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Article: A governing Shari'a.(Islam and the Secular State)(Book review)
- Article from:
- First Things: A Monthly Journal of Religion and Public Life
- Article date:
- December 1, 2008
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2008 Institute on Religion and Public Life. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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ISLAM AND THE SECULAR STATE
by ABDULLAHI AHMED AN-NA'IM
Harvard University Press
336 pages, $35
IS ISLAM COMPATIBLE with the idea of separation of state and religion? That has become the question in the past few decades. Some Muslims, especially the fundamentalist ones, insist that Islam is supposed to define both religion and state, deen wa dawlat. Some non-Muslims agree, arguing that democracy cannot flourish in any Islamic society. If this is correct, then we are all in trouble. Pious Muslims will inevitably try to establish theocracies, and their conflict with the rest of the world, including secular-minded Muslims, is permanent.
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