Critical thinking is needed now more than ever

This month, while I was digesting the latest tragic news from Turkey, I came across an interview on CNN with Omar Saif Ghobash, the UAE Ambassador to Russia. He was talking to Christiane Amanpour about his new book Letters to a Young Muslim. It was interesting to hear Mr Ghobash for two reasons: it was a timely interview after the New Year’s Eve Istanbul attack, for which the scourge of extremism was to blame; and because Mr Ghobash is an educated Arab Muslim re- evaluating our understanding of religion, while addressing the younger generation as well as the western audience.

I began reading his book, hoping to reach a better understanding of our current religious dilemma. For many, especially in our region, religion has become a realm that can only be understood and explained by religious scholars.

Therefore, we turn to preachers regarding almost all our concerns, from the most trivial to the most profound. Television channels have taken advantage of this high demand, devoting airtime to provide a platform for religious scholars to address an anxious audience struggling to make sense of the world around them.

Many contact these scholars because they are unable to trust their own judgment. Others believe that we cannot have answers to religious questions ourselves. Furthermore, Mr Ghobash suggests that there are also many questions that are off- limit, and which we have been taught not to ask. He says that the more we ask, the more we find ourselves in hot water.

Religious scholars considered, not so long ago, many of the platforms used today as haram or off-limits. The experience of the 1990s, when I was a teenager growing up in Saudi Arabia, provides some illustrating examples: the spread of satellite dishes alarmed religious scholars. They were banned initially, only to mushroom all over the country a few years later. Then came the camera phone.

It was faced with initial hostility, only to be normalised a year later. Music was considered haram for a long time. Now, it is seemingly accepted, and Riyadh will host its first concert next month under the sponsorship of the General Authority for Entertainment. In earlier times, people even burnt family photos because some scholars claimed that photography opposed Islamic teachings. Now, photography is taken for granted. As is the widespread use of almost any social media. More people are aware of these inconsistencies. Twitter has become a preferred platform where such stories are shared. The hashtag tijarat al waham (literal translation as “the trade of illusion”) has been trending for over a year. In this hashtag, one can see how these inconsistencies have caused many to feel frustrated and confused. This is especially so among the youth, who can be an easy target for radical movements, as Mr Ghobash notes in his book. To others, the inconsistencies of the religious discourse can open the door for self-doubt, loss of faith and questioning of credibility in religious scholars.

This growing confusion has also had an effect on our societies as a whole. Mr Ghobash notes how important it is to have a “psychologically healthy Islamic community”. Unfortunately, the current situation is fostering two trends: the spread of extremism and the rise in social hypocrisy by those who pretend to be conservative. Faced with these trends, we need to have a healthy and normal relationship with our inner Muslim selves. We should not hide behind the guise of conservatism and we should not allow our youth to fall prey to extremism.

Mr Ghobash tries to find an explanation to what constitutes true Islam. I think what makes the answer difficult is that the essence of Islam is mixed with aspects of our cultural heritage. We often perform practices because that is how they’ve always been done. We should be more mindful of our practices and that will help keep our passion for the faith.

This challenge also translates to a dependency on preachers. I have a vivid memory from when I was in school, sitting in class listening to our religion teacher. She was talking with so much pity about how Catholic Christians followed a faith that they did not understand because it was in Latin.

She also criticised their dependency on priests, while stressing that Muslims never needed an intermediary to connect to God. She was very proud that Islam was revealed in Arabic and, therefore, accessible to all Arabs.

However, despite Islam’s “accessibility”, many still do not dare to understand it without the help of a scholar. As a result, clerics are increasingly becoming like the intermediaries the teacher talked about with such disdain in Catholicism.

It seems that many of us need to have more faith in ourselves when we want to understand the world around us. More inclusive debates regarding redefining and reassessing our religious understanding should become the way out from our current dilemma. We must aim to reclaim the genuine spirit of Islam that encouraged critical thinking and re-evaluation. Just as Mr Ghobash says in his book, “Islam calls upon us to take responsibility for our own lives”.