Islam in a Post-Secular Society

Front matter

Studies in Critical Social Sciences

Dustin J. Byrd

Islam in a Post-Secular Society

Contents

Preface XI Acknowledgments xix

1 Professing Islam in a Post-SecularSociety 1 Introduction 1 On the Contemporary Possibility of Witnessing and Professing 3 The Post-Secular Society 6 What Does It Mean to Profess Islam? 15 Witnessing in Islam: On the Tradition of RadicalPraxis 17 New Religion as Return of the Old 19 Witnessing in the Time of War 22 “Perfected Religion": A Problematic Conception 27 Fear of Philosophical Blasphemy 39

2 Adversity in Post-Secular Europe 43 The Dialectics of Martyrdom: Death as Witnessing and Professing 43 Witnessing against Islam: The Case of Theo van Gogh 54 Je ne suis pas Charlie et je ne suis pas avec les terroristes 75

Preface

The idea for this book came about when I attended the 38th annual Future of Religion conference in Dubrovnik, Croatia, in April of 2014. The director, Dr. Rudolf J. Siebert, of Western Michigan University's Comparative Religion Department, has been my academic mentor, friend, and guide for over 20 years. Always faithful to the advancement of dialectical philosophy and theology, Dr. Siebert has never missed a year of the Dubrovnik conference since it was founded in 1976 at the request of Ivan Supek, a Croatian anti-fascist physicist, philosopher and humanist author. The theme of the 2014 conference was Witnessing and Confessing — a perfect theme for my interests in Muslim communities in Europe, relations between the West and the Muslim world, as well as my main theoretical foundation, the Critical Theory of Religion, as developed out of the Frankfurt School's critical theory of society. After presenting my paper in the Inter-University Centre in Dubrovnik, and listening to the other scholar's valuable critiques, I chose to continue my research and expand it into a book. The result is this modest volume.

To the reader, I hope my use of technical and foreign language, born out of philosophy, religion, theology and sociology, doesn't prove to be too impenetrable. For some this verbiage may seem like mesmerizing jargon; I assure you it is not. Certain categories, concepts, and notions (and some in languages other than English) are necessary in order to clarify, analyze, and debate the subject at hand. As philosophers dealing with complex issues that pertain to a multiplicity of cultures, wherein we both have to speak about the universal and the particular, the use of various languages to penetrate into the heart of the vexing problem is sometimes necessary. Each language provides another avenue by which the thinker can journey into the darkest recess of the dilemma. Through our conceptual language and categories we come to understand, interpret, differentiate and engage the world. If we are lacking in the conceptual tools to do so, we experience the world as an untranslatable phenomenon that lacks determinacy, lacks clarity, and consequently lacks subjective importance. In this blunted form of living, existential issues are reduced to a series of experiences and sensations that do not find sufficient articulation in meaningful language, which essentially leaves us with an amorphous biography of random impressions and passions. However, the world becomes unlocked to many students and scholars once they've acquired the language and conceptions to think systematically, abstractly, dialectically, concretely, as well as through what Walter Benjamin called “constellations.” Without such philosophical, theological, sociological and religious language, the status quo remains

XII PREFACE reified — it is experienced as simply "the given" and not the socially constructed and therefore mutable phenomenon that it is. Although much of mankind's history is the product of mere nature, most of it is the product of the way man choses to be through his labor, his passions, and his will. History and society are not fixed, nor are they on an unalterable trajectory, nor are they simply the product of the natural world. Society, and therefore history, can be changed when we can first understand their internal dynamics and characteristics. If we are able to articulate our worldview, identify our disagreements, and find the courage to transcend the status quo, than we can construct better and more penetrating arguments through which social change can be imagined and actualized.

In Marx's article, The Ruthless Critique of Everything Existing, he calls upon his reader to (1) have courage to accept the consequences of one's critique, and (2) to not be afraid to challenge the status quo, i.e. to be martyr material if history calls one to be such. In light of the increasing barbarity of the modern world, it may be an absolute necessity to adopt this attitude if we are to remedy the seemingly intractable ills that plague our present world. As every student of political philosophy knows, Karl Marx's famous nth Thesis on Feuerbach states, ‘Philosophers have hitherto only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it’ In this quote, Marx presupposes that philosophers already have the linguistic and conceptual capabilities to interpret the world adequately — some more than others for sure — but does not slip into a state of ataraxia (&tapaéia — tranquility) in doing so, but rather becomes maladjusted to the pathological sickness of their society. Philosophers, and consequently those who learn from philosophers, must go beyond the mere conceptualization of the world — although it is the necessary precondition — they must also contribute to a radical praxis adversus mundi (against the world) with its unnecessary injustices, and must never fuga mundi (flee the world) like cloistered mystics.

