In his interview Taufik Ibrahim argues that the main problem for Muslims is that the traditional, medieval understanding of religion has not yet been overcome. This traditional understanding is connected with the loss of the initial creative impulse of early Islam, with the so-called closure of the gate of ijtihad. Both the fundamentalists and the reformist typically reference the early Islamic period. But the question is, why do they do so? Is it in order to find ready-made answers or to find the inner sense of this or that statement, to liberate them from historical limits and discover how to realize them in modern life? T. Ibrahim thinks that there is no clash of Western and Isalmic civilizations but there are clashes between traditional and modern values within civilizations. His view is that in Muslim countries the modernization of the society without religious reform, as took place in Turkey, is not able to protect society from setbacks as long as the traditional understanding of religion remains untouched. And such radical organizations as ISIS exploit this situation. In the reformation of Islam T. Ibrahim underlines the special role of the Islamic periphery, mostly Europe, and also including Russia.

Keywords: Islam, globalization, traditional understanding of religion, reformation, citizenship, humanism.

Ibrahim T. Islam and one-sided modernization: "There was no liberation from the Middle Ages" (interview) // State, Religion, Church in Russia and abroad. 2017. N 3. pp. 300-317.

Ibrahim, Taufik (2017) "Islam and Partial Modernization: "There Was No Liberation from Medieval Elements'" (interview), Gosudarstuo, religiia, tserkov' v Rossii i za rubezhom 35(3): 300-317.

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We understand everything, and the further we go, the better we are more aware that something is happening in the Islamic world. Probably somewhere since the time of the "Arab Spring". What happens either in Islamic countries, or in connection with Islam as an ideology or as a creed, even in connection with Islamic eschatology, is increasingly appearing in the headlines. But in your opinion, what is happening in the Islamic world?

Tawfiq Ibrahim: In the Islamic world, in fact, by and large, nothing special or extraordinary happens. There are countries - whatever we call them, "developing", "third world" or something else - that are looking for their way in the modern world. Since they are far from the leading positions, this naturally forces them to react in some way, to do something. Moreover, this problem is not only for Muslim countries. Turbulence, it will continue for a long time, until we, on a global scale, have a more or less even distribution of wealth, until there is a consensus on a fair, equivalent exchange.

But there are probably two things that are really specific to Muslims. First, there are a lot of oil and gas resources in Muslim countries. The role of oil in the global economy is well known, and it will remain one of the main factors that will determine the interest in the Muslim world for many years to come. Secondly, it is the Islamic ideology itself, the specifics of Islam as a religion. Islam is a religion of active life position, active opposition to evil. Different regions and countries may react differently to the adverse and negative effects of globalization. Muslims are particularly sensitive in this regard.

However, I personally have nothing against globalization itself. In principle, globalization, universalism-this is a general trend that has been present throughout the course of history: think at least about the conquests of Alexander the Great. And Christianity itself, and then Islam, is nothing more than a globalist project. I don't see anything wrong if a certain culture, considering that it is more worthy, wants to bring

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your values and lifestyle are up to others. However, these others have the right to resist attempts to impose on them other people's values, other people's standards of life.

I would like to draw your attention to this point as well. Earlier, during the Soviet Union, the world was bipolar. One force opposed another force. And the protest moods that always exist, have always been and will always be, mainly accumulated communism and socialism. Now, to a large extent, these protest moods are accumulated by Islam.

But still, it was in the Islamic countries that the idea arose that the reason for their lagging behind the West, from Europe, from America is that these states have moved away from the foundations of the Islamic religion, and it is the return to true Islam that will allow them to return to the forefront. This is how you think this kind of ideology, how seriously does it affect what is happening now in the Islamic world?

It's very popular. Moreover, one of the main aspects of criticism of globalism is that it is essentially neocolonialism, a continuation of the imperialist expansion of the West.

