Human Struggle: Christian and Muslim PerspectivesMona Siddiqui In this section from chapter two of Human Struggle: Christian and Muslim Perspectives, Professor Siddiqui compares how Abu Hamid al-Ghazali and Rainer Maria Rilke wrote ‘letters’ to a younger student in which both men express their intellectual restlessness and search for faith, meaning and salvation. Abu Hamid Muhammad al-Ghazali…
Image adapted from Wikicommons by DhLeaks44 / CC BY-SA 4.0 “Free Speakers, Restrained Hearers: Blasphemy’s Legal Evolution“ Matthew P. Cavedon The most infamous terror trial in modern France began in September. Five years ago, Islamist terrorists shot nearly two dozen people at the offices of Charlie Hebdo, a satirical magazine. The publication had drawn their ire by reprinting…
Image adapted from Wikicommons by DhLeaks44 / CC BY-SA 4.0 “Don’t Write off Sharia’s Forgiveness Option Just Because of the Khashoggi Case” Matthew P. Cavedon Jamal Khashoggi was a prominent international journalist and Saudi dissident. He was tortured to death and dismembered in 2018 at the Saudi embassy in Istanbul. On September 7, eight Saudis were sentenced for…
Image adapted from Wikicommons by DhLeaks44 / CC BY-SA 4.0 “Sudan Criminalizes FGM” Adrienne Phillips Sudan recently criminalized female genital mutilation (FGM). According to the United Nations, about 87 percent of Sudanese women between the ages of fourteen and forty-nine have undergone some form of FGM. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that, worldwide, “more than 200 million…
Dār al-Islām Revisited: Territoriality in Contemporary Islamic Legal Discourse on Muslims in the West by Sarah Albrecht Review by David R. Blumenthal Albrecht begins her very fine study with a methodological introduction, a summary of the various pre-modern views of territoriality in Islam, and an overview of various Islamic views on territoriality in the modern…
This article is part of our “Religious Reflections on Forgiveness in Law” series.If you’d like to check out other articles in this series, click here. Amber Guyger, a white police officer, mistakenly entered the home of Botham Jean, a black man, and shot him dead. Months later, a Texas jury convicted Guyger of murder. Some celebrated…
Wall, Arabic, Alhambra Image (Pixabay) This article is part of our “Natural Law, Human Rights, and ‘Unalienable Rights” series.If you’d like to check out other articles in this series, click here. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s formation of the Commission on Unalienable Rights has generated controversy among human rights advocates, in part because of the…
Alhambra/ Jebulon on Wikimedia/ CCO The First Amendment is designed, in part to prevent – or at least severely limit the degree to which religion can be directly expressed through law and policy and the extent to which law can be used to define and control religious belief and practice. Nevertheless, some religious groups often seek…
Can an individual truly be a citizen of a nation and simultaneously a global citizen? For the 1.8 million Muslims of the world, and especially the estimated 4 million in the United States, the question is deeper than simple political allegiance; it goes to the core of belonging and self-perception. Citizenship, whether as a political…