Author: International Islamic Fiqh Academy
Resolution No. 146 (4/16)
Concerning the New Reading of the Qur’an and Religious Texts
The Council of the International Islamic Fiqh Academy, an organ of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference, meeting in its sixteenth session in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, from 30 Safar to 5 Rabi‘ al-Awwal 1426 AH, corresponding to 9-14 April 2005 CE;
Having examined the research submitted to the Academy on “the new reading of the Qur’an and religious texts”, and having heard the ensuing discussions;
Resolves as follows:
First: so-called new readings of religious texts that distort their meanings, even by relying on aberrant opinions, taking the texts outside scholarly consensus and contradicting established religious truths, constitute a reprehensible innovation and a grave danger to Islamic societies, their culture and values. Some proponents have fallen into this approach through ignorance of the standards governing interpretation or an obsession with renewal unrestrained by religious criteria.
Signs of the danger’s worsening include some universities adopting the methodology of these readings, circulating their claims through various media, encouraging dissertations on their topics, inviting leading advocates to lecture and participate in questionable seminars, translating their opinions written in foreign languages, and some institutions publishing their poisonous books.
Second: confronting this trend of readings has become a collective obligation. Means of confronting the trend and eliminating its danger include:
1. Calling on Islamic governments to confront this imminent danger and clarify the distinction between responsible, purposeful freedom of opinion that respects established principles and unrestrained, destructive freedom, so that these governments take the necessary measures to monitor publishing institutions, cultural centres and media organisations, deepen general Islamic awareness among young people and university students, and explain the criteria of lawful independent reasoning, correct exegesis and commentary on prophetic hadith.
2. Taking appropriate measures, such as discussion seminars, to encourage thorough study of Islamic disciplines and their terminology and independent reasoning governed by religious criteria and the principles and established usages of Arabic.
Expanding constructive, methodical dialogue with proponents of this trend.
3. Encouraging specialists in Islamic studies to intensify serious practical responses and discuss these claims in different fields, especially educational curricula.
4. Directing some postgraduate students in creed, hadith and Islamic law to choose dissertation topics that disseminate established truths and seriously answer these opinions and claims.
5. Forming a working group affiliated with the International Islamic Fiqh Academy and establishing a comprehensive library of works on this subject, monitoring publications and responses to them in preparation for serious research and coordination among researchers in different institutions within and outside the Islamic world.
God knows best.
Source: Journal of the International Islamic Fiqh Academy, issue sixteen, part two, pp. 415-416.
Article link: https://www.iifa-aifi.org/en/7334.html
Introduction: the International Islamic Fiqh Academy is an official international body established pursuant to Resolution No. 8/3-Th (Q.A.) of the Third Islamic Summit Conference, the “Palestine and Jerusalem Session”, held in Makkah, Saudi Arabia, from 19-22 Rabi‘ al-Awwal 1401 AH, corresponding to 25-28 January 1981 CE. It is affiliated with the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, whose membership comprises 57 Muslim states. The Academy’s scholar members are official scholars representing their countries. Its website states: “The Statute of the International Islamic Fiqh Academy provides that each member state of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation appoints a full member to the Academy. More than one full member from the same country may be admitted by a resolution of the Academy’s Council. The Academy’s member states are the fifty-seven member states of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation.”