ISLAMIC RADICALISM
Islamic fundamentalism - Wikipedia
Islamic fundamentalism has been defined as a revivalist and reform movement of Muslims who aim to return to the founding scriptures of Islam.[1] The term has been used interchangeably with similar terms such as Islamism, Islamic revivalism, Qutbism, Islamic extremism, Islamic activism, but also criticized as pejorative, a term used by outsiders who instead ought to be using more positive terms such as Islamic activism or Islamic revivalism.[2]
Some of the beliefs attributed to Islamic fundamentalists are that the primary sources of Islam (the Quran, Hadith, and Sunnah), should be interpreted in a literal and originalist way;[3] that corrupting non-Islamic influences should be eliminated from every part of a Muslims' life; and that the societies, economies, and governance of Muslim-majority countries should return to the fundamentals of Islam, the system of Islam, and become Islamic states.[1][4]
Definitions and descriptions
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The term fundamentalism has been deemed misleading by those who suggest that all mainstream Muslims believe in the literal divine origin and perfection of the Quran and are therefore "fundamentalists",[5] and others who believe it is a term that is used by outsiders in order to describe perceived trends within Islam.[6]
A professor of religious studies at Georgetown University, John L. Esposito, criticized the usage of the term "Islamic Fundamentalism" due to its ambiguous nature; asserting that the linguistic deployment of the term has been heavily influenced through Western-centric lens of Christian presuppositions.
According to him, the more appropriate terms would be "Islamic revivalism" and "Islamic activism", since the traditions of Tajdid (revival) and Islah (reform) are rooted within the Islamic religious history, from the early Islamic centuries to the contemporary times.
During the 1990s, the post-Soviet states used "Islamic fundamentalism" as a synonym for "Wahhabism".[7][8]
Some 20th century preachers and writers sometimes dubbed Islamic fundamentalist include Sayyid Qutb, Ibn Saud, Abul Ala Mawdudi,[9] and Israr Ahmed.[10] The Wahhabi movement and its funding by Saudi Arabia is often described as being responsible for the popularity of contemporary Islamic fundamentalism.
Definitions vary as to what Islamic fundamentalism exactly is and how it differs from Islamism (or political Islam) or Islamic revivalism.
- Form of Islamism – Graham Fuller believes that Islamic fundamentalism is a subset of Islamism rather than a distinctive form of it, and to him, Islamic fundamentalists are "the most conservative element among Islamists". Its "strictest form" includes "Wahhabism, which is sometimes referred to as salafiyya. ... For fundamentalists the law is the most essential component of Islam, and it leads to an overwhelming emphasis upon jurisprudence, usually narrowly conceived."[11] Author Olivier Roy takes a similar line, describing "neo-fundamentalists", (i.e. contemporary fundamentalists) as being more passionate than earlier Islamists in their opposition to the perceived "corrupting influence of Western culture", avoiding Western dress, "neckties, laughter, the use of Western forms of salutation, handshakes, applause", discouraging but not forbidding other activities such as sports, ideally limiting the Muslim public space to "the family and the mosque".[12] In this fundamentalists have "drifted" away from the stand of the Islamists of the 1970s and 1980s, such as [Abul A'la Maududi] who:
...didn't hesitate to attend Hindu ceremonies. Khomeini never proposed giving Iranian Christians and Jews the status of dhimmi (protected communities) as provided for in the sharia: the Armenians of Iran have remained Iranian citizens, are required to perform military service and pay the same taxes as Muslims, and have the right to vote (with separate electoral colleges). Similarly, the Afghan Jamaat, in its statutes, has declared it legal to employ non-Muslims as experts in the eyes of Islam.[4]
- Umbrella term – Another American observer, Robert Pelletreau, Jr., Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, believes it the other way around, Islamism being the subset of Muslims "with political goals ... within" the "broader fundamentalist revival".[13] American historian Ira Lapidus sees Islamic fundamentalism as "an umbrella designation for a very wide variety of movements, some intolerant and exclusivist, some pluralistic; some favourable to science, some anti-scientific; some primarily devotional and some primarily political; some democratic, some authoritarian; some pacific, some violent."[14]
- Synonym – Still another, Martin Kramer, sees little difference between the two terms (at least in usage in one country): "To all intents and purposes, Islamic fundamentalism and Islamism have become synonyms in contemporary American usage."[15]
- Scriptural literalism – According to another academic, Natana J. Delong-Bas, the contemporary use of the term Islamic fundamentalism applies to Muslims who seek not just "to return to the primary sources", but who use "a literal interpretation of those sources".[3]
- Use of ijtihad in Islamic law – According to academic John Esposito, one of the most defining features of Islamic fundamentalism is belief in the "reopening" of the gates of ijtihad ("independent reasoning" used in reaching a legal decision in Sunni law).[16]