Lecture: Liberalising Islam? What Liberal Islam stands for and our Response

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This is an overdue post on our part. However we decided to release it so that more are aware of the situation with Liberal Islam.

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My thoughts on the “Lecture: Liberalising Islam? What Liberal Islam stands for and our Response”

By Siswand

AlhamdulilLah, I was fortunate to have ample free time recently to be able to attend a rather one of a kind talk dealing with a pertinent issue, Liberal Islam. The talk entiled “Liberalising Islam? What Liberal Islam stands for and our Response” by Shaykh Abdul Halim was at Pergas on 27th Oct 2009. I was interested in this talk because I have heard of Liberal Islam being promoted, especially on the Internet. The truth is, I was already apprehensive about such ideas especially knowing that the proponents were not exactly established classical scholars of Islam. But I reckoned that this issue really needs to be looked at and a lecture to explain what it’s all about would be a good opportunity to find out more.

One of the first things I learnt at the talk is that the phenomenon of liberal Islam is a rather recent one, the term having been first coined by Ali Asghar Engineer. The lecture began by directing our awareness to the two kinds of enemies of Islam; the enemy from “Outside” and the enemy from “Within”. It also mentioned one of the reminders from the Prophet s.a.w. in his final sermon; that Syaitan has lost all hopes in leading Muslims astray over big issues, so beware of following Syaitan in small things.

With these two pieces of information in mind, it bids helpful to note that concepts such as Liberal Islam ought to be scrutinized, especially when already established teachings in Islam are being modified to suit the flippant whims of some people.

Shaykh Abdul Halim also briefly explained the origins of Liberalism having roots in the discontentment among the Christians in the face of the poor’s suffering, in view of the fact that the Catholic Church has massive wealth. In claiming itself to be the champion of the oppressed, Liberal Islam draws its inspiration from the idea of Liberation Theology in the historical development of Christian thought. Liberal Islam thus has “foreign” roots.

It was also explained how presently, Islam is being examined as a social phenomena, to be studied scientifically. This and more led to many misleading terms , such as Liberal Islam and Feminist Islam which in the words of Shaykh Abdul Halim  is the “conceptual fragmentizing of Islam” itself. Throughout the lecture, we were also reminded and exhorted to always refer matters to the proper authority, and when it comes to ‘Ilm pertaining to Islam, to refer to the genuine Ulama who are neglected by too many of us. With such a background on the current discourse about Islam, the main gist of the lecture, however, was a point by point rebuttal of Liberal Islam’s principles; Shaykh Abdul Halim demonstrated how these principles are either unacceptable to Islam, or simply fail to offer anything new.

Of interest is the explanation of the concept of Secularism and how this ideology/philosophy seeks to make God and religion inconsequential to our daily lives. The punch of this lecture, in my opinion, is the paradox that inevitably comes to mind when the terms “Islam” and “Liberal” are put together.  “Islam” has the meaning of Submission (to the will of Allah s.w.t.), so, when put besides the word “Liberal” which connotes the idea of being free from any constraints, it becomes a paradox that ought to be detected the moment one thinks more deeply about the term “Liberal Islam”. This alone is a signal that there is something fishy with Liberal Islam. This is the reason why Shaykh Abdul Halim draws our attention to the idea of “Freedom” in Islam which he contrasted with the Western view of Freedom.

Ok, what I was exposed to about Freedom during that lecture was really a mind opener; Freedom according to the Western understanding means to not be constrained by anything, this ‘not to be constrained by anything’ is very misleading in Islam, because one knows so well that a human being can be heavily influenced by things such as his own Nafs. Therefore when he perceives that he is ‘free’ to do whatever he likes, without being constrained at all, he may jolly well be trapped or succumbed to the demands of his own Nafs; this when properly realized, is not Freedom at all. Thus in the lecture we were reminded to understand and appreciate that true Freedom in Islam is the sincere submission to Allah s.w.t., and not to anything ephemeral such as our desires or anything else for that matter.

One of course needs to be aware that some Muslims are confused about the relationship between Islam and Modernity and so, Liberal Islam may appear appealing to them. It takes a learned and trained eye to look through all these confusions! AlhamdulilLah, attending the talk, the audience would be in a better position to not be fooled by Islam Liberal, insyaAllah!

Lastly, I really thought that it would be great should there be a second session or even a few week’s course dealing with this topic and other related issues.

Written on 06 Nov 2009

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This article is open for comments, please note that all comments are being moderated, hence please write your thoughts down with proper mannerism. Thank you.

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4 COMMENTS

  1. The other thing that needs to be noted is that Liberal Islam is also a reflection of secularization not just secularism. Secularization implying a continuous process of change, as opposed to just secularism, which implies a “static” state. In secularization, there is no constant. Everything keeps changing. Liberal Islam’s call to change with the times to re-look at the Qur’an etc according to the times is a reflection of this. It is a reflection of the mantra “There is no constant but change itself”. Please read this statement carefully as there is only one CORRECT definition of this statement.

    NOTHING is constant in the secularization process. Read Syed Muhammad Naquib al-Attas’ “Islam and Secularism” if you want to understand this better. This book is a classic exposition on secularism, secularization, the Islamization of Western Knowledge and adab. A must read.

  2. Siswand, Thank you so much for this review! I did not go for Sidi Abdul Halim’s talk, though i did so much want to.

    ” One of course needs to be aware that some Muslims are confused about the relationship between Islam and Modernity and so, Liberal Islam may appear appealing to them. It takes a learned and trained eye to look through all these confusions! ” – Indeed, in our attempt to play catch up with the world, important things seemed to be disregarded and mere blind-following steps taken just to be among the norms.

    Insyallah, I hope Sidi Abdul Halim would read this and consider another session for the benefit of others.

  3. “Change is not in the phenomenal things, as that would imply the persistence of existence in the things making them substrata for change to take place, but at the ontological level of their realities which contain within themselves all their future states.” -Prolegomena to the Metaphysics of Islam

    As such, there is an alternative interpretation to the term “There is no constant but change itself”, provided that we re-cast the statement into our worldview. Change is a constant, because it is constantly happening, in terms of constant creation and annihilation of beings?

  4. it’s sad tat i couldn’t make it. i wished to know more what their thoughts are like. as such i agree there should be another session.

    For Bro Amran, you mention a book by Syed Muhammad Naquib al-Attas’ entitled “Islam and Secularism”, can you share with me where to buy the book and just to clarify the book is in english right?

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