I’m absolutely delighted to bring you this intriguing and thoughtful guest post by John MC. It originally arrived as a series of comments on the story of a reformist Muslim woman who believes that the doctrine of Islamophobia, shields extremists and hampers the activities of reformists. The original post told of how the author of a recent article in Areo magazine, Israa Thiab, believes that obsessions with Islamophobia, prevented genuine good faith discussions about and arguments against Islamic theology and doctrine. You can read the original piece commenting on Ms Thiab’s article here.

The article elicited an excellent comment about the prospects of Islamic reform from one of this blog’s commenters, John MC. I was so impressed with the comment that I asked him for permission to repost it as a Guest Post which was given. He also offered to expand on the original comment which he has done. This has been put together to form the Guest Post below.

Islamic Reform?

I genuinely admire Muslims like Ms Thiab, and I also agree with much of what she says, but (and as her full article implies in the experience of her Father) history is against any “reason based reform” of Islam.

The problem is not just with ” Islamist ideologies, such as those of the Muslim Brotherhood, Salafism and Wahhabism”. There is nothing controversial (Islamically speaking) with their ideologies; in fact such ideology lies entirely within the mainstream of Islam going right back to Mohammed and his companion murderous thugs.

Let me state at this point that Al-Azhar has never been prepared to condemn ISIL as “un-Islamic”, but it has so condemned “reformist” Muslims, thus it isn’t a dislike of being labelled “Takfiri” that has prevented Al-Azhar doing so, it is that Al-Azhar considers ISIL at least “Muslim enough” to avoid strong censure.

The problem is that a reform of Islam itself such as that proposed by Ms. Thaib runs counter to the “triple lock” that Islam has against reform:

Lock one : if it’s in the Quran, and not abrogated, that’s the way things have to be forever. (This is based on the premise that the Koran is the literal word of “Allah”.)
Lock two: if it’s become part of Sharia, whether or not it’s in the Quran, it must stand forever. (The best example of this is the case of the “verse of Rajam” -Stoning of adulteresses – which has been lost from the Koran but is found in the Ahadith and which actually abrogates a Koran verse.)
Lock three: If anyone disagrees with lock 1 or 2 they are (at best) a “Munifiq” (hypocrite) or (at worst) an apostate who can be killed out of hand.

This is not to say that there are not multiple ways of interpreting Islam, but to create a peaceful Islam you either need your own prophet (a la Ahmadhis who are persecuted by both Sunni and Shia for it) or “interpreter” (a la Isma’ilis) and/or take a gnostic pathway as do some Sufi orders, but either way you must ignore the majority of the teaching and history of Islam.
This means that the “mainstream rationalist” (if you will pardon the oxymoron) is easily countered by orthodox Muslims pointing out how the rationalist ignores (as the rationalist must) swathes of the teaching of Islam as found in the Koran and Sunnah and the orthodox Muslim has by far the greater weight of Islamic teaching, history and experience on his side of the argument than does the rationalist, thus the orthodox Muslim’s argument is by far the most convincing to “al-muminoon” – the faithful of Islam, or at least those that are call themselves believers.

It is this that makes “radicalisation” or, more accurately, “orthodoxisation” so attractive and powerful. The orthodox Muslim knows without doubt that s/he is following Islam “fi sabeeli allahi” – “in the way of Allah” (and Mohammed) because such beliefs and attitudes are most consistent with what Islam says about itself in its sources.

From the Mutazalites to Kamal Ataturk, attempts at reform of Islam have invariably failed in time (as we see at present with the re-Islamification of ‘modern’ Turkey and its growing neo-Ottoman aims) and thus whilst Ms. Thaib and others like her have a noble idea I fear (and I mean that literally) that it is doomed to failure like all such attempts before it. It is actually frightening to see how Islam locks its evil within its teachings and how this prevents its re-interpretation within the mainstream of Islam.

IMO the only way to “reform” Islam is for Muslims to abandon Islam. They may believe in a sort of “Islam-lite” or become “cultural” or “secular” or “agnostic” Muslims (I’ve actually met a hijab wearing Muslima in the UK who stated she was agnostic!), but however you slice it, according to Islam itself that makes them (more or less) non-Muslims, no matter what the modern fashion for self-identification may be.

