Archives for the ‘ Works By Soroush ’ Category

The Merciless Blade of Vilification

By • Oct 1st, 2008 • Category: Works By Soroush

I have the impression that Morad Farhadpour doesn’t attach as much importance to “thoughts” as to peripheral issues. Let me put it more plainly: He doesn’t have the courage to take on thoughts or the competence for learned criticism. And he wraps this lack of courage and competence in a veneer of tirades about motives, […]



Religious Pluralism: Kadivar, Soroush Debate

By • Apr 9th, 2008 • Category: Works By Soroush

Part I of discussion between Hojjat ol‑Eslam Mohsen Kadivar and Dr. Abdolkarim Soroush {The question of pluralism is one of the discussions that has found its way in recent years into religious studies fields in our country and has recently prompted various arguments. SALAM newspaper, in connection with expanding the foundations of Islamic thought and […]



Milk and Sugar

By • Feb 1st, 2008 • Category: Works By Soroush

On the Pretext of Religious Intellectualism It would appear that religious intellectualism has turned into a weight, otherwise they wouldn’t be sending their henchmen into the ring to knock it down. Recently, one of the knockers wrote a disquisition in which he likened religious intellectualism to three things in order to prove its impossibility to […]



Militant Secularism

By • Aug 1st, 2007 • Category: Works By Soroush

Secularism was supposed to have been capable of digesting religions; not to turn into a religion in its own right that banishes some other religions. Was this not the objection to religions after all?  That an Islamic State, for example, does not treat Jews or Christians well, that it does not view them as equals, […]



Sense and Nonsense

By • Jul 11th, 2007 • Category: Works By Soroush

(About the Cultural Revolution Again)   The fact of the matter is that I still don’t know what the quarrel is about. Hasn’t it become clear yet that “the Cultural Revolution” was one thing and “the Cultural Revolution Institute” another thing? Has it still not become clear that Abdulkarim Soroush, Habibi, Bahonar, etc. played a […]



The Relationship between the Mathnawi and the Qur’an

By • May 9th, 2007 • Category: Works By Soroush

Istanbul May 9th, 2007 Every inch of the Mathnawi reveals that Jalal-al-Din Rumi, the ardent mystic, was deeply attached to the Qur’an. In the Mathnawi as a whole, there are more than two thousand instances in which the verses of the Qur’an have been cited or meanings and words derived from it. Perhaps only Abu-Hamid […]



On Reason

By • Mar 23rd, 2007 • Category: Works By Soroush

Extracting general rulings from the heart of “absolute, a-historical reason” and considering them applicable to all people in all ages has become more difficult today. Humanity has now arrived at a healthy and beneficial pluralism and relativism, the fruit of which is modesty and the rejection of dogmatism – writes the great Iranian philosopher Abdolkarim […]



Dr Soroush Criticizes the Pope’s Remarks

By • Oct 6th, 2006 • Category: Works By Soroush

During a private visit to Mashhad, Dr Abdulkarim Soroush has commented on the Pope’s recent remarks. Dr Soroush was speaking at a gathering of friends and students in Mashhad on Thursday 21 September. He began by mentioning some of the differences between the new Pope and the old Pope, and said: The old Pope had […]



Whither Religion in the Modern Age?

By • Aug 16th, 2006 • Category: Works By Soroush

In the Name of God [The paper below was to have been presented by Dr. Soroush at a conference in Tehran on religion and modernity.  In the event, it was read out by his son, because Dr. Soroush was told by the authorities that ‘they could not guarantee his security if he attended the conference’.] […]



Islam and Democracy

By • Dec 2nd, 2004 • Category: Works By Soroush

Abstract of Dr. Soroush’s Speech in the’ Islam and Democracy’ conference in Mashhad We better make at the outset a preliminary distinction between Political (otherwise called Minimal, Procedural or Formal) democracy and the Liberal democracy. Whereas the former is less problematic in terms of compatibility with Islam the latter creates all sorts of problems and questions. […]