Human Rights and Reformist Islam

Abstract

This chapter takes the form of a transcribed interview and consists of a reflection on the relationship between traditional Islam and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and its related covenants, and provides a solution for making traditional Islam compatible with the idea of human rights. It critiques traditional Islamic approaches to the question of compatibility between human rights and Islam and argues instead for their reconciliation from the perspective of a reformist Islam. The chapter focuses on six controversial case studies: religious discrimination; gender discrimination; slavery; freedom of religion; punishment of apostasy; and arbitrary or harsh punishments. Explaining the strengths of structural ijtihad, the author’s approach is based on the rational classification of Islamic teachings as temporal or permanent on the one hand, and four criteria of being Islamic on the other: reasonableness, justice, morality and efficiency. In the chapter, all of the verses of the Qur’an and the Hadith that are problematic in relation to the notion of human rights are abrogated rationally according to these criteria. The result is a powerful, solutions-based argument based on reformist Islam – providing a scholarly bridge between modernity and Islamic tradition in relation to human rights.