The Trouble with Islam Today: A Wake-up Call for Honesty and Change - Softcover

Manji, Irshad

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0679313613 ISBN 13: 9780679313618

Publisher: Vintage Canada, 2005

Synopsis

The Trouble with Islam Today is an open letter from award-winning journalist Irshad Manji to concerned citizens worldwide–Muslim or not. The book is a lively wake-up call, a demand for honesty and change in Islamic countries and the West. With guts and sincerity Manji insists that readers face some of the most important questions troubling the world today.

A self-proclaimed Muslim Refusenik, Manji exposes the disturbing cornerstones of Islam as it is widely practiced: tribal insularity, deep-seated anti-Semitism and uncritical acceptance of the Koran as the final, superior manifesto of God. But the book begins with and repeatedly returns to Manji’s own experience of Islam, from a teenage debate with a madressa teacher who couldn’t explain to her why girls weren’t allowed to lead prayer, to how she discovered what’s worth salvaging about Islam, to the surprising conclusions she reached about the Arab-Jewish conflict after traveling to Israel — a part of the Middle East that few Muslims dare visit.

Irshad Manji doesn’t claim to have all the answers, but in the book’s first two chapters she relates how, through her journey from childhood to adulthood, she came to ask several key questions about Islam that continue to concern her (and that few other writers have had the courage to raise): Why was her B.C. public school so open and tolerant, but her religious school bigoted and rigid? How could she reconcile her faith with the misogynist, homophobic and anti-Semitic violence committed in its name? Why are rote, literal readings of the Koran the mainstream of Islamic thought today?

“When Did We Stop Thinking?” she asks in chapter three, unearthing Islam’s tradition of creativity and curiosity — a tradition that died for entirely political reasons. Then, trekking through the Middle East, that Islamic countries’ difficulties can’t easily be blamed on the usual scapegoats: Israel, she discovers, is a fiercely pluralistic society that should be an example to Muslim nations; the United States, surprisingly, is admired by many Muslims and is seen more as an unrealized hope than as lead criminal.

This being the case, Manji wonders if the Muslim world is being colonized not by America, but by Arabia. Because Islam was founded in the land of Arabia, in the language of Arabia, for the people of Arabia, Muslims around the world have succumbed to “foundamentalism.” Even non-Arab Muslims — Islam’s majority — have come to imitate the seventh-century tribal rites of the Arabian Peninsula. But this narrow, intolerant and paternalistic system isn’t the only way to be a Muslim.

“Ijtihad” (ij-tee-had) is the positive message of this book. Ijtihad is Islam’s lost tradition of independent thinking, which flowered in the Islamic golden age between 700 and 1200 CE. Reviving ijtihad requires Muslims and non-Muslims alike to stop spouting received wisdom, start thinking for themselves and take action. For example, Manji writes, we can revitalize the economies of the Islamic world by engaging the talents of female entrepreneurs. When offered micro-business loans, women accrue assets, become literate, read the Quran for themselves and see the options it gives women for self-respect as well as for respect for the “other.” Through this and other practical ideas, Manji shows how ordinary Muslims, with a little help from their friends, can have a future to live for rather than a past to die for.

Of course, her campaign to revive ijtihad raises concerns: For Islamic countries, does becoming more humane mean becoming more Western? Can one sow reform without being a cultural colonizer? Manji addresses these questions head-on — and reminds us of a crucial fact: In the West one can ask dissenting questions about religion and society without fear of being raped, maimed or murdered by the state. Manji gives thanks for these precious freedoms and she challenges Muslims in the West to exercise them. She also invites non-Muslims to step out of “orthodox multiculturalism” and expect better of Muslims, both at home and abroad.

