"The major problems of the Muslim world are five in number. Their identity is hardly ever the object of dispute among modern Islamists. They are: sufism, taqlid, colonialism, disunity and secularism. Certainly they are inter-related and they do enhance one another. By sufism, we do not mean the pietism of spiritualism of Islam, but rather, the charlatanism which masqueraded under the name with its replacement of rational knowledge with kashaf and its advocacy of karamat, tawakul, qismat, fana', dhikr and ta'ah. Pursuit of the hal or mystical union with God through a self-conducted trance, together with sufi pantheism, blurring Islam's ethical notions. Sufism is by definition subjectivist, and can lead only to individual ethics which is necessarily anti-world, i.e.. world denying.
Taqlid is fluid following of the ancestors; its characteristics are literalism, uncreativity, laziness, lethargy and a state of demobilisation. Colonialism, which hardly needs to be defined comes next. In whatever shape or form - it dons a new form every day - it is a tremendously satanic power
working
against us.
Finally, the division of the Muslim society itself which together with secularism - the
seeking of personal and social values elsewhere than in the Qur'an and Sunnah, has created a problem of massive dimension. "
[Ismail Al-Faruqi, Modern Islamic Movements : Models, Problems and Prospects, IIUM, Kuala Lumpur, 2000, p. 13]
Let us ponder on the above quote by an intellectual which resonates with my sentiments.
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