There is also a thorough melancholy (as, indeed, in Russia!) by the greatness of the past, a deep sense of historical resentment: under the banner of Islam, we built a world power, spread our influence in many countries, created a great civilization, a high culture. Therefore, the thesis that let's revive the caliphate and return to its former greatness is a mandatory moment in this ideology.

To this is added the typical attempt in such cases to blame everything on others. In particular, the European powers are considered to be responsible for the backwardness of the respective colonies. In this regard, I will note the following. Of course, one cannot discount the negative aspects of colonialism, and one cannot help noticing that in its relations with Muslim countries, Europe, or the West, to put it mildly, has not always been and continues to be well-intentioned. But that's only half the truth. After all, colonialism itself is more likely not a cause, but a consequence-a consequence of our historical, civilizational backwardness,

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decline after the fourteenth century. And who, for example, prevented the Ottoman Empire from issuing world-class scientists?!

And in your opinion - why?

Because there was a conservation of religion, this is what is conventionally called "closing the doors of ijtihad". After the fact, we have come to refer to the stagnation that has occurred, the rejection of the creative impulse that was in the VIII-XIII centuries - a period that corresponds to the Middle Ages on a European scale. In Europe, there was first the Middle Ages, then the Renaissance, but in our country, on the contrary, there was first the Renaissance, then the Middle Ages came. It so happened that we revived the ancient culture, but then we seemed to abandon our own achievements. After the thirteenth century, conservative orthodoxy prevailed. And it was this, and not the Crusades or the Mongol invasion, that was the main reason for the stagnation and subsequent decline of Muslim civilization.

In fact, you also say that a certain distortion of the initial impulse of religion has led to the fact that Muslim countries began to lag behind. Then where do you disagree with what you call fundamentalists?

Such a thesis is precisely what the fundamentalist and the modernist reformer have in common, and in this respect they do not differ from each other. There is a conservative Salafist, and a modernist Salafist. If you criticize historical layers, you should tell us where to go. "Let's go back to the original Islam! "What do you want from the original Islam? Who is looking for a letter, ready-made recipes that were there. And who is looking for the meaning and spirit of a particular religious institution and is looking for how to realize this goal in the current conditions and through the means currently available, that is, frees this institution from rigid attachment to the historical situation in which it was formulated. Here is a fundamental, fundamental discrepancy. But what the fundamentalist conservative and the modernist have in common is a return to the beginning. Let us recall Luther's slogan: down with tradition, back to the Bible.

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And why do fundamentalists still play first fiddle among those who call for going back?

There are two main reasons for this. The process of moving from a medieval understanding of religion to a new understanding of it is a very painful process. Who introduced it to Europe? First of all, secular power. As a rule, it was the secular authorities who did not allow supporters of the old understanding to crush innovators. This has not happened in Islamic countries. The secular rulers did not even set such a task - to reform the religion.

Turkey is the country that has made the most progress on the path of modernization. It would seem that Ataturk has come closer to Europe, the state is separated from religion. But even before Erdogan and his party came to power, I said that this is a dead end. A one-sided modernization was carried out: the modernization of society, but without the reformation of religion itself. There was no liberation from the Middle Ages (I don't say religion), from the medieval understanding of religion. That is, even Turkey did not pass this stage.

Take Sharia law, for example. In addition to the headscarf, cutting off the hand and stoning - what else does Sharia mean for many, in the mass consciousness?! So, in the entire history of the Ottoman Empire, as they say, there was not a single case of cutting off the hand or stoning. So what of it? It is not enough just to refrain from applying medieval norms, as if to forget about them for a while. There was no ideological emancipation from mediaevalism, no actual religious justification for the rejection of these norms. This means that if someone like DAESH 1 comes and explains to the Muslims that they have been living "not according to Islam", they will win. And most of them will sincerely repent for their past.

So the first reason is that the Middle Ages themselves, the medieval understanding of religion, was not overcome, or rather, no one actually touched it. In this regard, it is significant that only last year the section of the program on captive slavery, i.e. on turning captive men into slaves and women into concubines, was abolished in schools in al-Azhar. With,

1. Prohibited in the Russian Federation by the decision of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation, dated 14.02.2003 N GKPI 03 116, entered into force on 04.03.2003.

