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A plethora of modern religious, social, political, and intellectual movements have primarily defined themselves vis-à-vis the Islamic tradition. Some of these movements have embraced the Islamic tradition wholeheartedly in an attempt at revival, others have sought vigorously to reform and reorient it, and still others have rejected it out right and sought its dismantlement. Specific examples of each include the Deobandi traditionalist movement most notably expressed through the proliferation of madrasas across the Indian subcontinent, the puritanical Salafi movement powered by Saudi Arabia evidenced by the global distribution of Darussalam publications, and finally the fast-spreading ex-Muslim movements across the world iconized by the ongoing establishment of ex-Muslim councils in countries as diverse as Pakistan, Iran, Jordan, Britain, Norway, Jordan, America, Canada, Morocco, and many others.<ref>[https://www.ex-muslim.org.uk/intl-coalition International Coalition of Ex-Muslims]</ref> While this last variety of movement - that is, those that define themselves against Islam - is perhaps not best described as a 'movement in Islam', it shares in common with the former varieties the fact that a particular, largely new-found relationship with the Islamic tradition comprises its essence, and thus can reasonably be grouped alongside them. | A plethora of modern religious, social, political, and intellectual movements have primarily defined themselves vis-à-vis the Islamic tradition. Some of these movements have embraced the Islamic tradition wholeheartedly in an attempt at revival, others have sought vigorously to reform and reorient it, and still others have rejected it out right and sought its dismantlement. Specific examples of each include the Deobandi traditionalist movement most notably expressed through the proliferation of madrasas across the Indian subcontinent, the puritanical Salafi movement powered by Saudi Arabia evidenced by the global distribution of Darussalam publications, and finally the fast-spreading ex-Muslim movements across the world iconized by the ongoing establishment of ex-Muslim councils in countries as diverse as Pakistan, Iran, Jordan, Britain, Norway, Jordan, America, Canada, Morocco, and many others.<ref>[https://www.ex-muslim.org.uk/intl-coalition International Coalition of Ex-Muslims]</ref> While this last variety of movement - that is, those that define themselves against Islam - is perhaps not best described as a 'movement in Islam', it shares in common with the former varieties the fact that a particular, largely new-found relationship with the Islamic tradition comprises its essence, and thus can reasonably be grouped alongside them. | ||
==Traditionalism== | ==Traditionalism== | ||
The Islamic tradition has as its essence the legal interpretive methodologies of the mainstream schools of Islamic law. It is a defense and prioritization of any or one of these methodologies against attempts at reforms that traditionalist movements in the Islamic world have in common. While the various interpretive schools within the tradition have been and continue to have reasons to be cooperative, their internal dialogue is also not without its conflicts. | |||
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{{PortalArticle|description=The All Pakistan Ulema Council is a Muslim organization in Pakistan, founded with the intention of reducing sectarian and interfaith violence through a return to the Islamic tradition, whose members include Islamic clerics and legal scholars from a range of persuasions. Its head is Tahir Mehmood Ashrafi.|title=All Pakistan Ulema Council|image=APUC.jpg|summary=}} | {{PortalArticle|description=The All Pakistan Ulema Council is a Muslim organization in Pakistan, founded with the intention of reducing sectarian and interfaith violence through a return to the Islamic tradition, whose members include Islamic clerics and legal scholars from a range of persuasions. Its head is Tahir Mehmood Ashrafi.|title=All Pakistan Ulema Council|image=APUC.jpg|summary=}} | ||
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==Salafism== | ==Salafism== | ||
Salafism is a broad umbrella term for Islamic movements which conceive of themselves against the later, historical Islamic legal tradition as harkening back to the purer form of Islam found directly in the texts of the scriptures. Thus, while salafi movements hold in common their supreme elevation of what are the same scriptures, they are also far more internally diverse and disconcodant than the traditional schools of Islamic law, for the various salafi movements have no basic approach to scriptural interpretation that they can be said to hold in common - that is, beyond a shared contempt for the traditional schools developed over hundreds of years. In this sense, the difference between Salafis and traditionalists in Islam is usefully compared to the difference between Protestants and Catholics/Orthodox Christians in Christianity. | |||
