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Questions: 1.Discuss Muhammad Husayn Haykals biography of Muhammad as an important modern attempt to retrieve the example of the Prophet Muhammad for life in modern society. 2.Compare the arguments of Ayatollah Khomeini and Abul Ala Maududi on the necessity and the nature of Islamic government. 3.Discuss the significance of Muhammad Abduh for bringing about Islamic renewal as a vehicle to create a modern Egyptian society. Answers: 1.The author Husayn Haykal has presented the life and teachings of the Islamic Prophet Mohammad in a very rational and modern method, with great knowledge. The Life of Muhammad is one of the most highly regarded life narrative of the Prophet that makes a balance between the two aspects of miracles that he made happen, and the human and practical part of the person which includes his daily chores. The author has established him as the most loving, most forgiving, and perfect person. (Haykal, 1976). The author begins the book with the remarks on the relationship pattern of the Muslims and the Christians, which are the worlds two greatest faith in numbers and the Haykal has expressed his wonder about the fact that in spitye of so much similarities in the holy books of these two religions how there can be any point of conflict between the two groups, and how can there be war. There are many sections of Islamic scholars which are orthodox and hardline and they view the life of the Prophet as a miracle person and not as a human being, and they try to react the super human aspect of the prophet (Fitzpatrick Walker, 2014). However, this author has given more importance on the aspect of the prophet which is more of a human being, this following the narrative of rationality, and scientific explanations of Islam as a religion and Prophet Muhammad as a human being. Example of such a difference in narrative between the orthodox writers and him may be given by the incident of the journey of the Prophet to Jerusalem overnight, this has been identified by most of the orthodox Islamic scholars as done physically by Muhammad. Haykal on the other hand expressed that the journey was done in spirit by the Prophet. Haykal wrote Those who believe that al Isrd' took place in spirit do not find such reports unbelievable now that science in our own days has confirmed the poss ibility of hypnotism and of the hypnotized one to report about events far removed from him. For a spirit holding in unity and presence the spiritual life of the universe in toto, for one so endowed with vision and power so as to penetrate the secret of all life from eternity to eternity, such a feat is not at all surprising. Haykal consciously and intentionally rejected those aspects of the faith that reflects irrationality, superstitions and out of the realm of modern scientific explanation and sensibility. He has stated that the religion is most scientific and modern religion. The writer had understood the fact the modern society is slowly moving to the age where everything needs to9 be supported by empirical facts and scientific evidences. The author understood that attemts to explain the religion in terms of vague ideas and miracles will be failure and it will rteult in the larger section of the population to reject the religion. Haykal has given all efforts endeavors in establishing islam as the most scientific, comprehensible and rational religion among all. The Prophet is depicted as a human being who is perfect in every senmse but in human terms, he is loving, he ius kind nad he is better than the rest in terms of these qualities. While he established the life of the Prophet as the ideal one, he also countered the criticisms made by many scholars about his marriages and invasions. The author is succesfull in explainming the life of prophet Muhammad in a very rational and sincere way. This book is one of the finest works on the life of the Prophet based on scientific facts and rationality. 2.The countries where the official religion is Islam is known as the Islamic states. In most of these states there is no permission for preaching any other religions in public sphere. The nature of the first modern Islamic state and its descriptions were delved out by scholar Abul Ala Mawdudi. He conceptualized the first modern definition Islamic state. There are two different perspectives given by Ayatollah Khomeini and the author who has been mentioned previously. Khomeinis idea of Islamic state is much more radical and extreme to some extent. The person also advocated forced conversion into Islam, which can be termed as Islamization (Gholizadeh Hook, 2012). On the other hand, Mawdudi did not prefer a system of forced conversion or Islamization of individual, rather he advocated Islamization of the society and the thought processes of the members of the society. He thought of the system where the social system will be designed in such a way that the people of the society will be f ollowing Islam naturally. In an Islamic society the main concepts and principles are Tawheed, Risala, and Khilafa, which means oneness with God, Prophet hood and Caliphate. These three are the main principles that drive an Islamic state. The Islamic government was clearly defined by Khomeini in his book Hokumat-e Islami: Velayat-e faqih. The author in this book has explained the urgent need for instituting Islamic states, and according to him such state will be administered by very strict Islamic laws. These laws may be