Community, law, and political authority. One vision privileges the early caliphate model, which places religious as well as political authority in the realm of the Community, which is in turn represented by the caliph. The second vision concerns the medieval Sunni model, which places political authority entirely in the hands of lay rulers and restricts normative religious authority to the legal sphere. The trade-off was justified by the Islamic scholars’ interest in not letting political powers manipulate religious authority. The casualty of this trade-off, however, was that the Community, which in has been the only source of political legitimacy, becameirrelevant in theory and politically passive in practice. Consequently, the political sphere became devoid of legitimacy. In medieval Islamic history, this led to the frequent appearance of military patronage states disconnected from the ethical roots of the Muslim society. In the post-colonial Muslim nation-states, this historical problem only adds to the challenges contemporary Muslim societies face in developing a healthy political sphere. Neither of these visions, however, lends itself to despotic theocracy. The early Community-centered and representative-caliphate vision requires an active and engaged political Community, which had become increasingly hard to maintain in medieval Islam. But that vision never died as an ideal. And it is becoming a viable contender once again in the modern world as the medieval vision is no longer sustainable.
Spring-2008 On page 39 December 15, 2013
To the traditional Muslim mind, that moment in history is sacred—when the divine light touched human history and produced a magnificent model of individual and collective life. It represents an ideal of justice, equality, engagement, and empowerment for all members of the Community. That moment cannot be reproduced, of course. But it is an ideal that has ever since colored aspirations and moved Muslim women and men to think, to act, and to continuously improve, fullyknowing that perfection cannot be attained. Traditionally aware Muslims have never sought utopia, for the aspirations of a perfect life are only for the eternal afterlife.
Spring-2008 On page 38 December 15, 2013
They did this by wresting absolute authority from the In the face of a scriptural —and hence, widely accessible —message like caliphate and placing it in the Community. this, one can only imagine the enormous difficulty that any ruler or Over time, this meant that the caliphate was religious institution would face in monopolizing authority. reduced to a mere symbol. Furthermore, real political authority rested with military rulers while religious authority belonged to the ‘
Spring-2008 On page 37 December 15, 2013
Community explicitly base this authority within the Communityitself and make such authority contingent upon obedience to God: “O ye who believe, Obey God, the Apostle, and those charged with authority amongst ye, and if ye differ in anything amongst ye, refer it to God and the Apostle […]” (4:59; 4:83 has a similar message).
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Thefact that its message is forcefully egalitarian and anti-elitist could never have allowed the early caliphs to claim any absolute authority. Rather, rulers were always seen as “representatives” and “employees” of the Community. They had legitimate authorityof both law and political power but only because they represented the Community. This essential structure of Islam and the content of the Qur’an are what make theocracy impossible in Islam. It is not an historical accident. Nor is it “disenchantment” with the idealism of the early caliphate, or the development of multiple legal schools, or the rise of private jurists as the sole source of normative authority.
Spring-2008 On page 37 December 15, 2013
The first reason for this “distance” from the is inherent to the itself: by its definition, it is the perfect,divinely-ordained way of life for humanity. As such, it is only divine as an ideal; as soon as it is actualized into a practical system of social relations, it becomes human. This is because such actualization of revelation requires human interpretation. Historically, the Islamic tradition has been keenly aware of this distinction. For example, it is well known that the primary sources of the are the divine scripture (Qur’an) and its elaboration in prophetic teachings (Hadith/Sunna). The actualized law, however, is derived from those two sources by means of hermeneutic tools. This derived law is called fiqh—literally, “human understanding.” Human understanding, it can be argued, is as much at work in living by the as it is in living by the American Constitution and the founding ideals, for example. The essential difference, of course, is that for Muslims, those ideals are given by G
Spring-2008 On page 36 December 15, 2013
guilds, and schools—while at the same time, reduce the nation-state to the minimal functions of defense and tax-collection. It is in such a circumstance that medieval Muslim jurisprudence was developed and functioned best. Despite their romantic appeal, however, such societies came at a price: states and their societies could not thrive without governmental political legitimacy. Hence, the governmentsin most medieval Muslim societies were unrepresentative, disconnected from any basis of legitimacy in the Community, unaccountable to the people, violent, and unstable. Anyone who reads the chronicles of the Mamluk period, for instance, cannot escape the impression that for long stretches of time, life was indeed “nasty, brutish, and short.”
