ABSTRACT
In the new millennium, especially in the aftermath of 11 September 2001, intensified and continuing scrutiny has been brought to bear on movements that invoke the shariʿa in their calls for reform and for the establishment of Islamic states. Sensational cases and aberrant regimes, such as the Taliban of Afghanistan, also have reinforced simplistic Western perceptions and fears of the shariʿa as backward, arbitrary and cruel. At present in the West, in the estimation of Muslim philosopher Ramadan (2004, 31), “the idea of shariʿa calls up all the darkest images of Islam.”
