LIBERAL ISLAM.(Review)

First Things: A Monthly Journal of Religion and Public Life, April, 1999

LIBERAL ISLAM. Edited by CHARLES KURZMAN. Oxford University Press. 340 pp. $49.95 cloth, $24.95 paper.

The title of this anthology is not an oxymoron, although some may think it comes close. Thirty-two Muslim essayists affirm conventional Western liberal doctrines such as the separation of church and state, the equal rights of women, and freedom of thought and speech. It is important to know that there are such Muslim thinkers, although those concerned about Samuel Huntington's "clash of civilizations" never doubted it. The question is how representative they are and the measure of their influence. The answers provided in this collection are, on that question, cold comfort.