Vom gesellschaftlichen Engagement für den Islam zum islamischen Engagement für die Gesellschaft – Verschiebungen In Tariq Ramadans Plädoyer für eine ganzheitliche Moderne

Tariq Ramadan (born 1962) is not only a leading thinker of Islamic Reformism, but also the most prominent Muslim actor in the ongoing reconfiguration of secularity in Europe. As a guiding back- ground, the introduction to this paper establishes that by now a public role for religion in secular societies is widely accepted, albeit attached to conditions (1). After an insight into the self-posi- tioning of Ramadan, followed by a comprehensive overview of secondary literature (2), I argue for two – discernible rather than clear-cut – phases to be identified within his discourse over 16 years: Considering secular societies as devoid of values, Ramadan promotes a distinct Islamic alternative that grounds its (modern) principles (allegedly) in revelation only, and also includes specific norms of Islamic law (3). Later, the Islam to be realized consists almost exclusively of ethics – of which the basic values are shared by, and even to be established with, all members of society (4). Ramadan’s continuous plea for a holistic modernity is elaborated on at the end of this paper (5).

"Progressiver Islam" im ausgehenden Zarenreich: Das Plädoyer des St. Petersburger Imams und Regierungsbeamten Ataulla Bajazitov (1846-1911) für die Partizipation der Muslime an der modernen Zivilisation

Ataulla Bajazitov (1846-1911) fulfilled a social double role by serving his Tatar community in St. Petersburg as imam and the Russian state as military Muslim ‘cleric’, translator and teacher. By founding Russia’s first monolingual Tatar newspaper, initiating St. Petersburg’s first Friday mosque and presenting scriptural and rational arguments for the compatibility of Islam and the modern Civilization to a Russian-speaking public as early as 1883, he has been a pioneer among the Muslims in Russia in several respects. In contrast though to similar activities of his Russian contemporary, the Krim Tatar Ismail Gasprinskii (1851-1914), Bajazitov’s endeavours have remained almost unnoticed in Western scholarship. Also in Tatarstan, his books have been only recently reprinted. The present study analyzes Bajazitov’s three monographs written in Russian, namely A Response to Ernest Renan’s lecture “Islam and Science” (1883), The Relationship of Islam towards Science and People of Different Faith (1887) and Islam and Progress (1898). There, he exposes many positions that around that time started to become key arguments of Muslim reformers in the Near East for the progressivness of Islam. The study takes also into account reactions to Bajazitov’s monographs by Russian officers in Tashkent who tried to demonstrate the backwardness of Islam, especially Nikolai Petrovič Ostroumov’s (1846-1930) response in his book entitled Quran and Progress – On the intellectual awakening of today’s Russian Muslims (1901/1903).

Was hat Max Weber mit Kātib Čelebi zu tun? Ein Annäherungsversuch an Gottfried Hagen

This article responds to Gottfried Hagen’s extensive review (see Der Islam 2/2013) of my book Islamische Verantwortungsethik im 17. Jahrhundert. Ein weberianisches Verständnis der Handlungsvorstellungen Kātib Čelebis (1609– 1657). Whilst I benefitted greatly from some of Hagen’s critical remarks and his- torical elucidations, his review not only misstates crucial passages of my book but also largely disregards its main objective, which is to develop a systematic model for understanding Kātib Čelebi’s ethical stance. Besides reiterating cru- cial arguments ignored and rectifying central aspects misrepresented in Hagen’s review, I here ask how the more fundamental misunderstandings – exceeding differences in theoretical positions or empirical observations – between the au- thor’s intentions and the reviewer’s reception may be explained. Gottfried Hagen’s historiographical perspective on Kātib Čelebi diverges from my sociological take on the same subject matter to the extent that both perspectives are struggling to enter into dialogue. Such dialogue, however, remains highly desirable so as to complement a historical reconstruction of Kātib Čelebi’s life and times with a systematic, theoretically grounded understanding of his views.