Muslims who want to modernize

International Herald Tribune ^ | Oct. 23, 2003 | Philip Bowring

[Alouette]

KUALA LUMPUR At the 10th summit meeting of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, held in Malaysia last week, the host nation made a valiant effort to drag the organization out its Arab/Middle East ghetto and make it more relevant to Muslims generally, and hence to non-Muslims.

The task may be impossible. The OIC is a gathering of 57 countries with Muslim majorities or large minorities. Thus it represents states rather than the broader ummah, or Islamic community. At the political level it is extremely difficult for them to find common ground on anything except the West's anti-Muslim prejudices and Palestine. Even on Palestine there was an underlying sense of frustration at the failure of Arab states to put support for Palestinians ahead of survival of their socially and technologically backward regimes.

But this gathering of Muslim heads of state and government - the biggest ever, and the first OIC summit meeting since Sept. 11, 2001 - helped concentrate minds on issues often forgotten by Muslims and Westerners alike.

It was a reminder that most Muslims live east of Iran in countries in which they are either a minority, such as India, or where there are large non-Muslim minorities, such as Indonesia and Malaysia.

Arabs account for only about 20 percent of all Muslims. The Arabic language and Mecca give Arabs a special position in the Muslim world, and in recent years oil money and the sheer number of Arab petty states have had added to their influence in Islamic institutions. This influence of socially and technologically backward states is not appreciated in Muslim states and communities that regard themselves as more progressive, focused on economic and social advancement not on rituals and dogmas.

Faced with the generalized anti-Muslim sentiment which had long existed in the West but has risen to often hysterical levels since the Sept. 11 attacks, Muslims from elsewhere are seeing the need to focus on self-improvement as well as grievances.

This expressed itself in a number of ways at the OIC meeting. First, the Malaysians repeatedly delivered reminders that the road to respect is, as during the glorious days of Islam, through the advancement of science and learning. Fixation with dress codes, rather than modern knowledge, has been the cause of backwardness.

Second, there was recognition that Islam is the only major religion to have been started by a trader, the Prophet Muhammad. Christians and Confucians may have been suspicious of the values of merchants, but Muhammad gave an honorable place to industry and commerce. Yet most Islamic nations west of Pakistan have economies that are as closed to trade with fellow Muslims as they are with everyone else.

Talk of an eventual Islamic common market or Islamic currency was the kind of impractical dream of which such gatherings are made. But it served as a useful reminder that the economic policies of several Middle East countries owe more to Marx or feudalism than to teachings of the trader Muhammad. Islam has no alternative to, or conflict with, modern economics. Even Islamic banking, which anyway only a minority of Muslims require, is easily compatible with interest-based systems.

The trade and learning needs of the ummah were underlined here by an OIC Business Forum. The first of its kind, it featured as speakers such recent converts to foreign investment as the president of Sudan. Pakistan's president, Pervez Musharraf, spoke at length of the need for private-sector economic leadership and the merits of free trade and capital.

Pan-Islamic trade groups are not going to happen. Any trade pacts involving OIC members will be based on geography, not religion. But at the level of individuals and of firms, the ummah may have a role to play in breaking down the nation-state fortress mentality that is strong in the Middle East, but less so in the eastern Islamic world. Any talk of the importance of trade, technology and investment rather than politics and grievances is a step forward.

Malaysia cunningly sought to expand the OIC's relevance by inviting two heads of state with significant - and rebellious - Muslim inhabitants, Presidents Vladimir Putin of Russia and Gloria Arroyo of the Philippines. Given the growth of Muslim minorities in Europe and the United States, will Presidents Jacques Chirac and George W. Bush be guests at the OIC's next meeting?

If nothing else, Malaysia's efforts as summit impresario may have given the OIC a chance to be relevant. The Islamic world

[Alouette]

Not even one mention of Mahathir's Jew-bashing in this gushing panegyric of an Islamic group hug.

[Alouette]

FRmail me to be added or removed from this pro-Israel ping list.

[SamiGirl]

"Fixation with dress codes, rather than modern knowledge, has been the cause of backwardness."

I wonder why they forgot to mention hatred of Israel, hatred of Christians, and a burning desire to kill anyone who's not Muslim.

[Cicero]

Of course not. The IHT is now wholly controlled by the NY Times, which regretably has very little interest in supporting Israel or the Jews. They prefer to follow the correct leftist position, which requires them to support the Arabs.

[RLK]

Mohammedism can not be modernized. The commandments of the Koran are too explicit and pathological to permit it. Attempting to modernize Mohammedism is the equivalent of trying to modernize advanced schizophrenia.

[goldstategop]

The last Muslim modernizer was Kemal Ataturk. Fascinating figure. He considered himself more European than Muslim and his reforms of Turkey transformed it into a European country, albeit with a Muslim coloration. The Muslim world has not had someone since who grasped the modern world and charged forward like he did.

[bereanway]

I agree completely. Problem is, the western mind and media in particular simply have no concept of what Islam really means, or, they don't want to admit as much. The Koran, Hadith and other sources are very explicit concerning the relationship of Muslims to the non-Muslim world. For example the very existance of Israel is unacceptable to a true Mohammedian and there is no peaceful solution as long as Israel continues to exist, with the rest of us non-Muslims being on the same list with just a slightly lower priority. How this is somehow compatible with modern economies as this author suggests is perplexing. To attempt to paint Islam in other terms as this article does is to deny reality.

It would also seem fitting that the last OIC summit was on September 11, 2001.

[bert]

Look at the Roman Catholic Church and the Reformation and then say Islam can't change because it is too dogmatic.

[RLK]

Look at the Roman Catholic Church and the Reformation and then say Islam can't change because it is too dogmatic.

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I've looked. Mohammedism can not be modernized. The commandments of the Koran are too explicit and pathological to permit it. Attempting to modernize Mohammedism is the equivalent of trying to modernize advanced schizophrenia.

[bert]

There is no Mohammedism. Do you mean Islam?

[TN4Liberty]

Moslems could modernize all the way to, what, the 15th century?

[RLK]

There is no Mohammedism. Do you mean Islam?

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I said what I meant. If you have a problem with it, tough.

[Mortimer Snavely]

When Islam is under complete non-Islamist state control and supervision, when Imams must be vetted by the same, when the secular State takes an active interest in and monitors the sermons and behavior of all Islamists, when Islamists are firmly under the boot, when they can be thrown in jail for the slightest inference of advocating Islamist government, then, and only then, can Islam be considered benign. And then only with with an alert suspicion and under constant surveillance.