In Search of a Modern Sharia Discourse of Pluralism

Shaykh Abdal Hakim Murad delivers the keynote address at the 2019 European Academy of Religion Conference . Because politicians and social administrators are learning the need to engage with Muslims in their self-definition as a religious community, purely secular definitions of human fulfillment and liberty must find ways of conversing with theological narratives which ground human dignity and rights in metaphysics rather than primarily in social utility. This paper will survey foundational Islamic assumptions about human diversity and measure their intelligibility to modern positivism.