Islamic revival?

Abdallah Al-Qomi* outlines what it would take

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There is hardly a question among Muslims about the need for a revival of the faith, restoring Islam to its former glory. The question is, rather, how such a revival might be accomplished. Views differ sharply on this matter, with the range of opinions falling broadly into one of two schools of thought.

The first, possibly more popular view, is that the current failure of Islam reflects the Muslims' own failure to adhere sufficiently to the example of the earliest Islamic community and what jurisprudence followed from there. It focuses on naql (literally, copying): the dependence on the early Islamic ulama in matters of jurisprudence; it variously promotes the notion of copying early Muslims in matters ranging from codes of conduct to modes of dress. Though dominant in the last few decades, this school of thought has failed to come up with relevant solutions to the current problems of Islam. It has not risen adequately to the challenges of present-day reality. And it has been instrumental in the revival and exacerbation of Islamic sectarianism and inter-faith tensions.

The second school of thought finds inspiration, rather, in the reformist belief that Islam as a timeless message cannot be confined to its interpretation in a particular period of history. It calls not only for a revival of Islamic thought but for reopening of the proverbial "gates of ijtihad " (literally, exerting an effort, but denoting innovation in matters of jurisprudence), which gates were arbitrarily closed by the Muslim powers that be in the 10th century AD. Yet apart from the obvious problem of opposition from the traditionalists, proponents of reform have had to reckon with two major obstacles in the course of time. First, the ulama 's unprecedented access to the media, which has enabled them to be influential in ways never before possible, has paradoxically reduced the credibility of any one of them alone. The religious and social authority necessary for reform has as such been compromised, making it more difficult to implement reform in the community as a whole. Indeed it is generally accepted that there is "no priesthood in Islam", but it cannot be denied that for the vast majority of Muslims only the ulama have the authority to undertake such reform, and if the ulama no longer have credibility as a unified body, reforms undertaken will not be taken seriously. Secondly, reform is identified with the edicts of foreign powers at a time when Muslims understandably view any suggestions emanating from the West with much suspicion. I personally am aware of more than one reform project shelved precisely for fear of the file and rank of the Islamic world believing it was dictated by the West.

Perhaps a revival of the modernist school of Mohamed Abdu holds the answer, after all. I for one am all for such a revival, which seems to overcome both obstacles in the way of reform. Towards the end of the 19th century Abdu -- grand mufti at a time -- identified the weakness and backwardness of the ummah (worldwide community of Muslims) with its disunity and domination by foreign powers, and pointed to an Islamic renaissance through a revival of the role of the mind (reason and the intellect) as a necessary move. His conviction was that Revelation, properly understood, should never conflict with reason; and he saw the path to the ummah 's advance in freeing reason from the strictures of naql -- the word most commonly targeted in this context is taqleed, meaning literally 'imitation' (of predecessors) -- which Abdu related to the root qaladda, denoting a chain around the neck. Mental laziness, he contended, had given way to stagnation; and he called for reopening the gates of ijtihad, stressing that Islam, as an eternal message to humanity, must never be confined to the opinions of early scholars or frozen in their times. Each generation, rather, had a better understanding of its own circumstances and should therefore exercise its own ijtihad and reserve the right to depart from previous opinions so long as it leaves the core of the creed untouched. Since the message was addressed to all Muslims, not to a select minority, Abdu argued that the principles and practices of Islam should be made accessible to ordinary Muslims, enabling them to come to their conclusions and so relieving them of dependence on the ulama. The ulama, he thought, should concern themselves with matters that have a practical bearing on the lives of Muslims, refraining from polemics or theological disputes not relevant to the essentials of the faith.

Along the same lines, Abdu's departure from classical methods of tafsir -- interpretation of the Quran -- redefining what a given tafsir should and should not entail, may be his greatest contribution to modern Islam. Tafsir has the function of making the Quran comprehensible as a guide to fulfilment in this life and the next and in so doing explaining the moral and social teachings contained therein in easily accessible language. But it is beyond the scope of this article to cover every aspect of the Mohamed Abdu school of thought, encompassing, as it does, a condemnation of sectarianism, a revision of religious textbooks to eliminate false and contradictory statements and, most relevant to the present, a call for bringing the mind back to its rightful position in Islam and emphasising the moderation by which Islam defines itself. Abdu's reforms were followed and built on by Mustafa El-Maraghi, Mahmoud Shaltout and finally Mohamed El-Madani, who, though highly esteemed by scholars, is not as well known to the general public due to his early death. Each was a self-avowed successor of Abdu, but with the dawn of new economic realities in the Islamic world in the 1960s, particularly after Al-Madani's death, the Abdu school came to an end. But it's on this school's principles of enlightenment, tolerance and moderation, its condemnation of sectarianism and promotion of Islamic unity that the future of ummah hangs; and if it seems ironic that we should reach back a whole century in pursuit of the future, this is but another indication of how far we have actually fallen behind.

* The writer is head of the Centre for the Rapprochement of Islamic Sects.