As I explained in my book Islam Unveiled, Muslim reformers will always face an uphill (and well-nigh impossible) battle because they will always face challenges from hardliners on Islamic grounds: the plain words of the Qur'an and Sunnah support violent jihad in so many passages that reformers have no way to win a debate within Islam while holding to any literal interpretation of such texts.
From "Unveiling Islam: Author Challenges Orthodox Precepts" in the Washington Post (thanks to JMP) comes another example of this phenomenon: Gamal Banna makes some reformist noises, and Al-Azhar is immediately on his case.
Note also that the ongoing and increasingly desperate Diogenes search for genuine moderate Muslims leads the Post to burble that Qaradawi, who has praised suicide attacks against civilians, has "contested the notion that Islam and Judaism are inherently at odds." It seems that the Post has overlooked that Qaradawi has also said that "there is no dialogue between" Muslims and Jews "except by the sword and the rifle…"
CAIRO -- The Islamic state? A contradiction in terms.Jihad? Far too much emphasis these days on military action.
A requirement that women wear a veil? A quaint leftover from pre-Muslim times that is not mandated by Islam.
These and other observations by Gamal Banna, an 84-year-old Egyptian author, have created a stir in Egypt recently. They are indicative of the ferment within Islam at large, and of the increasingly passionate discussion of political and religious issues in Egypt, the Middle East's most populous country.
Controversy surrounds Banna's books because they challenge some Islamic orthodoxy and the roots of Muslim teaching. His work is also a curiosity because of his family connections. He is the younger brother of Hassan Banna, founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, the prototype of radical Islamic groups throughout the Middle East. The Brotherhood is associated with rigorously pious practices, with an intense role for Islam in politics and with violence.
Criticism of Gamal Banna reached a peak last fall when Egypt's main guardian of Islamic orthodoxy, the Islamic Research Council of Al-Azhar University, recommended a ban on one of his books. The council's critique centered in part on the accusation that Banna was an unqualified amateur who exploited his brother's notoriety.
"Let them say what they will, but reply to what I am saying or writing," Banna said in an interview. "Islam allows for freedom of thought and evolution. Reform requires an open mind."
In the West -- where general attention to Islam among non-Muslims seldom extends beyond the threat of terrorism and the pronouncements of Osama bin Laden and his followers -- it is common to hear that Islam has no new ideas and has been unable to adapt to the modern world. Yet for decades, Islamic scholars have challenged the notion that Islam is opposed to everything Western and that only radical and violent solutions can bring change to Egypt, the Middle East and Islam itself. Today, Banna says, the perception of a cultural war between the West and Muslims has brought life to the promoters of new Islamic thinking.
"We are living in a world where the gun is battling ideas. Change is the greatest priority," he said.
Various articles on new ideas in Islam have been published recently in the Egyptian press. In one, Yusuf Qaradawi, regarded as one of Islam's most influential scholars, contested the notion that Islam and Judaism are inherently at odds. Another advised Islamic activists in Egypt to tolerate criticism. Al-Ahram, the government-run newspaper, used quotations from a book written by another prominent Islamic scholar, Mohammed Ghazaly, to urge young Muslims to study science, thereby keeping up with modern life.
"We are living in a world where the gun is battling ideas. Change is the greatest priority," he said.
Hmph. I don't know about Ghazali; the very first to take on Aristotelean logic from the islamic perspective, no?
Less it be the wrong Gha-za-li.
Geoff
I agree with this old man. Islam must be reformed and if the fundamentalists don't want to do it willingly, I say we pick them up by the scruff of the neck and drag them kicking and screaming into the 8th century.
Worryingly, this is the same university in Egypt where the Archbishop of Canterbury on the third anniversary of September 11th gave a lecture praising Islam.
This Ghazali is not the famous theologian Ghazali, often taken by Westerners to be dreamy and mystical when, of course, like all other Muslim theologians, he preached the necessity of the Jihad, undertaken at least annually by all Believers.
The Ghazali in question, once the mentor, Khaled Abu El Fadl tells us, of none other than Khaled Abou El Fadl, was telling young Muslims to study not "science" in the sense of engaging in the disinterested pursuit of knowledge as to how life began, or how memory works, or what the structure of DNA is, or anything of the sort -- no, the kind of "science" that is meant is technology, and not even all technology but more specifically, the kind of technology that can make Muslim countries more potent vis-a-vis the Western and Infidel world. For a good example of this see the speech of Mahathir Mohamed, former head of Malaysia, to the I.O.C., where he called for such study, justifying it as a way to ultimately match, and then defeat, the Infidels.
That is what Muslims mean when they talk about "Science" and the need to promote it. They have in mind not Watson and Crick and Rosalind Franklin (especially not Rosalind Franklin), but rather the V-2 alumni safely ensconced in Huntsville, Alabama, or the Americans engaged in World War II work at Los Alamaos or Cold War work at Lawrence Livermore Laboratory.