Irshad Manji remains a Muslim, one who takes seriously the verse in the Quran that states: “Believers, conduct yourselves with justice and bear true witness before God — even if it be against yourselves, your parents or your family.” In that spirit, she ends her open letter by asking critics to tell her where her analysis has gone wrong. The result is an intense discussion on her website. Whether you agree or disagree with her argument, one thing can’t be disputed: The Trouble with Islam Today has already created a worldwide conversation where none existed before.

About this title

About the Author

Irshad Manji is an acclaimed journalist, lecturer and human rights advocate based in Toronto. Her bestseller The Trouble with Islam Today has been published internationally. In those countries that have banned it, Manji is reaching readers by posting free translations on her website, www.muslim-refusenik.com.

Since writing the book, Irshad Manji has travelled the world engaging audiences such as the United Nations Press Corps, the Oxford Union, the Jean-Jacques Rousseau Institute and the Pentagon about supporting the liberal reformation of Islam. Meanwhile, her columns are distributed worldwide by the New York Times Syndicate and she is producing a feature film about what there is to love within Islam.

As a volunteer, she sits on the interfaith editorial board of Seventeen magazine, based in New York City. As well, she serves as a mentor to young scholars, specializing in human rights and public policy, at the Pierre Trudeau Foundation in Montreal.

In addition, Manji is working with young people around the world to launch the world’s first leadership centre for reform-minded Muslims.

Recognizing Irshad Manji’s leadership, Oprah Winfrey honoured her with a Chutzpah Award for “audacity, nerve, boldness and conviction.” Ms. magazine has selected her a “Feminist for the 21st Century.” Maclean’s named her to its 2004 honour roll of “Canadians who make a difference.” And on International Women’s Day in 2005, the Jakarta Post (Indonesia) identified her as one of three Muslim women creating positive change in Islam.

In 2006 Irshad will be writing her next book, as a Fellow at Yale University.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

My fellow Muslims,

I have to be honest with you. Islam is on very thin ice with me. I’m hanging on by my fingernails, in anxiety over what’s coming next from the self-appointed ambassadors of Allah.

When I consider all the fatwas being hurled by the brain trust of our faith I feel utter embarrassment. Don’t you? I hear from a Saudi friend that his country’s religious police arrest women for wearing red on Valentine’s Day, and I think since when does a merciful God outlaw joy -- or fun? I read about victims of rape being stoned for “adultery,” and I wonder how a critical mass of us can stay stone silent.

When non-Muslims beg us to speak up, I hear you gripe that we shouldn’t have to explain the behavior of other Muslims. Yet when we’re misunderstood, we fail to see it’s precisely because we haven’t given people a reason to think differently about us. On top of that, when I speak publicly about our failings, the very Muslims who detect stereotyping at every turn label me a sellout. A sellout to what? To moral clarity? To common decency? To civilization?

Yes, I’m blunt. You’re just going to have to get used to it. In this letter, I’m asking questions from which we can no longer hide. Why are we all being held hostage by what’s happening between the Palestinians and the Israelis? What’s with the stubborn streak of anti-Semitism in Islam? Who is the real colonizer of Muslims -- America or Arabia? Why are we squandering the talents of women, fully half of God’s creation? How can we be so sure that homosexuals deserve ostracism -- or death -- when the Koran states that everything God made is “excellent”? Of course, the Koran states more than that, but what’s our excuse for reading the Koran literally when it’s so contradictory and ambiguous?

Is that a heart attack you’re having? Make it fast. Because if we don’t speak out against the imperialists within Islam, these guys will walk away with the show. And their path leads to a dead end of more vitriol, more violence, more poverty, more exclusion. Is this the justice we seek for the world that God has leased to us? If it’s not, then why don’t more of us say so?

What I do hear from you is that Muslims are the targets of backlash. In France, Muslims have actually taken an author to court for calling Islam “the most stupid religion.” Apparently, he’s inciting hate. So we assert our rights -- something most of us wouldn’t have in Islamic countries. But is the French guy wrong to write that Islam needs to grow up? What about the Koran’s incitement of hate against Jews? Shouldn’t Muslims who invoke the Koran to justify anti-Semitism be themselves open to a lawsuit? Or would this amount to more “backlash”? What makes us righteous and everybody else racist?