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Apparently, it was canceled under pressure from President al-Sisi. You see, such mediaevalism has not been debunked. Yes, in almost all Muslim countries, the law does not provide for the death penalty as a punishment for adultery, and for many decades people have been living quietly without it. However, if any fundamentalist starts actively campaigning for the application of this norm as a true requirement of Islam, then most likely the majority of Muslims are ready to listen to it, since the secular regimes in these countries have not approved a different understanding of religion. This means that almost everywhere there is a solid foundation for restoring the traditional, medieval understanding of religion. In fact, Daesh is the legitimate son of the medieval interpretation of Islam. Its ideologues do not invent anything new: everything is in authoritative books on Sharia law. Another thing is that in many countries this has not been applied for a long time.

Now for the second reason. In these countries, almost everywhere there were authoritarian regimes to varying degrees that did not tolerate any liberal-democratic opposition. But on the contrary, they gave way to religious movements: the main thing is, do not touch us in your mosques and sermons. And they freely spread their ideology, their understanding of Islam. As a result, the liberal Democratic forces were pushed out. As a digression, I will note that against this background, what happened in Egypt as a result of the second wave of the revolution, when several tens of millions of protesters came out against what was called the Islamic project, was completely unexpected for everyone.

Back to your question. In almost all of these countries, such authoritarian regimes have ceased to be popular. And almost everywhere we have two terrible factors: corruption and population growth. Population size is the main problem, and it is a tragedy of almost all third world countries. On the contrary, modern technologies require job cuts. And in the Arab countries, the population doubles every quarter of a century. It turns out that the situation for young people is objectively bad, there is no perspective. Even if there were an ideal regime, it would be extremely difficult for it to meet the growing needs due to population growth. What's the way out? Liberal-democratic protest of the population? No. The easiest way is to go to religion. And they turn to her. And where else?

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You said at the very beginning that Muslim countries, like other "third world" countries, are looking for a path to modernity, and then you say that the medieval understanding of Islam dominates there. Isn't there a contradiction between the search for a path to modernity and this medieval thing you were talking about?

There is a society based on civic life. And there is a Bedouin, tribalist society. In many countries, people mostly live as if by Bedouin standards: tribal leader, hereditary power. We haven't gotten away from it yet. I thought we had already overcome this in our native Syria. Alas, no. Here is a whole tribe goes to the side of the opposition, then to the side of the regime. There is also such a dominant Bedouin, traditional, if you will, organization of society. Naturally, it is fraught with fundamentalism everywhere. There will always be a ready - made base for any kind of counter-reformation. But this is a plus for the most important problem.

It is not a question of who will put forward a more acceptable version of the ideology, this is a secondary issue if the most important issues are not resolved. How to feed people? This is the main thing. When people have nothing to feed, then there is a simple way out: take up arms. Let's just say that the whole world pays us the jizya (tax on non-Muslims in the Caliphate). For example, Switzerland flourished because people from other countries kept money in its banks. And we will live off jizya. Such easy solutions, they will always be tempting. We should not simplify the problem, reduce everything to the fact that there is a dictatorial regime and there is a medieval mentality. There are objective things: huge population growth, lack of natural resources. This is a super-problem that no one solves.

One more clarification. You have reflected at once two different positions on the role of fundamentalist Islam, which in modern Western science collide with each other. This is, in fact, the discussion that goes on between Roy and Kepel. So is radicalism the essence of Islam or is Islam the future-

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what is the ideology that the protest masses adopt, because in this world there must always be some kind of protest ideology?

