The Muslims need to adapt a modern mindset which requires changes traditional education

Has the closing of the gates of ijtihad let to intellectual decay?The above idea is something which I used to pooh-pooh once when I was very narrow-minded and ignorantly self-righteous but now, after thinking deeply about it, I think that a case can be made that once the Muslims lost the appetite for critical thinking and critically evaluating the works of their ancestors, the intellectual rot set in and led eventually to the ascendency of the West and the pathetic state which we are in now.

So, should we not re-open the gates of ijtihad? Not by every Tom, Dick and Harry (as the Salafis want) but by those who are trained to do so; someone who has a PHD in Islamic Studies--or its equivalent--should surely be allowed to do so? The problem, for me, is that since the 12th century when these gates were traditionally ’closed’, human thought--especially in the West--has advanced beyond recognition and yet our scholars are stuck in the 12th century in terms of the mental training they get. To use a simple example, the ulama do not study any post-Peripatetic philosophy (which was refuted successfully by al Ghazali) whereas human philosophy as understood now is unrecognisable from that classical philosophy. The most that they’ll study is Ishraqi philosophy of Mullah Sadra but that too is centuries old. I am inclined to the view expressed by Tabataba’i that Islamic philosophy is more able to tackle the problems posed by modern Western thought than Islamic theology or doctrine but for that I think the Sunni world needs to reopen and reexamine its stance on ijtihad (independent interpretation of the legal sources); after all, Islam is a dynamic religion yet we’ve made it into a static one.

The following recommendations by Smock (2004) are ones I broadly agree with a few alterations which I will mention later in this article:

• Many Muslims believe that they must choose between Islam and modernity or between Islam and democracy, but these are false choices. To reinterpret Islam for the twenty-first century, the practice of ijtihad (interpretation and reasoning based on the sacred texts) must be revived.

• Religious scholars effectively terminated the practice of ijtihad five hundred years ago. But the principles of interpretation are well established and the need for contemporary interpretation is compelling.

• New interpretations of the texts are particularly important in relation to the status ofwomen, relations between Sunnis and Shiites, relations between Muslims and non-Muslims, the role of Muslims in non-Muslim societies, and Islamic economic theories.

• Most scholars would limit the practice of ijtihad to specialists who have not only knowledge of the Qur’an and the hadiths but also broad familiarity with a wide range of modern scholarship in Arabic grammar, logic, philosophy, economics, and sociology.

• Other scholars assert that interpretation of the texts should not be confined to legal scholars but should be open to those with creative imagination.

• Restrict ions on the contemporary practice of ijtihad are imposed both by religious establishments and by repressive governments in Muslim countries. Democracy and freedom of inquiry and expression are essential to the practice of ijtihad and to the successful reconciliation of Islam and modernity. Reform of Muslim educational systems is also essential.

• Muslim scholars and leaders in the United States and other Western societies have particular opportunities as well as a responsibility to lead a revival of ijtihad. Muslim scholars in the West have the freedom to think creatively while still being faithful to the texts, and their new interpretations could stimulate new thinking among the more traditional religious establishments in Muslim countries.

I believe that this last recommendation is particularly important. Where I differ slightly is that I believe that reinterpretation of the source texts should be done by competent scholars within the principles [usool] of the established Schools of Thought [madha’ib] as there is no need to create a whole new set of principles when such a body of work already exists.

I think closely related to this issue is the one of training competent scholars who are able to bridge the worlds of classical Islamic learning and the modern secular world with ease. This means making changes to the traditional madrassah syllabi (as I have indicated above). Of course, one of the reasons why the majority of scholars produced by the madrassahs today is abysmal is that the quality of people entering them has diminished immensely. Once upon a time parents would send their most brilliant and academically gifted children to become scholars and jurists and muftis. Nowadays, the brightest are sent off to become doctors, lawyers and engineers etc. and only the riff-raff and the academically challenged, and these overwhelmingly from the poor, are sent off to the madrassah. Therefore, like any other education system, if the input is poor, the output will also be poor.

Assuming and accepting these socio-economic and demographic realities, let us look at the ‘elite’ scholars of today; the ones who make it as it were. I have yet to come across a single, intellectually rigorous (i.e. without just relying on quoting the Qur’an and hadiths and saying, ’It says so here’ therefore that is our proof: I am a Muslim and for me personally that is usually enough but for a skeptic it will not be; such arguments—as Imam Ghazali showed—do not convince those without faith (I will come to this later.) Muslim response to (post)modern and even post-Renaissance Western thought and philosophy.

So, accepting that most students of sacred law have to put up with abject conditions and also accepting that the least able are sent there, yet there must be *some* bright sparks who get through, right? Where are there works to defend Islam against the intellectually attacks of the West? The only half-decent effort I personally have come across is that of Pir Karam Shah Sahib and even that was dated since his refutations were based on 19th/early 20th century critiques and not current ones.

