Download or read book Addressing Aberrations in the Exegesis and Jurisprudence of Islam written by Leslie Terebessy and published by Independently Published. This book was released on 2022-08-29 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Reason acquired a bad reputation in Islam. This was the result of a tradition which treats refraining from the use of reason in religion as a manifestation of piety. According to this "reasoning," Muslims are expected to refrain from using their reason in matters of religion. Exegetes were expected to suppress their reason on the basis of a hadith according to which the prophet forbade the use of 'reason-based tafsir' as disbelief (kufr). The disparagement of reason has a troubling past in Islam. It was propagated by the Sufis, who perceived people of reason as their enemies and the enemies of Islam. They alleged that there is a "tension" between reason and revelation. The perception that equated reasoning with disbelief goes a long way towards explaining not just the proliferation of violence but the fall of the Islam itself. For a civilization that does not value reason is doomed. It by using reason that we attain knowledge of revelation and receive guidance from it. To this day we hear religious teachers advising their protégés against the perils of reasoning.The rejection of the relationship between causes and effects did a great disservice to Islam. For rejecting the relationship between cause and effect entails a rejection of a significant part of the teaching of revelation. Islam teaches that there is a relationship between the way we act and what we gain from it. If we believe and perform praiseworthy acts, we go to paradise. If we disbelieve and do evil, we go to the fire. Evidence of flawed reasoning is also found in the teaching of the purposes of the sharia. This teaching, attributed to al-Shatibi, fails to highlight justice as a purpose of the sharia. How to explain this glaring omission? For in the Quran, justice is next to piety. In their backlash against the rationalists, who advocated both reason and justice, the traditionists disregarded justice. More evidence of poor reasoning may be found in the elevation of tradition to revelation, the assertion that tradition judges revelation, and the belief in the theory of abrogation. The rejection of reasoning had catastrophic consequences for the Muslim civilization. It facilitated the incorporation of a range of unwarranted assumptions within exegesis and jurisprudence, including the perceptions that revelation is "ambiguous," "deficient," that tradition is revelation, and that revelation is better explained by tradition than reason. Little attention was paid to the fact that the explanation of revelation by tradition also requires the use of reason. Another troubling practice was the subordination of reason to tradition, which was reflected in the belief that tradition had to be followed even against reason. The subordination of revelation to tradition was expressed in the perception that "tradition judges revelation" and that "revelation requires tradition more than tradition requires revelation." Are these statements in agreement with the teaching of tauhid? The subjugation of reason and revelation to tradition tainted the knowledge of Islam. Folklore was engaged to "explain" revelation. What is more, it was expected to do so without the use of reason. This produced a paralysis in the Muslim mind. Contradictory beliefs became embedded in exegesis as well as in jurisprudence. An example is the perception that traditions are "equal" to and subordinate to revelation, simultaneously. Another example is the replacement of parts of revelation by traditions, which resulted from the utilization of the teaching of the abrogation of revelation by tradition. The theory of abrogation enabled extensive tampering with the knowledge of revelation, to the point that it distorted and corrupted its teaching. The alleged abrogation of the peace verses by the ayah as-sayf, taken out of context, transformed the teaching of peace into a political agenda known as Islamism. It transformed Islam as the religion of peace into Islamism as an ideology of war and conquest.
