Oppression by the West?
The West is said to oppress the poorer nations and certainly
capitalism is self-serving. Imran Khan, populist politician of Pakistan, has
spoken at great length about the IMF and World Bank. But would the
"developing" Muslim nations be better off if the West left them to
their own devices? Many of them are corrupt and stagnant; they spend vast sums
on weapons they cannot afford. Their health and education systems are woeful.
For example it is about 50 times more likely for a mother to die in childbirth
in Pakistan than in the West.(In Taleban Afghanistan where women could not be
treated by male doctors, the maternal mortality rate was 15,000 percent worse
than the West) Pakistan President
Musharraf has seen fit to insist on general education in the madrasas
(religious schools) and not just rote learning of the Qur’an (and, in some,
training and recruiting for al-Qaeda)
Yes, the real oppressors of Muslim people are their own rulers (and Osama
bin Laden has a point when he says the US helps keep them in power. But what is
the alternative? Allow the fundamentalists to take over with wholesale
oppression by Islamic law?)
Theocracy, the rule of a god, is
the opposite to democracy, the rule of the people. The sad fact is that arguably
Indonesia, despite its role in West Papua and Aceh, is the most democratic
Muslim country in the world. (It was colonized by the Dutch before hard-line
Islam could be established.) Bangladesh and Jordan, also not Islamic states,
are among the few Muslim countries where ordinary people have some say.
We consider punishments such as whipping, stoning to death for adultery
and amputation of limbs for theft as belonging to the Dark Ages. Western
micro-surgeons are successfully rejoining hands lost in accidents but the
Qur’an (5:38) "As for the thief male or female, Cut off his or her hands:
a punishment by way of example from Allah … exalted in Power, Full of
Wisdom" is still acted upon in some Muslim states (Saudi Arabia, Somalia,
Iraq, Oman, UAE and the late unlamented Taleban Afghanistan.)
It is 400 years since the last Christian "heretic" was burned
to death. Perhaps a Reformation is possible within Islam? However, there is no
Sunni hierarchy with the power to abrogate the Qur’an and Sunnah (traditions of
Prophet Muhammad) and change Sharia, Islamic law.
The Bible is taken as being the words of men, albeit
divinely inspired, and so subject to acceptance or otherwise. However the
Qur’an is considered to be the literal word of Allah and so there appears no
mechanism whereby Islam can be made more modern and humane.