Religion: A Traditional Institution

Muslims' struggle for Islam is also Their Struggle to Preserve their Cultures

All religions are first and foremost traditions. There is nothing intrinsically modern about religion. Like the institution of family, religion is also a traditional institution. Out of all living religions, Muslims are still arguably closest to their religion and constitute the last remaining frontier that modernism vies to engulf and dissolve. The Muslims’ struggle for Islam is also their struggle to preserve their cultures as receptacles of Divine words. According to S. H. Nasr:

“Islamic culture displays an undeniable unity which is the result of the spirit and form of the Islamic revelation and ultimately of Divine Unity itself. In the same way that the whole created order is the theophanic reflection of the One in the mirror of multiplicity, so are the various ‘faces’ of Islamic culture so many human echoes of the one Message which is itself beyond the human and which alone bestows upon the activity of a human collectivity the purposes and values which make it worthy of being called a culture in conformity with the noble destiny of man”.[28]

Religion & Culture: Reflections

 Dr. Ejaz Akram

Religion & Culture: Contours of the Debate

6th Islam Seminar

The Religion & Culture Debate

Aiwan-e-Iqbal Complex, Lahore

15th August 2009

http://baytunur.blogspot.com/2009_08_01_archive.html