The Islamic Secular and the End of History: A Reply to Professor Mohammad Fadel

Abstract

This article constitutes Sherman A. Jackson's reply to Mohammad Fadel's critical review of his book The Islamic Secular . Jackson argues that Fadel's review is shaped by a prior set of ideological commitments—centered on the normative status of the modern secular democratic state and legal monism, mediated through Rawlsian political liberalism—which causes the book's actual thesis to be displaced by Fadel's preferred narrative. Proceeding page by page, Jackson reaffirms that the "Islamic Secular" rests on the shar'ī/non-shar'ī distinction, a mode of differentiation rooted in classical and post-formative Islamic juristic tradition rather than an import from Western secularism, and that it does not seek to curtail religion's scope but simply demarcates non-shar'ī domains as equally Islamic. The article addresses, in turn, Fadel's objections concerning the relationship between siyāsa and sharī'ah, the historical viability of empire-state legal pluralism, the distinction between "formal equality" and "equality of respect," the jurispathic tendencies of the modern state, and Jackson's critique of Andrew March's treatment of liberal democracy, contending that Fadel's readings consistently import Rawlsian presuppositions that obscure rather than clarify the book's central argument.