Spring-2008 On page 36 December 15, 2013
The major problem in these newly formed Muslim nation-states has been the lack of a healthy political sphere whose legitimacy is grounded in the ethical system of society. There is a deep-seated mistrust of government and politics in these societies. This mistrust, which has made it difficult for Muslim societies to recover from the colonial onslaught, is a result of a long-standing “cultural memory.” Since the golden age of the Prophet and the early caliphate and a few rare historical exceptions, the Muslim statehas not legitimately represented the Muslim Community, and hence, has not been grounded in the
Spring-2008 On page 36 December 15, 2013
about 80%of Muslims wish the were either the only or a major source of their law.1 To many, this gulf of perceptions is the single greatest reason for the perceived clash between Islam and the West
Spring-2008 On page 35 December 15, 2013
The recently published The Fall and Rise of the Islamic State by Noah Feldman, professor of constitutional law at Harvard Law School, argues that the union of state and religion in Muslim societies, as demanded by the vast majority of Muslims today, should not be feared or impeded by the West.2 This is because, when properly understood and soberly applied, the has not historically entailed the theocracy or religious tyranny that the union of church and state has produced in the West. To the contrary, Feldman argues, provided a “rule of law” in medieval Muslim societies that guarded the populace from the tyranny of a military s
Spring-2008 On page 35 December 15, 2013
Medieval Muslim polities, although far from theocratic or totalitarian tyrannies, were not politically successful either and therefore ought not to be a model for future Muslim states. The historians of the medieval Middle East can point out undeniable indicators of the failure of the military patronage states (from the Seljuqs to the Mamluks). For example, these states neither legitimatelyrepresented the Muslim community nor offered a sufficient measure of order, peace, or stability.
Spring-2008 On page 35 December 15, 2013
their insistence against a state based in that Indonesia succeeded in establishing an essentially anti-secularist and simultaneouslypluralist constitution; they succeeded in writing a constitution thatbest reflected their history and their interests.18
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The foundation of the state of Indonesia was belief in the One and Only God. And yet, the country still adopted other aspects of Western theorieson statehood that it felt were suited to its people, including the importance of democracy. Inclusion of religion in state affairs was particularly suited to the Indonesian people, and this was n sacrificed by the writers for the sake of “modernizing” Western-style. No one was imposing secularism “on a people that it was not suited for” and there was complete freedom of religion: no ban on the headscarf or other forms of religious expression was enacted. The constitution remained true to the people and their aims and goals for the future.15
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For this same reason, the Jakarta Charter, which had been drawn up by orthodox Muslims in favor of the establishment of an Islamic state based in the was rejected upon its presentation. Individual provinces, however, were left free to determine for themselves whether they wanted to establish the provinces. Thus, Aceh was able to establish the in their whilethe country of Indonesia as a whole continued according to theprovisions of the 1945 constitution.17
Spring-2008 On page 14 December 15, 2013
separated from the state, but certain forms of religious expressionwere repressed. No wonder the suggestion of secularization is a cause for alarm for Muslims in other parts of the Muslim world.
Spring-2008 On page 13 December 15, 2013
Similarly, the Muslim-majority country of Tunisia also set in motion a number of reforms that were aligned with the Western model of progress, particularly secularization. The objectivestandard to which Tunisian society was compared was Western society: in order to align Tunisian society with Western society, legislation was written that was secular in nature, removing the influence of religion over the state. President Bourguiba appeared on television during the holy month of Ramadan (the month in which Muslims fast from sunrise to sunset), drinking orange juice and saying: “A modern nation cannot afford to stop for a month every year.” In order for the nation to progress economically, it is unwise to fast during Ramadan, he implied. Like Turkish women, Tunisian women also suffer from the ban on the hijab; Bourgiba appeared on national television physically removing women’s headscarves to symbolize female “emancipation.”13 Tunisia is yet another example of a Muslim country embracing the model for modernity and progress set forth by Western theorists.
