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VOLUME 8:

This book, the last in this series, deals with a country that has 60 million plus Christians and 60 million plus Muslims. No other country has this kind of configuration without both being overshadowed by even larger majorities. In Nigeria, they are two equal majorities staring each other in the face. That makes this country, more than any Muslim or “Christian” country the most strategic laboratory or test case for what it takes for these two peoples and religions to live in harmony

Earlier volumes have explored various aspects of the relations between them. Issues of violence, secularism, tolerance, pluralism and Muslim law have all come under the microscope. Adherents are strongly encouraged to give a listening ear to their counterparts, feel their pain, consider their proposals, and then put their best foot forward to give each other a chance to prove themselves.

The Boer proposals or parameters emerge from a combination of Nigerian Christian and Muslim perspectives explored and analyzed in this series, filtered through the perspective of the Dutch school of thought referred to as Kuyperianism. This is a dynamic tradition that recognizes as its founder the philosopher/theologian/journalist/educator/politician/social activist/revivalist Abraham Kuyper (1837-1920), about whom you can read more in the Introduction to Volume 1 of this series, in Chapter 3 of this volume and on the Kuyperiana page of this website.

Let me take you behind the curtain of both this series and of this volume. When I began, I did not have a carefully worked out detailed plan for this series. It grew and occasionally took unexpected turns, sometimes for reasons of economy, but more often because of new developments, new research and new thoughts. As to the economic reasons, from the beginning I have been concerned that this book stay within reach of Nigerian readers. Since books in their traditional forms are expensive in Nigeria and difficult to distribute effectively, I have resorted to multiple formats.

This series, or most of it anyway, has been published in book form by different publishers in different countries, namely, Canada and Nigeria. They are obtainable from the publishers as well as online distributors such as Amazon.com and others. The second format in which they are available is the Companion CD-Rom, which contains all the volumes, including all the appendices that are not in the actual books. The third format is that of e-books, in which form they are free of charge. The availability of all these formats is explained below.

And now, an unexpected announcement: Volume 8 is divided into Part 1 and Part 2. Volume 8-2 is already published in all the formats described in the previous paragraph.

Volume 8-1 is not yet ready. It is not likely to appear in book format, but eventually it will appear in digital forms. There will be a link to it from this Islamic page. In fact, Chapter 1 is ready for such a link now. Please look for it. When the other two chapters of Part 1 are ready for publication, they will all be published on the CD as well as e-books.

For the content of both Parts 1 and 2, please scroll down to the Table of Contents. Part 1 is the Nigerian section of Volume 8. First of all, Chapter 1 is the one I have promised long ago in earlier volumes, namely an analysis of the Nigerian Muslim reaction to Christian critique of sharia. Chapter 2 contains the Nigerian Muslim proposals for living together in Nigeria, while Chapter 3 deals with the Nigerian Christian parallel. Thus, Vol. 8-1, like all previous volumes, represents the Nigerian voices. They could be described as systematized strings of direct and indirect quotations.

The hard copy Part 2, the part already published, contains my own reflections, parameters, suggestions, options and challenges. I do apologize for this development; it is the result of the world's economic melt down. At this point, I cannot promise you when the whole of Part I will appear. I am merely expressing the hope that it will – insha Allah.

I need to stress that this is different from what I promised in 8-2. There I wrote as if it were a done thing, ready to go. Alas, more work remains to be done on 8-1 than I envisioned at the time. But, hey, you already have eight volumes with a total of more than 2700 pages waiting for you to read! That’s more than most writers have accomplished on the subject by far! If you have read those all, then you already have read most of what may appear in 8-1, since it is already found in the preceding volumes, but in scattered form.

Actually you don't even have to buy one single hard copy of this series. If you have the hard copy of this volume in your hand, you have only the chapters dealing with my proposals and solutions. I believe they are as worthy of reading as they were of writing, but they give you only my parameters. If you have the 2010 edition of the CD in your hand, you hold the complete project. You do not need to buy anything else to access it all, appendices, chapters, volumes. The bottom line is that you are better off with the CD than with the hard copy volumes of this series, for it contains it all. But the latest development of the e-book format now puts it all at your fingertips at no cost. You can’t ask me for better treatment than that!

