Book Review
Chasing A
Mirage – The Tragic Illusion of an Islamic State.
- Author:
Tarek Fatah
-
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.,
Canada
-
Reviewed
By: Javed I.
Chaudry
Dear Farzana: Re: Your Post #57
Thank you for taking time to offer your views in
response to Rafi Sahib and Javed Sahib. They might
have understood your response well enough. I am at
a loss. Your reasoning is founded on convoluted
hypothetical premises. Please help me understand!
As you say, quote:
“Temporal law can be separated from the doctrinal
aspects of the faith based on the belief that
societies evolve. This leaves Muslims with the
freedom to enact laws according to the needs of
changing societies and do not require Muslims to
implement Quranic punishments in a literal
sense”
It is rationalization (Not rationality) that some
assertions in Koran are temporal whereas others
deal with doctrinal issues and are eternal; it
sounds great. Let’s put your ideas to a real test.
Here is a test verse for you:
24:02
“The
woman and the man guilty of adultery or
fornication,- flog each of them with a hundred
stripes: Let not compassion move you in their
case, in a matter prescribed by Allah, if ye
believe in Allah and the Last Day; and let a party
of the Believers witness their punishment.” (Yusuf
Ali)
Kindly, filter out which of God’s words in the
verse above, you think, are not good anymore. And,
when you are done; please lay out principles
from Koran (Not Hadith that is a corrupted
source) with the help of which you could abrogate
more of God’s words from Koran whether on
temporality premises or otherwise.
Dear Farzana, allow me a few words on Ijtihad
also:
Iqbal’s views on Ijtihad are very clear in “The
Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam”. His
arguments are sometimes hard to understand.
However, those same arguments are in your book
too, in a more readable form. Iqbal’s arguments
simply veneer the true problems with Ijtihad.
The word “Ijtihad” can be translated several ways.
Iqbal has interpreted this word as, “To exert” in
The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam.
I often time wonder how it could be possible to
exert any injunction of Koran (left over after
abrogation that you suggest) without state
authority as a back up. When Iqbal talks about
Ijtihad and interprets “To Exert”, I am certain he
does recognize the peril of not backing it by a
strong Islamic state.
Secondly, let’s look at other meanings of Ijtihad
now. Even if somebody interprets Ijtihad as
counselling or consensus formation; this method
has miserably failed in the past history of Islam.
Can you cite from the history of Islam any Koranic
injunction that Muslims uniformly agreed as
abrogated as a result of Ijtihad? By the way, I
think that Ijtihad-theory that did not stand the
test of history would merit nothing in the future.
Thirdly, Ijtihad in past 1400 years has ended up
creating at least 72 sects in Islam. Verdict of
history is that Ijtiahd did not bring about any
sort of consensus in the past. Contrarily, it has
proved to be a divisive methodology within Islam.
Sectarian division wielded explicit devastating
impact on politics, society and history. Well,
there is a way to go beyond sectarian divisions
but that would take us away current focus of our
discussion.
Fourth, the very idea of Ijtihad insidiously sows
seeds of a theological Islamic state because
“State” is the only mechanism for Ijtihad to be
functional. Ijtihad by one sect has never been a
binding on other sects. Ijtihad, without a
mechanism to exert it and without being a binding,
is a useless exercise. I am seriously thinking
that anybody who proposes Ijtihad as a means for
liberating Muslims is indirectly and unwittingly
arguing for creation of an Islamic state in
reality. Or, I am missing something?
Kind Regards,
Tahir Qazi