Search Results (63)

This study critically examines how the deep institutionalization of Islamic thought in Indonesia’s religious educational establishments has fallen short in addressing contemporary challenges for Indonesian Muslims. The central argument is that a significant gap remains between the educational ideals of the Qur’an and Hadith and the lived realities of Muslim life. Employing Muhammad Abed al-Jabiri’s critical-analytical approach, the article advances three main claims: First, Islamic education in Indonesia is still dominated by logocentrism and school-centrism. Second, these paradigms act as obstacles to developing a critically engaged Muslim society capable of responding to global issues. Third, logocentrism encourages dogmatism by promoting a singular truth, while school-centrism entrenches fanaticism, formalism, and, at times, radicalism. The study concludes that only a critical reassessment of these paradigms can drive meaningful educational reform and enable Indonesian Muslims to better confront contemporary realities. Full article

Contemporary philosophers and epistemologists as well as scholars of Islamic studies have not failed to notice some striking similarities between aspects of the Islamic notion of the “fiṭra” (humanity’s archetypal nature) articulated by the medieval Hanbalī traditionalist jurist and theologian Ibn Taymiyya (d.728/1328) and the account of the sensus divinitatis (an innate, direct perception of God) espoused by the reformed philosopher Alvin Plantinga (1932–present). This article systematically compares both these notions and more by first situating them within the antecedent historical factors and developments leading up to their emergence in their respective intellectual milieu, the theological anthropology espoused by both thinkers and the religious epistemology of each respective thinker. The article will also discuss salient differences between each doctrine and their broader parent epistemologies and will examine major objections raised against them. The comparative study reveals not only a rich source of Islamic religious epistemology to be mined by diligent researchers but the exciting application of philosophical analysis to the thought of Ibn Taymiyya. Finally, the article argues that Ibn Taymiyya’s account of the fiṭra faces some problematic epistemological conundrums, one of which will be explored in detail. Full article

This work develops a scenario-based policy framework for the prospective implementation of AAOIFI Shariah Standard No. 62 in global sukuk markets. The analysis suggests that immediate, rigorous enforcement would advance Shariah authenticity yet risk near-term destabilisation: issuance could retrench, the pricing premia could widen, and the rating treatment could bifurcate or even become inapplicable for instruments with pronounced risk-sharing. By contrast, calibrated sequencing, targeted legal reforms to perfect title transfer, and harmonised supervisory guidance can mitigate fragmentation and sustain investor confidence while re-anchoring sukuk to their risk-sharing foundations. Taken together, aligning religious fidelity with market pragmatism is achievable: a measured adoption of Standard 62 can reinforce the ethical underpinnings of Islamic capital markets without compromising their capacity for resilient growth. Full article

The modern debate on the maqāṣid has become very diverse and includes numerous suggestions on how the maqāṣid are supposed to reform Muslim (legal) thought. For an illustration of this diversity, the approaches of two very different intellectuals are compared with each other. One scholar is the philosopher Ṭāhā ʿAbd al-Raḥmān (b. 1944), whose reflections are contrasted with those of the jurist Ṭaha Jābir al-ʿAlwānī (d. 2016). This research shows that they share some similarities in their premises regarding the ability of the maqāṣid to reform Muslim thought; however, differences can be noticed regarding the content of their maqāṣid concepts and how their concepts should be applied in practice. While al-ʿAlwānī presents concrete suggestions for practical applications, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān understands his contributions as a theoretical basis that is supposed to be used by Muslim jurists in order to reestablish Islamic law on an ethical basis. Full article

This article explores Jamāl al-Dīn al-Afghānī’s political thought in relation to modern debates on secularism and Islamic reform. While often invoked by Islamist thinkers to support their anti-secular stance, al-Afghānī’s reflections on reason, religion, and constitutional politics show that he engaged with modernity in a more nuanced way than is commonly recognized. This article examines al-Afghānī’s writings and their reception. It argues that his thought was not about choosing a side between religion and secularism. Instead, his thought is better understood as a pragmatic anti-colonial strategy aimed at the revival of Muslim civilization. This reframing challenges the widely cited genealogical narrative that links him to later Islamists. His attempt to reconcile religious traditions with the imperative for reform provides valuable insights into the responses of Muslim reformers to modernity—insights that remain highly relevant today. Full article