Download or read book Redressing Errors in the Exegesis and Jurisprudence of Islam written by Leslie Terebessy and published by Independently Published. This book was released on 2024-04-12 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Islam is faulted for terrorism. Particular verses of the Book of Allah were misconstrued. The Book is misunderstood. Terror perpetrated by militants encouraged by wayward preachers makes matters worse. Muslims respond that Islam prohibits terrorism. It would be more accurate to say that the Book of Allah prohibits terrorism. For what we understand by Islam no longer encompasses just the Book of Allah. Extra teachings, in a few cases teachings that contradict the Book of Allah, are also treated as a "part" of Islam. The extra teachings encompass the traditions ascribed to the prophet. The work of the ulama is also presented as a "part" of Islam. We encounter traces of belligerence in hawkish traditions as well as in the teaching of jihad al-talab. The transformation of the religion of reconciliation into an agenda for war was enabled by recourse to teaching of abrogation. Verses that teach reconciliation were allegedly abrogated" by the verse of the sword. The teaching of jihad al-talab furnished a "religious" justification for waging unlawful wars of aggression. What triggered the corruption of knowledge in the first place? The corruption of knowledge was inaugurated by the repression of reason, which enabled the turn from revelation to tradition. The corruption of knowledge was amplified by the weaponisation of exegesis and jurisprudence. Exegesis and jurisprudence were weaponised when they were engaged to further the political agenda of territorial expansion. Hawkish rulers felt constrained by the teaching of Islam. They wanted a rendition of Islam that would justify waging unlawful wars of aggression. Accordingly, rulers enlisted hawkish clerics to render unlawful wars of aggression lawful. The reinterpretation of revelation as a teaching of war required by-passing the teaching of revelation. It required embracing perspectives that defy if not also deny parts of revelation. By-passing the Book of Allah was enabled by silencing reason. Recourse to reason was treated as kufr. The repression of thought transpired in politics, too. Five thousand philosophers were killed by Musa a-Hadi in 786, as part of the Inquisition, initiated by al-Mahdi in 780. The Inquisition or mihna was a persecution of thinkers, in a tragedy resembling that of Pol Pot. Because of their reluctance to use reason, exegetes could not understand the Book of Allah properly. Problematic assumptions and practices tainted exegesis and jurisprudence. Problematic perceptions encompass the perceptions that the Book of Allah is in part "unclear," incomplete" and even "contradictory." Problematic practices encompass the teaching of abrogation. The alleged scarcity of "details" would be redressed by recourse to traditions. The alleged "contradictions" in the Book of Allah would be rectified by recourse to the teaching of abrogation. Alleged "contradictions" would be resolved by treating verses revealed earlier as "abrogated" by verses revealed afterwards. Recourse to the teaching of abrogation enabled extensive tampering with the teaching of revelation. In treating jihad al-talab as the sixth pillar of Islam, hawkish ulema did not just render lawful what Allah made unlawful. In endorsing wars of aggression to propagate Islam by the sword, the ulama drifted from the teaching of revelation and embedded the use of force in religion. In the process of reinterpretation of revelation, the teaching of Islam was altered. It was turned into its anathema. The religion of reconciliation was reinvented as a religion of war. Embarking upon wars of territorial expansion and "propagating" the faith by the sword was an act of political self-destruction. For wars of aggression required Muslims to become aggressors. Unfortunately, aggression breeds aggression. It triggered retaliation which destroyed the empire.
Download or read book Islamic Jurisprudence on the Regulation of Armed Conflict written by Nesrine Badawi and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2019-10-01 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Islamic Jurisprudence on the Regulation of Armed Conflict: Text and Context, Nesrine Badawi argues against the existence of a “true” interpretation of the rules regulating armed conflict in Islamic law. In a survey of formative and modern seminal legal works on the subject, the author sheds light on the role played by the sociopolitical context in shaping this branch of jurisprudence and offers a detailed examination of the internal deductive structures of these works.
Download or read book Ijtihad and Renewal written by Said Shabbar and published by International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT). This book was released on 2017-01-01 with total page 158 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the early centuries of Islam the response of Muslims to problem-solving the various issues and challenges that faced their rapidly expanding community was to use intelligence and independent reasoning based on the Qur’an and Sunnah to address them. This practice is known as ijtihad. As the centuries wore on however the gates of ijtihad were generally closed in favor of following existing rulings developed by scholars by way of analogy. And as reason and intellect, now held captive to madhhabs (schools of thought) and earlier scholarly opinion stagnated, so did the Muslim world. Ijtihad and Renewal is an analysis of ijtihad and the role it can play for a positive Muslim revival in the modern world, a revival based on society-wide economic and educational reform and development. It makes the case that the grafting of solutions rooted in the past onto the complex and unique realities of our own age, in a one-size-fits-all perspective, has paralysed the vitality of Muslim thought, and confused its sense of direction, and that to revive the Muslim world from its centuries of decline and slumber we need to revive the practice of ijtihad. Focusing attention on thinking through solutions for ourselves based on our own times and context, using the Qur’an and Sunnah, as well as the wisdom and experience of the past distilled from these, as tools in this endeavor whilst not the only solution, is certainly a viable and powerful one.
