Liberal movements within Islam

Liberal movements within Islam involve professed Muslims who have produced a considerable body of liberal thought on the re-interpretation and reform of Islamic understanding and practice. Their work is sometimes characterized as "progressive Islam" (Arabic: الإسلام التقدمي‎‎ al-Islām at-taqaddumī ), some regard progressive Islam and liberal Islam as two distinct movements.

The methodologies of liberal or progressive Islam rest on the interpretation and re-interpretation of traditional Islamic scripture (the Quran) and other texts (such as the Hadith), a process called ijtihad (see below). This can vary from the slight to the most liberal, where only the meaning of the Quran is considered to be a revelation, with its expression in words seen as the work of the prophet Muhammad in his particular time and context. As a consequence, liberal/progressive Muslims may then interpret verses from the Quran allegorically or even set them aside.

Liberal Muslim intellectuals who have focused on religious reform include Muhammad Ali, Sayyid al-Qimni, Irshad Manji, Nasr Abu Zayd, Khalil Abdel-Karim, Abdolkarim Soroush, Mohammed Arkoun, Mohammed Shahrour, Ahmed Subhy Mansour, Edip Yuksel, Gamal al-Banna, Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na'im, Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri,Javed Ahmad Ghamidi, Ahmed Al-Gubbanchi, Mahmoud Mohammed Taha, and Faraj Foda. Taha was hanged in 1985 under the sharia regime of Jaafar al-Nimeiri and Foda was assassinated in 1992 by al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya.

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