Based on ethnographic data collected in Germany, this article compares ultra-conservative Salafi and progressive, LGBTQI-plus Muslim movements and examines their negotiation of religious identity and practice within and in contrast to ‘mainstream Islam’ (e.g., DİTİB). While on the surface these movements appear to be on the fringes of Islam and clearly opposed to each other, a closer look reveals interesting moments of convergence and publicly gained prominence. In doing so, this article explores the actor biography issues that drive affiliation, including negative experiences with mainstream mosques and the search for authentic expression and roots. It analyses the politics of labelling (e.g., ‘Salafi’, ‘liberal’), and how these groups define their target audiences in relation to the perceived mainstream. It examines the negotiation of cultural diversity and Islamic ‘purity’, contrasting Salafi reform with progressive interpretations. Finally, it examines strategies for challenging mainstream institutions. By comparing these groups, the article offers a nuanced insight into Islamic practices at the margins. It sheds light on the various strategies employed to discredit mainstream Islamic institutions, ranging from theological differences to power struggles within the contested religious field. Full article

This study explores the role of religion as a state-promoted tool for political assimilation in Pakistan’s border provinces of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) and Balochistan. The study is based on five phases of fieldwork (2016–2024) combined with a thematic literature review. The research explores how religious strategies were deployed to forge a unified national identity in these regions. The findings reveal significant disparities in the effectiveness of these strategies. In KP, historical factors, cultural alignment, and geopolitical influences—particularly the Afghan conflict—largely facilitated the integration of Pashtun identity into Pakistan’s broader Islamic-national framework. Tools such as madrassa networks, education reforms, religious slogans, and state-backed Islamist parties effectively promoted religious nationalism. In contrast, religious assimilation efforts in Balochistan largely failed due to entrenched ethnic nationalism, economic exclusion, and political marginalization. Attempts to expand madrassas, delegitimize nationalist leaders as “anti-Islamic,” and support religious movements have been met with resistance, deepening distrust between the Baloch population and the state. The study found that religion alone cannot sustain national cohesion, particularly in regions with longstanding grievances and systemic inequalities. This research emphasizes the limitations of top-down, coercive assimilationist policies and underscores the necessity for more inclusive approaches, such as addressing economic disparities, recognizing regional identities, and promoting political participation as essential components for building a sustainable and unified nation. The study provides critical insights for policymakers, advocating for a shift from religious assimilation to strategies that prioritize justice, equity, and cultural accommodation, particularly in KPK and Balochistan. Full article

This paper addresses the longstanding tension between reason and revelation in Islamic religious epistemology, with a focus on the thought of Ibn Taymiyyah (d. 728/1328). It aims to reassess his critique of philosophical theology (falsafa and kalām) and explore his constructive alternative to rationalist metaphysics. The study adopts a descriptive–analytical methodology, combining close textual reading of Darʾ Taʿāruḍ al-ʿAql wa al-Naql and Naqd al-Manṭiq with conceptual analysis informed by contemporary religious epistemology and philosophy of religion. The findings reveal that Ibn Taymiyyah advances a triadic epistemological model centered on revelation (naql), reason (ʿaql), and innate disposition (fiṭrah). He refutes the autonomy of reason, redefines logic as a tool rather than a judge, and repositions fiṭrah as an intuitive foundation for belief. His approach emphasizes the harmony of sound reason with authentic revelation and challenges the epistemic assumptions of speculative theology. By presenting a comparative table of rationalist and Taymiyyan epistemologies, the study demonstrates how Ibn Taymiyyah’s framework anticipates key themes in Reformed Epistemology and the cognitive science of religion. The conclusions suggest that his vision offers a coherent, theocentric paradigm for religious knowledge that is highly relevant to the contemporary philosophy of religion and Islamic theology. Full article