This same desire to transubstantiate the world for the better was echoed in a religious form by Pope Francis in his 2013 exhortation Evangelii Gaudium (The Joy of the Gospel) when he wrote,

An authentic faith — which is never comfortable or completely personal — always involves a deep desire to change the world, to transmit values, to leave this earth somehow better than we found it.!

1 Pope Francis, Evangelii Gaudium: The Joy of the Gospel. (Washington D.c.: UsccB Communications, 2013), 93.

PREFACE XIII

For the critical theorist of religion and society, itis the role, some may even say the duty, of those who find themselves with the intellectual tools to see beyond the necessary appearances of the given, who have escaped Plato's Cave, who can pierce through the facade of the mesmerizing consumer society, and see clearly through the impenetrable darkness of the night-side of neo-liberalism, to engage not only the world via thought, but through deed as well. The Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Žižek encourages intellectuals to return to thinking, especially after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Marxist international. For him, we need to think through the catastrophic that was communism, and to also take stock of the ingenuity of capitalism to survive its own inner-contradictions, catastrophes and frequent collapses. However, as right as ZiZek is, and he is most assuredly correct about the need to re-think, we must also not lose sight of revolutionary and Socratic praxis. The victims of the world's pathological exploitation and oppression — created by the distorted logic and rapacious greed of globalized neo-liberalism — are still being manufactured, still being abused, and still being oppressed, and have not the time for self-satisfying intellectual theorizing. Yet this is not a call for action for action's sake. It is clear that the immediacy of unnecessary human, animal and environmental suffering needs not to be rethought. As such, we should avoid a perpetual state of praxis paralysis — satisfied within ourselves to only think about the victims but do nothing concretely to stop the creation of new victims. If religious believers and secular revolutionaries cannot change the world entire, or bring about the utopian Kingdom of God on earth, and must content themselves with waiting for the long-awaited and long-delayed messianic figure, we must not in our activist-slumber forget the suffering that is in the world at this very moment. Those whose suffering will never be recorded in the footnotes of history must not be forgotten, but rather their suffering must be expressed, as all perennial suffering, Adorno reminds us, has the right to be expressed, and academics are ina privileged position to articulate the suffering that today's societies fights to mute. It may be the appropriate moment in which philosophy retires its feeling of intellectual superiority and once again learns from the prophetic religions, especially as it has been articulated today by Pope Francis, who encourages the faithful to live in solidarity with the poor, which means to 'eliminate the structural causes of poverty and to promote the integral development of the poor? Pope Francis reminds us to remember that, as long as the problems of the poor are not radically resolved by rejecting the absolute autonomy of markets and financial speculation and by

XIV PREFACE attacking structural causes of inequality, no solution will be found for the world's problems, or, for that matter, to any problem. Inequality is the root of social ills.?

In light of the overwhelming social degradation that is occurring around the world with the spread of values that are diametrically opposed to the prophetic values of mercy, solidarity, and brotherly love, Pope Francis bravely calls the world to cultivate its inner sense of fairness and justice as a countervailing force to the tyranny of the markets and to engage in loving praxis in the hopes of redirecting our ailing world towards a greater sense of brotherhood and equality. Critical theorists of religion share this sentiment, albeit through humanist philosophy.

In the process of writing this book, I attended not only the 2014 Dubrovnik conference in Croatia, but also the Loyola University conference on Critical Theory in Rome, Italy, a week later. However, during the Dubrovnik conference, I listened intently to an individual with nationalist leanings voice some of the crudest stereotypes about Muslims and their faith. Astonishingly, he boldly articulated his belief that Muslims were inherently incapable of enlightened thought, inherently undemocratic and unwilling to accept the superiority of European religious culture. No matter how much I argued against his ill-informed thesis, he remained steadfast in his narrow and shallow beliefs about a community comprised of 1.6 billion individuals. The cacophony of Muslim opinions, philosophies, cultural practices, etc., were all artificially harmonized and reduced to a single concept: the Muslim, just as the Jews had once been conceptualized as der Jude (the Jew). Once singularized, he could dismiss all the Muslims with crude generalizations and stereotypes. An echo of fascism hung thick in the cool Adriatic air.