including penalties such as execution when the religion or the Prophet is blasphemed. However, the author Mawdudi has given by philosophical reasoning, sovereignty of God and he has stated that the sources of all the laws on earth is God himself. A Muslim is only Muslim when he or she is perfectly following the faith and not just by birth. The Islamization of the individuals must be done by education and awareness instead of enforcing the Islamic way of life on the individuals (Mawdudi, 2016). According to Mawdudi the two very evil concepts of the modern world are secularism and socialism. These two concepts, he believed are the products of western imperialism. On the other hand, Khomeini has gone two steps further and stated that saying democracy as bad as prostitution. He has envisioned Islamic state where the Islamic laws or the Sharia law will be enforced by very strict authority (Leurs, 2012). Mawdudi believed that Sharia was the basis on which a Muslim society will essentially be Muslim in its nature. He has emphatically stated without the application of the laws of the Sharia the society is not an Islamic state. The Sharia law must be the only law and laws from other sources cannot be considered as law, and societies following laws from other sources are not Islamic state. 3.The contribution of Muhammad Abduh in Islam has been its reformation to modernism. The idea of Abduh is that if the modern Islamic followers continue to follow the very rigid systems and laws of the medieval era then it would be difficult for the religion to become popular and include new people into its realm. The ancient and medieval laws that are not in par with the modern rationality must be transformed or reformed according to need. Muhammad Abduh has stated that the intelligence of the human being is the key to understand and interprete the ancient philosophies and ideas into modern rational interpretation. Abduh has researched on understanding that why the quality of the Muslim society worldwide is declining and what are the factors that are contributing to such decline. One reason as identified by his is the gradual spread of un-Islamic systems and beliefs, and the Muslims of the present day world being stuck into the medieval belief systems. The scholar has believed that there is an urgent need of reformation in the Islamic theology otherwise it will be stagnant after sometime. Some of the older thoughts and systems needs to be re-interpreted and education of the larger section of the population will help in bringing such reformation. The scholar has divided the Islamic traditions into two divisions, the first one is known as Ibadat which are the inseparable customs of the Islamic religion and these cannot be reformed or changed in any situation to any extent. Muamlat is another part of the Islamic faith which deals with the social affairs and lifestyle of the people and these have scope of modernization or change. Abduh has stated that an absence of the clear comprehension of these two separate concepts has given rise to such stagnation in Islamic theology. He has played a very important role in bringing the much needed discussion of transformation within Islamic society. The importance of his proposition behind creating a modern Islamic state is that he endeavored in integrating scientific and rational theories with Islamic theology. Abduh stated that if the Quran is interpreted in the proper and perfect manner then there is no difference of opinion between rationality and Islamic philosophy (Amir, Shuriye Ismail, 2012). He has stated that the Islamic religion is complete and self-sufficient and it has legal, medical, and social solutions for problems in human life. These aspects of the religion must be highlighted to the people in general so that the religion is seen in a positive light. The systems, the beliefs and the customs that are blocking the growth of this faith must be reformed. Muhammad Abduh also emphasized on establishing a friendly relationship among all the religions of the world. He said "I hope to see the two great religions, Islam and Christianity hand-in-hand, embracing each other. Then the Torah and the Bible and the Qur'an will become books supporting one another being read everywhere, and respected by every nation. He would be one of the notable scholars in the Islamic faith whose contribution n bringing modern reformation in the religion will be applauded in the future (Aksoy, 2015). References: Aksoy, N. (2015).Meeting the challenges of modernity as experienced by Said Nursi, Muhammad Iqbal and Muhammad Abduh. Rutgers The State University of New Jersey-New Brunswick. A'la Mawdudi, S. A. (2013).Towards Understanding Islam. Kube Publishing Ltd. A'la Mawdudi, S. A. (2016).Let us be Muslims. Kube Publishing Ltd. Amir, A. N., Shuriye, A. O., Ismail, A. F. (2012). Muhammad Abduhs Contributions to Modernity.Asian Journal Of Management Sciences And Education ISSN. Fitzpatrick, C., Walker, A. H. (Eds.). (2014).Muhammad in History, Thought, and Culture: An Encyclopedia of the Prophet of God [2 volumes]. ABC-CLIO. Gholizadeh, S., Hook, D. W. (2012). The discursive construction of the 19781979 Iranian Revolution in the speeches of Ayatollah Khomeini.Journal of Community Applied Social Psychology,22(2), 174-186. Haykal, M. H. (1976).The life of Muhammad. American Trust Publications. Leurs, R. (2012). Ayatollah Khomeini: The changing face of Islam.Estudos Em Comunicao N o 12, 25-45 Dezembro de 2012, Estudos em, 25-45