ENGAGING THE HERMENEUTICS OF SUSPICION ABOUT ISLAMIC FAITH AND PRACTICE

International experience with Islamist extremism such as that by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) requires both Muslims and non-Muslims to question what is essential to Islamic belief, especially if the religion is to overcome a suspicion now widely manifest in the polemics that articulate public perceptions and influence foreign and domestic security policy. Here this issue is engaged as a problem of epistemology, i.e., as a problem of intellectual and moral discernment, insofar as there is serious and unsettled concern today about the distinction of "good" Muslim and "bad" Muslim. Such distinction is to be made foremost by practicing Muslims faced with the task of clarification of Islam as religious experience and as a key element of contemporary identity. It is suggested, in conclusion, that the interpretive position of Nasr Abû Zayd provides an important avenue for epistemological clarification and, indeed, a call for an "Islamic Reformation."