Ziauddin Sardar, C. S. Lewis and “Mere Islam”

In regards to my recent BOOKS: Not Just for Idiots and Dummies blog, the following comments were posted:

As-Salaamu 'alaikum, one to avoid is Introducing Islam by Sardar
& Malik, published in the UK by Icon. It contains a lot of the same
liberal modernist propaganda which Z. Sardar has taken to
pushing in papers like the New Statesman and certain other
left-wing newspapers.

By the way, why do you call your blog "Mere Islam"?

I started to respond to these comments and questions in brief, but before I knew it I had several paragraphs which were enough for a full-blown blog entry in front of me. Due to that I decided to post them here.

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wa 'alaykumu as-salam wa rahmatullah,

Thanks for your comments. I strongly agree with you about the writings of Ziauddin Sardar and that his books should be avoided when introducing Islam to non-Muslims—if not altogether. However, there are many books out there that are probably a lot more dangerous than his. It’s a sad statement on the lack of integrity of many people today that quite a few of the books that are found on the shelves in bookstores, which attempt to “explain Islam” to non-Muslims, are often written by "experts" who are openly hostile to the Islam that they're attempting to explain. The same isn't true of the neighboring shelves of books in the Christianity and Judaica sections, at least not in anything close to the same ratio.

Coincidentally, in regards to Ziauddin Sardar, just the other day a friend sent me a link to an essay by Sardar entitled, Can Islam change? (New Statesman). Even though I've read Ziauddin Sardar's writings before, I was rather surprised how far he goes in this article in disagreeing with agreed upon aspects of Islam and praising the half-baked movement of so-called "Liberal" and "Progressive" Muslims. Some of the examples he gives about what Muslims are doing in the world certainly don’t sound like improvements to me. Rather, they seem to indicate that the Ummah has hit an all time low and we’re in a downward spiral towards the Last Days. In spite of these shortcomings, I think the article made a significant point in demonstrating how dissatisfied many Muslims are with the so-called "conservative" movements. I certainly don't think there's anything wrong with being Islamically conservative, since that's often the safest and most intellectually honest way to go, but it has to be done with wisdom, compassion and a healthy respect for the spiritual and intellectual legacy of Islam. Far too often these days conservativism seems to be synonymous with being a rigid, self-righteous and puritanical numbskull. No doubt, in many places our so-called "Islamic leaders" are not only out of touch with the modern world, but they have a crass political agenda as well. Many of our leaders are not equipped to deal with the myriad of contemporary challenges that we’re facing in an intelligent and wise way that promotes love of God, love of neighbor, tolerance and charity. We’ve got to reject the hate-filled rhetoric that’s coming from too many sectors, bypass those who have their heads buried in the sand, abandon the paranoid conspiracy theories and replace the violent worldly ideology that has permeated our Ummah with an authentic Islamic vision.

The problem, as I see it, is that the outward aspects of Islam have been emphasized at the near complete expense of the inward, which has taken place due to a modernist and puritanical re-interpretation of Islam. Muslims need to tap into their great spiritual legacy and regain their appreciation for the peerless transmission of traditional knowledge that is the hallmark of this Ummah. Following a bunch of sour-faced prudes who view Islam simply as a stale collection of dos and don’ts isn’t going to help the spread of Islam in a modern world starved for spiritual nourishment. There are still many excellent knowledgeable and pious Muslim scholars throughout the world and I pray that Almighty God raises up a great reviver amongst them in the not-too-distant future.

Before moving on, I’d like to mention something that I think many of those who advocate a “reformation” of Islam, whether Muslim or non-Muslim, fail to understand. This is the simple fact that the “liberal” and “reformed” Islam which they advocate actually follows the same basic methodology of Osama Bin Laden and other militants. This is because they both adhere to a “Do-It-Yourself” and “Pick-and-Choose” approach to the religious texts of Islam which casts aside about 1,400 years of understanding and interpretation by remarkable and rightly-guided Muslim scholars. Once this approach is accepted, textual interpretation tends to head wherever one already wants to go—whether the Reformist Left of Ziauddin Sardar or the Militant Right of Osama Bin Ladin. Yes, these two modernist approaches to the religion of Islam are really flip sides of the same coin.