Download or read book Militant Islam written by Stephen Vertigans and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2008-10-30 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Militant Islam provides a sociological framework for understanding the rise and character of recent Islamic militancy. It takes a systematic approach to the phenomenon and includes analysis of cases from around the world, comparisons with militancy in other religions, and their causes and consequences. The sociological concepts and theories examined in the book include those associated with social closure, social movements, nationalism, risk, fear and ‘de-civilising’. These are applied within three main themes; characteristics of militant Islam, multi-layered causes and the consequences of militancy, in particular Western reactions within the ‘war on terror’. Interrelationships between religious and secular behaviour, ‘terrorism’ and ‘counter-terrorism’, popular support and opposition are explored. Through the examination of examples from across Muslim societies and communities, the analysis challenges the popular tendency to concentrate upon ‘al-Qa’ida’ and the Middle East. This book will be of interest to students of Sociology, Political Science and International Relations, in particular those taking courses on Islam, religion, terrorism, political violence and related regional studies.
Download or read book The Quran and the Secular Mind written by Shabbir Akhtar and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2007-10-31 with total page 411 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is concerned with the rationality and plausibility of the Muslim faith and the Qur'an, and in particular how they can be interrogated and understood through Western analytical philosophy. It also explores how Islam can successfully engage with the challenges posed by secular thinking. The Quran and the Secular Mind will be of interest to students and scholars of Islamic philosophy, philosophy of religion, Middle East studies, and political Islam.
Download or read book Constructing a Religiously Ideal Believer and Woman in Islam written by A. Duderija and published by Springer. This book was released on 2016-04-30 with total page 263 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this comprehensive study, Adis Duderija examines how Neo Traditional Salafi thought (NTS) and progressive Muslims interpret the normative concepts of 'Believer' and 'Muslim Woman' in contemporary Islam
Download or read book International Law and Islam written by Ignacio de la Rasilla and published by Brill's Arab and Islamic Laws. This book was released on 2019 with total page 361 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: International Law and Islam: Historical Explorationsoffers a unique opportunity to examine the Islamic contribution to the development of international law in historical perspective. The role of Islam in its various intellectual, political and legal manifestations within the history of international law is part of the exciting intellectual renovation of international and global legal history in the dawn of the twenty-first century. The present volume is an invitation to engage with this thriving development after 'generations of prejudiced writing' regarding the notable contribution of Islam to international law and its history.
Download or read book Black Morocco written by Chouki El Hamel and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2014-02-27 with total page 534 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Black Morocco: A History of Slavery, Race, and Islam chronicles the experiences, identity and achievements of enslaved black people in Morocco from the sixteenth century to the beginning of the twentieth century. Chouki El Hamel argues that we cannot rely solely on Islamic ideology as the key to explain social relations and particularly the history of black slavery in the Muslim world, for this viewpoint yields an inaccurate historical record of the people, institutions and social practices of slavery in Northwest Africa. El Hamel focuses on black Moroccans' collective experience beginning with their enslavement to serve as the loyal army of the Sultan Isma'il. By the time the Sultan died in 1727, they had become a political force, making and unmaking rulers well into the nineteenth century. The emphasis on the political history of the black army is augmented by a close examination of the continuity of black Moroccan identity through the musical and cultural practices of the Gnawa.
