Some Features of this New Conception of Islam
Although we are committed Muslim, actively engaged in a movement working for the revival and reintroduction of Islam into modern life, we are so opposed to the committee for the revision of Sudanese laws in order to bring them into conformity with Al Sharia Al Islamiah, that we called for the immediate dissolution of that committee. In fact, it is precisely because we are committed Muslims that we call for the dissolution of the committee before it does irreparable damage to the cause of the revival of Islam as relevant and useful religion. When this ill-advised and hasty attempt fails, and it is bound to fail, Islam itself will be dismissed by most serious thinking people as an impotent and outdated religion; and nobody will then want to listen even to our new and universal conception of Islam.
We believe in the validity and relevance of Islam as a source of law, that is to say Sharia, because of its ability to provide an altogether new body of jurisprudence on higher plain than that which prevailed in the past. The traditional Sharia Islamiah, in some of its forms, is unsuitable today because it is inconsistent with fundamental human rights and contemporary political theory.
The unsuitability of traditional Sharia can be illustrated by reference to some of its general principles:
- a. Non-Muslims other than Jews and Christians, who are called Kitabiyeen or believers in one of the holy books, are offered the option of either becoming Muslims or fighting. If they choose to fight, they are then either killed or taken into slavery.
- b. The Kitabiyeen, on the other hand, my be offered the status of Zimiyeen those who are guaranteed security of the person and property in exchange for payment of Jiziya a derogatory and humiliating personal tax.
- c. The Zimiyeen are not entitled to enjoy the full rights and duties of citizenship that are enjoyed by Muslims. They are not entitled to hold responsible office exercising legislative, executive or judicial power over Muslims.
- d. The woman, even a Muslim woman, is subject to a variety of legal, social and political disabilities:
- I. She can neither marry nor divorce herself, while the Muslim man can not only marry and divorce himself, but also marry up to four women at the same time.
- II. A husband is legally entitled to chastise his wife in variety of ways, including beating, and she is legally bound to submit to the treatment.
- III. A woman is bound to stay at home at all times and not to leave it except for absolute necessities, which do not include general civil education.
- IV. She is not entitled to participate in public life, or to hold responsible office.
- V. In inheritance, she is entitled only to half the proportion of the man who has the same degree of relationship to the deceased.
- VI. In the administration of justice, her testimony is regarded as half the testimony of the man, so that it takes two women to make up a single witness, regardless of the intelligence, experience and personal integrity of such a woman.
These are some of the general rules of the traditional Sharia Islamiah in which the members of the Committee are supposed to be versed. They are experts in a public law that discriminate against non-Muslims, and a personal law that discriminates against women. Is it not imperative, then, that we disband this committee immediately?
These forms of Sharia Islamiah the committee, and other Islamic religious scholars persist in advocating as Islam, were never intended for our times. It is, however, open to us to derive from the original sources, the Koran and the life of the Prophet Mohamed Salla Allaho Alaihi Wa Salam, a framework for constitutional government that eradicates all forms and degrees of discrimination against non-Moslems and social and political disabilities of women. This framework would provide for the three essential equalities: political, economic and social, and thereby set the scene for individual excellence in self realization, each according to his own personal religion. It is then up to the Moslems, to set the best example, and thereby convince others that their own personal techniques of self discipline and education, commonly called worship methods, are the best and most effective.
The Islamic social order we propose to establish is democratic and socialist in the widest sense of these terms. In our national context, we envisage, as we have declared in our publications dating back to 1955 and earlier, a federal presidential state where decentralized administration is practiced and a cooperative socialist economy is developed and maintained. Although our conception is not a humanist secular one because it relates most directly and deliberately to religious objectives, yet it is not a traditional conception either, because it tends to ignore religious classification and differences in the social and political life of the community. We regard religion as the most fundamental and legitimate guiding principle, yet we leave every man to his own religion, or lack of it, as he freely and voluntarily chooses, without a shadow of stigmatization.
