Quotes about Islamic Theocracy

Maajid Nawaz

Islamism is not Islam. Islamism is the politicisation of Islam, the desire to impose a version of this ancient faith over society.

Ruhollah Khomeini

Western governments have completely separated Islam from politics. They have cut off its head and given the rest to us.

The notion that Islam would be practiced by individuals was in the Ayatollah’s view insufficient. Islam must also control the government—the head.

Ali Khamenei

The foundations of [Islamic] religious democracy are different from Western democracy

They are so different that most people in the West think of what Khamenei describes as “religious democracy” as not even close to democracy—almost the antithesis of democracy, and Islamic fundamentalists perceive Western democracy as sinful and evil.

Fraser Anning

The truth is that Islam is not like any other faith. It is the religious equivalent of fascism.

Stanley Hauerwas

The very idea that you could have separation between mosque and state from Islam's perspective is the imposition on them of Christian practice. Islam doesn't really have a place for state. They are a universalistic faith like Christianity, but they think there is no country that bounds Islam.

Andrew Mango

Political Islam is exclusive in its claims.

Paul Nehlen

Islam is not a religion. It's a political system. It has a different set of rules.

Abul A'la Maududi

Islam leaves no room of human legislation in an Islamic state, because herein all legislative functions vest in God and the only function left for Muslims lies in their observance of the God-made law.

Yaroslav Trofimov

There is this political ideology in the Muslim world that says that nations should be ruled by religious law…. Mali and Senegal are the exceptions.

He covers the Middle East.

Marc Sageman

Far from representing a political system likely to attract increasing numbers of adherents, fundamentalist Islam has failed everywhere it has been tried.

In almost every election in those Islamic counties that have elections, the fundamentalist political parties almost always lose by large margins.

Michel Foucault

It is often said that definitions of Islamic government are imprecise. To me, however, they seemed to have a clarity that was completely familiar and also, it must be said, far from reassuring.

Willie Brown

The Ayatollah of the Assembly.

Ibn Khaldun

… religious and royal authority are united in Islam, so that the person in charge can devote the available strength to both religion and politics at the same time. The other religious groups do not have a universal mission

This is a very important quotation as it focused on one critical difference between historical Islam and all the other major religions and fundamentally on the separation between church and state. In Islam there was a Caliph who was both the political ruler and the religious ruler. In comparison at the time, the Christians had a Holy Roman Emperor who was theoretically the overlord of all the Christian Kings but in reality he really could not exercise total or even much authority over all the other kings. At the same time, there was the Pope who was the religious leader of all the Christians. Since the distinction between Church and state was constantly in flux, the Christian Pope and Holy Roman Emperor were often at odds. The third Abrahamic religion, Judaism, had neither a secular leader or a religious one and no hierarchy other than local. Khaldun observed the theoretical advantage of Theocracy as a model, however he did not analyze the disadvantages among which were the assassination of many Caliphs and the laces. Even the Muslim Arabic states abandoned the idea of a Caliph in modern times until Iran adopted a Theocracy with a single Leader all powerful. However, all the other Arab nations wanted no part of a singular leader for all Muslim nations or even a single civil and religious leader within any other country. Al Qaeda however claimed to be fighting for a return to a Caliphate not only for the current Islamic Nations but for all nations which must be subservient to Islam.

Brigitte Gabriel

In Islam, there is no difference between the state and the religion. The religion is the state, the state is the religion

Gabriel exaggerates in the sense that while the quotation is correct for many Muslims, it is by no means true of all. Iran for example is an Islamic theocracy, but Turkey is a 99 percent Muslim nation which is totally secular and in some ways is much more restrictive of Islamic teaching and practice than most secular democracies. The fundamentalist Muslim view of the state and religion is essentially the same as the ultra orthodox Jews and Christians. It is true that a greater proportion of Muslims believe in the merging of civil and religious law than Jews and Christians, but by no means all. The non Arab Muslims are much less likely to see the unity of state and religion.

Frank Gaffney

I don't believe there is such a thing as a moderate Islamist party. The challenge with Islamists is that they seek to impose what they call Sharia on everybody, Muslim and non-Muslim alike.

Maajid Nawaz

Islamism is an ideology that seeks to impose any version of Islam over society.

Mustafa Akyol

It is no secret that many Islamic movements in the Middle East tend to be authoritarian, and some of the so-called 'Islamic regimes' such as Saudi Arabia, Iran - and the worst case was the Taliban in Afghanistan - they are pretty authoritarian. No doubt about that.

V. S. Naipaul

Why do people willingly choose lives that restrict their intellectual freedom? What becomes of modern societies founded on Islam, whose strictest adherents long for a return to the time of Muhammad?

Geert Wilders

My view on Islam is that it is not so much a religion as a totalitarian political ideology with religious elements.

Joseph C. Wilson

There is Islam in politics in the Moslem world.

Maajid Nawaz

I became, suddenly, not just a Muslim in faith. I became a Muslim in politics. Somebody whose politics were pre-defined by one interpretation of Islam.

Fethullah Gulen

Islam's basic principles of belief, worship, morality, and behavior are not affected by changing times. Islam does not propose a certain unchangeable form of government or attempt to shape it. Islam has never offered nor established a theocracy in its name. Instead, Islam establishes fundamental principles that orient a government's general character.

Islamic Theocracy Quotes