In Rome, under the shadow of the Pantheon — once dedicated to “all the gods" and now to Saint Mary and the early Christian martyrs — I was appalled to witness a tourist couple from Northern Europe berate an African immigrant trying to sell them a knock-off luxury purse. In front of their child, they yelled at him, hurled insults, and brushed him away like a vexatious fly. The pain of being belittled and disrespected in front of a child could be seen in the weary face of the already broken man who was only there trying to scratch out a meager existence, most likely to send most of what he earned back home to his family in Africa. What was most poignant to witness was the tourists' young boy, who was no more than ten years old. Without any thought, he mimicked his father's dismissive gestures — waving away the immigrant man without

PREFACE XV ever recognizing the humanity that dwelled within him. The father clearly approved of the boy's mimetic actions as he looked down at his son with pride. Unfortunately, this abusive and dehumanizing behavior ensures a cycle of antagonistic relationships with the “other, one that further entrenches already deeply held racist beliefs as well as their after-effect, a feeling of disrespect among the immigrants — especially those of Islamic faith. However, from the solidarist perspective of Pope Francis, it was in the suffering of that despised immigrant that one can find the presence of Jesus of Nazareth; he too, for Francis, was dismissed by the tourists — when history offered an opportunity to express Christian agape with the suffering, dejected and despised, they instead showed cruel and cold callousness, more typical of the bourgeoisie. These two footnotes of history shows us that this kind of hatred and disgust for others is not natural, it is not inborn, and it is not genetic; it is a learned phenomenon and an acquired attitude. It results in a cycle that is blindly repeated through the generations unless people who can think critically voice their firm opposition and begin to work against a world that devours itself based on small differences. Auschwitz — the inevitable outcome of pathological hatred and misguided metaphysics — begins with such inherited attitudes and gestures.

In his reflection on metaphysics after the horror and terror of the Shoah, Theodor Adorno wrote, a new categorical imperative has been impose by Hitler upon unfree mankind: to arrange their thoughts and actions so that Auschwitz will not repeat itself, so that nothing similar will happen.^

In order to make forbidden to history that which is already forbidden in Abrahamic morality — pathological hatred of the other — all instances of injustice must be opposed by an equal commitment to justice, mercy, and solidarity. The mass annihilation of others, rooted in a mass disgust, contempt, and hatred for their existence, must be forever eradicated as a potential for human relations.

Auschwitz, which forever doomed mankind's optimism about itself, cannot and must not be repeated. Yet, only decades after this great catastrophe, the conditions for another conflation of worldviews and peoples are already being produced in Europe, North America and the Middle East. In Europe, the ranks of anti-Immigrant political parties continue to swell while ists continues to call for lone wolf attacks on targets in the capitals of western nations.

XVI PREFACE

The potential for fascism and fascistic-like tendencies survived the Third Reich and are now once again being exploited within the debate about Islam in the West. The mirror image is happening among the Muslims, as the growth of extremist and terrorists groups in the Middle East continues unabated, but thankfully do not represent the vast majority of believers. Fascism has many forms and, like a cameleon, can camouflage itself in many different cultures; from the far right in Europe to Isis in Syria and Iraq, the human capacity for absolute destruction of the other is swiftly becoming a renewed reality. The "new imperative" of “never again,” that resulted from fascism's cruelty and destruction, has gone unheard between the clamor of militaristic slogans and the battle cries of war between nations and religions.

Despite the rise of the often Islamophobic and neo-Randian Tea Party in American political life, the situation has become worse in Europe. In the Netherlands, Germany, France, Italy, Switzerland, Greece, etc., political parties whose platform includes anti-immigrant rhetoric have made significant headways into the political system. For the first fifty years after World War 11, or the Great Patriotic War as it is called in Russia, xenophobic far-right political parties were unthinkable, fascistic policies and thoughts were unspeakable in the public sphere, but now they have been reborn with a sense of credibility. Then the target was the communists and Jews, now there is a new target: the Muslims. The language that Europe thought it had left behind after ww11 has reappeared and has forcefully made its way back into political discourse. The critical theorists Horkheimer and Adorno already foresaw the folly of believing Europe could resign its fascistic tendencies after the catastrophe of World War 11. With the proper catalyst, all of Europe was capable of the same authoritarian and violent tendencies that were cultivated in Nazi Germany. They wrote, fascism triumphed under a crassly xenophobic, anti-cultural, collectivist ideology. Now that it has devastated the earth, nations must fight against it; there is no other way. But when allis over, a spirit of freedom need not spread across Europe; its nations may become as xenophobic, as hostile to culture, and as pseudocollectivist as the fascism against which they had to defend themselves. Even its defeat will not necessarily break the motion of the avalanche.5

5 Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno, The Dialectic of Enlightenment: Philosophical Fragments, edited by Gunzelin Schmid Noerr. Trans. Edmund Jephcott. (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2002), 183.

