Scholars who advocated the reconciliatory approach between Islam and human rights have applied several methods to reach this end. Under this approach, Muslims are not obliged to apply the body of the traditional jurisprudence and the juristic reasoning (Ijtihad) should be allowed. A group of those scholars suggested drastic reform of the legal methods used by the traditional jurists in order to evolve Islamic public law and solve the contemporary tensions between this law and the universal human rights principles. They propagate a contextual interpretation of the Quaran and Sunna in light of time and place.
Muslim Scholars Approaches to Islam and Human Rights:
Abdullahi Ahmed An Nai’m as a Case Study
1) Introduction
Human rights have become an integral part of international politics of today. The international regime of human rights has enormously grown since the adoption of the UN Charter. All national constitutions have stipulated certain rights that should be secured for all citizens. Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) are active in monitoring state compliance with international human rights treaties. Muslims and Islamic states are part of the debate on human rights since the beginning of the human rights movement. Although many Islamic states are now part of a series of international and regional human rights treaties which acknowledge the principle of universality of human rights. However, the tension between human rights as a universal conception and Islamic law has continued as demonstrated in the Islamic states behavior at the international human rights mechanisms, or in the national constitutions and legislations of many Islamic states which contravene many universal human rights norms. Moreover, The emergence of the political Islamic movements has also intensified the debate on the applicability of human rights, democracy and secularism in the Islamic context.
This paper aims at reviewing this debate from the perspective of a prominent Islamic scholar who remarkably contributed to this debate. The paper will review the basic elements of the intellectual project of the Sudanese scholar Abdullahi Ahmed An Nai’m in the field of Islam and human rights. It argues that An Nai’m realizes that the classical Islamic law will not enable contemporary Muslims to accommodate the modern values of universal human rights and the only way to solve this dilemma is to achieve a radical reform process of Islamic law that entirely goes beyond the foundations of the classical Islamic jurisprudence. This reform is inevitable to realize the cultural legitimacy of human rights in the Islamic context. In pursuing this objective An Nai’m revived the methodology of his teacher Ustadh Mahmoud Mohamed Taha on the evolutionary nature of Islamic law. He also argues in favor of the secular state and explains its legitimacy in the Islamic historical context.
The paper will start by showing the significance of the issue of Islam and human rights in the academic and political life. Then, it will present the different approaches that have been advocated by Muslims to define the relation between Islam and human rights. In the second section, the paper will critically review the main arguments of Abdullahi An Nai’m of the issue of Islam and human rights by showing the premises of his reconciliatory approach and his suggested methods to reform the traditional Islamic jurisprudence.
2) The Significance of the Issue of Islam and Human Rights
Intellectual debate on human rights between universalism and cultural relativism is a global debate, and it doesn’t concern only one specific region or religion. Numerous scholars’ proponents or opponents to the concept of universal human rights came up with diverse arguments relevant to their cultural and religious background. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) which was the ground breaking initiative that has been followed by several international human rights treaties, assumes that human rights are universe and must be enjoyed by all human beings regardless of religious, sexual, national, linguistic backgrounds. Moreover, this universal conception of human rights was frequently confirmed in the preamble of any international and regional treaty of human rights. The world conference on human rights held in Vienna in 1993 asserted that the universality of human rights is beyond question. However, the common position among states and scholars on the universal nature of human rights is yet to be achieved.
In the defense of the universal nature of human rights Heiner Bielefeldt stated that although the modern concept of human rights developed in the Western context, it does not mean that human rights are only applicable to Western societies. Human rights system is a viable tool to mange differences and realizes political justice in any society. “[human rights] are historically connected with the experience of radical pluralism that today has become an inescapable reality in many societies all over the world . . .the idea of human rights seems to offer an opportunity for accomplishing a basic normative consensus across ethnic , cultural and religious boundaries.”
Moving to the Islamic world, the debate on Islam and human rights is too old and intense as well. Before the formulation of the modern conception of human rights as illustrated in the UDHR and since the 19th century Muslim intellectuals have reacted to western modernity and enlightenment’s values in different ways. A group of Muslim intellectuals called upon their societies to renew and reform the heritage in order to accommodate the achievements of modernity without losing the Islamic identity of Muslim nation. Other Islamic scholars denounced the western modernity and adhered to the historical experience of Muslim nation during the prophet Mohamed and the well-guided caliphs. Finally, a group of Muslim intellectual entirely refused the heritage and expressed high motivation to imitate the western modernity in all aspect of life. In the second half of the 20th century and after the emergence of the global human rights system, the debate in the Islamic world on Islam, human rights and democracy has been revisited again but this time it has become more sophisticated.
