Moderate Islam

Submitted by Ian Campbell (United Kingdom), Mar 8, 2007 at 05:15

Your comments suggest that there is no hope for the billions of Muslims who do not espouse violence or totalitarian means of spreading Islam, who for centuries have just lived peacefully along side the rest of us.

The difficulty is that a few have hijacked that faith and translated it into something close to that which you describe and so it is a threat. But to react as you do is to demand a conflict until all Muslims are defeated to the point that Islam is no longer viable. I don't think that is realistic or desireable.

We need Muslims to be 'more like us' - tolerant of other views, equality of the sexes, accepting of converts to other religions, welcoming to other cultures. They should not be so defensive about their faith but they should not try to impose it on others. Christain history teaches us this, if nothing else.

That is why Dr Pipes is right in his call for moderate Islam as the solution to the problem of radical Islam. The difficulty is that moderate Islam is not openly practiced in a widely acknowledged institutional form that all can identify with. There is no one Islam and there is no Islamic government that has the international respect for its moderation and democratic underpinnings. Until that happens Islam will be a source of tension in the modern world.

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