NOTES ON ISLAM AND DEVELOPMENT

In the present paper we are not concerned with a religious appreciation or a theological judgment of Islam, or parts of it. Our starting-point is that of the study of religion, as carried out in history and phenomenology, in sociology and anthropology, in psychology or other disciplines like the study of literature, art and also economy. We are concerned with what Muslims believe about God and His revelation, but instead of giving an opinion we rather listen to what they say about Islam in a time of rapid change which affects all religions of mankind. In these pages we shall deal, after a more general introduction about the Muslims' world (I), first with what Muslims have to say about their own development and some new interpretations of Islam which correspond with it (II). In the second place we shall take into consideration what some specialists have to say about the development of Muslim countries and the role of Islam therein (III).In both cases, of course, we shall have to restrict ourselves to examples referring to some specific countries. In the third place we shall deal with what Christians who are living together with Muslims in Third World countries have to say about "Islam and Development". On closer consideration, however, it became evident that hardly anything on this subject has been written by them, so that this section had to remain rather short (IV). The "Notes" end with some considerations on development and religion in general, including Islam and Christianity (V).