Islam in Context , livre ebook

Baker Publishing Group - G. Riddell Peter , Peter Cotterell

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145 pages

English

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In recent months, much attention has been paid to Islam and the greater Muslim world. Some analysis has been openly hostile, while even more has been overly simplistic. Islam in Context goes behind the recent crisis to discuss the history of Islam, describe its basic structure and beliefs, explore the current division between Muslim moderates and extremists, and suggest a way forward. Authors Peter G. Riddell and Peter Cotterell draw from sources such as the Qur'an, early Christian chronicles of the Crusades, and contemporary Muslim and non-Muslim writings. They move beyond the stereotypes of Muhammad-both idealized and negative-and argue against the myth that relatively recent events in the Middle East are the only cause for the clash between Islam and the West. Riddell and Cotterell ask the non-Muslim world to attempt to understand Islam from the perspective of Muslims and to acknowledge past mistakes. At the same time, they challenge the Muslim world by suggesting that Islam stands today at a vital crossroads and only Muslims can forge the way forward. Islam in Context will appeal to all those who are interested in an alternative to the easily packaged descriptions of the relationship between Islam and the West.

Sujets

Philosophie et théologie

Islam

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Publié par	Baker Publishing Group
Date de parution	01 juillet 2003
Nombre de lectures	2
EAN13	9781441231802
Langue	English
Poids de l'ouvrage	1 Mo

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0691€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

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©2003 by Peter G. Riddell and Peter Cotterell
Published by Baker Academic a division of Baker Publishing Group P.O. Box 6287, Grand Rapids, MI 49516-6287 www.bakeracademic.com
Ebook edition created 2011
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means for example, electronic, photocopy, recording without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
ISBN 978-1-4412-3180-2
Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright © 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.
C ONTENTS
Cover
Title page
Copyright page
Illustrations
Introduction
P ART 1: L OOKING B ACK
1. Beginnings
2. Caliphs and Confusion
3. Beliefs and Practices
4. Qur’an and Christianity
P ART 2: I N B ETWEEN : T HE E BB AND F LOW OF E MPIRE
5. The Age of Muslim Empire
6. Empires Crumble
7. From Medieval to Modern
8. The Missionaries
9. Conflict in the Middle East
P ART 3: L OOKING A ROUND
10. The Muslim Masses and Westophobia
11. The Radical Islamist Worldview
12. The Moderate Worldview
13. Responses to Terrorism
Conclusions