Through our screaming self-pity and our conspicuous silences, we Muslims are conspiring against ourselves. We’re in crisis, and we’re dragging the rest of the world with us. If ever there was a moment for an Islamic reformation, it’s now. For the love of God, what are we doing about it?

You may wonder who I am to talk to you this way. I am a Muslim Refusenik. That doesn’t mean I refuse to be a Muslim; it simply means I refuse to join an army of automatons in the name of Allah. I take this phrase from the original refuseniks -- Soviet Jews who championed religious and personal freedom. Their communist masters refused to let them emigrate to Israel. For their attempts to leave the Soviet Union, many refuseniks paid with hard labor and, sometimes, with their lives. Over time, though, their persistent refusal to comply with the mechanisms of mind-control and soullessness helped end a totalitarian system.

Not solely because of September 11, but more urgently because of it, we’ve got to end Islam’s totalitarianism, particularly the gross human rights violations against women and religious minorities. You’ll want to assure me that what I’m describing in this open letter to you isn’t “true” Islam. Frankly, such a distinction wouldn’t have impressed Prophet Muhammad, who said that religion is the way we conduct ourselves toward others -- not theoretically, but actually. By that standard, how Muslims behave is Islam. To sweep that reality under the rug is to absolve ourselves of responsibility for our fellow human beings. See why I’m struggling?

As I view it, the trouble with Islam is that lives are small and lies are big. Totalitarian impulses lurk in mainstream Islam. That’s one hell of a charge, I know. Please hear me out. I’ll show you what I mean, as calmly as I possibly can.

1.

HOW I BECAME A MUSLIM REFUSENIK

Like millions of Muslims over the last forty years, my family immigrated to the West. We arrived in Richmond, a middle-class suburb of Vancouver, British Columbia, in 1972. I was four years old. Between 1971 and 1973, thousands of South Asian Muslims fled Uganda after the military dictator, General Idi Amin Dada, proclaimed Africa to be for the blacks. He gave those of us with brown skin mere weeks to leave or they would die. Muslims had spent lifetimes in East Africa thanks to the British, who brought us from South Asia to help lay the railways in their African colonies. Within a few generations, many Muslims rose to the rank of well-off merchants. My father and his brothers ran a Mercedes-Benz dealership near Kampala, benefiting from the class mobility that the British bequeathed to us but that we, in turn, never granted to the native blacks whom we employed.

In the main, the Muslims of East Africa treated blacks like slaves. I remember my father beating Tomasi, our domestic, hard enough to raise shiny bruises on his pitch-dark limbs. Although I, my two sisters, and my mother loved Tomasi, we too would be pummeled if dad caught us tending to his injuries. I knew this to be happening in many more Muslim households than mine, and the bondage continued well after my family left. That’s why, as a teenager, I turned down the opportunity to visit relatives in East Africa. “If I go with you,” I warned my mother, “you know I’ll have to ask your fat aunties and uncles why they practically enslave their servants.” Mum meant the trip to be a good-bye to ageing relations, not a human rights campaign. In order to avoid embarrassing her, I stayed home.

While Mum was away, I thought more about what it means be “home.” I decided that home is where my dignity lives, not necessarily where my ancestors originate. That’s when it dawned on me why the postcolonial fever of pan-Africanism -- “Africa for the blacks!” -- swept the continent on which I was born. We Muslims made dignity difficult for people darker than us. We callously exploited native Africans. And please don’t tell me that we learned colonial ruthlessness from the British because that begs the question: Why didn’t we also learn to make room for entrepreneurial blacks as the Brits had made room for us?

Edition details

• Publisher: Vintage Canada
• Publication date: 2005
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0679313613
• ISBN 13: 9780679313618
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 272