Islam Has Its Luthers, Too. But Reform Is Far Away

At the heart of the current crisis in the Muslim world are the different conceptions of tradition. And the refusal to interpret the Qur'an with scientific as well as theological methods. The lesson of a great Islamologist, Michel Cuypers
by Sandro Magister

ROME, September 7, 2009 – The Oasis foundation dedicated its last annual study meeting to the question of the Christian and Islamic religious traditions: how they should be interpreted and lived in their respective communities, especially when they are in the minority, Christians in Muslim countries and Muslims in Europe.

The meeting, held in Venice, was attended – in addition to a few cardinals and bishops – by about seventy Muslim and Christian scholars from East and West.

The question of tradition – and therefore also of education, of the transmission of the patrimony of faith to the new generations – is one of the crucial questions in the Christian and Catholic camp. The Italian episcopal conference, for example, has put it at the center of its own program for the next ten years. The pontificate of Benedict XVI itself acts according to and is guided by the light of tradition, which in turn is an object of dispute. the rest