The Silent Insurrection of Liberal Muslims

Forget about Right-wing Extremism; Keep an eye on Leftist Muslims.

By Iheb Khachai Aprril 26, 2023

Worshipers of both sexes perform prayer together at the Qal’bu Maryam Mosque in Berkeley, California, US, April 2017. Image: Mercury News

With the rainbow flag flying above the Unity Mosque in the sky of Toronto, Canada, worshipers of both sexes sat together in a circle, as a woman was performing the adhan or the Islamic call for prayer. This image captures the essence of a new strand of Islam that has quietly taken shape in several Western countries. Liberal Islam, also known as progressive Islam, represents a new, if not controversial, perception of the religion whose proponents advocate for a reinterpretation of the holy scriptures (Koran and Hadith), affirming the notions of gender equality, women’s rights, LGBT+ rights, interfaith marriage, and freedom of speech while opposing theocracy. Currently, the adherents of this new form of the faith, though they might be of insignificant number to the global Muslim population, are spread across three continents and more than half a dozen countries while seeming to gain the attention and positive coverage from their local media and community.

The reason for this relative favoritism to liberal Islam might have to do with the outspoken beliefs of its adherents, how it is practiced, and how these elements accommodate the host countries’ culture. “We started it because we were looking for a place where we did not have to hide who we were,” said El-Farouk Khaki, a co-founder of Toronto Unity Mosque, a mixed, LGBT-friendly mosque. “It is a mosque that is inclusive of humanity,” he noted. Similarly, in the U.S., Rabi’a Keeble, an African-American female convert, founded the Qalbu Maryam Women’s Mosque in Berkeley, California, where men and women pray shoulder to shoulder and where women are not obliged to wear the hijab, the Islamic headscarf. Keeble reiterates the notion of inclusivity, wondering “Why would you give me an inferior place to be?” in voicing her opposition to how men and women are seated in conservative mosques, affirming her conviction that “men and women should never have been separated.”

The reason for this relative favoritism to liberal Islam might have to do with the outspoken beliefs of its adherents...

Across the Atlantic Ocean, Europe has also served as a suitable habitat for liberal Islam. In France, Ludovic-Mohamed-Zahed, an Algerian-born gay imam, officiates gay weddings while calling for tolerance and inclusion. “The goal was deconstructing prejudice, conflict, and fascist ideologies from within,” stated Zahed to DW News, by “reclaiming and rediscovering the traditions and texts.” Moreover, as it is with France’s “first female imam,” Kahina Bahloul, Germany and Denmark have both experienced the emergence of female-led mosques. In Germany, Seyran Ates, a Turkish-born German Muslim, founded the Ibn-Rushd-Goethe Liberal Mosque in Berlin; whereas Sherin Khankhan, a Danish Muslim of Syrian and Finnish origin, founded the Mariam Mosque in Copenhagen, the first women-led mosque in the Scandinavian country. “We have the wish to challenge these patriarchal structures within religious institutions,” said Khankhan, articulating what seems to be a common feature among liberal mosques.

As this new fragment of the faith absorbs the liberal notions of ‘tolerance’, ‘inclusivity’, ‘equality’ and ‘free choice’ into Islam’s religious rituals and practices, the endgame of liberal Muslims seems to be the proliferation of a new Islam that is compatible with modern Western culture. “We also try to disseminate new narratives of Islam in Europe,” noted Khankhan on the goal of her mosque. The ostensible objective, therefore, is to ‘modernize’ Islam by incorporating it into the 21st-century Western lifestyle while making it, and its followers, more appealing in the eyes of Western critics.

God and Freedom

Seyran Ates (on the right), founder of the Ibn Rushd-Goethe-mosque, sermons during the opening of the mosque in Berlin, Germany on June 16th, 2017. Photograph: Sean Gallup/Getty Images.

In investigating the genesis of this phenomenon, certain common denominators seem to be in play. On the macro level, all the aforementioned cases of liberal Islam advocates were either born or live in Western countries. The West, as a civilization, developed distinct cultural characteristics that laid the foundation for religious pluralism. Secularism, most importantly, ensures that the state remains neutral regarding religious affairs, taking no part in supporting, censoring, or banning religious doctrines. Unlike in Islamic, Confucian, Japanese, or Orthodox civilizations, Caesar and God are distinctly separated in Western society. “This division of authority,” wrote Samuel P. Huntington, “contributed immeasurably to the development of freedom in the West.” Besides, if secularism provides a green light from the state, Individualism equips the citizen with a religious entrepreneurial spirit. Unlike in other cultures, the right of the individual is central and paramount in the West. “Again and again,” Huntington added, “both Westerners and non-Westerners point to individualism as the central distinguishing mark of the West.”

