Harry’s Place

Great - a government-sponsored panel to give people religious advice. I hope Hazel Blears is involved. Her tour of imams to give them the correct line on extremism was such a fantastic success. Can we have a panel to tell the Catholic Church not to be so extremist and to get a more “moderate” Pope?

I think we’d see just that if the Pope was promoting violent extremism, or was connected to a terrorist movement.

There is, as I said, a precedent for this. Henry the VIII. Worked out ok.

Oh hang on … I didn’t realise you were an RCP-er

Sorry - I should have ignored you!

My apologies for appearing to be interested in what you have to say. I won’t make that mistake again.

Be interesting to see how they manage to get Sufis, Sunnis and Shias to work together on this, not to mention cultural traditions as diverse as you get from the Pacific to the Atlantic via the Middle East. There could be a problem with it trying to speak to everyone, and ending up being ignored by everyone because of it.

The purpose of the Church of England is, and always was, to destroy any meaningful role formerly served by Christianity in England (and empire), and to gild the machinations of the power-elite with a fake air of sanctity. Henry VIII was not a “decent” you know - look at the treatment of his wives, never mind the monasteries.

So, if we agree that the role (quite successfully acheived) of the Church of England was to destroy Christianity in England, why don’t you just come out and say what you mean - that you wish to destroy Islam too?

Meanwhile there are those of who working to return this god-forsaken land (god-forsaken in no large part because of the idolatories and cruelties of Henry VIII) to the Dowry of Mary.

What next: praise of Olly Cromwell?

I’m generally unhappy about state interference in religion.

Amen. But Islam is politics disguised as religion, and government is about politics. Ramadan is certainly a politician - Catherine Fourest sees him as unreconstructed MB in moderates’ clothing, and accomplished doublespeaker. Avoid.

The trouble with all such initiatives is finding leaders that both we and the true moderates (if there are any) can trust. Personally I cannot think of any. We cannot trust the MCB, MAP, MPAC, HuT etc, and they are unlikely to trust Ed Husain, Shiraz Maher or Hassan Butt. Another problem is that even if you can set up such an organisation, it will get infiltrated and probably subverted. A long shot, perhaps worth another try. More to the point is that government should strongly oppose Muslim institutions like the Deobandi seminary in Bury.

There is a BBC forum on this. Responses are mostly strongly negative.

There is a BBC forum on this. Responses are mostly strongly negative.

Really?! I’m shocked!

[i]What next: praise of Olly Cromwell?[/i]

Well, he did end the (official) ban on Jews, which had been in effect for 360 years.

stupid html tags

David T’s swivel eyed obsession with Muslims continues.
What does this have to do with you?
In any case its a total failure from the start -it will have little credibility, is state interference in religion (I thought “secularism” forbade that?) and is singling out and treating Muslims different from everyone else. I thought David T disapproved of that- or is it only when its against Muslims he does?

Ministers say the board’s membership will “reflect the diversity of Islam and Muslim communities in the UK” and the work will include seminars around the country.

He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “We felt we needed something of this nature to help create a better structured approach to how we are educating our children

MCB???????? They have got it wrong AGAIN!!!!!

MCB are NOT ordinary every day muslims. They are Hamas supporters!!

OMG!!!!

This is a waste of time. Extremists already dismiss theological advice from moderates. A board set up by the Government will have absolutely no credibility, unless it produces theologic advice that contradicts the government and who knows where that would lead.

gild the machinations of the power-elite with a fake air of sanctity

The Catholic church has never suffered from that, has it, no siree!

The purpose of the Church of England is, and always was, to destroy any meaningful role formerly served by Christianity in England (and empire), and to gild the machinations of the power-elite with a fake air of sanctity.

It’s debatable how meaningful Christianity had been in England, pre-Reformation. After periodic Saxon and Viking re-paganising of chunks of the land, the Normans essentially used the church as another means of imposing control on the population. (Or do you think there were sound theological grounds for Stigand being booted out of the see of Canterbury?).

Apart from such deeply spiritual and in-no-way political events as Thomas Beckett’s spat with Henry II, the Interdict and Adrian IV’s dodgy dossier which granted Ireland to the English crown (and look how well that worked out), England’s main contributions to European Catholicism were Wycliffe and the Lollards a popular movement which attempted to reclaim (or claim, more accurately, the Church for the masses).

