Critiquing Islam: Hamed Abdel Samad; Muslims should look critically at Hadith, Sharia and traditional theology
By
Arshad Alam, New Age Islam
21 June
2021
Muslims
Need To Reject Certain Aspects of Their Religion In Order To Live Harmoniously
In the Modern World
Main
Points:
• The teachings of Islam paint a negative
picture of modern western societies which promotes ethnocentrism within
Muslims.
• Muslims need to become critical of
certain aspects of their religion like the Sharia and reject it.
• Should the Prophetic tradition and the
earlier caliphs of Islam be the role model of Muslims today?
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Hamed Abdel Samad a German-Egyptian political scientist and author.
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Hamed Abdel
Samad is an Egyptian born German citizen who is emerging as a critic of Islam.
Born to a village Imam, he memorized the Quran early and was expected to take
the place of his father. But he became fascinated with the writings of Naguib
Mahfooz and eventually decided to enrol himself in Cairo University, leaving
the idyllic yet conservative setting of his birth place behind. While in the
university, he embraced Marxism and became part of the Left politics, only to
leave it after the collapse of Soviet Union. A lost soul, he allowed himself to
be charmed by Islamism and became part of the Muslim Brotherhood. But here too,
he could not reconcile his individualism with the almost total submission that
was demanded of him from the Brotherhood. In hindsight, he now argues that such
organizations break your will in order to transform you into an empty vessel of
their brand of politics. Leaving Islamism behind, he decided to study about his
religious heritage, first in Germany and then in Japan. Eventually settling in
Germany, he now writes extensively about Islam and its place in the modern
world.
Samad
argues that without criticality towards their own religion, Muslims will always
be a misfit in a modern society. His contention is that the teachings of Islam
paint a picture of western society as one without any values. This sort of
myopia understands value as located within the religion, in this case within
the Islamic religion itself. For a Muslim therefore, the consumption of pork
and alcohol, freedom of men and women, agnosticism and atheism all become an
assault on their common sense. Samad argues that there is a need to develop
empathy, a capacity to think from others’ point of view. Unfortunately, the
kind of training a Muslim mind goes through does not let this happen. Rather,
Muslims remained mired in their ethnocentrism which means that they understand
their values as the only standard against which all others should be judged.
Young
Muslims therefore have problems integrating with modern European societies
simply because they come with this baggage of negativity about the west. Samad
wants these Muslims to appreciate the good that Europe has to offer: its
freedoms, individualism, human rights and collective responsibility as
expressed through the welfare state. However, Samad argues that in order to do
so, Muslims will have to give up those aspects of their religion which do not
fit with the demands of modern society. The Islamic desire to police everything
from dress to even ideas, the conception that everything belongs to God and
hence She has to be the source of all legislation, are conceptions which do not
belong to modern societies and hence have to be given up by Muslims if they
want to integrate. If not, then the result can be disastrous: a condition of
anomie wherein the Muslim presence will be without the internalization of
European norms and traditions. This condition can fill Muslims with
unprecedented anxiety which may result in their complete alienation or worse,
in acts of violence against the west.
Muslims
should become critical towards aspects of their own religion. Here Samad is
different from the likes of Tariq Ramadan who always argued that Islam was
compatible with the west. Samad wants Muslims to change Islam and give up parts
of its teachings in order to accommodate in the west. One such aspect, which should
be given up, is the Sharia or the longing for it. Modern societies live by laws
which can be changed as per the demands of the time but as a God given law, the
Sharia is considered by Muslims as immutable. Moreover, as compared to any
modern law, the sharia is essentially regressive as there is no conception of
human rights, neither is there any freedom of thought and action within it.
Samad links this desire to create a Sharia state (Islamism) as a form of
fascism which needs to resisted by all right-thinking people, especially
Muslims. Its implementation anywhere has led to the curtailment of freedom,
loss of mobility for women, negation of any intellectual pursuit and a morbid
infantilisation of the Muslim self. If Muslims desire their religion to be
called modern, then this insistence on being governed by Islamic law must go.
Samad also
asks Muslims to think whether having role models of the past is going to be of
any help to them now. He is critical of the important personalities of Islam
like the rightly guided caliphs, the various jurists and even the Prophet
himself. His argument is that all of them believed in the eventual triumph of
Islam, that their only contact with non-Muslims was through the institution of
jizya (religious tax in lieu of protection) and that aspects of their personal
lives like having multiple wives and slaves cannot become the standard for any
Muslim today. He rightly observes that Muslims no longer do these things but
then these personalities continue to be the role models and Muslims are still
taught to follow their ways. If that is the ideal then how can we criticize
groups like ISIS because, in reviving the institution of slavery, they were in
fact practicing the prophetic path. There is a need therefore to delink Islam with
its problematic past; Muslims must only look towards the future and not try to
resurrect the past.
As can be
expected, there is a fatwa against Samad in Egypt for speaking his mind. But of
late, he is finding an audience in Muslim countries like Tunisia and Morocco
where his work is being read and discussed. Unfortunately, it is the liberal
left which has censured him for his writings, calling him Islamophobic. He was
forced to resign from the University of Munich where he taught and many
publishers have refused to publish his translations. And that’s the real
unfortunate part: that a Europe that prides itself on being the citadel of free
speech is increasingly becoming censorious. But it is heartening to note that
Arab Muslims are discussing his work. That sure is a sign of change for the
better.
----
Arshad
Alam is a columnist with NewAgeIslam.com.
URL: https://www.newageislam.com/debating-islam/critiquing-hadith-sharia-hamed-abdel-samad/d/124997
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