Religious discourse renewal is an innate and civilized necessity because this current religious discourse is disjointed and individual, while the world is witnessing massive gatherings and developments in the field of technology, information and invention. Therefore, there must be a conscious, contemporary and disciplined religious discourse that can establish a reconciliation between tradition and modernity
This living renewal is a conscious and promising reading of the soul, the other and reality. It is a reading capable of finding appropriate sharia solutions to reality problems. There is no escape from renewal, and if we do not believe in that then we have two options:
The first: stagnation, which means the overthrow of the right to life and crushing it in an era surrounded by the revolutionary movement from every side.
The second: dissolution and loss of identity
The talk about the “Islamic” religious discourse renewal took three approaches:
The first approach:
Rejecting the idea of renewing the discourse from its foundations, claiming that religion has descended, finished and completed, and the renewal of the discourse is nothing but a malicious claim to eliminate Islam.
The second approach
Expanding the talk about the necessity of renewing the religious discourse, reaching the renewal of the entire religion.
The third approach
Mediation, this team has prevented renewal in texts; It has permitted renewal in our understanding of the texts, with the right to fully respect the (Ijtihad) jurisprudence of previous scholars.
In addressing the issue of renewal, the following questions arise:
The first question:
Does renewal mean the renewal of the religion in the sense of sorting out the fixed and variable in it, or the renewal of the means of calling to this religion?
The second question :
Why does focus concentrate on Islam? No one has demanded a renewal of the Christian, ecclesiastical, Jewish, or rabbinic discourse
The third question :
Does purification of religious discourse from similar oddities come within the framework of the noble hadith “Everything innovation is heresy and every heresy is misguidance and every misguidance is in hellfire?”
The fourth question:
If renewal is required at all times, what are the rules for safe renewal?
The fifth question :
Is renewal done by whomever wants, in any religion sector, and is it a populist or an elitist process?
The failure to modernize Islamic societies is due to a number of elements and characteristics, including:
1- The past tendency that has accompanied the religious discourse and made it a captive of the past. It reproduces the sayings of the jurists and looks for solutions to present problems in the past, wary of societal changes, worried about future developments, not open to the era culture and its humanitarian endowments.
2- Glorifying history and praising glories, exploits, victories, symbols and heroes by selecting bright moments in history while completely ignoring a thousand years of injustices of tyranny, divisions and ethnic wars against each other and against other peoples; thinking that any criticism of history is a criticism of religion even though it is a human history full of what requires criticism, investigation and correction. There is no holiness to individuals, no matter how great their stature is.
3- The masculine character: Our religious discourse is governed by a cultural heritage that detracts from the woman. It sees (female) as the source of sedition and seduction, not a “person” who has all rights. Therefore, it imposes the guardianship of man on her to guide her behavior. Even though contemporary women have reached leadership positions, the logic of the religious discourse is based on the primacy of the male and his right to prevent her from driving a car, traveling, working or going out. The Mufti of Australia compared women to uncovered meat that lures cats. Paris expelled an imam who called for beating wives. Women in religious discourse have two tasks: to make men happy and to raise their children !!
4- The exclusionary characteristic: the religious discourse is an exclusionary discourse for the other who is different whether it is a doctrine or a sect. The other is questionable in its belief; the correct belief is the same, its believers are survivors, while the rest of the Islamic sects are lost, deviant, or, according to some, heretical.
5- Accusative tendency: the dominant tone in religious discourse is blaming and accusing the other. It depicts the world as a conspiracy against Muslims, as acculturation and malicious globalization, starting with the great discord at the hands of (Ibn Saba’) through the wise men of Zion and ending with the malevolent Crusader led by America. The West is a devil who does not want good for Muslims, and it is a lurking enemy of which we must take precaution. The west is material and pornographic and wants to corrupt us. Rather, the religious discourse accuses everyone who disagrees with it on a political, social or economic issue as being an agent serving West plans !
6- Absolutisms: the religious discourse is an absolute discourse that thinks that it possesses absolute truth. It does not believe in knowledge relativity and human facts.
7- Incitement: the religious discourse is always inflammatory and tactical one. It has incited our youth to join the (mujahideen) strugglers in Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine, etc. It has described self-bombing, even among civilians and children as “supreme” images of jihad in those countries! It has not refrained from inciting against writers, intellectuals, and artists, by suspecting them, confiscating their production, and persecuting them.
8- Justification: The religious discourse explains the terrorist ideas as a mere response to American and Western injustice. Therefore, it seeks multiple justifications for terrorists, which are either political justifications which is the case in Palestine and Iraq, double standards, or economic justifications such as unemployment or social as in the case of women going out, showing off, mixing, and the spread of evils, or the media: serials and concerts or justifying the terrorist act with Arab regimes grievances and their dependency on the outside.
9- Absence of science and reason role: Religious discourse ignores science and reason when it tries to convince people that earthquakes and hurricanes are divine punishment for sins and disobedience.
10- Unrealism: religious discourse seeks ideals and ignores reality. It talks about tolerance and does not notice that Muslims lack the minimum level of tolerance among themselves as well as among others. They boast about their freedom of belief but do not allow building temples for people of other religions. They wage battles over sub-issues of contention: veil, music, beard, mixing – and they never get angry at violating freedoms.
Can religious discourse be renewed?
Religious discourse can only be renewed by renewing religious thought besieged by the trinity of (takfirism salafism, brotherhood awakening, passeism nostalgia). The most important components of renewal are:
1- Reviving the human tendency which is absent in religious discourse and embracing the human being because he is a human being honored by his Creator: Muslim or non-Muslim, male or female, Sunni or Shiite, Salafi or Sufi.
2- Focusing on commonalities between religions and sects, to illuminate aspects of beneficial partnership, and to avoid differences and inflating them.
3- Openness to societies reality, the horizons of human knowledge, and the horizons of sharia purposes.
4- Promoting citizenship and belonging values, upholding human rights and respect of pluralism.
5- Rehabilitating the concept of Islamic jihad after it was distorted by the advocates of extremism by adopting a broad humanistic concept of jihad. The true jihad is to live, build, produce and advance.
6- Dismantling the alliance of religious authority with the political one that uses religious discourse for its purposes.
7- Re-educating imams and preachers, developing religious curricula and enriching them with innovators ideas.
8- Adopting the critical methodology, spreading it and opening it to human knowledge.
9- The distinction between the history of Muslims and Islam, and not confusing the advocacy with the political and the separation between what is a jurisprudential opinion and what is of a sharia origin?