In fact, these two positions are not so polar, they do not exclude each other. But when we talk about the "essence of Islam," we must first determine what kind of "Islam" we are talking about. The sacred texts themselves are one thing, but their interpretation is another. Moreover, these interpretations may differ significantly not only from one historical epoch to another, but also within the same epoch. In terms of radicalism, Islam in the understanding of medieval theologians-faqihs is far from similar, for example, to its understanding by Sufi mystics from the school of Ibn Arabi, who developed a pluralistic interpretation of faith, sometimes bordering on religious indifferentism. Therefore, it would be more correct to talk not about the "essence" of Islam, but about the dominant interpretation of it in this period. And the dominant political doctrine in traditional theology was formed in the conditions of a time when the "right of the strong" prevailed, everyone fought against everyone, and states often faced a dilemma - you will win or you will win. Under such conditions, naturally, only a militant, militaristic interpretation of the sacred texts could prevail. The pacifist, tolerant-pluralist attitude of the Qur'an, which, from the reformist - modernist point of view, actually expresses the true "essence" of the Qur'anic message, has remained in the shadows.

Today, for the protest masses, this political doctrine to a certain extent occupies the niche that the communist, socialist idea used to occupy. Who organized the bombings in Europe before? What were they called there?

There were all sorts of red brigades.

And how, in principle, do such actions differ from the terrorist acts that are now being committed under pseudo-Islamic slogans?! There is nothing specifically religious about it. In any more or less mass ideology, it is not so difficult to establish what we call a radical understanding. To do this, it is enough that there are forces interested in this.

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In addition, it is necessary to take into account this circumstance. Today we have made significant progress in terms of establishing humanistic values, but we should not forget that in the same Europe, and even more recently, the situation was much more complicated. We are now outraged - these bandits from DAESH are cutting their heads! Do you know what the Europeans did in their colonies? In India, British soldiers committed atrocities against the local population, raped their wives, killed their husbands, and forced their widows to wear beads with their husbands ' skulls around their necks. They kept the evidence of this in their photos, proud of it. Or the French in Algeria: the Natural History Museum in Paris displays more than a dozen severed heads of Algerian resistance leaders. And what the Americans did with prisoners in Vietnam! Did the Europeans and Americans think it was wild?! And no need for illusions, fascism is also the brainchild of that very European culture.

I understand that the Arab Spring in many Islamic countries has raised very high hopes for democratization, for the development of Islamic approaches, and in general for some new, just, different life. And almost nowhere did it work. Somewhere it ended in a military coup that overthrows the legitimately elected president, somewhere it ended in bloody chaos. Why?

First, I want to emphasize that the very fact of the" Arab Spring " is a very positive phenomenon. People realized that they have the right to a different life, and with this demand went out on the street. Whatever the outcome, do not belittle the significance of this fact. And then all sorts of experts sit and talk about the East, where the ideals of democracy and freedom are generally alien to people.

What happened in Egypt with the second wave of the revolution seems to me to be a very important moment. And again-regardless of how it ended or will end. It showed that not every religious project will pass. There was an Ikhvanist program, and religious people rose up against it. And by the millions. I used to think that for a long time we were doomed to one of two alternatives: either authoritarianism or ip-

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lamist project. It turns out that there is another perspective. This is the second positive point.

But the fact that the "Arab Spring" ended abysmally everywhere is rather natural, natural. Why? Because you're right to criticize, but you don't have a viable alternative. It is not enough to have the power to overthrow the existing regime. You must have a constructive alternative. If you intend to rebuild your dilapidated house, you should have a spare place where you will live during the reconstruction, and that there is a clear construction plan. Just what was missing here. Even those more or less organized groups that came to power on this wave-even for them, all this was unexpected in some sense. They weren't prepared for the prospect. They didn't have any programs. This is their weakness, or rather their doom.

But I have a feeling that this lesson of the Arab Spring was not realized.

You understand the tragedy of the situation. Nor is such a lesson learned from the concomitant phenomenon of Daesh. So what if we can get rid of it soon? I am sure that in ten years ' time some semblance of it may quietly appear somewhere else. For many radicals and jihadists, the failure of the current attempt does not mean that the project is doomed. And they are not afraid of their own death; quite the contrary, they are eager to become martyrs.

