Bonner Querschnitte 27/2016 Ausgabe 422 (eng)

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Thoughts regarding the Unification of the State and Religion is an Ideal projected back onto Islamic History

Lecture Series at Biberach University of Applied Sciences

(Bonn, 02.07.2016) The Islamic scholar Christine Schirrmacher has given a lecture as part of the 2016 Lecture Series entitled “The Open Society” at Biberach University of Applied Sciences in Biberach an der Riß on the question of “Islam and Democracy – a Contradiction in Terms?“

The professor holds that when reading the source texts of Islamic theology one finds that it neither advocates nor rejects democracy. To quote her, “The text of the Koran provides no explicit information with respect to the question of which form of rule is viewed as the ideal in Islam. Several movements concluded, however, in light of Mohammad’s unquestioned paradigm as a military leader,” that ideal Islamic rule should at the same time be spiritual and worldly.” Indeed, the thought of unifying the state and religion seems to primarily have to do with an ideal projected back onto Islamic history since actually very little can be known about the early days of Islam. In reality, since at the latest following the period of governance of the four Caliphs succeeding Mohammad from 632-661 A.D., the Islamic community has had to grapple with the fact that there has never again been a single ruler over all Muslims and there has never again been a unification of worldly and spiritual power. Instead, what has existed in reality has been a wide array of rival families, dynasties, regions, and theological groups wrestling with each other for power, combating each other and bitterly contesting their claim to rule and their superiority as far as the interpretation of Islam is concerned. There is no doubt that such theologically justified claims to power stand opposed to a democratically legitimate form of rule.

Schirrmacher noted her point of view that “Islam,” as a private exercise of religion or an ethical structure of values, hardly opposes democracy. That would supposedly not apply, however, were the Islamic system of law also possesses validity and determines laws, values, and norms. Wherever Sharia law shapes laws, the ordering of society, and the administration of justice, there cannot be comprehensive civil liberties in the sense of the United Nations’ 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This is due to the fact that in the classical understanding of Sharia law, neither men and women, nor Muslims and non-Muslims, nor those who change their religion and atheists can be granted equal rights.

The focus of Biberach University of Applied Sciences, which was founded in 1964, is in the areas of architecture, construction engineering, business administration, biotechnology, and energy engineering. It currently has about 2400 students.

 

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