We need an intellectual revolution within the Muslim world. We are Muslims according to our spirituality and these universal values, and not against the West, not against the Jews, not against the Christians, not against secular people. The way I'm trying to re-read our texts is based on the awareness that this message is universal: that is why, for instance, the definition of our Muslim identity could by no means be a closed one against the others. This definition will help, God willing, in the way we deal with others.
The concept of Dar al-Islam is a hindrance today within the Muslim world. Even when we speak of Dar al-'ahd [the House of Treaty, which stipulates that Muslims living as a minority among unbelievers should live peacefully but without truly joining these societies], it means peaceful coexistence but it also promotes this kind of binary vision, "us and them." It does not allow us to feel that we are part of the Western societies, that we are sharing with others our values and belonging.
It's always, "OK, I'm with you but ..." It's not enough for me. It's still a very old understanding of our belonging to Islam. When I'm speaking of Dar-ash-Shahada, the abode, the space of testimony, I'm saying we have to get past these tendencies.
In the modern context, what does Dar al-Islam, the House of Submission, mean?
It means the space where the Muslims are in the majority. People will say it is where the rules of Islam are implemented, which is not the reality for the majority of the people who are speaking about Dar al-Islam. We have other definitions: the Hanafi school of thought, for instance, says that Dar al-Islam is the space where we are at peace, where we are safe.
Which of the two definitions is for me the [most] accurate, today? Am I not in a safer place, in the West, than in the majority of the so-called Islamic countries experiencing dictatorship?
It's very difficult for Muslims, we don't have a safe place [to call Dar al-Islam]. So even this word, for me, is relatively outdated. It's not because we are in the majority that we are faithful to our principles. It's not because we are in the majority that we are in a safe place. That is why, in my perception, we have to say that all these concepts are outdated, and come to new concepts.
But it is more than that. I was talking to Muslims in the States, and they said: "Oh, it's just new concepts." I said, no, it is a new understanding of our texts. It's a new understanding of our universal values and these universal values, we can share them with others -- with Christians, with all our fellow citizens in our countries. And this will help, in the near future, Muslims throughout the world to understand their own references.
You wrote that for the last seven centuries Islam has followed a path of blind imitation, and that in applying thoughtful judgment it isn't so much that Islam will modernize, as that it will renew itself. What did you mean?
We are not against modernity. The problem is that mainly, since the 13th century, we have not read our texts in order to face up to reality of modernity, but to take a defensive posture in order to fight against Western hegemony, to fight against "the other." And to withdraw within ourselves and be preoccupied with speaking of halal [lawful] and haram [unlawful]. You know, this kind of discussion and obsession of limits is not all that Islam is about. This is not the real message of Islam. Yes, we have limits, but we have to face the reality to reform the world, not just to resist aggression or indulge in the feeling that we are oppressed by others. This has to change.
My perception is that what we need has to come from within. Sometimes when I am speaking to non-Muslims, I say, don't ask us just to follow your models, your ways or paths, what we need is something from within. We need Islamic tools that will help the Muslims to understand better what the main message of Islam is.
What are the tools we can use? First and foremost is ijtihad, which, as you know, is the reasoning effort of creativity according to our sources, but facing our context and our environment. To achieve it from within takes time but it is the only way.
If I'm speaking to Muslims today, and tell them that we have to imitate Western society, the Western models, they're not going to listen because they are still in the binary perception of reality. I have to come back to find something from within, and promote this kind of contextualization and promoting of Islamic values.
For example, the way Muslims for the last 20 years have answered the question "What is the Islamic identity?" is revealing: they were confusing Islamic principles and their culture of origin, which is wrong. The Pakistani or the Turkish or the Egyptian culture have nothing to do with Islamic principles. They are but the dress of these principles.
The fact that we are living in the West, helps us to come back to this deep understanding of what are the Islamic principles. Now we have to face a new culture and take from that culture what does not contradict our principles, and face new challenges. I think this is now helping Muslims.
For decades what the press lumps together as radical Islamic groups have committed terrorist attacks, with the Sept. 11 attacks taking this to a whole new level. Your grandfather Hassan al-Banna founded the Muslim Brotherhood, historically the most important and inspirational of radical Islamic groups. He said that Islam is "all-inclusive ... a home and a nationality, a religion and a state ... a book and a sword."
The problem is that that was a slogan used in a specific situation under English colonization. He was using slogans against the Western presence in Egypt, and trying to understand from the Islamic sources the kind of project he wished to implement. It was in Egypt, but it was wider than that. This is one thing I'm trying to communicate to Muslims, especially to the Muslim Brotherhood: they repeat Hassan al-Banna slogans, but they do not always understand what he meant.
His point to the English colonizers was, you have to go away. We don't want you here. We want a society here that is based on our Islamic principles. In one way, he was a reformer, saying that we have global principles in our text and a new context in which to read the text. He said, speaking about the Quran, for example, we have the Shura [a council that advises government], and we can take from the concept of consultation we have in our source, but also take from the West organizations that they have promoted from their history, and try to adapt them to our history. He was of the opinion that we can take the parliamentary system, and adapt it to the Islamic context.