Islam is the second largest religion in the world and growing very fast. Muslims have become a large community in western states. Muslim population represents 23% of the world population. Majority of Muslim population exists in 46 states. 15 states recognize Islam in the constitution as the religion of the states and 5 states are considered Islamic republics. Muslim states have ratified many basic international human rights treaties. However, many of these states have made reservations on some articles of these treaties by referring directly or indirectly to the incompatibility of these articles with Islamic law. The Organization of Islamic Conference and Islamic states in general are active actors in the international human rights political bodies such as the UN Human Rights Council. The behavior of many Islamic states in the UN human rights bodies unveiled their cultural relativist arguments in relation to women rights, family rights and duties, criminal punishments and religious freedom. However, and according to Mashood Baderin there has been now some attempts from the side of many Islamic states to narrow the gap between international human rights and Islamic law.
For the majority of Muslims all over the world, the adherence to Islamic law “Sharia” is a matter of faith and it is for other contemporary Muslims is a criteria to evaluate the validity of any political and social regimes. Since the 1970s the wave of constitutional Islamization has increased in the Islamic world where many governments and parliaments have become constitutionally accountable to enforce Islamic law. The demands to apply Islamic law have also become a persistent slogan for the different waves of Islamic political movements which have been active in many Islamic countries.
Moreover, Muslim states were the only states in the world to develop a regional human rights declaration that exclusively derives its principles from religion. The Cairo Declaration of Human Rights in Islam is a human rights document released by the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) IN 1990. It was widely perceived as a serious threat to the basic rights endorsed by the international human rights treaties. The declaration reflected the deep tension between universal human rights and the traditional interpretation of Islamic Sharia. It is also noted that there was a direct reference to Islamic Sharia in the Arab Charter of Human Rights adopted by the League of Arab States in 2004 as a basic determinant in women rights and gender equality. The aforementioned realities indicate the significance of the issue of Islam and human rights. It occupies a large space in the public sphere of the Islamic societies and the world as well.
3) Multiple Approaches to Islam and Human Rights
Muslim scholars have demonstrated three intellectual approaches to universal human rights; the conservative approach, the Secular approach, and the reconciliatory approach. The first two approaches have adopted an adversarial perspective between human rights and Islam and strongly believe that the two systems of values are at odds with each other. Each approach argues of its superiority over the other one. Contrary to that, the reconciliatory approach struggles to harmonize between international human rights and Islam by applying different methods of interpretation of Islamic sacred text. It is unfortunate that the reconciliatory approach has yet to dominate the public sphere in the Islamic world today.
The pioneer of the conservative approach is the Pakistani scholar Abou A’la Mawdudi. In his book Human Rights in Islam, he toughly criticized the modern concept of human rights and defended another concept of human rights derived from the traditional understanding of Islamic Sharia. This conservative approach to international human rights was the driving force in drafting the Cairo Declaration of Human Rights in Islam which was mentioned before in this paper.
Scholars who advocated the reconciliation between Islam and human rights have applied several methods to reach this conclusion. Under this approach Muslims are not obliged to apply the body of the traditional jurisprudence and the juristic reasoning (Ijtihad) should be allowed. A group of those scholars suggested drastic reform of the legal methods used by the traditional jurists in order to evolve Islamic public law and solve the contemporary tensions between this law and the universal human rights principles. They propagate a contextual interpretation of the Quaran and Sunna in light of time and place. These methods have been followed by Abdullahi Ahmed An Nai’m, Nasser Abou Zeid, Mohamed Arkoun, Riffat Hassan, Mohamed Talbi and Khaled Abou El Fadl. Other scholars under this approach advocated more pragmatic reconciliation between Islam and human rights without calling for a drastic reform of the classical methods of Islamic Jurisprudence. This trend believes that the methods applied by An Nai’m are not practical and not appealing for Muslims. In his book Human Rights and Islamic Law, Mashood Baderin acknowledged that while there are some divergence between Islamic law and international human rights law, this does not prevent a possible reconciliation between both of them. To reach this end, “a paradigm shift is sought from traditional hard line interpretation of the Sharia and also from exclusionist interpretations of international human rights law.” Baderin emphasizes the Islamic doctrine of Maslaha (welfare) to enable Muslims to go for more progressive interpretation of Sharia and he also suggested the adoption of the margin of appreciation doctrine which has been used through the European Human Rights Court to enable the international human rights organs to tolerate some specific traditions of Muslims. The application of two doctrines will enable Muslims and international human rights law to share common grounds. However, the method developed by Baderin was harshly criticized by Ann Mayer who believed that the method of Baderin will provide Muslim states with excuses to escape their human rights obligation, and it will also undermine the adoption of universal rights in the Islamic world under the names of accommodation and reconciliation.
