A world Without Islam pdfdrive com

Holy Texts as Source of All Law
The lessons of the Reformation left little doubt on one key issue: when the state,
or powerful institutions like the church, loses control over religion, religion can
quickly become an instrument for an attack on the state and its powers. In some
of the radical Protestant movements—especially Calvinist and Anabaptist—the
broader forces of democratization and individualism open the door to more
personal and radical interpretations of scripture. This process has immediate
implications for society and governance.
Islam, too, has undergone a process of liberation away from its state-
controlled clerical thinking of the past and toward the emergence of diverse
modern Islamist movements. And when state-controlled clerics lose credibility
and legitimacy, others take over interpretation of Islam and can direct its
message against the state. Some of these movements, however strict, harsh,
radical, and violent, are a direct outgrowth of a process of rethinking Islam. No
longer the purview of clergy working for the state, no longer limited to “safe”
questions of ritual and purity, newer Islamic movements have emerged against
the will of the state. They call for religion to play a role in combating corrupt,
incompetent, oppressive, and unrepresentative regimes and in alleviating poor
social and economic conditions, already under the strains and disruptions of the
Global War on Terror.
The varieties of contemporary Islamism attempt to speak out boldly, to open
up the political order, and even to aggressively change the status quo in line with
the ideals of Islam. The process of opening the system has unleashed
considerable pent-up radicalism and violence against the state. While some
groups have moved toward more liberal interpretations of Islam in keeping with
the contemporary world, many others have moved toward intolerance through
insistence on taking the texts literally and attempting to apply them unchanged to
contemporary conditions. As occurred in the Protestant Reformation, Pandora’s
box has been opened in Islam. A lot of intellectual shaking down will take place
in Muslim societies as they ponder the relationship between religious values and
societal improvement in today’s polarized circumstances. The process is well
under way: 9/11 and the Global War on Terror have accelerated radicalization
and, simultaneously, the production of its ultimate antibodies.
With the collapse of the centralized theological authority of the Roman
Church in the Reformation, the door was open: how could the contents of
religious texts be applied to the creation of the good (and Godly) society? In
reality no religious text offers a ready-made module of law for instant

---

application to the workings of society: devout followers can seek only to glean
values out of the texts and to craft legislation reflecting those values as best they
can. Christianity and Islam have both struggled with application of the texts and
values to society and governance—and continue to do so. Protestant Christianity
in particular sought to found its theology and moral judgments for society on the
texts themselves, not on the deliberations of unrepresentative church councils
that played such a major role in the earlier Roman Catholic and Orthodox
traditions.
Islam struggles with precisely these same questions: what is the role of the
Qur’an in shaping the individual’s understanding of Islam and in crafting Islamic
legislation? Both Islamic reformism and Protestantism are interested in action
and results, in applied religious values and their social implications, not in mere
abstract theology.
CALVINISM, along with Lutheranism and Anabaptism, was one of the three
main movements of the Reformation. John Calvin had undergone a powerful and
mystical personal religious experience that pushed him strongly toward embrace
of Protestant-style beliefs—“God subdued my soul to docility by a sudden
conversion”—and he was convinced that he had a divine mission as God’s
instrument for the spiritual regeneration of the world. Viewed as a heretic in
Catholic France, Calvin sought refuge in Geneva, which was struggling against
powerful external forces for its independence. In 1536, the city took three
astonishingly radical steps: the abolition of monasteries, abolition of Mass, and
rejection of papal authority. Calvin strongly favored “magisterial rule” for the
city, meaning rule by Protestant clergy—in effect a theocracy—seemingly
prefiguring Ayatollah Khomeini’s rule of the clerics in Iran. Calvin worked for
fourteen years to win over the leaders of Geneva and to impose his authority
over the form of his church’s doctrine and organization, and the moral behavior
of the congregation. We find here almost a blueprint for later Wahhabi thinking
in Saudi Arabia. Calvin established a “City of God” in Geneva and proclaimed
the Bible to be the source of all community legislation—parallel to trends in
much Islamist thinking that supports the Qur’an as the sole source of all
legislation; indeed, Saudi Arabia speaks of the Qur’an as its “constitution.”
All elements of Calvin’s religious services came entirely out of the Bible. As
the Wahhabis would later do, Calvin opposed the use of musical instruments,
church bells, and colorful vestments or artwork in religious services. Nearly all
traditional church holy days and saints’ feast days were abandoned. Fundamental

---

to Calvin’s thinking was a belief in the sinfulness and corruptibility of mankind.
Strict moral principles were imposed, whose violations were punishable:
excommunication and banishment for breaking religious laws, and the death
penalty for blasphemy. Dress codes required simple garb. Taverns were closed,
theaters and dancing were not permitted, and the general public was kept under
close scrutiny by informers. “Morals police” (like Saudi mutawwa’, or
“enforcers”) visited neighborhoods to ensure that moral codes were upheld. All
sensual pleasures were deeply suspect.
Calvin’s goal was that Geneva should become the Kingdom of God on Earth
and a community without sin or taint. And although Calvin and his movement
were a vital part of the Protestant Reformation, his views directly contradicted
the spirit of the Lutheran branch of the Reformation, which emphasized an
individual’s personal responsibility for interpreting and understanding the Bible
and God’s message. Calvinism employed authoritarian means to impose Calvin’s
moral vision. He himself led a strict, rigorous, and seemingly joyless life, replete
with constant health problems.
Whatever dissatisfactions may have existed among part of the population of
Geneva, John Knox, the leader of Scottish Protestantism, described the city as
“the most perfect school of Christ.” Geneva also became a center for training;
missionaries schooled in Calvinist principles fanned out across Europe, in effect
to “export the revolution.” The movement soon took on an international status
through the use of underground messengers and clandestine communications,
enabling its spread to points in northern Europe and later to America.

---