I’d argue that Christianity in England has always been something of an imposition which has served “to gild the machinations of the power-elite with a fake air of sanctity”, though I wouldn’t have put in quite those terms.

It’s a question of what they want its function to be. Having heard them say on the Today Programme this morning that it was aimed at guiding young British Muslims about what Islam “really” says about various issues, I thought that was unacceptable. After all, there is a Church of England, but its role isn’t to tell all English Christians what Christianity has to say about the issues of the day. Just as well, given the Archbishop of Canterbury. And I would be indignant and outraged if the government set up an English council of rabbis to put out a definitive line in what Judaism has to say about this and that. That is of course something Napoleon imposed on French Jews with his Consistoire in France, and I don’t think any Jewish community has ever wanted to establish a replica in any other country.

What I could see the point of is a council of any religious group that works together to explain what the religion has to say. It wouldn’t be practicable for the Jewish faith in England, because the orthodox wouldn’t agree to recognise and share this undertaking with the reform and other movements which don’t accept the central tenets of orthodoxy. And I find it difficult to imagine that the Roman Catholics would work together on defining Christianity with other churches. Just imagine what their situation would be re divorce, abortion, the family, gay unions etc.

So why will it be different for Muslims? It already looks as if that community is being singled out, in a way that other religious communities are not. The issue of terrorism is of course the underlying issue, but i doubt if this political ulterior motive will be make it acceptable to the UK-wide Muslim communities. For a start, how can Shias, Sufis, Ismailis and Sunnis all function in one college? It will be interesting to see which branches are included and which not. But again, it seems very likely that it will be dominated by clerics and scholars from those Islamic movements most likely to be attached to particular political and entryist agendas. I hope I’m wrong.

At best, it will achieve nothing. Assisting moderates in the market-place of ideas is not the issue. The problem stems from (a) the tolerence of organisations that support violent Islamism both at home and abroad and (b) the factors that prompt young Muslims in the UK to be attracted to such groups. Terrorism legislation against designated foreign terrorist groups has not been fully enforced - that is, it has not attempted to clamp down on their activities and fronts in the UK; the British Muslim Initiative is an example. And rather than fund scholars, the government should be funding youth workers and community projects that assist in the integration of young Muslims into society by supporting their skills and working towards greater community cohesion (ie by ensuring that schools have pupils of different backgrounds, instead of the de facto segregation that Oona King has written about in relation to the East End: http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2007/jun/06/guardiansocietysupplement.communities)

Academics have little impact on the young. Oxbridge initiatives will achieve nothing but provide expensive junkets for academics. Sure, the ESRC should sponsor research on political Islam, but this is not a panacea since the issue is not about presenting moderate ideas on Islam but ensuring that economically and socially marginalised youth are not drawn towards political extremism.

All of the establishment and in particular the Left are responsible. Powell told us years ago that we were creating a nation which would be dominated by the politics of communslism. Forget his racialist rantings, he saw the Oxbridge conference coming decades ago. He was absolutely clear that this was going to be the future, and no one listened. We should have dealt with these identity issues decades ago.

I agree with Tory. This is just too fucking late to make any difference to the curent crop of young British islamists. And really if they are going to include Tariq ramadan then they might as well get Bin laden on this committee as well.

I’m totally sure young people will be glad to follow the lead of government approved religious leaders.

Ramadan is not a theologian. He has no academic qualifications of note in Islamic theology. I expect, given his presence at Oxford, that he will be on this board, but he shouldn’t be.

Ramadan’s ramblings are indecipherable, at least to this Oxbridge graduate, so what the target market will make of them I have no idea.

Does the government have the expertise to decide sensibly whom to include?

And as Judy says, what happens if and when they go a little off-message?

Ramadan may be silver-tongued, duplicitous and Janus-faced, but he is well-qualified to speak about and teach theology. Theology covers a multitude of sins, and includes ecclesiology as well as well as religious philosophy in its more ontological and epistemological forms.

Ramadan’s aims are very clear.

He wants to create a Muslim parliament of Europe.