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Turkey. Headed byMustafa Kemal Ataturk, the new state embarked on a mission to metamorphose from a traditional Islamic society to a Westernized one:
Spring-2008 On page 13 December 15, 2013
Islamic law was replaced by secular law, characterized by an active neutrality towards all
Spring-2008 On page 13 December 15, 2013
But the Muslims were also suffering from extreme insecurity and humiliation, because upon engaging in introspection and observation of the global state of affairs, they were finding that perhaps their way of life might in fact be wrong, backwards, and out of sync with the progress of time. So Muslims began directing their rage at the twin pillars of current Western civilization: secularism and consumerism. And this has resulted in a “clash of civilizations,” “the perhaps irrational but surely historic reaction of an ancientrival against our Judeo-Christian heritage, our secular present, and the worldwide expansion of both.”
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The soft version, on the other hand, as described by Sociologist Rodney Stark of Baylor University,centers solely on the physical separation of the state from the church; it is making no explicit claim about the nature of man. Upon being enacted, this separation ends any influence religion has over state affairs. Religion is stripped of all authority in terms of the state and holds no power over policy direction or the various public
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Religion, thus, becomes wholly private endeavor.4
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According to this theory of goal-oriented social evolution, then,the natural and obvious maturation of a society or a nation must proceed from the first set of characteristics defining a “primitive” society (such as extended families, religious ideologies, and closed status systems) to the more developed set of characteristics defining a “modern” society (such as nuclear families, secular ideologies, and achievement oriented systems).
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This aptly captures the essence of the secularization thesis, of which there is a hard form and a soft form.2 Max Weber described the hard form as such: with the progress of time, men everywhere willbecome increasingly less enchanted with the world around them, slowly shedding all superstitions and even belief in a personal God. This process was termed “disenchantment.” Popularized by Weber, the secularization thesis maintains that with man’s increased control over his environment, there will come a rationalization of action and a concomitant disenchantment with the world. People will no longer wonder at the mysteries of the world and will no longer conceive of them as worthy of adoration and reverence, signs of a Greater All-Loving Being. Rather, everything becomes a logical puzzle to be broken into, paralleling the mechanical surroundings
Spring-2008 On page 11 December 15, 2013
Dean C. Tipps of the University of California, Berkeley describes the theory thusly: Modernization, then, becomes a transition, or rather a series of transitions from primitive, subsistence economies to technology-intensive, industrialized economies; from subject to participant political cultures; from closed, ascriptive status systems to open, achievement-oriented systems; from extended to nuclear kinship units; from religious to secular ideologies; and so on […] Thus conceived,modernization is not simply a process of change, but one which is defined in terms of the goals toward which it is moving.1
Spring-2008 On page 11 December 15, 2013
Jaynes defines "consciousness" more narrowly than most
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind On page 18 March 13, 2013
Henry Kissinger, challenged on television to meet my accusation that he was responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity, responded with a maniacal and desperate attempt to change the subject, and denounced me as a denier of the Nazi Holocaust. (He also followed custom in mentioning Mother Teresa and, for some reason, Jackie Kennedy.) This enabled me to bring legal proceedings against him, both for defamation in my own case and - via the discovery process - to demonstrate that he was a practised and habitual liar. Considering
Letters to a Young Contrarian At location 74 January 20, 2013
British television broadcast an exhaustive documentary on Princess Diana, giving (at last) proper space and time to those of us who did not subscribe to her cult.
Letters to a Young Contrarian At location 62 January 20, 2013
At the direct request of the Vatican, I was invited to give evidence for the opposing side in the hearings on Mother Teresa’s impending canonisation. It was an astonishing opportunity to play Devil’s Advocate in the literal sense,
Letters to a Young Contrarian At location 58 January 20, 2013 | Modified
The brief answer is that I have become inured without becoming indifferent. I attack and criticise people myself; I have no right to expect lenience in return.
Letters to a Young Contrarian At location 49 January 20, 2013
ghaflah, negligence or forgetfulness of God, which in Sufism is considered as the major impediment to spiritual realization and in Islam more generally speaking as the root of most sins.
Ideals and realities of Islam On page 194 January 5, 2013
