In his journal article, Abdul-Aziz offers a balance and incisive critical analysis on the clash of universalism Declaration. At the onset of his paper, Abdul-Aziz re-examines the onset of the movement to a certain group of Muslims. He observes their main interest is to integrate Islam with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. According to his view, the major challenge of the declaration is its hostility and secularization to divergent religious and philosophical ideas (Sachedina, 2007). He believes that, Universal declaration of human Rights is insufficient to provide for inalienable and inherent human rights. His position on the Declaration of Universal human rights presents varied forms of arguments on the new position of Islam and Secularization of Human rights (Sachedina, 2007).
In the first two paragraphs of its article, Abdul-Aziz claims that Islamists and Staunch opponents of the move to integrate Universal declaration of human rights to Islam are quite aware of its validity. However, he continues to claim that the secularization drive is absent in the Islamic religion. Therefore, as a staunch Islamist, he believes that there is no point the independent moral standards may impede religion. His argument counteracts some of his colleagues like Mohammad al-Ghazali. In his book on human rights, he believes that this document must be respected since some of its foundations are found in Quran. He further argues that criticizing this universal principle the drive will lack the required legitimacy and enforcement in the Islamic world. This notion has allowed several Muslim authorities to criticize the universal principles as “imperialistic.” As observed, sometimes this criticizes often fails to consider the philosophical and metaphysical issues guiding the universal principles in relation to the Islamic Philosophical theology (Sachedina, 2007).
In his paper, Abdul-Aziz, provides the historical backdrop of the human rights to the height of European colonization. However, he criticizes the failure of universal human rights to provide an opportunity to speak to different cultures and religions (Sachedina, 2007). As observed in this argument, the article fails to adhere to the main intention of the pioneer composers of the drive that was mainly to provide a universal human rights and not individual. He further fails to observe that the declaration was not formed for a pragmatic purpose but for just conduct for those who are in political, religious and any other form of power. One proponent, Morsik in his work, clearly traces the onset of the declaration. He agrees with Abdul-Aziz`s work by declaring that Universal morality from nay background needs to be able to accommodate all forms of diverse cultural and religious values. He continues to believe that the declaration of universal human rights has quite minimal Islamic representatives (Sachedina, 2007). Therefore, the drive may not be valid enough to articulate the universal impulse Islamic doctrines. To him, the declaration of universal human rights only treats Islam’s as “pragmatic instruments.”
Opponents, such as Muhammad `Anara and Dararat, on the other hand criticizes the Muslim fundamentalists and believes that, the declaration of universal human rights. They do not believe that this is a drive that is rooted in human dignity, natural law and divine purpose that should be embraced by every society and religion (Sachedina, 2007). They believe that the declaration exposes itself to every culture and religion in an equal manner and only may be determined by the valuation of human agency in providing a moral judgment. They declare that, human rights that promote an overlapping consensus like the Universal human rights is more compatible with respect to many cultural and religious values.
Reference
Sachedina, A. (2007) The Clash of Universalisms: Religious and Secular in Human Rights, in The Hedgehog Review 9:3 Retrieved from http://www.consciencelaws.org/religion/religion099.aspx