In other words he wants a traditional council of Mulim jurists (with himself being the most pre-eminent there is a genetic fallacy in Islam where religious power and authority are inheritable) given a ‘modern’ structural role as a quasi political body.

Oxbridge would be quite the stepping stone he wishes for (though his English is still apalling) as the French and Swiss have always seen him for wwhat he is.

Strikes me that this could give the MB the big in they have been scheming for.

Sufis I am afraid fold before the MB when it comes to the written word (their power and prestige come from the other more mystical vein of religious observence).

The Islamist jurist pedants will flay them and use their hides as book covers.

The problem stems from (a) the tolerence of organisations that support violent Islamism both at home and abroad and (b) the factors that prompt young Muslims in the UK to be attracted to such groups.

Wrong.

The probleme stems from Islam’s core texts which condone violence against non-muslims.

but this is not a panacea since the issue is not about presenting moderate ideas on Islam but ensuring that economically and socially marginalised youth are not drawn towards political extremism.

So why don’t economically and socially marginalised….say…..Buddhist youths blow up the tube?

Islam is violent and Muslims are violent because Islam’s founder, Mohammed, was violent chauvinistic murderer and because Islam’s texts promote violence and chauvinism.

We tender-footed westerners just can’t bring ourselves to believe that a ‘religion’ could be so ugly, repulsive and inherently violent.

So we mistakenly commit to Islam qualities and properties and sanctities it doesn’t have, never did have and never will have, in an effort to render it familiar and understandable

We’ll even go to the extreme of adding whole wings to the Louvre in a vain and futile effort to imbue islam with artistic finesse, all the while ignoring the glaring fact that Islam’s jihadists were and are art vandals par-excellence.

What a howler!

When Blears was asked what the gvt would do if the group rules that suicide bombing was not OK in the UK, but was OK in Israel- she was disappointingly dismissive, saying repeatedly that Islam was a religion of peace, and that any such interpretation would be political, not religious.

Tamimi of course just repeated the mantra that the gripe of Muslims in the UK was not about religion but about UK foreign policy

Well obviously this board could do some substantive good if they’re given sanction to takfir all of the extremists and pronounce death fatwas on them all. That would steal their thunder as the tough guys wouldn’t it?

Isn’t Timothy Winters (Shaykh Hakim Murad) already at Oxbridge? This sounds like his sort of deal. Yahyah Birt might be involved too…

Winters was amongst the Muslim clerics who signed the recent letter to the Pope and Christian leaders.

I don’t like the man. He’s a misery, and a woman-hater. But apart from being a dreary conservative I’d be surprised if he’s an Islamist. I have seen him in Islamist company though (like Tamimi) but maybe that’s just a professional hazard if you’re a leading Muslim theologian.

Ramadan’s academic credentials remain a slight mystery, don’t they?

His own website describes him as “Professor of Islamic Studies (Faculty of Theology at Oxford)”.

Yet the faculty website, while listing him as “Prof.”, lists no lectures nor research interests for him.

St Anthony’s College website lists him as a “visiting fellow” - not what you would expect for a full professor?

Is he a “theologian” at all?

Sorry - my mistake.

St Anthony’s in fact lists him as a “Research Fellow” - he describes himself as “Senior Research Fellow” - and as “Dr.” not “Prof.”

If he is what we normally understand to be an Oxford University Professor then I will eat my hat!

I thought that Ramadan’s tenure at Oxford was over and that he recently took up a post at Leiden or Utrecht (can’t remember which; I think Leiden). I seem to recollect he left Oxford under a bit of a cloud but I was given to understand that the ‘post’ he had there was just an honourary one.

Oxford’s theology faculty lists Ramadan as “Prof.”, so I would imagine that he has been awarded a “personal chair” on the basis of his academic standing. Ramadan is also a Research Fellow of St Antony’s College Oxford. An Oxford fellowship should not be confused with a senior postdoc position. It can be “honorary” or “visiting”, but it is still regarded as a professorship.

There is plenty to criticise in the man and his ideas, without calling Ramadan’s academic credentials into question.

“but it is still regarded as a professorship”? I don’t think so.

In any event the college seems content to refer to him as Dr. not Prof.