Select Bibliography
Index
Notes
I LLUSTRATIONS
Figure 1.1 The Near and Middle East
Figure 1.2 Life of Muhammad
Figure 2.1 Sunni and Shi’a Islam
Figure 2.2 Shi’a Islam: The Twelve Imams
I NTRODUCTION
T his book has been written with three aims in mind. First, we wish to help the reader to understand Islam. Wherever possible we have tried to look at the history and theology of Islam from the perspective of Muslims.
Second, we have sought to present an understanding of the ongoing interaction between the Islamic world and the rest of the world. We believe that it is impossible to understand present-day tensions, still less to resolve them, without identifying their underlying causes. In identifying those causes it is not sufficient to look at events in the immediate past. Rather, we need to go further back, to the root causes, which frequently are to be found in seeds sown by early history and sacred texts.
Our third aim is to take the next logical step and to attempt to identify a viable way forward that might help to resolve present tensions and conflict. In our view it is not the non-Muslim world that stands at the crossroads, but the Muslim world. Islam has, throughout its history, contained within itself a channel of violence, legitimized by certain passages of the Qur’an, though put in question by other passages.
The two streams within Islam, the violent stream and the stream advocating a more moderate approach to the non-Muslim world, have existed through the centuries but in constant tension. That tension has irrupted from time to time in internal conflicts, and sometimes in conflicts with surrounding nations. These have usually been relatively localized conflicts. But in the twenty-first century the situation has changed in a radical and potentially catastrophic way. It is now possible for relatively small but determined and well-financed groups to make use of sophisticated modern technology to threaten destruction on an unprecedented scale. Recent research by both Muslims and non-Muslims shows that these extremist groups have a strong attraction, especially among idealistic youth.
As President George W. Bush has attempted to do with the al-Qa’ida network, so other political leaders may be able to deal with the acts of such radical groups. But ultimately it is only the Muslim world that can deal with the roots of the problem, which, in our view, do not lie in Western materialism or nineteenth-century colonialism or American imperialism, but in Islam’s own history, both distant and recent. Some moderate Muslim scholars agree. In the words of the Pakistani writer Izzat Majeed,
We Muslims cannot keep blaming the West for all our ills. We have to first get our own house in order before we can even make any credible struggle possible to rid us of ignorance, living-in-the-past chest thumping and intolerance of the modern world. . . . Without a reformation in the practice of Islam that makes it move forward and not backward, there is no hope for us Muslims anywhere. [1]
This view stands in contrast to the current view that places the burden of blame on the non-Muslim world in general and on the United States of America in particular.
Our hope is that this book will appeal to readers raised in the broad Judeo-Christian tradition, though perhaps not actively practicing a particular faith. But we also hope that the book will find readers among those who do seriously practice their faith, whether Christianity, Islam, or Judaism.
The book is divided into three parts. The first focuses on the distant past, the period in which the foundations of Islam were laid, with an emphasis on the lifetime of Muhammad and his immediate successors. Here, although we have looked at the development of Islamic theologies, this has not been a major concern.
The second part of the book deals with the medium past, that period characterized by the clash of empires, a clash that has contributed so much to the present-day relationship between Islam and the non-Muslim world. We have included a consideration of the Crusades, Muslim empires, European colonialism, and the contentious Christian missionary movement.
Part 3 considers the more recent past and the present. This period is obviously marked both by ongoing and largely unresolved tensions and by actual conflict. Here we have offered tentative suggestions for appropriate responses of governments and of Christianity, but also responses that might be appropriate for the majority moderate Muslim world.
There are several features of this book that might be considered distinctive. First, we have attempted to penetrate beyond the many stereotypes that have circulated concerning the person of Muhammad, both negative stereotypes from non-Muslim writers and idealized stereotypes from Muslim writers.
Again, we have argued against the myth that empire is a one-sided thing, insisting instead that Western colonialism is only one chapter in the saga of empires, and that the ongoing clash between Muslim and largely “Christian” empires has sown seeds that have grown to the harvest we see today.
And we have tried to maintain a balance between academic rigor and readability. We have assured rigor by making critical reference to original sources such as the Qur’an, the collection of Traditions by Bukhari, the biography of Muhammad written by Ibn Ishaq, and other works by Muslims down the centuries. We also refer to original Western and Christian sources, such as the various chronicles of the Crusades. We strive to achieve readability by avoiding the esoteric and the obscure.
Finally, we address some of the hard questions. We challenge the non-Muslim world to attempt to understand Islam from the perspective of Muslims and to acknowledge past mistakes. At the same time, we challenge the Muslim world by suggesting that Islam stands today at a vital crossroads, and the way forward is for them alone to decide. As with all religious movements, Islam has, in its long history, faced many such crossroads: obvious examples are the one that inevitably confronted it at the death of Muhammad and the one following the massacre at Karbala.
The crossroads analogy is helpful if it is properly understood: the decision taken at the crossroads determined on each occasion whether Islam would advance along a single road (as it largely did after the death of Muhammad) or along several distinct roads (as it did after Karbala). At the beginning of the twenty-first century Islam advances to the crossroads along several routes, among them the road of violence. The question of significance to the future history of the world is whether, after negotiating the crossroads, the highway of violence will have been closed off, leaving Islam to advance peacefully, albeit along more than one road.
Peter G. Riddell Peter Cotterell London, June 2002

1
B EGINNINGS
W hen Muhammad was born in Mecca, more than five centuries after the birth of Christ, a movement was initiated that would utterly transform Arabia and the fortunes of the Arab peoples in the space of a mere twenty years. Few men have had a greater impact on world affairs, lasting century after century, than this man Muhammad.
Muhammad ibn Abdullah was born in Mecca, probably in the year 570. By the time of his death at the age of sixty-two he had brought into existence a dynamic movement that would carry Islam through the centuries and across the continents, birthing empires, transforming the sciences, and challenging economic, cultural, and political systems. At the twenty-first century, as occurred frequently in its past history, the Islamic faith that sprang out of Muhammad finds itself at a crossroads, facing a choice between a radical identity willing to use violence to achieve its goals, and a moderation that could accept and even welcome coexistence with other cultures; a choice between moving ahead along a single highway or pursuing separate roads, with travelers on each nervously eyeing the others.
A RABIA BEFORE M UHAMMAD
Muhammad came to a no-people. The Arabs were largely ignored by the two great empires of the sixth century: the Christian empire centered on Byzantium (Constantinople, the modern Istanbul), over to the west; and the Zoroastrian Sassanian empire to the east, in Persia. It is, perhaps, not surprising that Arabia was ignored. The great Empty Quarter held no attraction for the traveler, and the sea route to India had made the old overland caravan trail obsolete.