Rather, it should be a lesson for those forces that were more or less liberal-democratic at the beginning of the protest actions. Perhaps there should also be a lesson for the West, which, I believe, did the wrong thing in relation to the opposition forces, just as before it did the wrong thing when it supported this or that authoritarian regime.

Perhaps more precisely, I hope that what happened will not be in vain for the moderate wing of political Islam, although so far there are no higher-level figures among its ideologues. We have been demanding for more than a hundred years: give a positive alternative! And they actually remain within the framework of the traditional understanding of religion, which in principle cannot give a proper, promising, viable project.

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We, the supporters of the reformist-modernist approach, have a different understanding of Islam. For us, the Prophet Muhammad laid only the foundations, the beginning of a progressive movement, and noted some development vectors. For fundamentalist traditionalists, this is the highest ideal, the peak to be guided by, and all our efforts should be directed at recreating the order that was established in the time of the Prophet and his closest companions-successors.

It is necessary to overcome the traditional understanding of history for all three Abrahamic religions - Judaism, Christianity and Islam. We need to move away from the traditional, eschatological regressivism, according to which the "golden age" was behind us, and ahead of us - the end of the world, where we are all heading. And all hope is placed in the Messiah, who decides the fate of the world. In the framework of such a paradigm, with such a worldview, no civilization can be created. It is necessary to move from the regressist paradigm to the progressive one.

As for the modernization of Muslim societies, it should be ideologically immanent, relying on internal resources. It should be exactly its own, in no case introduced. Otherwise, it is for a short period of time, and not very promising.

In addition, the modernization program must be endured. This aspect is often lacking, and this is the problem of most third world countries, including Muslim ones. When something positive is taken from the European experience, it remains one-sided, detached from the deep foundation, and therefore it turns out to be ineffective, "does not work". In Europe, however, it has suffered: they paid to establish science-how many martyrs, how many Galileans!

But this does not mean that we must necessarily follow the same bloody path of Europe. We should try to avoid as much as possible the sacrifices that the adoption of a different understanding of religion cost Europe. Although, what is happening now in some Muslim countries is just like the birth pangs of a new society.

A phenomenon that is not new at all, but has now acquired a completely different scale - this is the migration of Muslims to the West, to Europe. How do you think this will affect understanding as well-

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the influence of Islam, and on Western society itself? What can we expect from this?

I look at this phenomenon in the light of the experience of Russian Islam. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, the Muslims of Russia, I believe, were at the forefront of the entire Muslim world in terms of an adequate and correct understanding of Islam. They lived in fundamentally different conditions. Religion and politics were not so tightly connected here, and it was in this atmosphere that one might conclude, for example, that the union of religion and politics, religion and the state, is negative, especially for religion itself. And I believe that migrants who will be able to speak more freely about Islam - unlike those who live in the strongholds of the Muslim world-will move towards a more correct understanding of religion. In this sense, much hope is placed on such a peripheral Islam. At one time, the great Tatar thinker Gasprinsky stated:: The Muslims of Russia should stand in front of the entire Muslim world. This attitude is also promising for European Islam as a whole.

This is one side of the coin. The second aspect is whether Muslims, the majority of them, will be able to enter into a new context, how our modus vivendi will be combined with the new environment. If it succeeds, then it will be good for everyone. If not, it's a disaster.

So, you mean, will they be able to fit in with this new society?

One of the most difficult problems, which was hardly considered after the abolition of the Caliphate, is related to the actual religious justification, religious legitimation of the transition from life in a religious society to life in a political and civil society.

