Islam is a great religion than is adored by many people around the globe. And it has been estimated that about 1.7 billion people practice Muslim. One astounding aspect of Islam is that the Islam religion is not easy to change since it derives its beliefs from Quran, the holy book. Although it is not easy to change any of the Islam practices, some scholars have In some cases changed the Islam practices to fit with the need of the areas where they are, otherwise these changes are not possible for all Muslims around the globe but only for specific regions which they are deemed necessary. In deed, in the dawn of 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century many Muslims had lost a big part of their cultural and political sovereignty to the neighboring Christians living in Europe and America. This has been brought about by the trade between the European and the Muslims during the earlier parts of the century and it has been further influenced by the increasing Western technology, civilization and modernization. As a result of modernization there was a strong change in power which was brought about by the falling Ottoman Empire, and in regard contributed to the subordination of Muslims due to Western technology and modernization.
Adeed (2003) has researched in his book, Arab nationalism in the twentieth century: from triumph to despair and established that, traditionalists, modernists and fundamentalists have varying ideologies and concepts on Sharia. And that for any person who is interested or intend to seek for changes and reformation in the Islam law, it is imperative that he master the concepts of Quran, Fiqh and Sunnah. And pertaining to different school of thoughts of Islamic Law by different scholars, Ali Khan has investigated and found that in the modern era the concept of Sharia has been changed to fit with the society needs. For instance, reformers in the United States changed the Islam Laws to fit with the expectations and needs of the Islam’s living in the United States. These changes have enabled Islam’s from these societies to access loans, something that is not accepted by many Muslims around the globe. With the high renting rates and difficulties of renting homes, Muslims living in these societies had to think of a way that they would avoid pressure of moving with there families from place to place in such of homes, thus they settled on reforming part of their Sharia to fit with the needed changes. Some of these reformers though do not view this as a change. They base their arguments from Prophet Mohammed’s prophesy when he suggested that a time will come when Muslims will need to live in high buildings and practice the modern technology. During this time Muslims will need to change some of their lifestyles, for instance, the mode of transportation will change from camels to cars, ships and planes. Though this has changed, the camels are still being used by many Muslims around the globe. Moreover, many of the Muslims do not consider this as a change in the Muslim practices, but rather an adaptation to the changing times and modernity.
Lapidus (1996) has also found out in his book, The Cambridge illustrated history of the Islamic world that since being a human being is enough guarantees for an individual to become a citizen, there is no need to go beyond and judge somebody based on the color of the skin, creed or personal beliefs. In deed, the Arab intellects and think tanks have agreed that they are faced with a big mountain to climb, and each of them is thrown into the dilemma of choosing between their beliefs or modernity. Furthermore, the fact that most of these men acknowledge and accepts that there is need to revise the existing Muslim laws, they also find it difficult to accept that these laws should change because they believe this will be the beginning of their extinction since Muslim will lose its identity. But real modernists Islam do find it easy to add into their practices all the advances that have been brought about by civilization.
Muslims are definitely tied up by the rigidity of their doctrine Tanzil which is also interpreted to mean mechanically dictated revelation resulting from the Quatrain revelation coming from their god Allah. As much as the mentality of most Muslims may have a place and mind ready for reforms, they always tend to disagree with the notion that the change is inevitable. Instead, most of these Muslims will go for revelation of the Quran and non will go out of the way to change what was written in the Preserved Tablet at the beginning of Islam. In these revelations, human agency is not necessary and thus it is not acknowledged. All Muslims are aware of the fact that all men are slave to Allah and that Allah is not a slave to any man. Based on this concept, there is no way an Islam is going to think or look into the Quran in ways that favor man. (Ann, 1999), Islamic law and human rights: conundrums and equivocations, chapter 14 in Carrie Gustafson.