Finally, the secular approach calls for the enforcement of international human rights law regardless of the possible tensions with Islamic Sharia. While this approach upholds the universal nature of human rights, it has failed to develop a cultural legitimacy for human rights in the popular traditions and beliefs. This approach is not appealing for Muslim public. It is also perceived as not practical by both liberal Muslims and western scholars who believe that human rights advocates should take Islamic law seriously.
4) Abdullahi Ahmed An Nai’m: A Reconciliatory Approach to Islam and Human Rights
The development of An Nai’m religious and political thought was highly affected by his previous public activism in Sudan. During his stay in Sudan, He was a leading member of the Republican Brothers Party where he closely interacted with his teacher Ustath Mahmoud Mohamed Taha, the founder of the Republican Brothers and a prominent Sudanese religious and social reformer. The ideas of Taha will constitute the intellectual basic of An Nai’m in the issue of Islamic law reform as we will see in another section of this paper. An Nai’m experienced the application of Islamic law in his country Sudan since 1983 by Al Numiri regime. His teacher Mahmoud Mohamed Taha was executed in January 1985 after being accused of apostasy on the ground of his reformer ideas. In the same year the Islamic Salvation Front took power in Sudan after a military coup lead to the transformation of Sudan into a model of Islamic state. As a result of the political turmoil in Sudan, An Nai’m had to leave his country and moved to the Western states to continue his academic works. There is no doubt that these developments affected the intellectual project of An Nai’m. He was stimulated to dedicate his writings to the issue of Islam and human rights; he presented a comprehensive methodology to drastically reform the traditional interpretation of Islamic Sharia. He also dedicated one of his books to argue in favor of the secular state and constitutionalism in the Islamic context as the most proper model to protect religious freedom of all Muslims and non-Muslims and to ensure that public policy derives from free civic reason and public debate which is accessible to Muslims and non-Muslims. He denounced the model of Islamic state which tends to impose a specific version of Islamic Sharia on all citizens and exclude any other competitive opinions.
A) The Need to Legitimate Human Rights in the Islamic Context
An Nai’m believes that human rights advocates in any society should struggle to legitimate the universal human rights principles in their local cultures. The realization of this cultural legitimacy of human rights entails a “thoughtful and well-informed engagement of religion.” He believes that religions are not permanently at odds with human rights and they are also not immediately reconciliated with human rights. As Heiner Bielefeldt noted “because all cultures and religions are open to various interpretation and evolution, the frequently perceived antagonism between universal human rights and cultural identity appears at least questionable.”
An Nai’m illustrated that two terms of human rights are used in public discourses. The first term is the general one which refers to the human struggle across history to promote freedom and social justice. According to him, this general term is not useful to solve the tensions between universal human rights and cultural relativism as each culture or system of tradition will be biased for its own perception of human rights. Therefore, the term human rights which was elaborated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the subsequent international human rights treaties is more precise in identifying a set of universal rights that are prescribed for all human beings by virtue of their humanity which are widely articulated in national constitutions all over the world.
An Nai’m advocated the universality of human rights. the basic rational of this universality is the principle of reciprocity under which every person shout treat other persons as he would like to be treated. This principle is an Islamic principle as well but the traditional jurisprudence did not apply this principle in relation to non-Muslims and women as it was applied on Muslim men. Therefore, it is imperative to “establish a technique for reinterpreting the basic sources, Quran and Sunna, in a way that enable us to remove the basis of discrimination against women and non Muslims.” Human rights have been constructed with the objective of providing all humans with “the will to live and the will to be free”. Each culture and religion sought to provide its own members with the two forces, and according to the principle of reciprocity the two forces should be secured for the members of other cultures and religions as well.
