Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf wants religious reform in his country: Islam of the 21st Century, not the 16th. There's hope, although it's slow going. More in this excellent SF Chron op-ed.

Progressive forces in Pakistan, a country often derided in the international press as an impoverished backwater overrun with gun-toting wackos, are fighting hard for changes in the education curriculum here that have the potential to bring Pakistan more in line with Western secularized modern education systems and make it a role model for other Islamic countries struggling to progress in the 21st century.

But the battle, which speaks directly to the base identity of Pakistanis, is fierce.

On one side, there are the progressive forces that want a modern Islamic homeland where religion is an individual choice, such as in Malaysia, a developed world player. On the other side, there are conservative forces that seek a narrow interpretation of Islam that determines an individual's life, such as in Saudi Arabia, where thousands of frustrated unemployed youth have few places to turn for relief.

Recent government attempts to reform curricula in religious schools (madrassas) were met with stiff resistance in parliament, the media and mosques.

...pro-modern, tolerant, worldly forces found themselves on the run as the government backed down.....Many of the textbooks used in government schools are based on a syllabus created 10 to 15 years ago -- before the end of the Cold War and the advent of the Internet. All are infused with dictates of former military dictator Gen. Zia ul-Haq, who embarked on an Islamization program that spawned thousands of willing recruits for military campaigns in neighboring Afghanistan and Kashmir and fomented serious divisions inside Pakistan.

....But this is one of those rare cases where what appears to be bad news, is actually pretty good.

For its many -- many, many, many -- problems, Pakistan has a relatively open society when compared to other Muslim countries -- such as Syria, Egypt and Saudi Arabia. Dissent is, largely, tolerated. The press is, mostly, free. The national pastime -- arguing, shouting, crying, lamenting - - is alive and well...

"This battle goes right to the heart of what we Pakistanis want Pakistan to be," said (physics professor and critic of extremist Islam, A.H.) Nayyar. "It's not about going against Islam. It is a question of whether we want to be Muslims of the 21st century or the 16th."

Should Musharraf lose this particular battle, the war is not lost, for the debate will surely go on -- and that is a lesson political rulers across the globe would do well to learn.

UPDATE: Turmoil in Pakistan continues, with a suicide bombing at a Shi'ite mosque in Karachi today killing 15 (now 19, and three more in related riots). The blast occured just one kilometer from where a Sunni cleric was assassinated yesterday. Earlier in May, a suicide blast at another Shi'ite mosque in Karachi killed 23 and injured 100.

Posted by Matt Rosenberg at May 31, 2004 07:45 AM

---

Trackback Pings

TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.rosenblog.com/mt/mt-tb.cgi/335

Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Toward A Modern Islam in Pakistan:

---

» shemale hentai from
heshe tranny trick ladyboy tranny surprise asian shemales free tranny she... [Read More]

Tracked on August 22, 2005 10:00 PM

» trannies from
trannys black shemale shemale galleries free tranny shemale galleries heshe [Read More]

Tracked on August 22, 2005 10:00 PM

» trannies from
ladyboys shemale sex tranny become a shemale black shemales become a shemale [Read More]

Tracked on August 22, 2005 10:00 PM

---

---