Just like any wave found in the ocean, Muslims want to be modern and participate in the activities promoting modernization and complete civilization. Though Muslims want to be modern and accept and acknowledge all that are brought by modernity including gender equality and equity, their religion can allow them to. Because, there religion command them to know that a woman is not anything to rely on, but is half man in inheritance of wealth and court witnessing of cases. The Quran also teaches an Islam person to remove out the hand of that person, who has been found steeling, administer using a whip, hundred strokes of the whip to that single man and woman who by any chance have been found enjoying sexual intercourse, and in the case where the two are married, Muslims are commanded to stone them to death. This do not go well with many, and for that reason a number of people have kept asking themselves a big question, like what should a Muslim do?, to go by the Quran and retain the favor of gender inequality that Quran teaches, or to choose to be a modernist who is also motivated to be a progressive Muslim. In the Middle East or any Arab media, most of the Muslims will choose to introduce themselves as “مسلم حداثي” Muslim hadāthī, which when is interpreted mean that modern progressive muslim. The Islamic law, Shari’ah is based on the principles and rooted on the dictating texts from the Quran and they have been confirmed and approved by the practices and tradition of the Mohammed. And since Islam is not any new age spirituality, but political, state religion, it is very hard to withdraw reforms on the laws. Furthermore, many Muslims perceive that Mohammed’s military tactics in the city of Medina enabled Allah to emerge victorious since the people of Mecca had no choice but to surrender to Mohammed. Thus, their Allah, according to them is beyond questioning. (Badawi, 2010), The status of women in Islam.
Looked differently, modernization is real more so when it is intended to seek for human dignity as its goal number one. For instance when people get to know that the Sabbath day was created for man and not the other way round, they will be able to understand and embrace modernity. There are Muslims who have got the will to embrace modernity and they have managed to take in what Mohammed did like having too many wives and concubines. However, in Surat Repentance 29, the verse of Jizya orders Muslims to humiliate Christians as much as possible for not submitting to Islam. But this makes one to wonder whether this verse was really written by a prophet of Allah or not. Because, there is only one God who has made man in His own image and that everything on earth He has created for man. So how can such a good God also want something bad for the same man He has created? And because all men should realize that with God it is just love and no humiliation of one another, man must endeavor to reciprocate his true paradise which is nothing other than trying to make God the sole purpose of living, or the goal of ones life. Hence, for such kind of verses, regardless of how strong in faith one may have in Islam, he can ignore considering reformation on the same. (Eposito, 1998), Islam: the straight path
Therefore, as I conclude, it will be vital for all people practicing Islam to know that once a Muslim adopt the three fundamentals of the French revolution, Liberté, égalité, fraternité which together implies brotherhood, he will be best placed to practice fraternity, equality and liberty. Yet in this way, the Muslim will be indicting his God and his own prophets by practicing brotherhood and in so doing he will bring down the Islam teachings which have been in existence for the last fourteen century. In fact, the person will be announcing to everyone the hypocrisy of Islam to which he is steadfastly clinging on and fighting for. In deed the Islam laws and teachings are founded on the characters of authoritative and biased prophets like Mohammed and some undermining and authoritative texts in the Quran, which hardly suggest anything close to brotherhood, liberty, fraternity and equality. For instance in Quran verses where non-Muslim people are termed as infidels who deserve being killed, we don’t see anything like brotherhood. On the other hand, liberty refers to showing and giving full respect to a person, and that the person is entitled to full human dignity irrespective of his autonomous sovereignty or personal life. But this is not the case as discussed above and as founded in Quran where men are more equal than women. Conversely, only fellow Muslim are able to experience fraternity as investigated in the Quran by scholars, whereas non Islam people are shown contempt and are pressured by the Muslims to give in to there Islam guidance. Therefore, the Muslim law is still held tightly by the Islam practices of the past and the Muslims education, thought and heart yearn for advancement of the modern world. Surely, how can a Muslim bring in the laws and policies of the fifth century into the light of today?
Ann, E. M., ed 1999. Islamic law and human rights: conundrums and equivocations, chapter 14 in Carrie Gustafson. New York: Oxford University Press
Badawi, J. A., 2010. "The status of women in Islam". Al-Ittihad Journal of Islamic Studies 8 (2)
Esposito, J., 1998. Islam: the straight path. New York: Oxford University Press. 126-7.
Hafez, M., 2006. "Why Muslims rebel". Al-Ittihad Journal of Islamic Studies 1 (2).
Khan, L. A., 2003. A theory of universal democracy: beyond the end of history, the Hague, Kluwer Law International.
Lapidus, I., eds 1996. The cambridge illustrated history of the islamic world. Cambridge University Press. p. 296.
Nawawi, E. C., Howard, L., Willem, C. and Minhaj, T., 2007 : A manual of Muhammadan law ; according to the school of Shafi. Lahore : Law Pub. Co, 467.