The current international system of human rights doesn’t have the appropriate tools to enforce these universal human rights norms on the national levels. The whole international human rights regime has been built on the premise that the adherence to human rights law requires a proper political will from states that need to be generated from within the sovereign states. In this regard, An Nai’m asserts that the popular conviction of universal human rights is necessary to ensure their application. To establish this popular conviction, human rights should be accepted by the local cultures and religious beliefs. According to An Nai’m, cultural legitimacy is not the only factor to enforce human rights in any society. However, “the underlying cause of any lack or weakness of legitimacy of human rights standards must be addressed in order to enhance the promotion and protection of human rights in that society.”
Although the ethical foundations of universal human rights as elaborated in the UDHR are rooted in Islam and many other religions, the tension usually arises between religions and the specific conception of human rights. According to An Nai’m “reconciliation will require a re-interpretation of some of the precepts of those religions.” He accordingly, suggested an anthropological approach to religion whereby understating the religious texts should consider “the specific political, social and economic context of the community of believers.” However, An Nai’m pointed out that this method will also maintain “a theological dimension to the interpretation of religious percepts.” An Nai’m appealed to the Quoran to defend his approach. He argued that in many verses of Quaran, God invited Muslims to reflect and reason independently. Moreover, the diversity of views over the Islamic policies across history proves “the dynamic relation between the Quaran and Sunna, on the one hand, and human comprehension imagination and expertise, on the other.”
In the context of Islam, there is a strong belief among reformers such as An Nai’m that the old classical human interpretation of Muslims sacred texts should not be mandatory for contemporary Muslims. According to those reformers, the conservative Islamic scholars ignored the fact that contemporary Muslims lives in entirely different societies than the societies that were lived by the Muslim community in the first centuries of Islam. The application of the traditional Islamic jurisprudence without a drastic critique for the its content and methods means that contemporary Muslims will not be able to live up to modernity and universal human rights values. It will also lead to the isolation of Muslim societies in the world of today.
An Nai’m asserts that Islamic law is not the only reason behind the poor records of human rights in many Muslim states, and it is not the only deriving force of public policy in these states. However, Islamic law has a unique moral and religious authority in the Muslim world as a set of rules and ethics must be obeyed by all Muslims. “Sharia influences individual and collective behavior in Muslim countries through its role in the socialization process of such nations regardless of its status in their formal legal systems.” Consequently, any efforts to root human rights values in the Islamic world should consider innovative reconciliation between Islamic rules and human rights. This reconciliation should be established from Islam to be effective.
For An Nai’m, the application of the traditional Islamic law in modern Muslim states will likely violate the basic rights of the international human rights law. Within the framework of the traditional jurisprudence “Muslims cannot exercise their right of self determination without violating the rights of others.”
B) Advocating New Methods of Islamic Law
The main argument of An Nai’m is that as long as Muslims stick to the traditional methods of Islamic jurisprudence, the tension between Islam and human rights will not be adequately solved. The majority of reform endeavors which appeared since the 19th century have failed to overcome this limitation. For An Nai’m, re-opening the gate of Ijtihad is extremely necessary to find solutions for the different aspect of Muslims’ lives. However, this Ijtihad has not brought about any genuine results as long as it has been practiced within the traditional framework of Islamic Jurisprudence.
For An Nai’m, it is not enough to defend the idea of the secular state in the Islamic context but it is also necessary to develop an adequate reform methodology for the traditional Islamic law. He praised the reformer intellectual efforts in the second half of the 19th century and the first half of the 21st Century to defend the idea that Islam did not regulate for a certain kind of political structure and that “there was no Islamic authority for the concept of Caliphate in the classical and historical sense.” However, he stated that this reform position did not explain how Muslim will not apply some rules in Quaran and Sunna which contravene basic citizenship and human rights particularly in terms of non-Muslims and the status of women.
