One More Islam Post

I really found the contrast between the Bhutto and Qutb readings quite shocking. Where Bhutto used history, logic, and the Qur'an itself to try to prove extremist views wrong, Qutb seemed openly and unabashedly against any interpretation that would "weaken" Islam.

Qutb writes, "This group of thinkers, who are a product of the sorry state of the present Muslim generation, have nothing but the label of Islam and have laid down their spiritual and rational arms in defeat. They say, 'Islam has prescribed only defensive war'! and think that they have done some good for their religion by depriving it of its method, which is to abolish all injustice from the earth, to bring people to the worship of God alone, and to bring them out of servitude to others into the servants of the Lord."

By contrast, Bhutto writes, "I know that some authors have speculated that women in Islamic countries can never achieve self-actualization or a degree of assertiveness unless they look at this [their situation] from a non-Islamic point of view. I don't agree with that at all. I believe that Islam within it provides justice and equality for women, and I think that those aspects of Islam which have been highlighted by by the mullas [religious scholars] do not do a service to our religion."

Only enough, they both try to blame thinkers and scholar for the prevalence of the opposing view.