Western Courier

Issue date: 4/21/04 Section: News

Media Credit: W. Mitchell Craver Ahmud Karcmustafah, director of religious studies at Washington University, discusses ethics in Islamic culture Monday afternoon.

Continuing the campus-wide theme of "Now is the Time ... Social Justice," guest lecturer Ahmet Karamustafa, associate professor of history and director for the religious studies program at Washington University in St. Louis, discussed ethical Islamic thought and social justice Monday afternoon.

Karamustafa spoke about ethics in Islam, where to find Islamic ethical traditions, and the appearance of ethics in legal situations, as well as ethical analysis in the religious tradition. He then discussed how social justice is related to Islamic ethics.

Karamustafa said to find ethical practice in Islam, a variety of sources must be surveyed. These sources are from different cultures within the general pre-Islamic culture, which include Arabian, Egyptian and Persian cultures, among others. Karamustafa said these cultures set forth key Islamic practices such as their values. These values include "personal honor, courage and loyalty to immediate group and/or tribe, hospitality, endurance and self-control."

When Islam appeared, these values were re-articulated.

Karamustafa explained another source for Islamic ethical practice: the Koran and the Sunna. These documents are the two foundational elements of the Islamic tradition.

"The Koran is the direct speech of God to all of humanity sent through meditation of a human messenger, the Arabian prophet of Muhammad in the human language of Arabic," Karamustafa said.

"The Sunna is the life example of Muhammad which serves to all Muslims," Karamustafa added. "Islam has developed the richest religious thought (in the development of virtue and) theology, which is the Kalam." Karamustafa also explained three different areas of Islamic ethical thinking. The first is religious and it refers to a revelation. The religious perspective is found in the Koran.

The second is secular, meaning human reason. This perspective includes guidebooks for political gain and "how to rule empires," Karamustafa said. According to Karamustafa, the guidebooks include wisdom literature, proverbs and axioms.

The third area is normative or the rules of human conduct. Normative thinking is found in rituals Muslims perform and in the rules of livelihood - for example, not eating pork.

Karamustafa discussed how the religious and legal tradition of Islam intersects.

"The legal and theological thinking analysis by philosophers includes the virtues and vices of thinking about human perfection. The lines between (religion and legal) Islamic ethics are blurred," Karamustafa said.

Karamustafa also applied the information on Islam to social justice. He said there is a strong trend of radical egalitarianism by God as a value and vitality. Muslims take these principles from the Koran, Sunna and other practices and apply them.

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