ISLAM AND THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY

Abstract

On 4 June 1996, a plenary session was held at Groot Auditorium, inthe Academy Building of Leiden University. This session was chairedby Professor Leertouwer, the vice-chancellor and rector of LeidenUniversity (est. 1575), who also gave the opening address. In hisspeech, he emphasized the importance of the conference theme andreferred to one of the most noteworthy and influential Dutch scholars,Snouck Hurgronje, who taught at the university between 1907 and 1921and contributed to the field of Islamic studies in a unique manner. Hethen introduced Tarmizi Taher, Indonesia’s current minister of religiousaffairs, who delivered the opening address along with AbdelkabirAlaoui M'daghri, Morocco’s current minister of waqf and Islamicaffairs, and a representative of the Netherland’s Ministry of Education,Culture, and Science. The minister of the Netherlands was not able toattend the conference.The Indonesian minister, a trained medical doctor, used his openingaddress to stress the importance of research in Islamic studies and to conantrateupon Dutch-Indonesian cooperation in this field. The Moroccanminister‘s speech was well received; the minister was added to the programat the last minute when it was learned that he would be visiting thecountry at that time. Tht title of his speech was “Coexistence in the NewWorld Order.” A lawyer by training, he Ssed the issue of human rightsand perfaced it by commenting upon the changes that have taken placeover the centuries and the manner in which societies and communitiestook control of their circumstances.The keynote speaker, Riffat Hassan (University of Louisville, KY,USA) gave a speech titled “What Does it Mean to be a Muslim on theEve of the Twenty-First Century?” A social anthropologist by training,she addressed the topic and drew quite a bit upon her own life history asa woman. The audience genedy found her feminist ideas to be veryprovocative and challenging.It was indeed unfortunate that one of the first parallel sessions wascancelled because one of the key participants fell ill. The other panelistsfor this session were fitted into other sessions. Atadah Bogdan Kopan ...