Shaykh Amin Kholwadia on Theology and Ontology in Medical Ethics

I’m going to try and explain the terminologies so it becomes easier for us to explain what we hope to do with bioethics or Islamic bioethics. Theology as the owner: the study of God and what God wants, God’s will, and what God wants us to believe in. That is the Islamic outlook. Ontology is the study of being and existence: the different layers and levels of being, not of God but of creation. God’s existence does not flow into the existence of creation. There is a separation there according to Islamic metaphysics. We have to be clear from the outset that when we are talking ontology and the theory of being in Islam, we are about not God’s being, but about how God has created being in layers. Continue reading Shaykh Amin Kholwadia on Theology and Ontology in Medical Ethics

Can European Muslims Resist Assimilation?

The Charter of Principles of French Islam declares the religion to be compatible with France’s particular brand of secularism, laïcité, and its attendant values; in other words, it represents the subjugated and heavily privatised form of the religion that President Macron wishes to see. In January, a close advisor to Macron warned that Muslim organizations which refused to sign the charter would “see their operations inspected very, very closely by our services.”[1] The French Republic cannot tolerate Muslim difference: it aims only to homogenize and assimilate. Continue reading Can European Muslims Resist Assimilation?