These punishments violate contemporary principles of proportionality, dignity, and protection from torture.

Armin Enayati

Islam, Freedom, and the Crisis of Modernity: A Critical Analysis of a Closed Ideology

Abstract

Islam, as one of the Abrahamic religions with a comprehensive structure of jurisprudence and politics, initially emerged with the claim of guiding humanity toward salvation. However, in the face of modern values such as freedom of conscience, critical rationality, gender justice, human dignity, and minority rights, Islam has often responded not with reform or adaptation, but with resistance, suppression, and justification. This article critically explores—through Islamic texts and historical experience—how Islam is not merely a personal faith but an ideological system founded on obedience, discrimination, and sacred violence, fundamentally at odds with the principles of freedom and humanism.

Introduction: From Faith to Authority

Historically, religions have first emerged as answers to existential anxiety, fear of death, and the human need for meaning. Yet, once consolidated into power, they often evolved from instruments of solace into structures of domination. Islam, especially in its historical experience, has followed this trajectory entirely—from divine revelation to caliphate, from verse to penal code, from prayer to lash.

This article examines Islam not through the embellished narratives of modern apologists, but through its primary texts, traditional jurisprudence, and political experience—showing how contradictions with freedom and human dignity are embedded within the structural foundations of the religion.

1. The Authoritarian Structure of Islamic Faith

Islam is founded on the concept of submission. The very term “Islam” means submission—an initial sign of its incompatibility with critical rationality. In Islam, faith is not a product of philosophical reflection but absolute obedience to God and His Prophet:

“It is not for a believing man or woman, when Allah and His Messenger have decided a matter, to have any choice in their decision.”

— Qur’an 33:36

Within this system, the individual has no right to choice or critique. Freedom of conscience, as a fundamental right, is rejected outright. Apostasy is not only condemned but punishable by death:

“Whoever changes his religion—kill him.”

— Sahih al-Bukhari 6922 (sunnah.com)

In both classical Sunni and Shia jurisprudence, apostasy (riddah) is a capital crime, even if it stems from sincere intellectual reflection or inner transformation. Such a system cannot tolerate philosophical doubt, intellectual growth, or free moral agency.

2. Institutionalized Gender Discrimination

Islam does not merely restrict women’s freedom—it legally and theologically institutionalizes gender inequality. The Quran states:

“Men are in charge of women…”

— Qur’an 4:34

This male guardianship includes the right to physical discipline:

”…and strike them [if they persist in disobedience].”

— Qur’an 4:34

According to the Qur’an, a woman’s testimony is worth half that of a man’s (2:282), and her inheritance is also half that of her male counterpart (4:11). In classical jurisprudence, a woman cannot serve as a judge, divorce rests solely with the husband, and she requires her husband’s or guardian’s permission to travel, work, or even receive medical treatment.

In countries where Sharia law is implemented (e.g., Iran, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan), these are not mere theological ideas—they are legal realities. They demonstrate that in Islam, gender inequality is not an anomaly; it is foundational.

3. Sacred Violence and the Legitimization of Suppression

From its inception, Islam has not only been a personal belief system but a political project, one that employed violence for consolidation and expansion. Numerous Quranic verses command warfare against unbelievers:

“Fight those who do not believe in Allah or the Last Day… until they pay the jizyah with willing submission and feel themselves subdued.”

— Qur’an 9:29

Classical legal texts support harsh penal codes, including stoning, amputation, public flogging, and execution of dissenters—based directly on the Qur’an and Sunnah.

In modern Islamic states, this sacred violence manifests as systems of repression: executing apostates, policing women’s bodies, persecuting LGBTQ+ individuals, censoring free thought, and criminalizing conscience.

4. Denial of Diversity and Suppression of Love

Islam defines legitimate relationships strictly within heterosexual marriage under male authority. Same-sex relationships are condemned as the “acts of the people of Lot” and punished severely. The Quran describes the divine destruction of the people of Lot with a rain of stones:

“So We made the highest part [of their city] its lowest and rained upon them stones of layered hard clay.”

— Qur’an 11:82–83

In Islamic jurisprudence, the punishment for homosexuality includes execution, being thrown from a height, or flogging. These are not just archaic legal codes—they are deeply ideological norms rooted in fear and hatred of the “other.”

There is no place in Islam for free love, same-sex affection, or sexual autonomy. Desire and the human body are not seen as aspects of dignity and individuality, but as sources of corruption and sin.

5. A Male-Centric Paradise and the Absence of Transcendence

Quranic depictions of paradise focus more on sensual rewards than spiritual elevation. Houris, eternal virgins, await the believing man:

“Fair ones reserved in pavilions, like hidden pearls…”

— Qur’an 55:72

The male-centric fantasy continues with verses like:

“And full-breasted companions of equal age.”

— Qur’an 78:33 (wa kawaʿiba atrāban)

(Note: “Kawaʿib” in classical tafsir refers to “prominent breasts,” see Tafsir al-Tabari.)

Wine, houris, and erotic pleasures are portrayed as the rewards of piety. In these visions, women are either absent or objectified.

Islamic paradise reflects not a spiritual transcendence but the earthly fantasies of a tribal male warrior society.

Conclusion: Islam and Freedom—Two Diverging Paths

Islam, as reflected in the Qur’an, Hadith, classical jurisprudence, and its political manifestations, is a closed, authoritarian, patriarchal, anti-rational, and anti-individual system. Reform is impossible without a radical rupture from its foundational sources.

In classical jurisprudential texts—such as Al-Kafi (al-Kulayni, 3rd century AH), Al-Sharh al-Kabir, Tahrir al-Wasilah (Khomeini), Al-Mughni (Ibn Qudamah), Al-Bidaya wa al-Nihaya (Ibn Kathir), and the fatwas of Ibn Taymiyyah and Nawawi—the same institutionalized violence and discrimination are codified. These sources make clear that the violent and oppressive aspects of Islam are not mere misinterpretations or extremist deviations—they are intrinsic and systemic.

In a world built on freedom of thought, legal equality, sexual diversity, human dignity, and minority rights, Islam—at its core—is in conflict.

And so, the final question remains:

Can one be loyal to reason and also to a faith that criminalizes doubt?

Can one praise liberty while living under the yoke of Sharia?

The answer is clear:

Freedom is not Islam’s companion.

Freedom finds its path through reason, love, and conscience—not through revelation, obedience, or coercion.

Taslima Nasrin, the Bangladeshi writer and physician long targeted by Islamists, once said:

“Islam does not merely deny women their freedom; it denies the very freedom of being human. In this religion, a woman is nothing more than a tool for pleasure and reproduction—not a person with the right to choose.”

In those words lies the essence of all resistance to theocratic ideology—a cry for human freedom against the chains of sacred authority.