As for the life sciences, Mahathir Mohamed, and Ghazali, did not have Otto Loewi, or Konrad Bloch, or Aaron Klug in mind as role models. Not even the work done to eradicate diseases seems to have struck their fancy. Think of penicillin, and streptomycin, and the polio vaccine. The Muslim Fleming and Ernst Chain, the Muslim Waksman, the Muslim John Enders or Albert Sabin or Jonas Salk, does not exist, and the amount of science done in the entire Muslim world is both very small, and in exact relation to the free-thinking permitted by the local environment -- i.e., the less strict the Islam, the more likely it is that there might actually emerge some scientists out of the world of Islam. There are some in Turkey, and of course Abdus Salam was an Ahmadiyya, which hardly qualifies as Islam. There are none, and will continue to be none, in Saudi Arabia, despite 35 years of the most fantastic unearned wealth in the history of the world, which one might have thought could have been employed so that the country, or perhaps all the Arab countries, could together produce just one important contribution -- its first in the last thousand years -- to science.
We are still waiting.
This is just another instructive example of the fear that these Muslims have of any ideas that may challenge the Islamic power structure. Maybe if the mass of Muslims knew all of what Muhammed actually said and did according to the Qu'ran and hadith, they may run away in droves? Alternatively, some may actually run towards this destructive dogma creating more jihadists. Regardless, the world would be better off without the religion of Muhammed, thereby allowing basic human rights to flourish.
Hugh:
Worse than not boasting of leaders in medical research (or any other kind that has merited recognition by the Nobel Foundation), I'm sure you are aware that elements in the Muslim world have made absurd and insulting claims that diseases such as AIDS were concocted in western/Israeli labs and even forbidden their people to receive vaccinations to protect them against diseases as they believe the vaccines contain birth control hormones. And there are the absurd Iranian propaganda films that accuse Israeli medical personnel of harvesting organs and body parts from Muslim children in Palestine or taken captive on sea-going vessels.
Talk about intellectual bankruptcy.
waterdragon52
There maybe some truth to AID’s being made in a American lab...
One theory suggest that HIV was possibly a biological weapon, created at
the request of the DOD, or a lab monster created by sloppy lab work.
I don’t buy into all the conspiracy stuff, but they do make some excellent points.
A group of scientist from Perth, Australia, claims that HIV has never been isolated so far, and questions the existence of the virus-entity.
There is no scientific evidence that proves HIV causes AIDS.
What is needed to prove or disprove the HIV theory of AIDS?
http://www.think-fitness.de/html/perth_group.html
Hmph. I don't know about Ghazali; the very first to take on Aristotelean logic from the islamic perspective, no?
Less it be the wrong Gha-za-li.
Geoff
Posted by: Geoff at March 7, 2005 11:25 AM
Right on, Geoff--al-Ghazali (the famous older guy, who is known as the "father of Islamic fundamentalism") was right smack in the middle of the Muslim scholars who had latched on to Greek philosophy and run with it, creating the "Golden Age" of Islamic culture.
Al-Ghazali was caught between a rock and a hard place; he himself tended to a literal interpretation of the emerging scriptures of Islam, while his colleagues thought that his arguments for a literal interpretation were just plain dumb.
Al-Ghazali had a crisis of faith, so he took off for remote parts to come to terms with his angst. It took about ten years, but by the time he got back to Baghdad, he had a gimmick.
The gimmick was this: He cleverly reformulated his arguments so that they appeared logical (the logic having been stolen from its developer, Aristotle, of course).
His arguments for a literal interpretation sounded ever so much better this way, at least to the less educated, and so he bagan to make substantial headway among them.
The Golden Age scholars weren't fooled, but eventually they died out, while the al-Ghazali followers gained ground.
The rest is history.
That's the power of ideas.
Talk about intellectual bankruptcy.
Posted by: waterdragon52 at March 7, 2005 04:22 PM
Absolutely, waterdragon! Intellectually, they went bankrupt very early in their history, and because their ideas don't measure up, they have had to resort to force ever since.
You go, Hugh!
There are none, and will continue to be none, in Saudi Arabia, despite 35 years of the most fantastic unearned wealth in the history of the world, which one might have thought could have been employed so that the country, or perhaps all the Arab countries, could together produce just one important contribution -- its first in the last thousand years -- to science.
We are still waiting.
Posted by: Hugh at March 7, 2005 02:30 PM
But they do not hesitate to avail themselves of all the decadent West has to offer in the way of advanced medicine, technology, and especially weaponry. They're too lazy, inept, and unmotivated to compete or even get involved in the advancement of civilization. Muslims are consummate hypocrites, incessantly condemning Western civilization yet depending upon it to cure their diseases and provide the weapons that they use to kill us. Their idea of helping humanity is to spread their vile Islamic filth around the world, which in turn foments hatred, violence, and unrest. Islam should be illegal in the West.
Iraq is about to become an Islamic state, after all of our sacrifices and expense. I guess that means we can expect a few million new immigrants from Iraq who aren't keen to live under Shariah in Iraq, but will change their minds once they move to Dearborn.
