Reclaiming the Tradition An Essay on the Condition of the Possibility of Islamic Knowledge

Abstract

The issue at hand for every Muslim who takes hisher Muslim identity
seriously is to work toward the creation and maintenance of Islamic
knowledge. The commitment to this agenda should not, however, be
seen exclusively as an exercise in constructing yet another knowledge
structure, for then it would be an empty academic exercise. The full truth
and force of Islamization of knowledge is captured only in its being
understood initially as a political act. Only later is it to be understood as
an act that, for its completion, requires Muslims to engage in academic
exercises without, however, ever losing sight of the political import of
the entire undertaking.
The sense in which I am using the term “political” should not be understood
in the narrow and parochial sense of belonging to a political party
or an organization or even of being committed to some political ideology.
I am employing the term to mean the exercise of power not for individual
gains but for the betterment of the community viewed as a moral
entity. Hence, the political is the realm within which moral debate takes
place regarding the ends for which the community is to use power, by
whom it will be exercised on behalf of the community, and how it will
employ power to realize those ends. In this sense, the political becomes
constitutive of the community considered as a moral entity.
This understanding of the political is consistent with the Islamic view,
which does not separate the political from the moral. In fact, in Islam
political activity has legitimacy and makes sense only if undertaken for
a moral purpose. In the West, the moral understanding of the political
was the Cornerstone of Plato’s and Aristotle’s classical political theory,
until it became marginalized as the West grew more secular and ...