Are we saying that we cannot produce one scholar who has produced thought --similar to al Ghazali--by which one may convincingly argue with the modern Western thinker on a level playing field without bringing matters of faith or dogma into it, like Imam Ghazali did to Aristotelian philosophy? Has there not been a single scholar to do the same for post-Renaissance philosophy? The only Muslim thinker I can think of who has even tried to tackle these issues is Iqbal yet he did not have a classical madrassah training.

I am not saying throw the baby out with the bathwater! Madrassahs are important elements of our civilisation but I am deeply concerned about the state of Islamic civilisation and each year we are falling further and further behind. When the West is discussing nanotechnology as a practical reality in the next 50 years we cannot--combined--make a single fighter plane from scratch (just to take one example).

I think what we need to do is change the madrassah syllabus; the Dars-e-Nizami is centuries old. We need to add to it a study of the English language, physics, chemistry, biology, and of Western philosophy and of the philosophy of science and of history. These need to be thorough too (and get rid of some subjects which might be superfluous now like, e.g. my beloved Farsi). Then we can have ulama who can reply to the West’s best thinkers and are ready for the modern world’s challenges.

At the moment even the best scholars I’ve heard speak base their arguments on logic which even a bright undergrad student of philosophy could refute since they are the same arguments made by medieval scholars. Arguments which Hume and Kant etc. refuted amongst others (e.g. the First Cause argument or the Design Argument and which Dawkins, in his excellent recent polemic, The God Delusion has again refuted).

The problem is that these ulama have only been trained to think in a certain manner, reflective of the past, whereas human thinking and knowledge has itself changed. It is the classical position of Ghazali (and Sunni Islam) that God’s existence cannot be proven by reason alone and hence faith, by its very definition, is not rational (which also answers the otherwise noteworthy rational arguments of Dr. Dawkins!—since a non-rational belief cannot be proved/disproved by rational means.). However, the Muslim must be thoroughly conversant with such rationality in order to see its limits. This requires a modern mindset which requires modern knowledge. A medieval mindset will not do to convince modern minds.

Allow me to make my point with an example: ‘ulama traditionally have identified Dhulqarnayn in the Qur’an with Alexander the Great of Macedon. Historical research though has proved that he was a polytheist beyond doubt, thought of himself as the Son of Zeus, and was probably bisexual. Now, it is clear such a person cannot be a wali or a Prophet (according to Islamic criteria). So, wouldn’t it be silly of ulama today to still insist Dhulqarnayn is Alexander simply because the classical exegeses (tafsir) have said so? I hope that illustrates my point. If an apparent meaning of the Qu’ran or hadith contradicts a known fact then surely we have to accept that the traditional accepted meaning was wrong (since the Word of God itself cannot be wrong) and reinterpret it in light of our new knowledge?

I also think that Muslim mindset has to change where this material world also becomes important per se and not just the Afterlife. This thought process also occurred in the Renaissance in Europe and was the key moment when their material condition began to approve.

Nor am I suggesting we ape the West in everything: but knowledge is the lost property of the believer and he takes it from anywhere.

I am saying we are well behind in knowledge and I am looking at/thinking of ways to catch up if you will.

Let me narrow my argument and make it very specific: let us leave Kalam (speculativetheology) alone. Belief I accept is based, by definition, on faith. I do too. I accept that for the Next World faith in Islam is required. I want to restrict the discussion to this world only since it is in this worldly life that we are so far behind the West in every field of human activity and which concerns us here. (We are (mostly) material people in a material world to paraphrase Madonna!) Why is this so? Why does the US occupy our lands and rob us of our resources without even an apology? Why is the Islamic world so politically, economically and technologically behind the West? These are issues which affect our daily life in this world and it is answers to this I am looking for. The answer I would suggest is that it is because of our material (economic, technological) weakness.

Of course, I realise I am not new in seeking answers to these things, practical answers. Nor am I so enamoured of the West that I uncritically accept everything its philosophers/media say. I am saying there is some underlying reason for the backwardness of the collective Muslim world and I think it is due to our mindset. (In spiritual matters, in the realm of the soul, we are way ahead-even now--of any other civilisation (and that is the weakness in Dawkins book!) but that doesn’t change our material situation in this world.

I think therefore that the mindset of the Muslims needs to change, and foremost that of our scholars since they are the elite and change in them will lead to change in the masses’ mindset eventually. Here is another, deliberate, rhetorical question: when we Muslims harp on with misty eyes about our glorious past (and justifiably so) what is it exactly we are so proud of? Isn’t it that at that time we were the *worldly* superpower, the numero uno civilisation?

Let me try to be as precise as I can and state the crux of my argument in one sentence so we can then debate its merits or otherwise:

Traditional Islamic learning needs to be enhanced by the addition of modern subjects such as post-Renaissance philosophy, hard sciences, modern mathematical logic and history and IT to enable them to better understand the modern world they inhabit and thus be better equipped to lead Muslim masses and lead to an Islamic Renaissance by altering the Muslims’ medieval mindset into a modern mindset.