Today we live in a state that is built on geographical or political principles. The main criterion here is citizenship, not religious identity or ethnicity. For example, I am a Russian citizen, I am a Muslim, I am an Arab, and another is a Russian Orthodox, a third is a Jew, and so on. But as fellow citizens, we have the same rights, we are citizens of this country. Everyone should understand,

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that we live not in a religious state, but in a political one. A different identity principle applies here. If we are not aware of this identity, then, for example, a Muslim will assume that any Muslim is closer to him everywhere than a non-Muslim. We must learn to have different identities at the same time. In addition to religious identity and ethnic identity, there is also a civil identity, and this should be the primary one, the main one in all that concerns the socio-political sphere. Unfortunately, we are still far from such a consciousness.

If we are talking about migrants in Europe, then here, in my opinion, there are all sorts of artificial battles. For example, around the hijab. If you really want people to move away from the misinterpretation of religious symbols that you think have no place in modern society, if you really want to help people free themselves from misinterpretation, you should not go down the line of confrontation. This, on the contrary, causes many acute protest moods. It is impossible to drive both Muslims and ourselves into a dead end for both sides.

In general, I believe that the European project of rationalism and secularism is only partially justified. Historically, it was justified as a reaction to the medieval understanding of Christianity. But in general, on a large scale, such a project is not justified and has little prospect. As a result, instead of Christianity, we have all sorts of forms of mysticism, neo-Paganism and Satanism, which simply replace the role and niche that Christianity used to occupy. This is not the best alternative. It is necessary to establish a synthesis in which religion takes its proper place, and a person does not feel uncomfortable because he is a religious person and a man of science. This is the direction that Europe should move in.

In the meantime, we have to admit that European culture has gone too far in its secularism. At times, the militancy of its secularists is no less abhorrent than that of its religious fanatics. In terms of type, as it seems to me, they are not much different: "I can do anything, even if I go without clothes, but you have no right to cover your hair"!

What do you see as the reasons for the phenomenon that is commonly called "Islamic terrorism"?

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All the radicals say that to avoid the big evil, they go to small evil. Remember how in the history of Christian Europe the following motive was also used: burn these heretics together with their children, in mercy to them, because the less they sin on Earth, the better they will be in the next life. Unfortunately, similar arguments work almost everywhere. Take the example of the American atomic bombing of the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II. Or the use of napalm by the same Americans in Vietnam. We don't always want to reflect on this, to realize that these are the same type of phenomena.

In this regard, I would like to draw attention to one psychological moment of our era, the era of technicism. If, for example, they broadcast about a bombing that kills several hundred civilians, it will cause less shock than, say, showing on TV how someone's finger is cut!

I have one last question. If we now try to generalize something, well, go back, so to speak, to the beginning - after all, what is happening in the modern world? Is this a clash of civilizations? Is this some kind of global intra-Islamic, I don't know, Shiite-Sunni or traditionalist-reformist conflict? Is this some other process? What kind of packaging should we put all this in?

But we probably shouldn't pack everything in one package. Because different processes take place in parallel in the world. There was a project to secularize Europe, and now the process of desecularization of Europe is underway. There was a modern project, and it was replaced by postmodernism. Globalization is progressing, but there is also resistance to it. In the Muslim world, too, everything is different in different regions and countries. You should not think that everything here needs to be built into one big scheme. This is a counterproductive temptation. On the contrary, such generalizations should be avoided.

Clash of civilizations-yes, in a certain sense it is. We just need to clarify what civilizations we are talking about. And if to specify, then, probably, big claims

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back to the theory itself. If we mean a clash of two approaches, for example, to understanding the role of religion in society, then this understanding is correct. Can this be framed in terms of civilization? I don't see anything wrong with that.

But still, when they talk about the clash of civilizations now, they put a very definite meaning into it. This is a clash of Western and Islamic civilizations.

Modernization is a transition to the understanding of society that, in principle, we must pay tribute to Europe, it has developed. There is a struggle going on between the old understanding and the new, and this, of course, is a complex civilizational process. But it does not go between different areas, it also goes inside each of the areas.

But Islamic and Western values, do they clash?

