The Quranic Islam versus the ‘Religion’ of ‘Islam’: Yoginder Sikand on Syed Akbar Ali’s vision of Islam, Ijtihad, Rethinking Islam, NewAgeIslam.com

Ijtihad, Rethinking Islam

The Quranic Islam versus the ‘Religion’ of ‘Islam’: Yoginder Sikand on Syed Akbar Ali’s vision of Islam

By Yogi Sikand

A second major aspect of Ali’s understanding of Islam is his insistence that Islam is not a religion, in the sense of a cult and a set of beliefs about the supernatural. Rather, it is a complete way of life, ad-din in Arabic, which has been taught by all the many prophets that God has sent to the world, the last of whom was the Prophet Muhammad. ‘Islam’, he points out, simply means ‘to surrender’ to God, and this has been the way of life that all the prophets. As he puts it, ‘Islam is not a religion or agama. There is no such thing as a religion of Islam […] Islam is a deen or way of life, a good way of doing things. Deen can also imply an Order—an ordered way of life.’[1] In these two senses, then, he argues, Islam represents true universalism. In contrast, he claims that Muslims have reduced Islam from a way of life to a mere religion, a narrow set of laws and beliefs. In his view, they wrongly understand Islam as a cult that is in fierce completion with other cults for supremacy. In this way, he claims, they are not ‘true’ Muslims, in the literal sense of the term (which means to ‘submit’ to God’s Will). Instead, he generally refers to them as ‘deviationist religionists’ [2] and ‘cultists’.

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