Adapt Islam?

Submitted by Bob Webster (United States), Aug 15, 2002 at 08:25

In responding to critics with: "My response, however, is that no matter what Islam is now or was in the past, it will be something different in the future. The religion must adapt to modern mores." Pipes draws a conclusion based on Western perspective that does not apply in the world of Islam ... nor does it apply to any principled devotion to standards, whether religious or constitutional.

The notion that principles are time-dependent is false ... only one's devotion to principles is subject to change.

In the USA, we routinely ignore government's constitutional restraints in favor of a contorted view of founding principles that enables us to justify our self-indulgence in government as the ultimate satisfier of all needs.

Islam is what it is, and it is not defined by what some choose to live by. Same goes for constitutional government.

The only change that is possible is evolutionary ... from Islam to something different (a variant of Islam that does NOT accept all original tenets of the religion). In the case of government, the change is from one based on constitutional restraint to something based on the morass that unrestrained self-interest (of politicians & special-interest groups) yields when restraint is tossed aside as something more suitable for "the past" (this is the "down" side to democratic process).

Neither established religious principles nor constitutional principles will change to suit the times ... but they CAN be abandoned as inappropriate.

It is worth pondering exactly what will induce followers of Islam to abandon their beliefs in favor of something evolutionarily different. Same question applies to the abandonment of constitutional restraint in the USA (as has been the case for over 100 years now).

Bob Webster

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