PROFILES
The Wise Mufti
05 June 2008
Published in TIMESONLINE
There was nothing inaccurate about Tony Blair’s remarks to a conference on Islam yesterday. Nor was there much that was new; he has extolled the virtues and diversity of moderate British Muslims many times before. The contribution that deserved to be singled out for its courage and clarity came, instead, from Dr Ali Gomaa, the Grand Mufti of Egypt. His subject was Islamic law and governance, in which he is one of the world’s foremost experts, and his message was simple: ill-trained Islamic “scholars” who take it upon themselves to issue fatwas, or religious edicts, with little understanding of the contemporary world have no authority to do so. And extremists declaiming in mosques and via the internet that the only legitimate Islamic form of government is a restored “Caliphate”, such as that which stretched from Fez to Samarkand 500 years ago, are simply wrong.
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There was nothing inaccurate about Tony Blair’s remarks to a conference on Islam yesterday. Nor was there much that was new; he has extolled the virtues and diversity of moderate British Muslims many times before. The contribution that deserved to be singled out for its courage and clarity came, instead, from Dr Ali Gomaa, the Grand Mufti of Egypt. His subject was Islamic law and governance, in which he is one of the world’s foremost experts, and his message was simple: ill-trained Islamic “scholars” who take it upon themselves to issue fatwas, or religious edicts, with little understanding of the contemporary world have no authority to do so. And extremists declaiming in mosques and via the internet that the only legitimate Islamic form of government is a restored “Caliphate”, such as that which stretched from Fez to Samarkand 500 years ago, are simply wrong.
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Cairo Journal
06 March 2008
Published in US News and World
Report
By: Jay Tolson
As readers of this blog may know, I traveled to Cairo recently to interview Sheik Ali Gomaa, the grand mufti of Egypt, for a story that appears in the March 17 issue of U.S. News.
A scholar and jurist who studied and taught for many years at Cairo's venerable Al-Azhar University, Gomaa since 2003 has been head of the Dar al-Ifta (the house of fatwas), a government office charged with rendering nonbinding religious legal opinions on virtually any question that might arise in a Muslim's life. As grand mufti, Gomaa ranks second only to the Sheik of Al-Azhar in Egypt's official religious establishment, and he also has considerable influence in the wider Sunni Muslim world. I went specifically to learn more about his traditionalist approach to Islam and particularly Islamic sharia law, an approach that he claims provides the best antidote to the simplistic, puritanical versions of Islam that are the seedbed of radical and often violent Islamic extremism.
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By: Jay Tolson
As readers of this blog may know, I traveled to Cairo recently to interview Sheik Ali Gomaa, the grand mufti of Egypt, for a story that appears in the March 17 issue of U.S. News.
A scholar and jurist who studied and taught for many years at Cairo's venerable Al-Azhar University, Gomaa since 2003 has been head of the Dar al-Ifta (the house of fatwas), a government office charged with rendering nonbinding religious legal opinions on virtually any question that might arise in a Muslim's life. As grand mufti, Gomaa ranks second only to the Sheik of Al-Azhar in Egypt's official religious establishment, and he also has considerable influence in the wider Sunni Muslim world. I went specifically to learn more about his traditionalist approach to Islam and particularly Islamic sharia law, an approach that he claims provides the best antidote to the simplistic, puritanical versions of Islam that are the seedbed of radical and often violent Islamic extremism.
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Meeting Egypt's Grand Mufti
19 February 2008
Published in US News and World
Report
By: Jay Tolson
I set off to Cairo this week to meet and interview a man who is considered to be one of the most influential voices of moderation in the Islamic world. His name is Ali Gomaa, and he is the grand mufti of Egypt, a leading scholar of jurisprudence and head of the Dar Al-Iftah (literally, the House of Fatwas), a state-sanctioned body that issues religious judgments on matters ranging from employment and finance to gender relations to, well, just about anything of importance in a Muslim's life. In terms of religious authority in Egypt, and indeed within the larger Sunni Muslim world, the grand mufti ranks second only to the grand sheik of Cairo's Al-Azhar University, perhaps the foremost center of Sunni Islamic learning.