Download or read book Heretic written by Ayaan Hirsi Ali and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2015-03-24 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Continuing her journey from a deeply religious Islamic upbringing to a post at Harvard, the brilliant, charismatic and controversial New York Times and Globe and Mail #1 bestselling author of Infidel and Nomad makes a powerful plea for a Muslim Reformation as the only way to end the horrors of terrorism, sectarian warfare and the repression of women and minorities. Today, she argues, the world’s 1.6 billion Muslims can be divided into a minority of extremists, a majority of observant but peaceable Muslims and a few dissidents who risk their lives by questioning their own religion. But there is only one Islam and, as Hirsi Ali shows, there is no denying that some of its key teachings—not least the duty to wage holy war—are incompatible with the values of a free society. For centuries it has seemed as if Islam is immune to change. But Hirsi Ali has come to believe that a Muslim Reformation—a revision of Islamic doctrine aimed at reconciling the religion with modernity—is now at hand, and may even have begun. The Arab Spring may now seem like a political failure. But its challenge to traditional authority revealed a new readiness—not least by Muslim women—to think freely and to speak out. Courageously challenging the jihadists, she identifies five key amendments to Islamic doctrine that Muslims have to make to bring their religion out of the seventh century and into the twenty-first. And she calls on the Western world to end its appeasement of the Islamists. “Islam is not a religion of peace,” she writes. It is the Muslim reformers who need our backing, not the opponents of free speech. Interweaving her own experiences, historical analogies and powerful examples from contemporary Muslim societies and cultures, Heretic is not a call to arms, but a passionate plea for peaceful change and a new era of global toleration. In the wake of the Charlie Hebdo murders, with jihadists killing thousands from Nigeria to Syria to Pakistan, this book offers an answer to what is fast becoming the world’s number one problem.
Download or read book The different aspects of islamic culture written by UNESCO and published by UNESCO Publishing. This book was released on 1998-12-31 with total page 476 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume, the first of six to be published, studies fundamental values of Islam, along with the nature of rights and the responsibilities in a general context. The authors analyse the development of social thought and morality in Islam, and ways in which they are enforced through the family and education. Particular attention is paid to the status of women, children, youth and the socially excluded. Several chapters broach specially Islamic approaches to economics, government and justice. A world religion since its inception in the seventh century A.D., Islam is today seeking vigorous answers to contemporary problems through its multi-faceted history. Issues of poverty and wealth, inequality and demands for political expression, and respect for diversity in a difficult world of conformity are dealt with in this series. The study is organized along thematic rather than chronological lines and thus it is not necessary to read the volumes in order. Volume II is in fact the first to have been published. Volume IV is forthcoming end 2002, volume V mid 2003 and volumes III and VI in 2004. This volume, the first of six to be published, studies fundamental values of Islam, along with the nature of rights and the responsibilities in a general context. The authors analyse the development of social thought and morality in Islam, and ways in which they are enforced through the family and education. Particular attention is paid to the status of women, children, youth and the socially excluded. Several chapters broach specially Islamic approaches to economics, government and justice.
Download or read book Crisis in the Muslim Mind written by AbdulHamid AbuSulayman and published by International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT). This book was released on 2004-01-01 with total page 182 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Across the Muslim world today, if anything is self-evident across the Muslim world today it is that the Ummah is badly in need of reform. On this point it can be stated with confidence that Muslims are agreed. Poverty and injustice characterize the face of Muslim lands from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Pollution and corruption are the order of the day in the societies where the gulf between them and the developed countries of the world has never been wider. Politics in the Muslim world are all too often the politics of deprivation, and culture the culture of despair. “Crisis in the Muslim Mind” examines the intellectual and historical roots of the malaise that has encompassed the Ummah and threatens to efface its identity. Firs published in Arabic in 1991, this important work (in an abridged English translation) is designed to familiarize educated and concerned Muslims with the nature of the crisis confronting them, and to suggest the steps necessary to overcome it.
Download or read book War and Peace in Islam written by Ghazi bin Muhammad (Prince of Jordan.) and published by . This book was released on 2013 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Written by a number of Islamic religious authorities and Muslim scholars, this work presents the views and teachings of mainstream Sunni and Shi’i Islam on the subject of jihad. It authoritatively presents jihad as it is understood by the majority of the world’s 1.7 billion Muslims in the world today, and supports this understanding with extensive detail and scholarship. No word in English evokes more fear and misunderstanding than "jihad." To date the books that have appeared on the subject in English by Western scholars have been either openly partisan and polemical or subtly traumatized by so many acts and images of terrorism in the name of jihad and by the historical memory of nearly 1,400 years of confrontation between Islam and Christianity. Though jihad is the central concern of War and Peace in Islam: The Uses and Abuses of Jihad, the range of the essays is not confined exclusively to the study of jihad. The work is divided into three parts: War and Its Practice, Peace and Its Practice, and Beyond Peace: The Practice of Forbearance, Mercy, Compassion and Love. The book aims to reveal the real meaning of jihad and to rectify many of the misunderstandings that surround both it and Islam’s relation with the “Other.”
