A Thinker of In-between/New Field: Fazlur Rahman

Abstract

This essay seeks to shed light on the fresh line of inquiry Fazlur Rahman has opened for us. His invitation has the following main justifications: 1) As long as Islamic thought concen-trates on the historical forms of religion, i.e., Islam is reduced to its early historical forms, then its universal messages stay in the shadowy areas behind the forms. To find those mes-sages that essentially that transcend historical forms, a new field of thought needs to be es-tablished. 2) Contemporary thought tends towards secularism, that is, atheism. Consequent-ly, this new field of thought is required to save contemporary man from atheism. 3) Islamic tradition has a rich intellectual history, but it has lost the ability to discern the Qur'an's overarching meanings (messages). Therefore, we must introduce this new field of thought in terms of a strong methodology that simultaneously unearths the messages and gives us a critical viewpoint on Islamic heritage. Islamic tradition lacks a clear space or vantage point from which to conduct self-critique. In order to conceptualize the crises in traditional and modern thought and to give the world a new opportunity to provide a solution for them, Fazlur Rahman obviously views this new field of thought as essential. In other words, the new field of thought should be a field that is not subject to or reproduces these crises. If this is the case, where is the new field of thought that can rescue us from the dilemma that mod-ern secularism and Islamic tradition face? Fazlur Rahman argues that it is within his meth-odology that the new field of thought can be opened that will take us out of the Islamic tra-dition, which has been damaged by both secularism (atheism), rigid formalism and non-Islamic influences. This unbiased approach to the historical context of revelation can help us understand the relationship between early religious forms and their overarching teach-ings (messages). Then, we can view these messages as the general goals or aims of the Islam, enabling us to come up with original solutions to the issues facing the present world. He considers that the Qur'an itself provides us with this creative thinking.