Ijtihad, Rethinking Islam *Wednesday, Apr 01 2009* Is the idea of New Age Islam merely a restructuring of an unhealthy faith? <http://www.newageislam.org/NewAgeIslamArticleDetail.aspx?ArticleID=1276>
*Does New Age Islam then not become a creation of Man and no longer a theology inspired by God?* The question is that your site seems to defend Islam only on select passages of good intention, such as God creating us to get to know one another and so forth, but what of the other passages of malice? If your goal is to create a New Age Islam, does that imply that you ignore some aspects of the faith and apply others? It comes down to this: is Islam inspired by God or not? If God is perfect and the Koran is perfect, then why has Man found so much fault with it? … This isn't some attack on Islam. You call on your readers to think. Here I am thinking. -- *Scott Bowen* ------ This seems a very honest and sincere question from an avowed non-believer in any faith. Readers are invited to think and express themselves on whether we should be engaging in Ijtihad and seeking to understand the relevance and practicability of some controversial aspects of our faith in the present New Age. This brings us back to the question of those belligerent verses in the Holy Quran, asking us to kill the non-believers wherever we find them. Only the enemies of Islam and the Jihadis own them as relevant and meaningful and binding on all Muslims for all times and in all situations but the rest of us too do not want to disown them and yet we claim to be a peaceful religion fit to be allowed to live in peace and in close proximity to others. Do these verses continue to provide us guidance today in the present situation and are they binding on us today? And if that is so, is the rest of the world justified in being afraid of us? Are we encouraging Islamophobia of the world by owning bellicose verses of the Holy Quran as our guide unnecessarily today, verses which provided us necessary and appropriate guidance in a certain situation in the 7th century A D., but clearly are no longer relevant in the present situation? Should we explain to the world that the Holy Quran is not a book that was revealed in one session, but is a collection of verses that were revealed to the Prophet (PBUH) at different times over a long period to guide us to tackle both universal questions of spirituality and day to day problems facing the community in those initial days and the relevance of these latter verses in the present age has to be judged by us individually and collectively on merit in case of each verse before we come to a conclusion if they are our guides in the present situation. Setting the agenda for a New Age Islam is clearly not just about the relevance or irrelevance for us today of the bellicose verses of the Holy Quran. There is a whole host of issues that we have to rethink and reconsider in order to be able to live in peace not only in relation to other religious or non-religious communities but also with and within ourselves. But certainly the issue of clarifying our stand on these war-like verses is the most urgent. Are they still relevant or are they now obsolete as our guide in this New Age is the question that brooks no delay. – *Sultan Shahin, editor, New Age Islam* More...<http://www.newageislam.org/NewAgeIslamArticleDetail.aspx?ArticleID=1276> Radical Islamism & Jihad *IBN TAYMIYYAH: THE FATHER OF ISLAMIC RADICALISM? <http://www.newageislam.org/NewAgeIslamArticleDetail.aspx?ArticleID=1288>* *Professor Yahya Michot*, who is a lecturer at Oxford University and prominent authority on Ibn Taymiyyah, argues both the Western scholars and the Islamists have advertently or inadvertently emphasised his political thought at the expense of his moral and ethical teachings. This has led to the increasing politicisation of his complex and sophisticated writings on Islamic moral, ethical and legal thought. This raises an interesting question, namely, were there two different Ibn Taymiyyahs, an “Islamic reactionary and jihadist” or Islamic thinker and pragmatist? ... his Islamic moral, ethical, legal and economic thoughts are much more polished and restrained in their tone than, for instance, his refutation of the Sufis, falasifah, mantiq’in, qadariyyah, the Christians, etc. Thus, as a polemicist, he was not only uncompromising but also very dogmatic. This naturally led to his incarceration on more than one occasion, but Michot is right to say Ibn Taymiyyah bore all his trials and tribulations with great patience and dignity. He eventually died in prison in 1328. -- *Emdad Rahman * More...<http://www.newageislam.org/NewAgeIslamArticleDetail.aspx?ArticleID=1288> Islamic Society *What Muslims Really Want: Life in The Hereafter or Here and Now? <http://www.newageislam.org/NewAgeIslamArticleDetail.aspx?ArticleID=1282>* Are these poor Muslims not orthodox because Islamic organisations have not tried hard enough? The truth is that neither Jamaat-i-Islami nor Jamaat-i-Ulema-i-Hind is keen on advocating fundamentalist lifestyles. They have no interest in sponsoring madrasas that teach only Arabic and the Quran. Instead they have set up schools that provide secular education, and there is one such even in Naroda Patiya where Hindu violence was at its worst in 2002. These schools are not a ruse for Islamic organisations, or clerics, to pump religious fervour into Muslim kids. On the contrary, these Muslim institutions are clear that they want the boys and girls in their care to learn secular sciences and skills and heave themselves out of parental poverty. The curricula in these schools are so designed that they conform to the requirements of the state education board. There would be some religious instructions in these institutions, but they would be on the side, and a minor matter. -- *Dipankar Gupta* More..<http://www.newageislam.org/NewAgeIslamArticleDetail.aspx?ArticleID=1282> -- Syed M. 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