PREFACE XVII

Conversely, the Muslim community hasn't always given their fellow European and American counterparts a sense of security, as many within the community have often contributed to the suspicion of violence that surrounds them. From rallies that fanatically condemn European culture, to terrorist acts upon European and American cities, radical Muslims — having rejected the values of European society as well as traditional Islam — have often pushed their American, Dutch, British, German, Italian, French, etc., neighbors into the anti-Islamic political parties for fear that they are losing their culture, their nation, and their way of life.

This new and rabid Islamophobia draws upon a different legitimation than the neo-pagan fascism of Hitler and Mussolini; it is often clothed in the language of "defending the Enlightenment" itself. These far-right and often neo-fascist politicians and activists are drawing their legitimacy by appearing to defend what was once thought to be the universal values of the European Enlightenment, and they often have help in this endeavor from liberals and anti-religion leftists. Having traveled around Europe often in the last ten years, I've witnessed this growing trend firsthand and have noticed that it has only worsened as Europe has become increasingly entangled in Middle Eastern and North African affairs and as emigration from Muslim countries to Europe has increased beyond its capacity (or national will) to accommodate them. Unfortunately, I see that a new dark and ominous specter is forming over Europe: neo-fascist Islamophobism, or what I have defined as miso-Islamism, or “pathological hatred for Islam." The hatred of Islam will spread like a virulent cancer unless people of good will, revolutionary faith and Socratic faithlessness, who are committed to the peaceful cooperation between the religious traditions and secular citizens — a being-with-each-other that is rooted in mutual recognition, respect and shared commitments — work together for a common goal: a more reconciled future society. Absent a discourse movement such as this, both the neo-fascist nativists of Europe and the extremist Muslims who find no real attachment to their western societies, and who dream of an "Islamic Europe,’ will continue to pull western society to the political and cultural margins — an unsustainable situation under any analysis. Without discourse there will be no true knowledge of the other; without knowledge there will be no potential for reconciliation; and without reconciliation there will only be a state of war.

When examining Dr. Siebert's time in Dubrovnik during Yugoslavia's civil war, it's important to note the great courage that was demonstrated as he continued to travel to the Balkans during the fighting; he never missed a year despite the heavy bombardment that surrounded him; he refused to take sides between the Croats, the Serbs, and the Bosnian Muslims, but rather stood

XVIII PREFACE steadfast for what he believed was morally right; he suffered with whomever was suffering unjustly. Dr. Siebert not only brought a penetrating philosophical analysis and critical religiology to the Balkans but also cared for the physical and material needs of the victims. Medicine was given to whoever was in need, regardless of their national identity and/or ethnicity, and he welcomed any discourse partner who was willing to offer their constructive and critical thoughts. Amidst the artillery shells falling on the worker owned Hotel Argentina, in which the conference was being held, he had the prophetic and Socratic commitment to continue his lectures on Immanuel Kant's most hopeful proposition for Perpetual Peace (1795). In the face of war, he embraced a revolutionary yet illusive peace. It is in this light — the undiminished search for a better world - that I offer this book as a small attempt to help find a way towards that more reconciled future society that Dr. Rudolf J. Siebert taught about and longed for since he was a soldier in World War 11, through the Yugoslav civil war, and until today. Dum vivimus, vivamus.®

Dustin J. Byrd

Dubrovnik, Croatia Rome, Italy

6 "While there is life there is hope:

Acknowledgments

Like all academic works that take a long time to produce, this book was the result of many long conversations with good friends, colleagues, students, and even my children: Benjamin, Layla and Maxwell. They have all challenged the way I see the world, the way I interpret international political, economic and cultural events, as well as my ethical and moral reasoning. I owe them all a great debt of gratitude for their unrelenting commitment to my work.

I would especially like to thank Jamie Groendyk for all her hard work formatting and editing my often long, complex, and philosophically tortured language. Without her dedication and perseverance this book would not have been possible. I cannot thank her enough for all she has done for me over the past decade. She is the light in my life and foundation of my being.

