Fundamentalist Islam Comes Under Scrutiny | Voice of America - English
This is the first part of a five-part feature series on Perspectives Within Islam.  It includes the views of Somali born feminist Ayaan Hirsi Ali, an activist and outspoken critic of Muslim fundamentalism.  Hirsi Ali was recently interviewed by VOA's Carolyn Weaver. Additional information is provided by William Eagle. Outspoken critic of fundamentalist Islam and former Dutch parliamentarian Hirsi Ali says the 9/11 terror attacks [in the United States] inspired her to transform her perspectives on faith and to become what she has termed a ?Muslim atheist?.
Imam Mohammed bin Uthman of the Sahaba mosque in Kano, Nigeria, says critics of Islam are seeking ?cheap popularity? in the West, sometimes to gain residency or citizenship there. ?It surprises me,? he told VOA, ?that the cheapest way for some wretched souls to (get asylum) in the West is to launch an attack on Islam?.Every Tom, Dick and Harry who wants to be heard, applauded, ?given the Nobel Prize?launch attacks on Islam.? The northern Nigerian Imam acknowledges a controversial verse in the Muslim holy book, the Koran, that allows for beating disobedient wives. But he adds, ?no obedient woman will misbehave [to the point that] her husband would raise his hand against her.? He says there is violence against women in the West as well, including what he calls moral violence, including pornography. He and other scholars also say attacks on unbelievers are taken out of context:  they say Koranic passages that espouse taking the property of unbelievers and other acts of aggression are only responses to attack. Farid Esack, who served as the chairman of South Africa?s Gender Equality Commission, said violence does not happen in a vacuum. ?You do not wake up in the morning,? he said, ?read a verse in the Koran, all of a sudden grab a bomb and go.? He says violence often has a political, historical and social context behind it. Esack, who is now a visiting professor at the Harvard Divinity School, said radicals like al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and those who attacked the US in 2001 are disconnected from centuries of Islamic scholarship and jurisprudence that add context to the sacred texts. It is only be studying the rich traditions of Islam, they say, that verses espousing violence can be properly understood.