Customer Reviews

Islamic Human Rights and International Law

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A disturbing work by an international law attorney translator. Tracing the importance of custom in Islamic law, which he asserts has incorporated many ancient tribal and traditional Arab cultural elements in the Sharia, Roberts lays out a view of traditional Islam as a tightly interconnected and internally coherent network of legal, political, religious, and cultural traits that are largely immune to external influence. This internal coherence, he states, is strengthened by a tradition that emphasizes literal interpretation of the Quran to a far greater degree than is found in other religions such as Christianity, making Islam "highly resistant to altered interpretation" or "reification into abstract principles." Stating that Islam and the Sharia are ultimately inseparable, Roberts claims that, contrary to the "wishful thinking of religious liberals," Islam "cannot be de-textualized," and supplies a wealth of facts, densely footnoted and referenced, that illustrate the deep incompatibility of Islamic culture and values with the modern West.

Lamenting American efforts to halt the growth of fundamentalist Islam with naked force and a "human rights offensive," which Roberts claims is corrupting international law and re-defining human rights in ways that guarantee future conflict, he ends by warning that demographic changes are leading to the "secret suicide" of the West, and constitute the "secret weapon" of the Islamic world. If Roberts is even partially correct, then the West and America may have entered a perpetual Cold War with time on the side of their sworn enemies. For the West--and especially America--a bleak future indeed.

Book was written within an academic perspective. Certainly did not suffice for my need of knowing more about islamic law