The Concept of Freedom in Contemporary Islamic Thought

Abstract

Al- Masawi provides a critical reading of the concept of freedom in contemporary Islamic thought and provides a close reading of the contemporary output of Islamic political thought and the most important writing done on the concept of freedom. The paper is premised on the notion that religious texts in Islam incorporate many principles and ideas that essentially converge with the concept of freedom. This is what prompted a number of Islamic scholars (ulama’) and leaders of Islamic political movements to draft the “Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Islam”, as declared by the World Islamic Council in Paris, on September 19, 1981 – a declaration which summarized much of the literature attempting to formulate the idea of human rights in the Islamic system. The religious texts of the Quran and the Sunnah enabled these thinkers to find Islamic roots for many of the rights and freedoms universally recognized in the Universal Declaration, but a problem remained: how could one determine when or if the bounds of acceptable ijtihad – juristic interpretation – had been exceeded? This paper offers an in-depth discussion on the natural concept of freedom and the ways in which contemporary Islamic thought has debated it, taking various stands regarding civil and political rights, in the framework of the political community.