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By: Jay Tolson
I set off to Cairo this week to meet and interview a man who is considered to be one of the most influential voices of moderation in the Islamic world. His name is Ali Gomaa, and he is the grand mufti of Egypt, a leading scholar of jurisprudence and head of the Dar Al-Iftah (literally, the House of Fatwas), a state-sanctioned body that issues religious judgments on matters ranging from employment and finance to gender relations to, well, just about anything of importance in a Muslim's life. In terms of religious authority in Egypt, and indeed within the larger Sunni Muslim world, the grand mufti ranks second only to the grand sheik of Cairo's Al-Azhar University, perhaps the foremost center of Sunni Islamic learning.
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The Peoples Mufti
01 October 2007
Published in Egypt Today
October 2007
I’VE MET THE mufti before, but always in a secondary capacity, and never had I been the sole object of the undivided attention of a man known to be scarily intelligent and blunt, with a short attention span for fools.
Our interview was scheduled for noon, and at 11:30 on the dot I was at Dar Al-Ifta, the nation’s —and, by extension, Sunni Islam’s —highest body for the interpretation of religious law. I was shepherded into a very small side office where the photographer and I struck up a conversation with the two men. An hour later we were still there, having progressed from drinking tea to a debate about the nature of preaching and what makes a sheikh a good sheikh.
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October 2007
I’VE MET THE mufti before, but always in a secondary capacity, and never had I been the sole object of the undivided attention of a man known to be scarily intelligent and blunt, with a short attention span for fools.
Our interview was scheduled for noon, and at 11:30 on the dot I was at Dar Al-Ifta, the nation’s —and, by extension, Sunni Islam’s —highest body for the interpretation of religious law. I was shepherded into a very small side office where the photographer and I struck up a conversation with the two men. An hour later we were still there, having progressed from drinking tea to a debate about the nature of preaching and what makes a sheikh a good sheikh.
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Ali Gomaa: Bridges of Understanding
04 July 2007
Published in Al-Ahram
28 June - 4 July 2007
Credible eminence is the challenge faced by any grand mufti in this day and age, and while one might choose to abide by a fatwa of his -- a fatwa, as he is eager to point out, is but a legal opinion on a specific topic, by no means binding to everyone in the Muslim community -- there is no denying the love and respect Sheikh Ali Gomaa inspires, nor the fact that, however lightly the media have taken some of his fatwas, he embodies hope in a progressive and tolerant future, counterpointing many and varying hardline views. He comes at the start of millennium, and for those Muslims who respond to him, at least, he is the right man at the right time. Though perfectly orthodox, Sheikh Gomaa is sufficiently aware of perspective and context to answer questions about daily life, politics, economics, women's status, sociology, science, astronomy, sports and art in a breathtakingly modern spirit, demonstrating as much familiarity with the secular as with the religious world. His responses testify to the ability to formulate a vision which, orthodox in its roots and form, is nonetheless modern in outlook and content. A Sufi, globally-oriented, Sheikh Gomaa is a multilingual orator, a professor in the modern sense as well as a religious scholar, a writer, television presenter, a husband and a father. And, controversial as he has proved to be, he is intent on preaching his message wherever he happens to be in the world, regardless of how it rings with government figures or other religious authorities.
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28 June - 4 July 2007
Credible eminence is the challenge faced by any grand mufti in this day and age, and while one might choose to abide by a fatwa of his -- a fatwa, as he is eager to point out, is but a legal opinion on a specific topic, by no means binding to everyone in the Muslim community -- there is no denying the love and respect Sheikh Ali Gomaa inspires, nor the fact that, however lightly the media have taken some of his fatwas, he embodies hope in a progressive and tolerant future, counterpointing many and varying hardline views. He comes at the start of millennium, and for those Muslims who respond to him, at least, he is the right man at the right time. Though perfectly orthodox, Sheikh Gomaa is sufficiently aware of perspective and context to answer questions about daily life, politics, economics, women's status, sociology, science, astronomy, sports and art in a breathtakingly modern spirit, demonstrating as much familiarity with the secular as with the religious world. His responses testify to the ability to formulate a vision which, orthodox in its roots and form, is nonetheless modern in outlook and content. A Sufi, globally-oriented, Sheikh Gomaa is a multilingual orator, a professor in the modern sense as well as a religious scholar, a writer, television presenter, a husband and a father. And, controversial as he has proved to be, he is intent on preaching his message wherever he happens to be in the world, regardless of how it rings with government figures or other religious authorities.
Read More...