Download or read book The Empires of the Near East and India written by Hani Khafipour and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2019-05-14 with total page 1103 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the early modern world, the Safavid, Ottoman, and Mughal empires sprawled across a vast swath of the earth, stretching from the Himalayas to the Indian Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea. The diverse and overlapping literate communities that flourished in these three empires left a lasting legacy on the political, religious, and cultural landscape of the Near East and India. This volume is a comprehensive sourcebook of newly translated texts that shed light on the intertwined histories and cultures of these communities, presenting a wide range of source material spanning literature, philosophy, religion, politics, mysticism, and visual art in thematically organized chapters. Scholarly essays by leading researchers provide historical context for closer analyses of a lesser-known era and a framework for further research and debate. The volume aims to provide a new model for the study and teaching of the region’s early modern history that stands in contrast to the prevailing trend of examining this interconnected past in isolation.
Download or read book The Qur anic Worldview written by Abdulhamid A. Abusulayman and published by International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT). This book was released on 2011-01-01 with total page 206 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a carefully reasoned, positive, and largely reflective work. Looking back at the various stages of Islamic historical development, AbuSulayman puts forward a thesis that focuses on the recovery of what is termed the Qur’anic worldview. By this is meant an ethical, monotheistic, and purposeful perspective on the world and those within it. Our faith will only be complete when we have become utterly sincere in our love for God, a love expressed in a pure, passionate love for goodness and truth in this world. It was the strict internalization of this perspective and close adherence to the principles of the Qur’an which AbuSulayman contends, played a key factor in galvanizing the devout and intensely God-conscious followers of fledgling Islam to achieve the successes that they once did, the profound historical and global impact of which is still the subject of much study and admiration today. The rebirth of Islamic identity through this Qur’anic worldview is the key requirement of our times and a prerequisite for any future healthy and viable development of Muslim societies.
Download or read book The Construction of Belief written by Aziz Esmail and published by Saqi. This book was released on 2013-02-01 with total page 207 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mohammed Arkoun was one of the most prominent and influential Arab intellectuals of his day. During a career spanning more than thirty years, he was revered as an outstanding research scholar, a bold critic of the theoretical tensions embedded within Islamic Studies and an outspoken public figure, upholding political, social and cultural modernism. This Festschrift honours Arkoun's scholarship, bringing together the contributions of eleven distinguished scholars of history, religious studies and philosophy. It offers a comprehensive selection of critical engagements with Arkoun's work, reflecting on his considerable influence on contemporary thinking about Islam and its ideological, philosophical and theological dimensions. The authoritative reference study on the work of Mohammed Arkoun, The Construction of Belief is essential reading for students and scholars of Islam, Muslim societies and cultures, modernity, religious studies, philosophy and semanti.
Download or read book Reason Freedom and Democracy in Islam written by Abdolkarim Soroush and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2000-04-20 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Abdolkarim Soroush has emerged as one of the leading moderate revisionist thinkers of the Muslim world. He and his contemporaries in other Muslim countries are shaping what may become Islam's equivalent of the Christian Reformation: a period of questioning traditional practices and beliefs and, ultimately, of upheaval. Presenting eleven of his essays, this volume makes Soroush's thought readily available in English for the first time. The essays set forth his views on such matters as the freedom of Muslims to interpret the Qur'an, the inevitability of change in religion, the necessity of freedom of belief, and the compatibility of Islam and democracy. Throughout, Soroush emphasizes the rights of individuals in their relationship with both government and God, explaining that the ideal Islamic state can only be defined by the beliefs and will of the majority.