Many Muslim states since the 19th century adopted western legal systems in the fields of criminal, commercial, civil and constitutional law and limited the application of Islamic law to the family law after a process of reform through multiple techniques that enabled governments to select the appropriate rules from different juristic schools. However, An Nai’m thinks that this reform did not bring about significant reforms in the whole traditional body of Islamic jurisprudence. According to him “the temporary and insufficient relief that is introduced though these devices is subject to loss when there is a forceful reassertion of Sharia”
An Nai’m like many of his liberal reformers companions stressed on the fact that the new paradigm of juristic reasoning should dismiss the traditional rule which forbids the human Ijtihad on the scriptural texts with clear meaning. This vision attempts to liberate the juristic reasoning from the absolute authority of the texts which according to the traditional Islamic scholars transcends time and space. According to An Nai’m, the Ijtihad is allowable on any texts deal with the human and social interactions as long as the general objectives of Sharia and the essential message of Islam are maintained. This approach strongly calls upon Islamic scholars to endorse a contextual analysis for the Quaranic verses and Sunna to maintain their accommodation to the accelerating social, political and economic variables. Historically and before the establishment of the body of traditional Islamic jurisprudence, the clear and definite texts of Quran and Sunna did not prevent Muslims to practice juristic reasoning. For instance, Omar Ibn Al Khattab, the second Caliphate of Muslims suspended the application of two rules derived from definite and clear texts of Quaroan, when he believed that this suspension will better serve the interests of Muslim community.
In defining his reform approach, An Nai’m explained his understating of the three elements of reform and renewal which were common to the Islamic scholars’ response to modernity. These three elements as suggested by John Voll are, “the strict application of the Quaran and Sunna, the exercise of Ijtihad, and reaffirmation of Islamic authenticity.” As for the strict application of the Quaran and Sunna, An Nai’m stress on the human understating of the texts as supported by the Quaran in verse 29:49, which says that “this Quaran is a revelation that is clear to the hearts of those endowed with knowledge.” This meaning was also supported by Ali, the fourth Caliph of Muslims when he said that “the Quaran doesn’t speak but that men speak for the Quaran.” The third element of the Islamic reform and renewal is the practice of juristic reasoning (Ijtihad). For An Nai’m, Ijtihad will lead to nothing in the reform process if it is applied according to the traditional methods of Islamic jurisprudence. Most of the controversial Islamic rules pertaining to criminal law, human right, international law and constitutional law are derived from unambiguous and definite texts of Quaran and Sunna. Consequently, An Nai’m insisted on developing entirely new methods of Ijtihad that are not restricted by the clear and definite texts.
As for the authenticity of Islam, An Nai’m believes that a decisive criteria to examine the authentic Islamicity of any norm or rule is its consistency with the total message of Islam. However, some rules in Quaran and Sunna are not consistent with each other. To solve this problem, the founding jurists developed in what so called (Naskh) abrogation of specific texts in Quaran and Sunna to develop a coherent and consistent system of Sharia. An Nai’m elaborated on that,
To justify compulsion as opposed to freedom of choice in religion and to give legal efficacy to verses sanctioning the use of force against non Muslims and renegade Muslims, the founding jurists deemed that the verses enjoining freedom of choice and peaceful persuasion were abrogated or repealed by the verses authorizing compulsion and use of force. It is my thesis that since the technique of Naskh has been employed by the past to develop Sharia which has hitherto been accepted as the authentic and genuine Islamic model, the same technique may be employed today to produce an authentic and genuine modern Islamic law.
In developing his method in understanding the rules of Quaran and Sunna, An Nai’m inspired the evolutionary approach of his teacher Ustadh Mahoumd Mohamed Taha who explained the remarkable distinction between the Quaran and Sunna in Mecca and Medina. The message in Mecca was universe, considered the full equality of human beings and promoted the individual free choice but, the message in Media came up with a set of rules to regulate the emerging Muslim community in Al Medina. These rules of Al Medina have been analyzed by Taha and his student An Nai’m according to the political, cultural and social circumstances of the Muslims at that time. All rules which concern women, non-Muslims and penal law were developed at this stage. According to An Nai’m, contemporary Muslims can appeal now to the Islamic message of Al median to develop the Islamic public law and make it consistent with the current circumstances.
In his book Islam and the Secular State An Nai’m counter argued against the notion of Islamic state. An Nai’m explained that Islamic Sharia speaks to Muslims consciences and its application is a private matter. There has been no clear reference in Quran or Sunna to a certain set of political institutions that need to be established to sanction the violation of Sharia. However, Islamic practice after the death of the prophet and traditional jurisprudence assigned in a different degree a central political authority the observation of the application of Sharia in the Muslim community. Moreover, the divergent views and schools over Sharia rulings create practical hardships in the nation state where a certain institution or a group of persons tasked to rule according to Sharia. The outcome will be the enforcement of their interpretation of Sharia which may differ from other interpretation believed by other Muslims in the same state.