Would it surprise you at all if he had chosen to big-up his academic status?

A research fellowship is a time-limited appointment and relatively (in the scale of these things) junior, is it not?

Hardly the status a college would give to a professor of the university?

Ramadan may be silver-tongued, duplicitous and Janus-faced, but he is well-qualified to speak about and teach theology.

Well it depends what you mean by well-qualified. He spent a year or so in Cairo receiving private tuition from an al-Azhar scholar (as opposed to the lengthy process of education offered by the University itself) and a year at the Islamic Foundation in Leicester. His PhD from the University of Geneva was actually a hagiography of his grandfather that was initially rejected by the University. His initial academic training was in philosophy and most of his professional life has been spent as a social and political activist.

The appointments at St Antony’s and the faculty are two different things, even though both institutions are part of the federal University of Oxford. As for time-limited or otherwise, this is completely irrelevant.

Ramadan is clearly a conceited individual, so of course he “bigs-up” his status. He’s not the only professor to do so.

Trad Catholic - Meanwhile there are those of who working to return this god-forsaken land (god-forsaken in no large part because of the idolatories and cruelties of Henry VIII) to the Dowry of Mary.

Idolatories - would have thought his theism was anything but idolatrous…wasn’t that one of the very tenets of the Proto Reformation?

“His PhD from the University of Geneva was actually a hagiography of his grandfather that was initially rejected by the University.”

Ramadan is not the only holder of a doctorate who had to re-write his thesis in order for it to be passed. Hagiography it may have been in many respects, but the thesis was still a scholarly work that was deemed worthy of a doctorate.

And of course he’s qualified to teach theology at university level. For goodness sake, I was seen as qualified to teach undergraduate physics before I’d even written up my PhD thesis.

Ramadan is a knowledgeable man, and from his writings it is clear to me that he knows a thing or two about philosophy, both secular and religious. As I said before, we should engage with the man and his ideas.

Alcuin - isn’t the seminary in Yarkshire…Batley way?

Kudos to you though…can we exclude the Barelwis, the Ayatollah al-Khoei Foundation and the Ahl ul-Bayt League…

What about Irsh Manji, Ellen Degeneres….and let’s say Lyndsay Lohan?

John P.

You come out with a lot of shit but this takes the cake:

We’ll even go to the extreme of adding whole wings to the Louvre in a vain and futile effort to imbue islam with artistic finesse, all the while ignoring the glaring fact that Islam’s jihadists were and are art vandals par-excellence.

This is akin to arguing that because some Christians burn Harry Potter books we shouldn’t put the works of Da Vinci in the Louvre. In other words, completely retarded.

How does the existence of art vandal jihadists (or, indeed, the Bamiyan Budda-destroying Taliban) negate the existence of Islamic art worthy of exhibition?

Unfuckingbelievable stupidity.

has he published any research papers, which have been peer reviewed?

Dan - but why is there this segregation in the first place?

There are pockets of exclusively Caribbean cultural areas, but not like the Pakistani, Indian and Bengali Muslims…

Isn’t Magaloof pretty Anglocentric?

What is it about principlly Muslim immigrants that make them so impervious to integration? Is it culture, religion, numbers, government policy?

If more ‘natives’ married those whose ancestors came from the sub-continent I feel Islam would be less of a problem in the UK…provided of course that the ‘natives’ didn’t have to ‘revert’ to their ar-Rahman worshipping embryonic alter-egos…

What say you sir?

I agree

And by “engage” I mean “engage properly”.

Until recently, there was a - frankly Islamophobic - tendency among many on the left to treat Ramadan as the most incredibly progressive forward looking and liberal Muslim that there could ever possibly be.

On that basis, Ramadan has tended to be co-opted by the Government, on the basis that he’s “the Muslim who doesn’t say that you should blow yourself up on public transport”.

I think it would be good to see Ramadan’s ideas pinned down, and considered in detail. At present, there’s a tendency to allow his obscurities to pass with out comment.

There is a good review of Ramadan’s writings by Paul Berman in New Republic (which is on-line). The main point Berman brings up is the classic charge levied at all Islamists - that they disguise their real agenda behind pliant eloquent lofty abstract talk that sounds liberal and progressive, but isn’t once you try to pin them down.

