While Muslims were experiencing a state of intellectual decline, Europe began to emerge as a new intellectual power in the world. During this time, Europe experienced the Renaissance, which resulted in the emergence of Capitalism as a new ideology. The Capitalist ideology had as its foundation the Secular creed which defined the relationship between Church and State. Thinkers such as Hobbs and Rosseau began propagating the newly-emerging concepts of Democracy, Freedom, Individualism, and Liberty. Parallel to the intellectual development was the emergence of the scientific way of thinking, which Europe embraced. All of these intellectual developments ushered Europe into the Industrial Revolution. With the emergence of the Capitalist ideology and the Industrial Revolution, the West emerged as a new intellectual and material force in the world.
Muslims, content with their military superiority, were either unaware or heedless of the sweeping changes which were occurring throughout most of Europe. This contentment was further strengthened by their belief that Islam could not be conquered, the long history the Islamic State enjoyed as the First State in the world for a millennium, and their ability to defeat both the Crusaders and the Moguls. Further adding to this feeling of contentment was the fact that the Muslims were able to sweep across Europe, ultimately reaching Central France and Vienna.
Although the Ottoman State was a military giant, its political and intellectual influence was miniscule. Politically and intellectually, the Muslims were declining due to the accumulation of several internal factors, and this deterioration became more widespread and obvious during the days of the Ottoman State. The Muslims in this state of decline were ill-prepared in dealing with the sudden changes that swept through Europe, and consequently the progress that Europe experienced was a shock to the Muslims that took them by surprise. While the Muslims before continuously expanded their frontiers to new lands, the Muslims during the days of the Ottoman State witnessed the European Nations, particularly Spain, Portugal, Holland, Britain, and France, colonizing Muslim lands in different regions. In the past, the Europeans were forced to cross the Muslim world in order to trade with other nations and territories in remote areas such as China. However, with the discovery of new trade routes by Vasco De Gama, Magellen, Columbus, and others, Europe no longer depended solely upon the Muslims in this regard.
In light of such events, the Muslims began to realize their weakness and decline, but this realization was not initiated by any intellectual awareness of the situation. Instead, the Muslims reacted based on physical criteria to the material advancements in Europe and the conquering of Muslim lands. As a result, the Muslims were overwhelmed by the material advancement of Europe. Although the Muslims attempted to initiate a revival, the concept of revival in their minds was no longer an intellectual revival but was restricted to keeping pace with the progress occurring in the West. As a result of this reactionary stance towards the revival, Muslims became enchanted with the West for the first time in their history.
In their attempts to define and create the revival, the Muslims became divided into three major currents. The first current, the so-called "Traditionalists" or "Conservatives," consisted of the common masses, the traditional shaykhs and scholars, and the Sufis. They took the stance of passiveness and carelessness and paid little or no attention to the events happening in Europe.
Furthermore, they were unable to recognize the distinction between the material and the cultural aspects of a civilization. As a result, they viewed the Western civilization as Kufr in all aspects, which caused them to reject any product of the West as something from Shaytan, whether the product was intellectual, cultural, scientific or technological.
The second current which attempted to revive the Muslims was the Secular current which consisted of those who were fascinated and mesmerized by the European culture and civilization. The seeds of this current were planted with Napolean's invasion of Egypt. Some individuals started visiting Europe in order to study, and these individuals eventually began calling the Muslims to adopt the European culture and civilization in their totality. They called for such Western ideas as the detachment of the Deen from the state, the separation of Islam from life, and other Western-borne concepts such as Equality, Individualism, and Freedom. The Secular current would eventually give rise to the Turkish secular nationalists such as the Young Turks and the Union and Progress Party, as well as some westernized arabs who would form the seeds of arab-nationalist movements.
The last current were represented by the "Modernists" who propagated the idea that the Western culture has both positive and negative qualities and that Muslims should adopt from Europe anything that does not conflict with their Deen. This current started calling Muslims to bridge the gap between Islam and the Western culture by reinterpreting Islam to adapt to the modern life defined by the West.
To the misfortune of the Muslims, all of these currents were wrong in their approach. The Traditionalist current chose the path of stagnation and was not prepared to think in any aspect. And the Secular and Modernist trends considered the West as the reference point, either consciously or subconsciously. They incorrectly defined the revival as being based on the relationship between the Muslims and the West, differing only in the extent to which Muslims should emulate the West.
