This is a serious book by Dr M. A. Sherif about European roots of the struggle for an Islamic State. I say serious book, although it is more a long essay (40 pages), yet at a time when such thoughts are increasingly considered as an anathema, addressing the subject is indeed of profound importance and Sherif has handled it with his customary academic rigour.

The author successfully demonstrates why ‘the socio-political dimension of Islam’ is not a ‘dead-end project of the ‘Eastern’ mindset’. By carefully sifting through the thoughts and actions of two outstanding European Muslims, Mohammad Asad and Alija Izetbegovic, he established how it is rooted fi rmly in European soil with little or no cross-fertilisation from the ‘East’.

Sherif rejects this ritualistic trashing of the noblest of Islamic institutions – the Islamic State. ‘Re-reading’ the life mission of these two European Muslim giants he conclusively proves that there exists a distinct European strand for the struggle for an Islamic State;
which, I am sure, will be a welcome reassurance for the workers for the Islamic idea in the West. He recounts how until the end of his life Asad remained true to his early understanding of Islam articulated in 1934 when he was only 34 years of age that, ‘unlike other religions’
Islam is not only a, ‘spiritual attitude of mind …but a self-sufficing orbit of culture and social system of clearly defined features’. This idea was translated into practical activism when poet-philosopher Iqbal persuaded him to stop his restless wandering ‘and to remain in India to help elucidate the intellectual premises of the future Islamic state’. (p-13). Sherif’s finding (p-15) that Asad was one of the two Mawlanas (the other being Mawlana Mawdudi) in setting up the Policy Institute, the Darul Islam Trust in 1938 further underlines how deeply involved Asad had been with the practical work of establishing this ideal. Quoting from Asad’s 1980 publication ‘The Principles of State and Government in
Islam’, Sherif demonstrates that not only did the Idea of Islamic State ‘remain un diminished’ in Asad’s mind till this latter part of his life but he also felt the need for the ‘continuation of the discussion imperative’ because ‘none of the existing Muslim countries has so far achieved a form of government that could be termed Islamic’ (p-34).

Asad’s ‘unchanging ideals’ and ‘continued commitment’ to an Islamic state ‘despite his disappointment of the Pakistan experience’ is explored in greater length when the author provides further evidence from the notes of Asad’s monumental commentary on the Qur’an – the Message of the Qur’an (published in1980). In Asad’s view verse 4:59 provides ‘the conceptual basis for the conduct of the Islamic state’, while 3:159 as ‘one of the fundamental clauses of all Qur’anic legislation relating to statecraft’ (p-32/33).

As a member of Mladi Musulimani (the Young Muslim Association) Izetbegovic, with his youthful introspection was similarly shaping up his early ideas that ‘Islam was not only a religion but also a universal ideology which included social affairs and matters of state (p-17). This idea never escaped him in his later years and even in prison he was thinking of establishing a political party different from Miladi Musulimani, as a
Muslim party bringing together the Muslim peoples of Yugoslavia (p-35). This project the Party for Social Action (SDA) made reference to the ‘powerful moral potential of religious teachings’ in its manifesto and began its journey with the slogan ‘Muslims should be re-Islamised’. Izetbegovic knew that ‘it is a long and hard road’ (p-38). In his Riyadh address at the end of 1997 he warned how copying other civilisations ‘creates an inferiority complex in young generations of Muslims’ while strong nations are those who ‘hold on to their moral principles and remain true to themselves (p-39).

This image of a youth under siege and struggling to remain true to itself is real and present in our society today. Some even find it embarrassing to contemplate and dream about an Islamic state. They find it difficult to hold their ground and argue as the poet Iqbal did
that ‘when faith is removed from politics what remains is Chengizi .’ That perhaps the secular Christians of today also missed the point of the oft-repeated prayer of the Bible which clearly prays for God’s Kingdom on Earth, not just in heaven: ‘Thy Kingdom come, Thy Will be done, On Earth as in Heaven’.

This is why Sherif concludes his treatise with a clarion call, ‘the Muslim champions should inspire our next generation of leaders to hold fast to a vision of a political project grounded in the spirit of Islam’.

[Chowdhury Mueen-Uddin was a seasoned journalist, who edited the Bangladeshi weekly Taleem, The Prithivi, and The Purbodesh, a publication of the Observer Group of newspapers. He is a prominent British Muslim, serving on the Boards of a number of distinguished charities while occasionally contributing to newspapers and journals.]