Clinging to the past will get us nowhere
CULTURES ARE ENRICHED when new ideas are raised and different opinions regarding social, political, philosophical and religious issues are respectfully discussed and debated.
In Saudi Arabia, religious issues are especially important because Islam is intertwined with every aspect of our lives. Unfortunately, many people think that discussions about religion should be restricted to reinstating what early Muslims — the Salafs have said, which stagnates intellectuality and intends to insure homogeneity of thought, if there is such thing as homogeneity.
Thus, thinking about new approaches or interpretations in Islam is definitely considered a taboo. This is why when a Saudi intellectual suggests a new insight; conflicts arise between those who resist change and others who want it.
The irony is that both parties are calling for reforms, but the first defines it as clinging to the past while the latter defines it as catching up with the present.
The typical definition of religious reforms for many Saudis have been to rid Islam from reprehensible innovations, which result from people’s ignorance of Islamic teachings, and the solution in that case would be to go back to the pure origin exactly as applied at the time of the Prophet (PBUH) and early Muslims.
Obviously, no one can deny early Muslims’ invaluable contributions and significance in our Islamic heritage and current understanding of Islam.
However, their intellectuality was the fruit of their culture, education, language and the age they lived in, not ours.
In order to keep up with our modern lives, reforms should still indicate maintaining the pure origin while modifying its application by utilizing the intrinsic flexibility of Islam.
If we should not think about religious matters, why did early Muslims, such as Al-Shafi’i and Ibn Hanbal, themselves thought about them when Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) taught us everything we needed to know through the Qur’an and Sunna?
Prophets reached their belief in God through thinking and contemplating because taking things at face value without reasoning could lead to shallow belief that could break at any point. This is why many fundamentalists refuse to even look at different points of view because, to them, new ideas would corrupt our faith and minds when in actuality, refraining from thinking and shielding our minds from new ideas is a sign of our insecurity of our own belief.
Thinking and those who think deeply, ponder, contemplate, reflect and understand are mentioned about 169 times in the Qur’an. Our belief in God and finding our ‘true’ path should be based on thinking as God praised the ‘winners’ to be those who think and understand, and criticized those who followed the wrong path because they did not think nor understand and simply copied their forefathers.
In our case, copying our forefathers will not stray us from the truth, but it will equip us with outdated tools in an arduous journey.
Islam does not need reforms because it is atemporal, but our understanding of its teachings and approach do. The glory of Islam in general and the Qur’an in particular partly stems from the fact that it is fixed, but how we understand and interpret them change. As Muslims, we believe that Islam can be applied to anyone who embraces it all over the world regardless of ethnic, cultural, linguistic, racial, and educational differences.
When we refuse change, however, the only way to make it fit is by freezing time and making our way of life exactly like the time and place of the Prophet (PBUH), which is impossible. Many Saudis emphasize copying and in this way, they disregard the changes that have affected our way of life, which led others to wonder incorrectly if Islam is in conflict with modernity.
Like our predecessors, we are the product of our ethnicities, language, culture, and education, and these factors should be reflected in how we understand and apply our religion.
If we want to be a strong nation and our country to develop, we should tolerate and respect each other. Different points of views should not turn into personal feuds and attacks on personal characteristics.
Our religion is vast and sophisticated in a way that tolerates different points of views whether new or old as long as it does not lead to infidelity or to harming others.
Those who are against reforms should have the freedom to follow their path without forcing it on others whereas others who truly believe that Islam fits every place and time should not be labeled as heretics and apostate because they dared to think.
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