Many peaceful Muslims (IMO) are actually in this position. They have rationalised away the parts of Islam’s teaching that conflict with their innate humanity (the irony is that Islam also stresses kindness, generosity and charity to Muslims and if that view is strong then the attitude spills over onto non-Muslims as well thus creating the dissonance between different parts of the teachings of Islam) or, in the attempt to harmonise them, decide that (e.g.) sword-jihad is not required because…

It is also worthwhile bearing in mind the recent experience of Christians (who are a “tolerated” minority in Islam) in Iraq and Syria. In many cases when ISIL came calling their neighbours who had been friends (sometimes for “centuries” according to reports) turned on them and very actively and enthusiastically aided ISIL in the despoilation, murder and expulsion of their Christian neighbours.

“Quietist” Salafists (particularly in the West) are often peaceful because they think the conditions for sword-Jihad (adequate Muslim military strength to ensure gains) are not yet in place where they are living and the tension between the “Quietist” and “Jihadist” branches of Salafism are well documented.
I take from this that there are many “peaceful” Muslims who use the peaceful teachings of Islam as a “place-holder” until the suitable circumstances for sword-Jihad against the infidel arise.

There is a lot more that could be said to build the full argument, but I did not intend to write an essay, so I’ll finish with this:
Individual Muslims may believe and act on as much or as little of Islam as they wish for a multitude of reasons, but Islam in and of itself is un-reformable.

Another reason for the peaceable nature of most orthodox Muslims in the west is the doctrine of Taysir or “ease”.
What this says is that Muslims may set aside parts of Sharia (which includes a duty of Jihad under certain circumstances) when their implementation would cause them problems.
Thus orthodox Muslims in the west may set aside stoning, amputations, killing apostates etc. if they believe (and rightly) that enacting such things would bring trouble – in these cases criminal prosecutions – on their heads.

Thus they might say “We don’t think it is right to amputate/stone/etc.” and they would not be lying, because in their present situation it isn’t “right”, it has been set aside to avoid “persecution / oppression” of the Muslims for implementing sharia law.
But note that these elements are set aside – they are not abandoned, abrogated, or removed from the Islamic canon. They are merely in abeyance until such time as they can be implemented.

This is why some commentators refer to “creeping Sharia”. It is the gradual re-establishment of Sharia as time, opportunity and circumstance permit, initially within the Muslim community but eventually (if unchecked) this will inevitably lead to the imposition of sharia on the non-Muslim population.
So orthodox Muslims ask nicely to be permitted religious dress at work … then for washing facilities to be built … then for time off for prayer … then for their own parallel legal system (i.e. “Sharia Courts”) …

A second example is the attempt by various Muslim groups to use “Hate-speech” laws to silence any critique of Islam (such as this) as a case of “hate speech” and “Islamophobia” (thus utilising “Jihad of the tongue/pen”), an argument they seem to be winning at present.
Again, the “no-go zones” in various continental Countries show that eventually orthodox Muslim enclaves form where the “Authorities”, including emergency services, fear to tread and in which the law of the land no longer holds sway but is replaced with restrictive Sharia norms and which may well be “policed” by self-styled Mutaween “religious police”.
Thus the Sharia elements set aside under the doctrine of Taysir are gradually restored and implemented and the Islamification of the west continues, perhaps slowly, but definitely steadily.

For many orthodox Muslims the success of the forms of Jihad I have described in the paragraph above – known as “hand and tongue/pen Jihad” – is enough of a, or at least another, reason to hold off on sword-jihad.
Why risk the crushing of Islam in the West by a majority population enraged beyond all restraint by sword-Jihad when the more peaceful forms of Jihad are working so well?
Sword-jihad will always cause loss and damage to the Muslim community, the killing wouldn’t be entirely one-sided if Muslims raised an insurrection, so why take the risk when it may not be needed in order to bring the west within the fold of Islam?

Footnote: The final step, for orthodox Muslims, is the reduction of the non-Muslim population to at least de facto Dhimmi status and preferably de jure Dhimitude; as, for example, offered by Al-Baghdadi to the Christians of Raqqa. As to what that means, I recommend reading the Pact of Umar, and perhaps I might recommend this source as a start: http://www.faithfreedom.org/the-pact-of-umar/