Did anyone watch O'Reilly tonight? He interviewed two former students from the Virginia Islamic school, two females who both denied that they were ever taught to hate Christians and Jews. One of them quoted the "people of the book" bullshit, saying that Jews, Christians and Muslims were descendents of Abraham and worshipped the same God. If we all worship the same God, what's the problem? Why are Judiasm and Christianity "false" religions? It was so obvious that they were lying, especially when they refused to endorse the American-led war on terror. Neither of the two women, both American citizens, would agree that the U.S. is justified in hunting down and killing Osama bin Laden and his savage minions. In other words, they support Al Qaeda!
O'Reilly spoke too soon when he told them that he "knew" they were loyal, patriotic Americans. They are about as loyal to America as Ward Churchill.
I see more intellectual shysterism going on here than I do intellectual bankruptcy (though to be fair, there's THAT, too). These people KNOW the infidels must be fooled into submission to Islam, and Islamic reformers and genuine intellectuals cannot help them with that (Heck, God TOLD them this is the way it must be, see??). But at some point, the Islamic world's leaders' own delusions have come into play. These folk have begun to half-believe their own web of deceptions, even when they are just excuses that cover up their deep-seated fears that Islam is fundamentally (there's that world again) and intrinsically flawed-- and irredeemable.
Deep down, these unfortunate people KNOW Islam is a human sacrifice cult dedicated to feeding a snicker-snack of a deity (Al-lah) and dressed up to resemble the Judeo-Christian faith it IS NOT and never will be. Attempts to reform Islam will likely expose this reality to the world once and for all.
And of course, the last thing the Muslim world's leaders want is us westerners knowing what Islam truly is (a human sacrifice cult thousands of years old and presently dressed up (courtesy the efforts of Muhammed and company)to resemble a Judeo-Christian faith). They don't even let their OWN people ask questions concerning Islam, since they probably are afraid even MUSLIMS will eventually find out what Islam actually is--and if Muslims were permitted to put 2 and 2 together, it could happen. So, what we see here by this overtly mean treatment of Banna's reformist book is FEAR.
Islam cannot be reformed as we can plainly see from Jihadwatch articles. And, by trying to reform Islam, persons such as Banna will inadverdently make that fact known globally. Or more precisely, the failure of reformists to reform Islam will make this known to the world community. That is the reason for the suppression of efforts at reforming Islam and writing Islamic reformist books. The Islamic world's leaders are probably terrified of perwons like Gamal Banna.
Susanp, I watched O'Reilly tonight. You would think that a reporter of his stature would do a little investigating on the subject of islam. He seemed to take all they said as truth. Like you said, they wouldn't denounce al-qaeda so that means they sympathize with terrorists. I wonder what it would take to get the media to say out-loud that islam is a hateful religion? It doesn't cost anything to read the quran online, it is readily available.
If there is a reporter out there reading this... please post a response as to why you people will not tell the truth about islam. Use an alias.
testing
Gary: the utterly shocking thing is that important Democratic spokesmen are not afraid to admit they're rooting for the enemy.
As for the Washington Compost, its editors seriously believe there's a secret tunnel connecting Qom, Iran, with Lynchburg, Virginia, and every Halloween, the Falwells and Khatamis get together for a pleasant chat over live-boiled liberated lesbians, while the shade of Meir Kahane intones a B'rokhes.
Further, due to the popularity of Islam among disgruntled African-Americans (who are the majority in Washington, DC), it will never say anything critical about that religion.
SusanP and Carolyn2:
Other posters on different threads report a very different perception of O'Reilly's interview with the two female students, including the way he nailed them with an excerpt from one of their text books that left them hissing all sorts of taquiya.
Of course he'd have to soft-soap them rather than be tough with him, or the usual media suspects would have been all over him for abusing them. Lawyers, media types and politicians do this all the time when they are setting people up for the kill. Much easier to blind-side someone who isn't feeling threatened.
Other posters on different threads report a very different perception of O'Reilly's interview with the two female students, including the way he nailed them with an excerpt from one of their text books that left them hissing all sorts of taquiya. Posted by Waterdragon
O'Reilly quoted from a textbook used at the school but the edition date was 2003, and the former students graduated long before then. It was obvious to me that they were prevaricating, but O'Reilly appeared to believed them. He would have had them nailed if he had quoted from a textbook that was used before they graduated.
The woman wearing the hijab, although made up to the hilt, was particularly contemptible to me. She had that "holier-than-thou", superior demeanor common to so many muslims and tried to make O'Reilly look like a fool because he had no irrefutable evidence against the school. It's impossible to say, but I almost got the impression that this segment was designed to discredit previous allegations against the school and its curriculum. Most debates involve people with opposite opinions. Did he really think two loyal muslimas would say anything that might harm their cause or their alma mater?
O'Reilly is usually credible, but something wasn't kosher about this little foray into dissimulation. He should have presented an opposing viewpoint as well, but maybe he couldn't find any former students who would truthfully expose Jihad High.