Liberal Islam advocates were either born or live in Western countries

Furthermore, take into account the number of Muslims living outside the Islamic Heartland and the West: 14-28 million in Russia, 21-28 million in China, and 200 million in India. In contrast, only 7 million Muslims live in North America (the US and Canada) and 19 million in the EU, for a total of roughly 26 million Muslims living in the West. Yet, to this day, there are no reported cases of liberal mosques or outspoken advocates of liberal Islam in non-Western societies. Consequently, the separation of spiritual and temporal authority combined with a central emphasis on individual liberty formed the sociocultural pillars on which Liberal Islam rests, making the latter a Western-induced practice.

On the micro level, pioneers of Liberal Islam share certain personality traits and societal backgrounds that, in one way or another, prompted them to herald this new religious dogma. From North America, through Europe, and to Australia, proponents of Liberal Islam were either marginals in their countries of origin, Western converts, or descendants of Muslim immigrants to the West, for whom the fusion of Liberalism and Islam offers an answer to the central question: Who Am I? Caught between two historically and ideologically antithetical civilizations, Liberal Islam functions as a middle ground, an amicable compromise, through which its followers can reconcile their identities, for which they would have probably been ostracized, and their sense of belonging to the Islamic faith.

A Multifaceted Faith

There has been a palpable presence of Western Muslims in LGBT pride parades. Image: DW News.

Whenever a new faith comes into existence, it usually has two components to it: a set of spiritual beliefs that it tries to promulgate and a holy book representing the word of God. Through these two elements, the faith’s legitimacy is tested and scrutinized. Unlike other religions, however, Liberal Islam is merely a contemporary strand of a 1400-year-old religion. This begs the obvious question: from where does Liberal Islam obtain its legitimacy? Contrary to the belief of its advocates, the number of adherents does not legitimize a certain practice or theme in Islamic jurisprudence. Instead, it is the interpretation of the Koran, Hadith, and Sira by high-level renowned Islamic scholars which either legitimize a new phenomenon within the Islamic community or deems an ancient one outdated. Pioneers of Liberal Islam, tough might be college educated, lack the lifelong academic commitment and in-depth understanding of Islam’s religious texts to formulate an impartial verdict. A little knowledge is, indeed, a dangerous thing.

Outside the cultural boundaries of the West, the tenets of Liberal Islam seem to be met with a degree of rejection and disapproval. In an anonymous opinion poll that included college-educated, English-speaking-born Muslims, 67% of participants rejected the notion of equal inheritance, with 60% being females. In addition, 86% of respondents rebuffed the concepts of gender-mixed mosques and female imams, while also voicing their belief that the LGBT movement is at direct odds with Islam. “They are trying to change Islam to what suits them,” said one commentator, while another proclaimed that “there is no such thing as Liberal Islam.” Even those who cherish the notions of freedom of speech and expression do that as long as it does not come at the expanse of their faith. As the main societal forces that seem behind Liberal Islam are Feminism and the LGBT movement-two intellectual and social movements that originated in the Judeo-Christian West- the collective mind of the Muslim community, outside the West at least, appears to be in a state of repudiation.

Outside the cultural boundaries of the West, the tenets of Liberal Islam seem to be met with a degree of rejection and disapproval

Liberal Islam is still under the radar when it comes to the more than one billion Muslims living outside the Western World. However, if Western media persists in paying more attention and shedding a positive light on this phenomenon, there is the prospect of having more people, first Westerners and then non-Westerners, joining this new creed. Liberal Muslims already claim that “Islam is an individual experience that can or not be shared in the collective space,” essentially striping the faith of what makes it whole, Collectivism. Liberalism and its individual-based tenets had slowly but steadily infiltrated Judaism and Christianity, causing the Church and the Temple to be emptied of their spiritual values, and turning the two Abrahamic faiths into ‘hollow religions.’ As Liberal Islam has the potential of becoming mainstream, Muslims outside the West are faced with a sense of urgent realization that the threat to their faith is not the West’s Right-wing Islamophobic rhetoric but rather the encroaching Left-wing Liberalism that aims not to fight Islam, but change it from within.