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Muslim Theology and Religious Studies: Relational, Practical, and Inter-Faith Dimensions

For a Muslim the question of a “practical theology” within what could loosely be called Muslim or Islamic Education is a perplexing phenomenon. As a Muslim theologian1 I am keenly aware that there is no separation between belief/faith and practice in my religion: Islam is recognized by its adherents as a revealed “way of life” with both a sense of belief and an orthopraxy (Hussain 2004, 319). Islam is viewed as a revealed religion by those who adhere to it and as Merry (2006, 42) eloquently points out from this point of view the link between all human endeavor and Islam is God. This in itself removes the necessity for a term such as “practical theology” because, for a Muslim theologian, all Muslim Education is just an element of the wider Muslim theology. It is also important to understand that what is loosely called Muslim theology also entails Islamic jurisprudence. A Muslim scholar not only deals with issue of faith and belief but as well the complex issues of law and jurisprudence (Hussain 2007, 3). As a Muslim academic working within religious studies I seem to come across such perplexing phenomena more often than I would think possible. I believe one of the main reasons for this is that religious studies as we study it is still very much anchored within a Western Judeo-Christian and a postmodern society. The main theoretical proponents behind core subjects such as Sociology of Religion, Philosophy of Religion, Psychology of Religion, and the Study of Religion are names such as Durkheim, Marx, Weber, Freud, Jung, Smart, Smith, Sharpe, and so on. There is no doubt that these scholars have all been firmly anchored within a Western Judeo-Christian and a postmodern secular worldview. One example of this should suffice; the study of religion at the university level seldom uses non-Western scholars to define religion from a non Judeo-Christian tradition. There would be a great benefit for Religious Studies if such scholars were encouraged to define the term “religion” (if they are even writing in the