Issues in Contemporary Islamic Thought

Taha Jabir Al-Alwani

Jan 2005 · IIIT

About this ebook

This collection of papers presents a reformist project calling upon Muslim intellectuals and scholars everywhere to comprehend the vast breadth and depth of the crisis engulfing Muslim thought today and the necessity of solving this crisis to enable the Ummah to experience a revival and fulfill its role among the nations of the world. The reader will find a variety of articles dealing with this intellectual crises, these include a chapter on ijtihad's role and history, important since our intellectual problems cannot be solved without the scholars' use of independent reasoning and creativity. Another discusses imitation (taqlid) calling upon Muslim scholars and intellectuals to abandon imitation and to stop favoring the past over the present when trying to solve modern problems. Another looks at human rights

About the author

Dr. Taha Jabir Al-Alwani is a graduate of Al-Azhar University and an internationally known scholar and expert in the fields of Islamic legal theory, jurisprudence (fiqh), and usul al-fiqh. He is President of The Graduate School of Islamic and Social Sciences (GSISS), USA; President of The Fiqh Council of North America; Member of the OIC Islamic Fiqh Academy; and former President of The International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT), USA. He is also the author of numerous works including: “Source Methodology in Islamic Jurisprudence”, “Towards a Fiqh for Minorities”; “The Ethics of Disagreement in Islam”; “Ijtihad”; and “The Qur’an and the Sunnah: The Time-Space Factor”. (2005).