Furthermore, by considering the West as the frame of reference which defined their course of action, these currents, particularly the Secular and Modernist currents, made themselves easy targets for the European nations to use them as tools in their cultural and intellectual campaign against the Muslims. Both Britain and France started openly assisting the Seculars from among the Turks and Arabs. Egypt, which was occupied by Britain, became a safe haven for Seculars who were forced to leave the Ottoman-controlled territories. In addition, some Lebanese Christians emigrated to Egypt and established newspapers and journals advocating the Secular point of view. Britain and France assisted these individuals in spreading their publications to different regions of the Ottoman State.
Lord Kromer, who resided in Egypt at the time as the British Viceroy, played a critical role in this process.
The Modernist current was also supported by Britain, but the support was done covertly and with the intention of establishing its roots firmly among the masses. This Modernist stream included members such as Refaah Tahtawi, Kahyrid-Deen Al-Tunusi, Jamaal ud-Deen Al-Afghani, Abdul- Rahman Al-Kawakiby, and Muhammad Abdu. A prominent aspect of this covert support was Lord Kromer's efforts in helping Muhammad Abdu reach the position of Shaykh al-Azhar, although he was not well appreciated by the scholars there.4 The works of Muhammad Abdu and Lord Kromer eventually resulted in the establishment of a new educational and judicial system in Egypt.
Muhammad Abdu used the stagnation which gripped the Islamic world to justify his stance of modernizing Islam to mold into the Western-dominated status quo.
In addition to the Secular and Modernist currents, Britain and France also lent support to the Conservative or Traditionalist current by advocating the Sufi trend and promoting the various Sufi orders. This support was clearly visible when the Sufis in Algeria fought alongside the French government against the Muslims. In addition, the new publishing houses established in Egypt began publishing many works of Sufi literature, such as the books of Ibnul-Arabi and Al-Ghazali.
A critical analysis of these currents will reveal that all of them were incorrect for two principle reasons:
1. These movements incorrectly defined the concept of revival and its approach. The Traditionalist movement defined the concept of revival based on stagnation and passiveness.
And the Secular and Modernist currents defined the concept of revival from a purely materialistic vantage point. This outlook led them to restrict the concept of revival to dealing with the West and keeping pace with its progress, rather than dealing with themselves and identifying the factors which would create progress for the Muslims. What the Muslims should have done was to initiate a discussion about their situation, proceed to identify factors and causes that led to their decline, and then define the approach they should follow to revive themselves intellectually with the objective of restoring their creativity, productivity, and above all, the correct Islamic thinking. Unfortunately, no attempts of this nature happened.
2. Both the Traditionalist and Modernist currents failed to identify the difference between Hadaara (the cultural aspects of a civilization) and Madaneyyah (the material aspects of a civilization). For thisreason, Muslims were unable to identify what they can adopt and what they should reject from other civilizations. Because the Hadaara consists of a set of concepts about life derived from a fundamental thought or creed, then the Muslims cannot adopt anything from the other civilizations related to the Hadaara. Aspects related to a civilization or society's Hadaara include its systems, the economic and political orders, the outlook towards man and society, and the prevailing arts and philosophies.5 On the other hand, the Madaneyyah consists of the material aspects of a civilization which is not influenced by a unique point of view, philosophy or creed, such as industry, mathematics, physics, engineering, and medicine. All of these material aspects are permissible because the Sharii Qa'ida states: "The original rule for objects is permissibility, unless it is proven otherwise."6
In addition, Muslims failed to differentiate between the different types of knowledge and, as a result, could not identify what areas of knowledge they could adopt from the West and what areas of knowledge they could not. Because the scientific knowledge is acquired through the scientific methodology, which is universal and cannot be influenced by any doctrine or specific point of view, the Muslims are allowed to acquire scientific knowledge from any source. However, the Thaqafah, or the knowledge that is influenced by a specific point of view towards life is particular to any culture and is acquired by narration and deduction. Such areas of knowledge include language, history, jurisprudence, and philosophy. Muslims must exercise care in studying any cultural knowledge such as sociology, psychology, and economics because they are influenced by the point of view of others.
Based on this distinction between the universal and the particular, the Muslims were supposed to adopt the science and technology from the West and develop it further while rejecting the Western culture and point of view. However, instead of adopting this strategy, the Muslims ironically attempted to transfer the thoughts and concepts unique to the Western culture while rejecting many technological and scientific advancements which the West achieved.
These attempts to revive the Muslims failed to address the true nature of revival. Instead, they compounded the problem of the Muslims by mixing the Islamic thought with the Western thought.
Such a mixture led to more backwardness in science and technology. Further exasperating the decline was the intellectual invasion of the West, which systematically targeted specific issues in the Islamic way of thinking. Following are examples of specific issues in Islam which the West addressed and their impact upon Muslims: