The third book is Carmen Bin Ladin's Inside The Kingdom
"It has become impossible for fundamentalist Muslims to separate the Sharia code from their religious beliefs. For them it simply cannot be done, for the Sharia is not a separable part of their religion. Any alternative point of view is unacceptable for these zealots, which is why democracy as we know it in the West may not be able to exist in the Muslim world. A fundamentalist cannot allow the ideas that he sees as his religious law to be subjected to scrutiny and debate.
In the West, our laws can be reviewed and changed to adapt to our modern world. An unjust and outdated law is questioned. It is noticed, resented, and fought about, sometimes bitterly. Ours is not a perfect society but it has the strength and flexibility to examine itself and change. We look forward and we seek to improve our laws and our society. To Islamic fundamentalists, Sharia law is immutable. All society must be guided by the way the original community of Muslims in the seventh century lived and thought. Therefore everyone looks backward.
This is a dash of cold water, a chilling, but I think a very true assessment."
The fourth book is in a completely different category, since it asks that you join in understanding from the Islamic perspective those pluralistic Muslims who strive to reconcile their religious values with those of the modern world vs those Muslims who always revert to the 7th Century and the "fundamentals" of their faith.
The book is Reza Aslan's No god but God.
Reza Aslan very clearly identifies the root cause of the current problem with the Islam faith (and he is a pious Muslim). He states his faith has been hi-jacked over the centuries by misogynistic men with a tribal mentality. They have subverted the original egality of that faith with the rigidity of masculine dominance, most specifically the imposition of their harsh interpretation of Sharia law and its radicalized version of the Qu'ran.
Let me quote him here.
"Like puritans of other faiths - militaristic or not - the Jihadists' principal goal is the "purifying" of their own religious communities. In other words, their first target is not the West, or Jews, or Christians, or Zionists, or Crusaders, or any other outsiders (what the Jihadists term "the far enemy"), but those hundreds of millions of Muslims who do not share their puritanical worldview ("the near enemy"). Perhaps the most hopeful development in this internal battle to define the faith and practice of over a billion people is that Muslims themselves are becoming increasingly aware that they are as much endangered by the extremist agenda as are the so-called infidels."
"The theology of those Wahhabists who wish to return Islam to some imaginary ideal of original purity must be once and for all abandoned. Islam is and has always been a religion of diversity. The notion that there was once an original, unadulterated Islam that was shattered into heretical sects and schisms is a historical fiction. God may be one, but Islam most definitely is not.
It has always been this way. From the very moment that God spoke the first word of Revelation to Muhammed - "Recite! - the story of Islam has been in a constant state of evolution as it responds to the social, cultural, political, and temporal circumstances of those who are telling it. Now it must evolve once more.
The tragic events of September 11, 2001, may have fueled the clash-of-monotheisms mentality among those Muslims, Christians, and Jews who seem so often to mistake religion for faith and scripture for God. But it also initiated a vibrant discourse among Muslims about the meaning and message of Islam in the twenty-first century. What has occurred since that fateful day amounts to nothing short of another Muslim civil war - a fitnah - which, like the contest to define Islam after the Prophet's death, is tearing the Muslim community into opposing factions."
Mr. Aslan also states that "the tide of reform cannot be stopped. The Islamic Reformation is already here."
My problem, as Bob Jenks, is that I see no concrete evidence yet of this reform movemment. I sincerely hope that it is underway and that it succeeds. But I fear that it will take some time, perhaps generations, for the Reformation to succeed (as it did for the Christian Reformation).
Identifying Jihadism, and calling it by name is certainly the first step. But that is not enough. The Jihadists will still thrive unnoticed and waiting in this situation.
We need to identify and support
moderate, pious, Muslims who are struggling mightily in Iraq and elsewhere to stand up
against the extremist Islamists who are bent on world-wide
domination and the establishment of a new Islamic Caliphate.
Pious Muslims need our our support because they need to recognize we understand and support their battle to reform Islam and bring it into the twenty-first century with a tide of reform and a radically new vision of tolerance and pluralism.
This continues to result in an ever-increasing drain on our economy, to the great advantage of our known enemies in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere. The solution is quite clear, it seems to me.
We must switch to energy sources already available to us, such as nuclear energy, and start implementing the selective practicality of alternative sources such as solar, and wind power. We need to manufacture and promote both hybrid vehicles and those powered by alternate fuels such as ethanol. We can reduce our dependence on middle-eastern oil and that economic drain on our resources.
I would really appreciate hearing from you with your current viewpoint on this issue. It's a complex and difficult one to come to grips with, but I think we must indeed face it for the future safety of our country. I feel deeply that we need to effectively address this underlying issue of Jihadism here in the United States. Please send me an Email today!
Put "My View" in the subject line, and give me your comments and suggestions on my proposed assessment above. Thank you.
