July 20, 2011

Fethullah Gülen's Search for a Middle Way between Modernity and Muslim Tradition

Ahmet T. Kuru *

Are the constant and allegedly transcendental principles of religion compatible with ever changing human experiences? This question has been at the center of the debates about the relationship between religion and modernity, in general, Islam and modernity, in particular. The answer of many modernists has been negative. Modernization and secularization theorists had claimed that religion was a traditional phenomenon which would eventually wither away (Inkeles and Smith 1976, 27-28). According to these theorists, there was a dichotomy between modernity and Muslim tradition (Stark and Finke 2000, 1-82). Therefore, Muslims should choose "Mecca or mechanization" (Lerner 1958, 405).