The charge that Caroline Fourest made in Brother Tariq was that amongst western liberal intellectuals he says - or appears to say - one thing, but amongst his own following, and in Arabic, he says quite the opposite - a charge of ‘double discourse’.

I can’t agree with Francis Sedgemore. I think we should be wary.

What on earth does he mean by a phrase like ‘universal values’? Can he be a little more specific? Give particular examples? This sort of phrase can mean just about anything without context. It’s part of his techniques of bewitchment and obfuscation.

Timothy Garton Ash was Ramadan’s colleague at St Anthony’s.

Francis - On what level should the government engage with Prof. Ramadhan? Has his scholarly training involved preparation in the traditional Islamic sciences of Arabic grammar, rhetoric, composition, poetry, Qur’anic commentary, Hadith and principles of jurisprudence?

I very much doubt he was able to cram much in the way of substantial textual scholarship during his year in Cairo…’internships’ for Imams at al-Azhar last a minmum 5 years and this presupposes that the student has a substantial grasp of Arabic…

The only ‘respected’ Islamic scholars, outside of the European oriental scholars were historically and still are those who have had a profound grounding in the traditional Islamic sciences. I guess it depends on what level the government hoed to engage with him? He doesn’t have the authority to issue religiously-binding edicts

When does the Blears report come out?

I’m rather fond of Tim Winters’ pet ’scriptural reasoning’ project…seems a step in the right direction to me

Are their any concrete suggestions on the rumour mill about whose likely to take part? What about young Muslim ladies? My wife says she’d like to be included if at all possible…

“I can’t agree with Francis Sedgemore. I think we should be wary.”

Are you under the impression that I’m a supporter of Tariq Ramadan? If so, I suggest you re-read my comments.

David T has interpreted correctly what I mean by “engage”. One last comment on Ramadan’s qualification (and nor more from me on this subject)…

Ramadan is a philosopher-theologian, not a cleric-jurist. He has taught, and continues to teach, Islamic studies in western universities. And he he perfectly qualified to do that. Ramadan is a product of the western academic system, and he continues to serve that system.

I think it inevitable that Ramadan will be invited to sit on the new government-sponsored board of Muslim theologian. That is what I wrote on my own blog this morning (“UK government to establish Good Islam franchise”). I endorse neither the government’s plan nor Professor Ramadan.

‘Universal values’.

Would stoning women for adultery not be contrary to ‘universal values’ of human rights, for instance? To the UNDHR 1948?

Yet on French TV in 2003 in a debate between Sarkozy and Ramadan, Sarko brought up the position endorsing stoning that Hanif Ramadan, R.’s brother, had published, and challenged him on this particular point. Ramadan obfuscated.

‘We could always hold a moratarium on stoning…’

Sarko pressed on. ‘A moratarium? Surely the stoning of women for adultery is intolerable?’

But Ramadan would not condemn lapidation. I think what he was trying to say, in an extremely convoluted way, was that since authority in Islam is essentially democratic, (or ‘totalitarian’?) any authority to dismiss this Quranic injunction would require the entire umma to agree that it be rejected forever but that until then, a ‘moratarium’ on stoning could be agreed.

Sarko on the other hand saw the matter as intrinsic. So how can Ramadan’s ‘universal values’ be our ‘universal values’?

Good for Sarko for pressing on. But this is precisely the kind of specific engagement that is required.

The Labour Government should start its own education on Islam here, with this full-length Video:

“Islam: What the West Needs to Know”

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-871902797772997781

Francis - I might be wrong, but, and this would be in the interests of Uk Muslims, in the eyes of a Muslim, a cleric-jurist-theologian caters to the same audience. Whilst devout Muslims seeking spiritual and temporal deen guidance are unlikely to take what Mr Ramadhan says seriously in terms of religio-practical matters, he is probably influential in terms of a new generation of contemporary Islamic commentary. If he makes clear, unambiguous statements and had helps to rid Islam of the attachment to stultifying primitive dogma in which it is ensconced.