Contrary to popular notions of a perpetual antagonism between ‘Hinduism’ and ‘Islam’, played out on Indian soil over the centuries, this article examines the relatively recent origins of a Hindu–Muslim conflict in South Asia, situating it in the reconfigurations of ‘religion’ and religious identity that occurred under British colonial rule in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The multivalent and somewhat fluid categories of religious identification found in pre-modern India gave way to much more rigid and oppositional modern and colonial epistemic categories. While much has been written on how colonial policies and incipient Hindu and Muslim nationalisms shaped the contours of modern Hindu–Muslim conflict, little work has been done on the important role religious actors like Muslim and Hindu scholars and reformers played in shaping the discourse around what constituted Hinduism and Islam, and the relationship between the two, in the modern period. This study examines the first-known public theological debates between a Hindu scholar and a Muslim scholar, respectively, Swami Dayānanda Sarasvatī (1824–1883), founder of the reformist Arya Samaj and first exponent of a Hindu polemic against other religions, and Mawlānā Muḥammad Qāsim Nānautvī (1832–1880), co-founder of the seminary at Deoband and an important exponent of Islamic theological apologetics in modern South Asia, and how they helped shape oppositional modern Hindu and Muslim religious theologies. A key argument that Nānautvī contended with was Dayānanda’s claim that Islam is idolatrous, based on the contention that Muslims worship the Ka’ba, and thus, it is not a monotheistic religion, Hinduism alone being so. The terms of this debate show how polemics around subjects like monotheism and idolatry introduced by Christian missionaries under colonial rule were internalized, as were broader colonial epistemic categories, and developed a life of their own amongst Indians themselves, thus resulting in new oppositional religious identities, replacing more complex and nuanced interactions between Muslims and followers of Indian religions in the pre-modern period. Full article

Islam in the history and modernization of the Maldives demonstrates an intrinsic tension, serving both as the foundational cornerstone of national identity and as the source of social conflict and political division. On the one hand, the narrative of being a “100% Muslim nation” has shaped a highly unified national identity, achieving legalization and institutionalization within the power structure and becoming a critical pillar of state legitimacy and social integration. On the other hand, the politicization and homogenization of religion have weakened social inclusivity, exacerbating religious extremism and social tensions in the face of globalization. The Maldivian experience not only reveals how religion undergoes self-transformation through power negotiation and legal reform but also reflects how the tension between traditional religion and the modern state shapes the dynamic framework of national governance. As a microcosm of global religious renaissance and geopolitical interaction, the Maldives offers a vital theoretical perspective and practical insights for understanding the complex interplay among religion, power, and national identity. Full article

The Sufi dimension is usually underestimated within the debate on Islam and modernity as well as in discussions about resistance to Western ideas within contemporary Islamic culture. In contrast, Islamic modernism is often defined as the result of a coherent process of modernization and reform, which stems from cultural confrontation with European Western thought and is accelerated by certain key historical events between the 19th and 20th centuries. This modernization, in the last decades of the 19th century, led to the emergence of a cultural Arab renaissance, known as naḥḍa, and a religious reform, iṣlāḥ; both are strongly influenced by modern Western thought. At the opposite end of this current of thought is the perspective of Sīdī Salāma al-Rāḍī, who denounced the damage that the scientistic view of Western origin was doing to Egyptian culture. His most important work, from this point of view, is an untranslated book entitled al-Insāniyya (“Humanity”), in which the author criticizes, from a traditional perspective, the biochemical, medical, evolutionary, and spiritualist conceptions of the physical, psychic, and spiritual constitution of the human being. The general tenor of this work is highly critical of modern Western civilization and represents an attempt to propose a traditional Islamic viewpoint, which is of extreme interest due to its uniqueness. Al-Insāniyya highlights a topic rarely addressed in academic literature on early twentieth-century Sufism: the involvement of a Sufi master in the dialogue between Western modernity and the Sufi Islamic tradition. This reveals a historical framework in which the Sufis of Cairo’s cosmopolitan environment, while mastering scientistic themes, reject modernity in favor of a classical Sufi vision of evolution understood as an initiatory path of spiritual perfection. Full article

This article aims to answer the question of whether identity-based movements are free from tendencies in political economy. By analyzing the actions and orientations of the militant Islamic group from the New Order to the Reform era, we show that social movements based on cultural identities are far from representing the demands of groups of recognition. Rather, these movements are leveraged as political tools for the executive group in determining dominant issues among the public to increase voter preferences and bring economic benefits to militant Islamic groups. This is insisted upon through a shift in political trends from religious populism to authoritarian populism. We argue that a possible solution could be prioritizing democratic values that lead to performance and integrity, not sectoral interests that can create fragmentation in society. Full article