Not quite. It is a fact that some of the values of traditional Muslim culture collide with modern ones. But this is not a clash between Islam and modernity or the West. The traditional understanding of Christianity also clashes with the values of modern Western civilization. Not only the highest officials of the Orthodox Church, but also the Catholic Church, call modern Western culture Satanic.

So you think that a civilizational clash is more a clash between the old and the new within each civilization, rather than between civilizations? Do I understand your position correctly?

Exactly. Moreover, we should generally be extra careful when putting forward such global theories - about the conflict of civilizations, religions, confessions, ethnic groups, etc. There is a fundamental difference between studying realities that are already the property of history, and studying realities that can serve as the basis for concrete decisions that are of crucial importance for these realities, and not just about the future. just for them. Here you need to be extra careful and understand all the responsibility. A business

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It's not just about being politically correct. You don't comment on a medical history that was in the distant past. You give a prescription that the patient can be cured or not cured, survive or die.

And whatever the differences between people in culture, religion, ethnicity, language, wealth, etc., we all belong to the same humanity. We are all sons of Adam and Eve, and therefore members of the same family. And we all need to think together about solving global problems.

The ideals of humanism, which are much talked about, should include a sense of great respect for a person as a person, regardless of whether they are Russian, Arab, French or Chinese... We are moving in this direction, but we have not yet made much progress. Somewhere people are swimming in gold, and somewhere children are starving to death. It must be that any life is valuable to you. Only then is it true humanism.

So for you, Islam is a humanistic religion?

Yes, that is my deep conviction. And this belief is not based on my religious identity. I speak as an objective researcher. I have tried to show this, especially in the book "Quranic Humanism", the first volume of which was published in 2015.

For me, Islam, like any heavenly religion , is a religion of humanism. Conflicts arise due to the incorrect understanding of religion on the part of people. This applies both to conflicts between different religions and between different confessions within the same religion, and to conflicts between religion in general and science. Nature, the laws of which science reveals, is the same Book of God as the Scripture given to Him - the Koran, for example. These two Books cannot contradict each other. And if there is a seeming discrepancy, then you have misunderstood the text of Scripture.

Similarly, religion is first and foremost love, God's love for us and, in return, our love for Him. Love for God should be expressed mainly in love for His creatures. If something contradicts this principle, it means that you are misinterpreting the text of Scripture, which comes from the name of God.

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But when reading the Qur'an, we must take into account one fundamentally important fact, which I have already mentioned, namely:: God addresses people in the Qur'an, taking into account their mentality, level of their mental and social development. This, of course, should have been taken into account by the Prophet Muhammad, who acted as a reformer. That is why in many areas he realized not the desired, ideal, but the maximum possible in those times. It is one thing to have Qur'anic attitudes that target all societies and all times, but another to have attitudes that target the Bedouins of seventh-century Arabia. The theoretical and methodological error of many rationalists and critics of religion is that they do not take into account the specific conditions in which the prophets preached.

Do you know what the Prophet Muhammad complained about when he passed away? He complained to Aisha, his wife, that the Kaaba was not built quite right, and he would have liked to rebuild it, but he did not dare. The Meccans had only just entered Islam, and the Prophet feared that such a transformation might alienate them from Islam. Listen, I say: The Kaaba, the main shrine for us, to which we make pilgrimage and towards which we turn in our prayers five times a day, the Prophet was afraid to rebuild, and you want, for example, that he would free the slaves in one fell swoop or give a woman the same rights as a man?! You can't ask him to do that. He is a reformer, he did what he could and went super-carefully. In many areas, the Prophet only outlined a vector for further development. This is precisely what the fundamentalist conservatives lack in understanding, who call for a return to everything that was under the Prophet as something complete, perfect, and ideal. Without due consideration of attachment to specific historical circumstances.

If you take this attachment into account, you will find in the Qur'an a much more rational, more intellectual, and more humanistic intention. This essence of the Qur'anic message of Islam must be distinguished from its historically limited interpretations in the writings of theologians, and from the practice of Muslims themselves.

Interviewed by Irina Starodubrovskaya

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