No True Islam?

Imagine if I you and a friend were arguing about whether it's morally wrong to murder someone, and then suddenly your friend shouts "well, there's no one true morality!", undermining any further discussion on the subject. 

Absurd, right? Also, not very common. It's rare to find anyone who would seriously take this position. However, when it comes to religious beliefs -- particularly Islam -- critics and supporters alike tend to invoke the idea of "no true Islam". And why is this a problem?

Because a bunch of mutually exclusive interpretations placed under one umbrella does not make a coherent concept. For instance, you cannot believe Islam simultaneously approves of and condemns terrorism. You cannot believe Islam simultaneously rejects the idea of the Qur'an being divine and promotes it. Contradictions aren't rational nor do they possess any meaning. 

In other words, saying there is "no true Islam" is like believing there's such a thing as a 'married bachelor' or that 2 + 2 = 5 -- because you feel like it. 

But why do critics, and allies alike, invoke this standard? The answer is quite simple: because it's the easiest way to legitimize their own interpretations of Islam while disregarding all criticisms. 

Stuck trying to find evidence for your position? "There is no true Islam!"

Losing a debate? "There is no true Islam!"

Want to find an easy way to dismantle bigotry? "There is no true Islam!"

But this is intellectually lazy and fallacious thinking. And ironically, it does the exact opposite of what people want it to do. If your job is to prove that "Islam is evil", then you have to actually believe there is an 'Islam' to begin with that can be objectively understood as such. If you're job is to say that extremists "don't represent Islam", then saying "there is no true Islam" doesn't help your case at all -- it just empowers the extremists by making their interpretation another equally valid one. 

Islam is not whatever people want it to be. The fact that there are different interpretations does not necessitate that there is no one true or correct version. This idea of an unlimited pluralism of interpretations is just the musings of irrational postmodernist thinking. 

In summary: if Islam can be anything, then Islam is really nothing at all. So what are you attacking or defending?

Asadullah Ali