary issues are and how they are being addressed.