ভূমিকা

Binder maintains that liberalism is not only rational, universal, and politically feasible, but it is the only alternative to the political and moral predicament of the Third World, especially the Muslim world.

Binder claims that his main goal behind writing a book on "Islamic liberalism" is to help Muslim intellectuals produce "a liberal Islamic discursive formation which poses a challenge to the existing scripturalist and fundamentalist alternatives." Modern Muslim theologians and thinkers are aware of the Straussian distinction between political philosophy and political theology.

According to Leo Strauss, [^21] political theology is made up of those teachings that are based on divine revelation, whereas political philosophy is limited to what is accessible to the unassisted human mind. Western political philosophy rejects any divine intervention in the historical and political process. Political philosophy, as advanced by Binder, is based on the notion that the best context for political action is that of a democracy.

Therefore, according to this view, the main assumptions, trends, and manifestations of political philosophy are sustained by a democracy. Binder contends that liberalism, as a political philosophy and Western ideological formation, is viable in the contemporary Muslim world, especially in the Middle East. He points out that "political liberalism can exist only where and when its social and intellectual prerequisites exist ...

These preconditions already exist in the Middle East." [^22] Political liberalism rests on the fundamental assumption of the state-religion separation. Although the latter has been a de facto reality in many Middle East societies, Muslim theorists of contemporary state and politics have not appropriated it yet. It is clear that Binder does not question the inherent notions of superiority underlying modernization theories.