Mohammed Arkoun: for economic and political data to be reckoned with
For Arkoun, it is paramount to consider the cultural heritage keeping in mind all its historical and social manifestations, not just a selection thereof. It is in this way that it will be possible to take into account all the Muslims in the world no matter what their linguistic, cultural or historic references may be. Their cultural heritage must be perceived through its three great pillars, namely the Quran, the Hadith[1] and the Sharia through which jurists have over the years sought to implement “God's commandments”. Each of these elements must be reset within the historical, sociological and anthropological data that attended to them, which means taking religious data into account but within the context of political and economic data. Arkoun admits that the challenges set by this approach are considerable given that “the religion” has always been set apart. Arkoun insists that a historian should study gone-by times as if he were an anthropologist or an archaeologist, fathoming their depths in order to understand them as though he actually lived through them. He should also position himself in regard to this past history and bring it alive thanks to modern methodology, rather than offering the image of long gone epochs, dead, over and done with.
