For analytical purposes...

For analytical purposes, one could talk of this universal religious phenomenon in the following terms: (1) Islam as metaphysics; (2) Islam as civilization (it means different things to different people); (3) Islam as the "other." I would venture to argue that the history of the modern Muslim people has been highly intertwined with that of the West.

And, therefore, modern Islam cannot be understood except in relation to the modern West and all the movements that constituted this modern West, be they philosophical, cultural, economic, political, and military. We can delineate three moments or phases in the interaction between modern Islam and the West: (1) the first is the military conquest of Muslim lands by Western powers. Muslims were weak militarily and politically.

Their only response was to seek refuge in Islam as the source of their strength. (2) The second phase witnesses the translation of European hegemony into a cultural and religious system. This phase is distinguished by the building of Western educational, cultural, and legal institutions that begin to replace the traditional Islamic ones. This is the phase of westernization.

The third phase is that of post-colonialism, one distinguishing feature of which is the rise of both nationalism and religious revivalism. What are the main premises of "resurgent Islam?" The following are some basic characteristics. (1) Islamic resurgence has emphasized the role of reason in Muslim legal theory, and called for a renaissance of Islam in the modern world on the basis of a reactivation of ijtihad in the religious and legal sciences.

The Muslims can achieve the ideals of Islam as a religion, as a Shari'ah and as a state, by opening the door of ijtihad. Furthermore, the neglect of ijtihad led some Muslims to become ignorant of Islam, and others to be attached to westernization and atheism.

(2) Second, Islamic revivalism has called for the reconstruction of the notion of authority, of the Islamic nation, which is a gradual "reconstitution of the Muslim Ummah," and the building of a comprehensive system of Islamic law, government, education, and ethics in the modern world. The reconstitution of the Ummah in the modern world was possible, if there were "a return" to the original sources of Islam. (3) Third, it has called for the reconstruction of the sources of knowledge.

The Qur'an and the Sunnah were the only sources recognized.