Christian History Shows Why an Islamic Reformation Is Harder Than It Sounds
Five hundred years after Martin Luther unleashed his jeremiad against the Catholic Church, a question has seized the attention of the West with a special urgency: can Islam undergo its own reformation?
The terrorist attack on Iran’s national parliament and shrine to Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini; the assault on security officials in Paris; the knife-wielding attack in London; the rampage against teenage concert-goers in Manchester; the assassination of Christian pilgrims outside Cairo, Egypt; the raft of executions of civilians in Iraq; the sectarian rage fueling the Syrian Civil War—it all suggests a sickness in the soul of Islam. What is needed, many argue, is a new interpretation of sacred texts that delegitimizes the advocates of terror. Even Egyptian president Abdel Fattah el-Sisi—no champion of political liberalism—has called for “a religious revolution” to rescue Islam from those who would pervert its message.
Source URL (retrieved on June 20, 2017):
http://nationalinterest.org/feature/christian-history-shows-why-islamic-reformation-harder-it-21124
