The Future of Islam PDF
Preview The Future of Islam
The Future of Islam This page intentionally left blank The Future of Islam John L. Esposito 2010 OxfordUniversityPress,Inc.,publishesworksthatfurther OxfordUniversity’sobjectiveofexcellence inresearch,scholarship,andeducation. Oxford NewYork Auckland CapeTown DaresSalaam HongKong Karachi KualaLumpur Madrid Melbourne MexicoCity Nairobi NewDelhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto Withofficesin Argentina Austria Brazil Chile CzechRepublic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore SouthKorea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Copyright(cid:1)2010byOxfordUniversityPress,Inc. PublishedbyOxfordUniversityPress,Inc. 198MadisonAvenue,NewYork,NY10016 www.oup.com OxfordisaregisteredtrademarkofOxfordUniversityPress Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthispublicationmaybereproduced, storedinaretrievalsystem,ortransmitted,inanyformorbyanymeans, electronic,mechanical,photocopying,recording,orotherwise, withoutthepriorpermissionofOxfordUniversityPress. LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData Esposito,JohnL. ThefutureofIslam/JohnL.Esposito. p.cm. Includesindex. ISBN978-0-19-516521-0 1.Islam—21stcentury.2.Islam—Relations. 3.Islamiccountries—Relations—UnitedStates. 4.UnitedStates—Relations—Islamiccountries.I.Title. BP161.3.E8672010 297.09#051—dc22 2009018732 135798642 PrintedintheUnitedStatesofAmerica onacid-freepaper For Jean Past, Present, and Future This page intentionally left blank Contents Foreword by Karen Armstrong, ix Acknowledgments, xiii Introduction, 3 Chapter 1 The Many Faces of Islam and Muslims, 10 Chapter 2 God in Politics, 56 Chapter 3 Where Are the Muslim Reformers? 88 Chapter 4 America and the Muslim World: Building a New Way Forward, 142 Conclusion, 195 Notes, 201 Bibliography, 215 Index, 221 This page intentionally left blank Foreword Thisisanimportantbook.Thoseofuswhohavebeenonthefrontlineofthe effort, since the atrocities of September 11, 2001, to explain Islam in the Westernworldsoonbecameawarenotsimplyofthewidespreadignoranceof Muslim religion in both Europe and the United States but also of an entrenched reluctance to see Islam in a more favorable light. People often look balked and vaguely mutinous when, for example, you explain that the Qur’andoesnotinfactadvocatetheindiscriminateslaughteroftheinfidelor thepropagationofthefaithbythesword,andthateventhoughthereisstill much to be done to promote gender equality in Muslim countries, the message of the Qur’an was initially friendly to the emancipation of women. One of the most frequently asked questions is: ‘‘Why has Islam not had areformation?’’ThequerybetraysanignoranceofbothIslamicandWestern history. It assumes that there was something special and unique about the reformmovementinitiatedbyMartinLuther(1483–1556)andJohnCalvin (1509–64) that points to the inherent superiority and progressive nature of our Western culture. In fact, Luther’s was a typical premodern reformation, similar to many of the movements of islah (‘‘reform’’) and tajdid (‘‘renewal’’) that have regularly punctuated Muslim history. They all, Muslim or Christian,followasimilaragenda:theyattempttoreturntothewellsprings oftraditionandcastasidethepietyoftheimmediatepast.ThusLutherand Calvin sought to return to the ‘‘pure’’ Christianity of the Bible and the Fathersof the Church,in exactly thesame way as Ahmedibn Taymiyyah of Damascus (1263–1328) advocated a return to the Qur’an and the sunnah (‘‘customalpractice’’)oftheProphetMuhammad.Inhisdesiretogetbackto basics,IbnTaymiyyahalsooverturnedmuchreveredmedievaljurisprudence and philosophy, just as Luther and Calvin attacked the medieval scholastic
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