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{{PortalArticle|summary=|image=Salafism.jpg|title=Salafism|description=Salafism is a modern Islamic movement which seeks to reform Sunni Islam through a return to scripture and the ways of the ''salaf al-salih'', or the first three generations of Muslims. The movement seeks particularly to replace what it perceives to be the excessive interpretive apparatus of the traditional ''madhhabs'', or schools, of Islamic law with direct references to scripture. The Salafi movement also seeks, for similar reasons, to replace the Aristotelian theology of mainstream Sunnism as expressed by Asharism with the more scripturalist and literalist theology of the salaf.}}{{PortalArticle|title=Muhammad ibn Abd-al-Wahhab|image=Wahhab.jpg|description=Muhammad Ibn Abd al-Wahhab (محمد بن عبد الوهاب, born 1703 in 'Uyaynah; died 1792) was a Muslim scholar from the Najd region of what is today known as Saudi Arabia, who founded the eponymous Wahhabi branch of the Salafi movement, a movement which he would also be ultimately responsible for popularizing in general.|summary=}} | {{PortalArticle|summary=|image=Salafism.jpg|title=Salafism|description=Salafism is a modern Islamic movement which seeks to reform Sunni Islam through a return to scripture and the ways of the ''salaf al-salih'', or the first three generations of Muslims. The movement seeks particularly to replace what it perceives to be the excessive interpretive apparatus of the traditional ''madhhabs'', or schools, of Islamic law with direct references to scripture. The Salafi movement also seeks, for similar reasons, to replace the Aristotelian theology of mainstream Sunnism as expressed by Asharism with the more scripturalist and literalist theology of the salaf.}}{{PortalArticle|title=Muhammad ibn Abd-al-Wahhab|image=Wahhab.jpg|description=Muhammad Ibn Abd al-Wahhab (محمد بن عبد الوهاب, born 1703 in 'Uyaynah; died 1792) was a Muslim scholar from the Najd region of what is today known as Saudi Arabia, who founded the eponymous Wahhabi branch of the Salafi movement, a movement which he would also be ultimately responsible for popularizing in general.|summary=}} | ||
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==Modernism== | ==Modernism== | ||
Modernist movements, while comprising a very small minority of intellectuals engaged in Islamic thought, distinguish themselves in a clear fashion from traditionalists and Salafis. Modernist movements share in common a straightforward acknowledgement, often made explicitly, of the merits of modernity. These movements come in various forms - ranging everything from the introduction of new and even infallible spiritual leaders and the radical re-conception of what constitutes Islamic scriptures to the outright appropriation of critical western philosophies. What they share in common, however, is a desire to move Islam towards meeting the moral, social, legal, and even financial expectations of the modern world. To many in the Muslim world, these movements appear as measly concessions to the west, analogous, even, to holding the door wide open for enemies with colonial ambitions. As the 2021 edition of the widely acclaimed ''Muslim 500'' puts it, "Islamic modernism remains popularly an object of derision and ridicule, and is scorned by traditional Muslims and fundamentalists alike".<ref>{{Citation|title=The Muslim 500|edition=2021 Edition|publisher=The Royal Islamic Strategic Studies Centre|location=Amman, Jordan|page=59|chapter=IIIC. Islamic Modernism|url=https://themuslim500.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/TheMuslim500-2021_Edition-low_res_20201028.pdf|editor1=S. Abdallah Schleifer|editor2=Tarek Algawhary|editor3=Aftab Ahmed}}{{Quote|[https://themuslim500.com/about-us/ The Muslim 500: About Us]|The Royal Islamic Strategic Studies Centre (MABDA المركز الملكي للبحوث والدراسات الإسلامية) is an independent research entity affiliated with the Royal Aal al-Bayt Institute for Islamic Thought. '''The Royal Aal al-Bayt Institute for Islamic Thought is an international Islamic non-governmental, independent institute''' headquartered in Amman, the capital of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.}}</ref> | |||
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{{PortalArticle|image=Ahlalquran.jpg|title=Quranism|description=Quranism is a modern movement which seeks to reconceive Islam solely in light of the Quran while disregarding the hadith. The movement is largely inspired by a distaste for the more unsavory contents of the hadith. Critics have argued that Quranism is hardly possible given that most of Islamic ritual, law, and doctrine derives from the hadith rather than the Quran. Several elite modern traditionalist scholars have declared Quranists heretics and non-Muslims.|summary=}} | {{PortalArticle|image=Ahlalquran.jpg|title=Quranism|description=Quranism is a modern movement which seeks to reconceive Islam solely in light of the Quran while disregarding the hadith. The movement is largely inspired by a distaste for the more unsavory contents of the hadith. Critics have argued that Quranism is hardly possible given that most of Islamic ritual, law, and doctrine derives from the hadith rather than the Quran. Several elite modern traditionalist scholars have declared Quranists heretics and non-Muslims.|summary=}} | ||
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