Mohammedanism: Lectures on Its Origin, Its Religious and Political Growth, and Its Present StateSnouck Hurgronje, C. (Christiaan)
Islamic
Mohammedanism: Lectures on Its Origin, Its Religious and Political Growth, and Its Present State
Snouck Hurgronje, C. (Christiaan)
Islam
The rather hasty start and the lack of a well-defined scheme have made
the Egyptian University a subject of severe criticism. Nevertheless, its
foundation is an unmistakable expression of the desire of intellectual
Egypt to translate modern thought into its own language, to adapt modern
higher instruction to its own needs. This same aim is pursued in a perhaps
more efficacious manner by the hundreds of Egyptian students of law,
science, and medicine at French, English, and some other European
universities. The Turks could not freely follow such examples before
the revolution of 1908; but they have shown since that time that their
abstention was not voluntary. England, France, Holland, and other countries
governing Mohammedan populations are all endeavouring to find the right way
to incorporate their Mohammedan subjects into their own civilization. Fully
recognizing that it was the material covetousness of past generations
that submitted those nations to their rule, the so-called colonial powers
consider it their duty now to secure for them in international intercourse
the place which their natural talent enables them to occupy. The question
whether it is better simply to leave the Moslims to Islâm as it was for
centuries is no longer an object of serious discussion, the reforming
process being at work everywhere--in some parts with surprising rapidity.
We can only try to prognosticate the solution which the near future
reserves for the problem, how the Moslim world is to be associated with
modern thought.
In this problem the whole civilized world and the whole world of Islâm are
concerned. The ethnic difference between Indians, North-Africans, Malays,
etc., may necessitate a difference of method in detail; the Islâm problem
lies at the basis of the question for all of them. On the other hand,
the future development of Islâm does not only interest countries with
Mohammedan dominions, it claims as well the attention of all the nations
partaking in the international exchange of material and spiritual goods.
This would be more generally recognized if some knowledge of Islâm were
more widely spread amongst ourselves; if it were better realized that Islâm
is next akin to Christianity.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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