The predicament: the exposure to cultural modernity, and the need for an accommodation. Religious reform and cultural change in Islamic civilization

Continuing the themes of the Introduction, where the course was outlined, in this chapter I address the major subject matter of the book. The chapter acquaints the reader with Islam’s predicament, applying the approach of “developing cultures,” adopted from the Culture Matters Research Project/ CMRP.1 The starting point is the historical reality of the Islamic civilization’s exposure to cultural modernity in the context of European expansion and the globalization that this has triggered. In fact, modern science and technology provided the tools that enabled this expansion to occur successfully. Since then, Islam has been not only in crisis, but also in conflict with itself. In pondering the European expansion, which was facilitated by the achievements of modernity, Hegel in his Rechtsphilosophie/Philosophy of Law noted that civil society in Europe is driven, by its own dynamic, to expand beyond its boundaries and reach out to the entire world.2