There is a precedent for a Ramadan-esque figure as a new face for Muslims…in Egypt, Amr Khaled is still popular as the ‘modern’ face of Islam. Alas, he is also largely derided for his lack of traditional scholarship and myriad ‘appearance fee requests’…not to mention his hilarious antidrug campaign. Given the contemprorary interest in ‘reviving’ traditional Islam, can Ramadan play a role even on a ‘Western’ intellectual level?

Do you think Tim Winter will be involved Francis?

The Bewleys…surely their Norwich Muslim collective would generate Kudos, at least with ‘home-grown’ Muslims. But are they too apolitical?

I’m not sure the Bewleys are ‘apolitical’. OK they are not openly pushing for political Islam and are content to live quietly. But the recent Quran that they produced alarmed Patrick Soodheo and their ultra conservative mentor, Ian Dallas, hates Jews and wants the King of Morrocco to be the new Caliph.

Their Islam is very English (in the worst possible sense - rather frigid). I can’t see it connecting with Asian Muslims.

One name who ought to be at the top of the appointments is Dr Taj Hargey, founder of the excellent Muslim Educational Centre of Oxford http://www.meco.org.uk/

Ok, so he is a bit of a demagogue against the Iraq intervention (but then it is hard to find a British Muslim that isn’t), but he is certainly a progressive in his theology, and committed to secular democracy.

Does Taj ud-Deen disavow all the violent verses revealed in Madinah?

Is he willing to allow Muslim girls to marry non-Muslim men?

This is the sort of ‘demagogue’ we could do with…

Devorgilla…where can I find out more on Ian Dallas?

Does Taj ud-Deen disavow all the violent verses revealed in Madinah?

Is he willing to allow Muslim girls to marry non-Muslim men?

MECO allows not just men and women but non-muslims into their services.
http://www.meco.org.uk/charter.htm

Dr Hargey is a founded of British Muslims for Secular Democracy.
http://www.bmsd.org.uk/

I would think he would affirm both your suggestions above.

It’s debatable how meaningful Christianity had been in England, pre-Reformation. After periodic Saxon and Viking re-paganising of chunks of the land, the Normans essentially used the church as another means of imposing control on the population. (Or do you think there were sound theological grounds for Stigand being booted out of the see of Canterbury?)

Pre-Reformation Catholicism was popular, vital and growing, as Eamonn Duffy’s monster of a book demonstrated. The Reformation was a full-on revolution from above.

‘Devorgilla…where can I find out more on Ian Dallas?’

He’s got a web-site under Abdulqadir as Sufi (or is it Al Sufi?) and he has a wikipedia entry under ‘Ian Dallas’ that gives you that link.

He’s currently praising David Cameron. He’s now based in S Africa where he’s trying to convert blacks to Islam.

He’s an old true blue Tory from Ayr. (Used to be aTory stringhold).

Berman’s article on Ramadan here

‘Devorgilla…where can I find out more on Ian Dallas?’

Enjoy! He’s a real fruit loop!

Posting for Reality salts

Thanks old labour! Let’s hope he does and that he is indeed on the panel!

Thanks for the other link MarkT…

Dallas sounds like a pseudonym. I’ll google it.

“Do you think Tim Winter will be involved Francis?” [Great Gaon of Vilna]

I’m not sure how to answer this, as all we have so far is a broad statement of intention. Yes, we can say that Ramadan will almost certainly be a member of this board of theologians, but that is down to his very high public profile. Those who put together the board will have an eye on PR, but the question is whether they will pack the body with media tarts such as Ramadan.

Timothy Winter is another intellectual, but he comes across as more typically ‘academic’ than Ramadan. As an atheist I can only look at this as a detached and somewhat cynical observer. But from what I know of Winter, he is an obvious choice for such a project.

Posting for the Gaon

Yes, Winter certainly fills the tick boxes as far as traditional Islamic study, profound Arabic knowledge etc. is concerned. Indeed, more so than Ramadan, who has never translated any Islamic literature as far as I’m aware…perhaps into French?

Let’s nominally posit Tim Winter, Ramadan and Taj Harigey for roles…how about female academics?

This move is far more dangerous than a bomb on a packed tube. This is striking at the very hear of our culture.