I am most grateful to Dr. Rudolf J. Siebert, my mentor and friend. As I have benefited from his knowledge and wisdom for over twenty years, he has instilled in me the ability to look critically at the ugliness of nature and history, and most specifically the unnecessary suffering men have forced upon each other. At the same time he has solidified my personal resolve, so I do not lose myself within the despair of the suffering — for what good is genuine empathy with those who suffer if one becomes paralyzed by that suffering. If the world is blind (O Cieco Mondo) to the misery of others, the Critical Theory of Religion and Society, which Dr. Siebert has developed over the course of his career, is not. In proleptic solidarity with those destroyed by the slaughterbench of history, global Golgatha, and the innocent victims of war, torture and exploitation, who often don't appear even in the footnotes of history, the Critical Theory remembers their agony, their misery and their longing for the totally other.

I would like to thank my most devoted companions: Mikel Cloman, Spencer Michaud, Steven Chamberlin, Mladjo Ivanovic, Walter Jensen, Michael R. Ott, Mary Louise Ott and Kirk Hendershott-Kraetzer. They have all influenced my work in their own ways. All that is good within this book can be attributed to their brilliance; all that is flawed is my own.

I must acknowledge Olivet College for its support of my work in and out of the classroom, especially President Steven Corey and Provost Maria Davis. Olivet College began in protest against slavery, misogyny and class oppression. In 1844, it opened its doors to those who were told that they were not worthy of education on account of their race, gender and class. To this day, its tradition of radical egalitarianism guides its path towards a more reconciled future society. Being dedicated to the 'divine art of doing good to others, and their commitment to 'those who are not rich in this world's means, makes Olivet College

XX ACKNOWLEDGMENTS one of the most prophetic and Socratic institutions in the state of Michigan. In a world that desperately needs critical voices, it instills a sense of ‘social and individual responsibility’ that is unmatched. As its motto states, it is Pro Christo et Humanitiate.

Lastly, I cannot forget one of my dearest friends, David Ward Thomas, who lost his battle with his failing heart on February 7, 2015, in Ann Arbor, Michigan. A long time resident of Kalamazoo, Michigan, and a proud graduate of Western Michigan University, David was one of the most giving human beings one could ever be blessed to have in one’s life. The University of Michigan hospital kept him alive long beyond what his own heart was capable of, and I am eternally indebted to them for giving us the time we had with him. He was a man of quiet heroicism, a modern saint who embodied the best of his Catholic faith. I speak for all his friends when I say we all miss him dearly. He left us too soon, but he will not be forgotten. ‘Keep your stick on the ice’ David! Requiem Aeternam dona eis, Domine, et lux perpetua luceat eis.

Introduction

The post-September nth world has brought a new concentration upon the nature of Islam and the Muslim world, especially in light of the millions of Muslims that live in the West. The turmoil in Syria and Iraq, as well as in parts of North and East Africa, has brought hundreds of thousands of Muslim immigrants and refugees to the shores of Europe. Once there, they join the millions of other Muslims who have already made their homes in the West. Although the secular democracies of Europe are seen by many as places of opportunity and freedom, many Muslims find their presence to be unwanted, unwelcomed and hated; their religious sensibilities disrespected; their culture maligned, and their faith positions mocked and degraded. Indeed, the post-secular society, in which both religious communities remain an important and powerful presence despite the continual secularization of the lifeworld, is a contentious mix of worldviews, cultural norms, epistemologies and moral systems. Following the philosophical work of Jürgen Habermas and the Frankfurt School, such a society can either chose to embrace the diversity and live in a dynamic democracy, or retreat into stagnant provincialism, in which the various secular and religious communities fail to engage in a productive discourse. As such, the challenge of the post-secular society can either result in a vibrant multicultural and cosmopolitan democracy, where constitutional values are the basis for shared citizenship, or the various factions can continue their discourse avoidance and fragment into waring faction, which will inevitably lead to increased social conflict.