An Nai’m defended the secular state as a viable mean to ensure state neutrality towards different religions in a given society. He suggested a model of a secular state and constitutionalism which can be applied in the Islamic world instead of the Islamic state model. In his secular model, religion is not separated from the public sphere, and it affects the articulation of the public policy and legislation but through a process of civic reason in which “reasons can be publicly debated and contested by any citizen, individually or in community with others, in accordance to the norms of civility and mutual respect.” The purpose of civic reason is to limit the exclusive imposition of one religious vision or opinion so all citizens whether Muslims or non-Muslims are able to take part in the public debate. This virtue of civic reason does not exist in the Islamic state model, where “the proponents of a so-called Islamic state would not permit each other the freedom to disagree on what such a state means in practice.” An Nai’m believes that his secular state model will even allow Muslims who want to apply Islamic law to take part in the civic reason but in this model they will not be able to impose their own views on others without their consent. In this model any group of persons through collective civic association can also voluntary comply with their convictions as long as this compliance does not affect the public outside the civic reason which is accessible to everyone.
In most of his writings, An Nai’m stressed the fact that Freedom of expression and academic freedom are prerequisite to enable contemporary Muslims to develop the Islamic law. But with the absence of a free civic reason and public debate in many countries in the Islamic world, intellectuals are reluctant to speak publicly about their reform ideas due to the atmosphere of intimidation and accusations. Muslims who introduce a critical assessment of the traditional interpretation of Islamic Sharia can be easily accused of apostasy or blasphemy or can face serious pressure in their daily lives. There have been numerous examples of that in Egypt, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and Iran. This atmosphere brings hardships to challenge the dominant interpretation of Islamic Sharia in any Muslim society.
As an evaluation for the contribution of An Nai’m to solve the tension between human rights and Islam, I will start by affirming the courageous of his project by which he challenged the foundations of the traditional Islamic jurisprudence and the idea of the Islamic state. His contribution provides Muslims with drastic methods that can develop an entirely new paradigm of Islamic law where human rights, democracy and secularism are legitimated and rooted from within Islamic rational. Unlike secular intellectuals An Nai’m insisted on finding a solution from within Islam. Like his liberal Muslims colleagues, he believed that Islamic Sharia should be understood within the historical social and political context and that contemporary Muslims are free to develop their own jurisprudence that corresponds to the new challenges faced by Muslims societies.
However, An Nai’m courageous approach is not likely to gain public support in the short run for many reasons. The whole public sphere in the Islamic world is controlled and dominated by the traditional Islamic jurists who will continue their antagonism for any intellectual project that deconstruct the basics of the traditional interpretation of Islamic Sharia. Those traditional jurists and scholars have established close alliances with political ruling elites in many Islamic states. They monopolize religious institutions and universities and they have strong access to media outlets. Many of the governments in the Islamic world with few exceptions are not supportive to the enlightened Islamic thought and for political legitimacy reason; those governments tend to accommodate religions to water down the dangers of Islamic movements.
5) Conclusion
There have been different approaches to deal with the issue of Islam and human rights. Some reactions denied the possibility to harmonize between both of them while other scholars who believed in the universality of human rights advocated the reconciliation between human rights and Islamic law by applying various methods. Abdullahi Ahmed An Nai’m is one of the pioneers of the reconciliatory approach. He advocated drastic methods to reformulate the Islamic jurisprudence in a way that is more responsive to the political and social circumstances of Muslims today. He denounced the traditional interpretation of Islamic Sharia and argued that it will not enable Muslims to respect the modern conception of human rights. An Nai’m believes that any attempt to re-conciliate between human rights and Islam should grow up from within the Islamic culture to gain the appropriate public support.
As a strategic goal to encourage these well-meaning efforts that aim at harmonizing between human rights and Islamic law, it is imperative to prioritize the issue of freedom of expression and academic freedom in the Islamic region so that reformers can produce knowledge and disseminate their ideas without intimidations. Human rights groups in the region have been struggling to achieve this goal. Without being bias for any reform methods, contemporary Muslims are in dire need to freely deliberate different ideas about their religion. The final choice will be for the people but as long as they are provided with free public sphere which is accessible for any doctrine or belief. The purse of reform is a long road and an accumulative process but Muslims should be empowered to actively debate this reform.
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