It probably won't surprise any Christians, or anyone familiar with English literature or comparative religion in the 20th century, that I came up with the name Mere Islam after thinking about a certain title by C. S. Lewis. When I decided to establish this weblog, I wanted to come up with a catchy title that would express the purpose, message and spirit that I had in mind for it—which is explaining Islam to non-Muslims, reflecting on Islamic spirituality, discussing aspects of comparative religion and trying to make sense of life in the modern world. Although this is not exactly analogous to what C. S. Lewis did in his classic Mere Christianity—and I certainly in no way intend to compare my religious views or my (lack of) writing skills to those of C. S. Lewis—hopefully I did manage to come up with a catchy title. As I intend it, Mere Islam means "Islam just as it is—straight from the mouth of a Muslim"—unadulterated by the bigotry of Islamophobes, the snide remarks of pundits and the distortion of Orientalists. By that I certainly don't claim to be speaking for all Muslims, but rather I'm only presenting my own subjective views—views which hopefully fit within the limits expounded by the large majority of Sunni Muslims for the past 1,400 years.

Speaking of C. S. Lewis, a couple of months ago a traditional Islamic scholar that I respect immensely recommended reading The Screwtape Letters to the Muslims attending his class. This was done in the context of a discussion about understanding how the Devil works and how he deceives us, and this erudite scholar felt Lewis’ book would be valuable in this regard. I still haven’t read the entire book, but I have read enough to see that it is a unique work that does indeed have some religious value. This is in spite of the fact that it has some severe flaws in regards to certain aspects of theology, a proper understanding of monotheism and other perspectives that a Muslim will find to be rather erroneous. Personally, one of the main shortcomings that I see in C. S. Lewis' writings is that he didn’t express much knowledge of other religions – especially Islam. He lived in a time when cultural arrogance and racism were nearly all-pervasive in English society, so I can't help but wondering whether C. S. Lewis would have had the moral courage to rise above his cultural milieu if the pure Abrahamic monotheism of Islam was ever properly explained to him. Based on the fact that many of his arguments for faith in God are not specifically Christian, but simply put forward a generic pro-theism stance, and many of his explanations of Christian doctrines are rather shallow, especially from the perspective of a pure monotheist, I find it rather sad that C. S. Lewis never explained (as far as I know) why he didn’t consider Islam. I only hope that Almighty God might count C. S. Lewis amongst those who never received the pure message, but I hardly know if that’s the case.

Keep in mind that C. S. Lewis is generally understood to be a "popular theologian", since he was a professer of English literature and writer by trade, thus formal theology was not his specialty. Although C. S. Lewis' books remain widely popular with Christians, he is one of the favorite whipping boys of atheists and secular humanists, who often see his arguments in favor of Christianity as shallow, incoherent and poorly argued. I recall reading a review of one of his books in which someone quipped that "C. S. Lewis couldn't reason his way out of a wet paper bag." While I think that's a bit of an overstatement, my own conclusion is that Mere Christianity is popular because it simply makes Christians feel good about their beliefs, even though it doesn't hold up under the scrutiny of truth seekers who really understand the issues at hand. For one thing, as Christians often do, C. S. Lewis considers Christian doctrines and explains his beliefs, but totally ignores the negative implications of those beliefs. I noticed a similar trend recently when I saw an episode of a new television special by PBS.org entitled, The Question of God: C. S. Lewis & Sigmund Freud. While the show contained some thought provoking dialogue, mainly by a select group of intellectuals who discussed major aspects of belief in God, much of it was rather shallow. For one thing, responses to some of the rather bold (and dubious) Christian claims were not even included. Indeed, there wasn't a believing theist, whether Jew or Muslim, invited to the table in order to articulate the fact that one can maintain a deep, coherent and satisfying belief in Almighty God without adhering to specifically Christian doctrines. It seems that the folks at PBS wanted to avoid such difficulties altogether—at least in one episode. When this initially became apparent, I thought I'd just bite my lip and consider the documentary to be about the debate between theism and atheism within the confines of the Western intellectual tradition. However, that sentiment collapsed when brief discussions of Zen Buddhism were included. I should admit that I haven't seen each portion of the entire The Question of God: C. S. Lewis & Sigmund Freud documentary, so I hope that I'm not judging it too harshly based on just one somewhat disappointing episode.