“Let there be a community
among you that calls
people to the good and commands what is right
and forbids what is wrong” (Q 3:104). Likewise,
it says, “Indeed, God will not change what is in a
people until they change what is in themselves”
(Q 13:11). Such declarations have been used by
Muslims in later times to call for individual moral
correction in accordance with what is understood
to be God’s Law (the
sharia
) and, circumstances
permitting, to advocate collective moral, religious,
and social reform. The quranic term that is used
most commonly today with respect to the idea of
reform is islah. It is related to a term for reconcilia-
tion and peacemaking (sulh), as well as to the idea
of doing what is good. In its verbal form it can also
mean “to restore” and “to renew,” and those who
engage in such action are the “restorers” or “recon-
cilers” (muslihun). Islah was not widely used in the
sense of “reform” until the modern reform move-
ments of the 19th and 20th centuries.
The Arabic term most commonly used for
renewal is tajdid. Unlike islah, this word is not
found in the Quran. Rather, proponents of Islamic
renewal cite a
hadith
found in later collections
(Abu Dawud, ninth century). This hadith states,
“At the beginning of each century God will bring
forth for this community (
umma
) a person who
will renew its religion.” Different “renewers” (sing.
mujaddid) have been acclaimed in Islamic history.
These include the Umayyad caliph Umar II (r.
717–720), Sunni theologian and mystic
al
-g
hazali
(d. 1111), Hanbali jurist i
bn
t
aymiyya
(d. 1327),
Egyptian Sunni scholar Jalal al-Din al-Suyuti (d.
1505), Indian mystic and reformer a
hmad
s
irhindi
(d. 1625), and Iranian jurist and revolutionary
Ayatollah r
Uhollah
k
homeini
(d. 1989). The idea
of a “renewer” is primarily encountered in Sunni
Islam; it is eclipsed in s
hiism
by belief in the m
ahdi
.
Nevertheless, there have been important religious
reform movements in Shii communities, too.
The establishment of the a
bbasid
c
aliphate
in the eighth century and the subsequent con-
solidation of orthodox s
Unnism
also contributed
significantly to the shaping of Islamic reform-
ism and renewal. Pro-Abbasid Sunni historians
portrayed the U
mayyad
c
aliphate
as illegitimate,
accusing it of being too worldly and un-Islamic,
the implication being that the Abbasids were the
legitimate restorers of the true religion of the
prophet m
Uhammad
. Developments during the
first century of Abbasid rule led not only to the
establishment of the major Sunni legal schools,
but also to the articulation of the fundamental
principles of belief. Rather than Abbasid political
authorities, however, it was the religious scholars,
the
Ulama
, who became the official arbiters of the
sharia and Islamic teachings. Though every Mus-
lim in theory was responsible for leading people
on the path of religious and ethical correctness, the
ulama claimed priority. This is reflected in the list
of mujaddids named above, all but one of whom
(Umar II) had expertise in the religious sciences.
MODErN rENEWAl AND
rEFOrM MOvEMENTS
Although Islamic movements of this type differ in
organization, ideology, and even objective, there
are nevertheless characteristics that many of them
share. These include (1) promoting a “return” to
the “straight path” of religion based on the Quran
and
sUnna
, which are regarded as universally
valid; (2) looking to the righteous community of
the first Muslims (the salaf) for inspiration; (3)
and reforming traditional practices and beliefs
that are considered to be innovations (sing.
bidaa
)
or deviations from cherished Islamic principles
established by the Quran, Muhammad, and the
salaf. Islamic studies scholars also point out that
reformers and revivalists have not only been
critical of rulers, but also of “traditionalist” reli-
gious authorities who rely too much on “imita-
tion” (taqlid) at the expense of essential Islamic
principles. In order to validate their break with
traditionalists and imitators and adapt the Quran
and Sunna to changing circumstances, reformers
call for the use of
ijtihad
, an approved method
of jurisprudence (
fiqh
) that allows for the use of
individual legal reasoning when explicit guidance
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