This study addresses the critical challenge of predicting liquidity risk in the banking sector, as emphasized by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision. Liquidity risk serves as a key metric for evaluating a bank’s short-term resilience to liquidity shocks. Despite limited prior research, particularly in anticipating upcoming positions of bank liquidity risk, especially in Iranian banks with high liquidity risk, this study aimed to develop an AI-based model to predict the liquidity coverage ratio (LCR) under Basel III reforms, focusing on its direction (up, down, stable) rather than on exact values, thus distinguishing itself from previous studies. The research objectively explores the influence of external signals, particularly news sentiment, on liquidity prediction, through novel data augmentation, supported by empirical research, as qualitative factors to build a model predicting LCR positions using AI techniques such as deep and convolutional neural networks. Focused on a semi-private Islamic bank in Iran incorporating 4,288,829 Persian economic news articles from 2004 to 2020, this study compared various AI algorithms. It revealed that real-time news content offers valuable insights into impending changes in LCR, particularly in Islamic banks with elevated liquidity risks, achieving a predictive accuracy of 88.6%. This discovery underscores the importance of complementing traditional qualitative metrics with contemporary news sentiments as a signal, particularly when traditional measures require time-consuming data preparation, offering a promising avenue for risk managers seeking more robust liquidity risk forecasts. Full article

In the aftermath of the 2003 Casablanca bombings, the Moroccan state emphasized, through official public discourse, the components that constitute “official Moroccan Islam” to combat extremist ideologies. These religious elements include Mālikism in jurisprudence, Ashʿarism in theology, and the Sufism of Imam Al-Junayd (d. 298/910), all balanced by the pledge of allegiance to King Mohammed VI (a descendant of the Sharifian lineage), the constitutionally designated Commander of the Faithful and sole religious leader. Since the reform policy initiated in 2004, the Moroccan state has constructed a narrative on the distinctiveness of Moroccan Islam—moderate and tolerant—and promoted it among its own citizens and beyond its borders. However, while the Moroccan state claims to have a unique form of Islam, controversial arguments have been raised questioning the nature of the state’s purported Islam. Other criticisms include investigating the state’s endorsement of Sufism and its broader policy of institutionalization. Yet, this article argues that the state supports any form of Islam, not necessarily Sufism, that aligns with its religious and political leadership. Like other Arab and Muslim states, Morocco’s religious policy is impacted by the global context, where Salafism is now perceived as a threat to established worldviews. In addition, this article argues that Morocco’s support for Sufi Islam is based not merely on its perceived political passivity, but because it complements the state’s policies and gains advantages from this support. It concludes that the official narrative of Moroccan Islam, which emphasizes a Sufi-oriented approach to counter extremism, is open to question, particularly given that Salafism was the state’s preferred form of Islam in post-colonial Morocco. This highlights the complex and often conflicting relationship between political actors and religious leaders in shaping Morocco’s religious discourse. Full article

Increasingly, educators committed to the vision of Islamic schooling are expressing sentiments of moral dissonance. On the one hand, they choose Islamic schools because they aspire to affect hearts, nurture whole human beings, and grow spiritually while impacting their learners’ sense of higher purpose. On the other hand, they are up against an era of globalised educational reform, characterised by neoliberal-engendered market forces and neoliberal policy logic that promote performativity and efficiency. This narrows what counts as learning, technicises the art of teaching, and assumes all learning that counts is visible and measurable. The teacher education and ongoing professional learning that educators working in Islamic schools have access to remains bifurcated. It is unable to address how an educator committed to tarbiya as “soul-making” ought to navigate aspirations with realities. This paper serves as the introduction to a special issue (SI) dedicated to conceptualising why Islamically grounded teacher education is needed and what it may entail. This SI will also offer empirical studies related to existing Islamic teacher education and professional learning programmes that capture essential reflections for a burgeoning subfield of Islamic Education Studies. In this introduction specifically, the co-editors and a co-author colleague make three big moves to lay the foundations for Islamic teacher education, including (1) establishing urgency for why Islamic teacher education is needed, (2) conceptualising what makes teacher education “Islamic”, and (3) providing an example of one Islamic teacher education programme’s attempt to advance a coherent professional learning journey for Islamic school educators. Together, these three moves serve as an attempt to redress bifurcation and advance a contextually relevant in-road to teacher education that is rooted in an Islamic paradigm and worldview while conversant with contemporary debates in education. Full article