Firstly we have our pre-eminent educational institutions involving themselves in the promotion of a totalitarian ideology. It’s really taking us back to the bad old days of the Cambridge communist cells seeking to subvert the country by infilitrating various key organisations.

Secondly, in order for the scheme to work Hazel Blears (and the rest of the Government) has to peddle the lie that Islam is a “religion of peace and compassion”. There is no evidence for this whatsoever. Nearly everywhere you look in the Muslim world there is war and strife. Wherever Muslims are a substantial minority they are a disaffected and dangerous minority. As for compassion, the Islamic countries have some of the most savage criminal codes on the planet and some of the least effective provision for welfare or charity.

This project is of course doomed to failure. It will further confirm borderline militants in their belief that there is a conspiracy to neuter real Islam (and they are more or less right of course) and thus alienate them further, possibly pushing them into active Jihadism. The only people it will satisfy are the Taqiyya merchants of the MCB and the burgeoning class of well paid Islamo-Quangoites that serve up the required blandishments. It won’t free Muslim women from male tutelage . It won’t stop the teaching of hate in the Mosques. But it will further erode our defences.

Well “Prof” Ramadan
(a) lies about his academic status - he holds no Chair at Oxford, nor anywhere else
(b) talks in such a way (I saw him at an Intelligence Squared debate - it was impossible, literally, for any of his opponents to grasp any of his arguments) as to render anything he says (perhaps deliberately?) meaningless.

So - he’s perfect!

Let’s nominally posit Tim Winter, Ramadan and Taj Harigey for roles…how about female academics?

Mona Siddique at Glasgow University would be high up the list, though her academic credentials are less than those of Winter and Ramadan (her only published book is a quick intro to the Quran).

There seems to be some confusion over Ramadan’s actual official position.

The Oxford Faculty of Theology website lists him as a ‘Prof.’, yet I cannot see that he holds any chair. ( http://resources.theology.ox.ac.uk/staff.phtml?lecturer_code=tramadan) St Antony’s College website lists him just as a ‘Research Fellow’, not even eligible to sit on the governing body. Probably worth someone contacting the Faculty to see what entitles him to call himself a professor.

See Ibn Warraq’s excellent critique of him here:
http://www.city-journal.org/2008/bc0229iw.html

On this list, Ramadan is not included on Oxford’s list of Theology Faculty Professors:
http://www.theology.ox.ac.uk/prospective_students/undergraduates/prospectus/guide_to_teachers.htm

Perhaps some of the Radical Middle Way scholars will get involved: http://www.radicalmiddleway.co.uk/scholars.php

It will be interesting to see who ends up on the panel - given the brewing row over government funding, I wonder if some of the attendees will hold back till the last minute before throwing their hats (turbans?!) into the ring. Trust New Labour to make a dog’s dinner of the announcement.

The real difficulty is that the West is only just beginning to produce Islamic scholars of sufficient calibre to enter this kind of debate. A Ph.D. from a European university is fine to discuss these matters at an abstract level but without a thorough grounding at a traditional university, they can’t begin to make a proper contribution to the discussions raging on these issues.

A Ph.D. from a European university is fine to discuss these matters at an abstract level but without a thorough grounding at a traditional university, they can’t begin to make a proper contribution to the discussions raging on these issues.

Unfortunately, a whole generation of British academics who did have such credentials, from John Wansborough to Patricia Crone and Michael Crook, who made extremely significant contributions to scholarship on Islam, were ostracised as Orientalists or left these shores for the United States.

Even Timothy Winter doesn’t have a doctorate.

The really disturbing thing about the present approach, is the idea that one has to be a Muslim to be an academic postholder on Islam these days. This is extremely dangerous, since it will block serious critical scholarship and entrench the current reactionaries.

Perhaps some of the Radical Middle Way scholars will get involved: http://www.radicalmiddleway.co.uk/scholars.php

The so-called Radical Middle Way scholars include Tariq Ramadan. Nuff said.

Franciis Sedgemore

Of course it is legitimate to question Ramadan’s academic qualifications as well as his personal connections with prominent Islamists.

In a Western sense Ramadan is a Muslim theologian in Islam this is called a jurist (the scholars at Al-Ahzar are jurists rather than Clerics (a western concept not clearly applic