The purpose of this study is to probe the various points in western society, especially Europe, where the issue of professing Islam can either be a force for solidarity among religious communities and secular citizens, or a force of division. Informed by the Frankfurt School for Social Research, especially Theodor Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Erich Fromm, Herbert Marcuse, and the 2nd generation philosopher and sociologist Jürgen Habermas, this study will be attempt to shed light on the future possibilities of a more reconciled future society wherein Islam finds a welcoming place within the post-secular society. As both a critical scholar of religion as well as a citizen of a secular state, I and many others wish to avoid the situation in which western societies degenerate into rigid communities of exclusivity; we wish to arrest and reverse the

This is an open access chapter distributed under the terms of the cc-By-NC License.

entrenched economic marginalization that so many experience, as well as to abolish the religious bigotry that plagues both the Muslim community as well as the post-secular — and post-Christian — West. Rather we choose to seek out ways to peacefully co-exist and thrive together as one community regardless of the other's faith or faithlessness. In order to explore the possibilities of such a future reconciled society, we, like the Frankfurt School's critical religiology, will turn to philosophy, sociology, history, psychology, cultural studies and even theology. Although some remain skeptical, I find a turn towards theology to be extremely insightful, as its transcendent nature can inform us of the innerdynamics of any given situation and help point us towards the ought, as opposed to simply abandoning the future to the is. Furthermore, "reconciliation," which is an underlying theme throughout this work, is not simply a matter of eschatology, but one that we recognize as being within the realm of possibility in the here-and-now. Just as Karl Marx's vision of a classless society reconciles the antagonism of class by the removal of that which antagonizes — oppression and exploitation of one class over all others; just as 'Ali Shariati's visions of a society beyond the colonial/colonized paradigm pointed to the reconciliatory potential of revolutionary Islam; just as Malcolm x, in his last days, saw a vision of the world that no longer used the yardstick of race to judge others, but rather judged based on the deeds of individuals; and just as Che Guevara had a radical vision of a society unified under the principle of equality and social justice, so too do we want to search for the potential for reconciliation within the context of our contemporary times. In order to do this, we will examine, interrogate, and critique both religion and secularity in a dialectical fashion, hoping to determinately negate that which leads mankind into continuous cycles of hatred and violence, while simultaneously preserving, augmenting, and fulfilling the prophetic and Socratic spirit that dissolves such irrational and destructive antagonisms. That being said, our aim, predicated on the permanence of the modern secular society in the West, wishes to see the construction of a more humane post-secular society; a society that values both the achievements of secularity as well as enlightened religion.! In working for such a better society, we must turn our attention to one of the most vexing issues within western society today: the trouble with recalcitrant faith, especially Islamic faith, in the context of the post-secular West and its post-Christian society.

1 One should not confuse the ‘post-secular society’ as being a society that has returned to religion. Many religious believers, seeing the destruction that secularity has had upon their faith, the moral values, and the pious way of life, engage in wishful thinking when they hear the phrase ‘post-secular, thinking that secularity is finally over. This is not the notion of 'postsecular that we are discussing or attempting to advance in this study.

PROFESSING ISLAM 3 On the Contemporary Possibility of Witnessing and Professing

Professing a religious position can be a perilous proposition in a world that has been thoroughly secularized. It is an even greater problem when the faith that one professes is thought to be suspicious or threatening by the dominant group within one's society, which is the case for Islam in much of Europe? When a community's deeply held beliefs, the basis of their identity, spiritual life, and cultural norms, is thought to be backwards, oppressive, undemocratic and unenlightened, it becomes easy for that community to internalize those accusations and close themselves up within their particular religious lifeworld (religióse lebenswelt) and refuse to engage the broader society in a non-antagonistic and/or open way. When the marginalized religious identity is the source of social scorn, many within the faith community often cannot bolster the courage to engage other voices as equal members within that society, despite the fact that the believers may be the carrier of all the same civil rights afforded to them via their status as equal citizens of such a society. The notion of "equality" through mutual recognition, as often articulated by the Critical Theorist Jürgen Habermas, is the precondition for democratic and pluralistic deliberation. When society fails to adequately internalize and/or practice such notions of equality, democracy becomes distorted and degenerates into a hollow state-ideology in service to a single class, race, creed, etc. Therefore, when an undemocratic and therefore unfree situation presents itself within a context of social hostility on the basis of religious faith, especially Islam, the Muslim believers are often confronted with three choices; (1) abandon the faith, (2) engage in “religious dissimulation” (taqtyah), or (3) retreat into fundamentalism - the cutting off of an individual from the symphony of voices within the national discourse and adopting a staunch and unyielding attitude towards their own beliefs. Religious fundamentalism, by its nature, deprives the national discourse of the authentic voices of religious communities, as the believers often refrain from the social and theological risk created