I want you to know that the lady who helped me put the e-book series together, Sabrina, did so “pro bono”, the term lawyers use when they volunteer their services free of charge. When she heard that the e-books would be available free of charge, she insisted that her services would also be free of charge. So, if you read these books as e-books, please thank Sabrina. And also thank < lulu.com > a publishing company that is hosting this series free of charge. You see that a lot of sacrifice went into making these books available free of charge – a value of $311.50! I will not even begin to mention the energy and finances it cost me, the writer, to put all this together.

And now I need to explain the shape of Part 1. After much consideration, I decided to turn the entire Part 1 into appendices. So, Chapter 1 is Appendix 1. But the chapter has generated its own appendices. These are numbered Appendix 2-5. Chapter 2 became Appendix 6, while the appendices it generated are numbers 7-34. Chapter 3 became Appendix 35, while the appendices it generated are numbers 36-69. Finally, Part 2 is divided into normal chapters and has generated its own numerous appendices numbers.

I refer to the main or root appendices, namely numbers 1, 6 and 35 as “Chapter-Appendices” to distinguish them from those they generated. Thus, please note the following:

APPENDIX 1 can also be considered Part 1, Chapter 1.

• Title: "Muslim Reactions to Christian Critique of Sharia."
• Appendix 2-5 are generated by Appendix 1 and support that root "chapter-appendix."

APPENDIX 6 can also be considered Part 1, Chapter 2.

• Title: "Muslim Proposals and Solutions."
• Appendix 7-34 are generated by Appendix 6 and support that "chapter-appendix."

APPENDIX 35 can also be considered Part 1, Chapter 3.

• Title: "Christian Proposals and Solutions."
• Appendix 36-69 are generated by Appendix 35 and support that "chapter-appendix."

APPENDIX 70-104 are generated by chapters 1-11 of Volume 8-2.

NOTE: The list of appendices that appears further down below includes all the appendices of both 8-1 and 8-2. At the time of this writing, Appendix 1, 6 and 35 are not yet ready for publication, but the appendices they generate are already in place. You can read them on the Companion CD-Rom and, in due time, in the e-book format, but not as hard copy. That will not happen.

(Eventually only on Companion CD and in e-book format)

Chapter 1—MUSLIM REACTIONS TO CHRISTIAN CRITIQUE OF SHARIA—Appendix 1

Chapter 2—MUSLIM PROPOSALS AND SOLUTIONS—Appendix 6

Chapter 3—CHRISTIAN PROPOSALS AND SOLUTIONS—Appendix 35

(In book, on Companion CD and as e-book)

Chapter 1—GENERAL INTRODUCTION—p. 17

• Housekeeping Details
• End Remarks to Reviewers and Readers

Chapter 2—INTRODUCTION TO PART 2—p. 31

Chapter 3—WORLDVIEW ISSUES—p. 43

• Kuyperian World View Recommended
• World Views
• Universality
• Wholistic Nature
• Secularism
• Religion/ World View and Culture
• Relations Between Cultural Sectors (Sovereignty of the Spheres)
• Individualism vs Collectivism and Communalism/ Ethnocentrism
• Pluralism
• 4. Religious Issues

Chapter 4—RELIGIOUS ISSUES—p. 89

• Introduction
• The Nature of Religion
• Creation Order and Ordinances
• Church/ Mosque: Institute and Organism
• The Human Mission
• The Image of God
• Responsibility of the Clergy
• Fundamentalism and Islam
• Ijtihad: Qur’anic Interpretation

Chapter 5—POLITICS AND RELIGION—p. 123

• Sharia: Religion or Politics?
• Introducing a New Church-Government Formula
• Church-Government Relations – Practical Problems
• Church as Organism in Society
• Inset: African Forum on Religion and Governance

Chapter 6—SAMPLE POLITICAL ISSUES—p. 165

• Introduction
• The Role of Government
• The Democracy Factor
• Pluralism and the Majority Factor
• Party Politics
• Pluralism and the Ethnic Factor
• Indigene vs Settler
• The Partiality Factor: Appointments, Promotions, Access
• Imperialist Factors
• Internal Colonialism
• External Threat
• A Programme of Radical Creativity
• Inset: Jonathan Chaplin – A Kuyperian Authority on Politics

Chapter 7—HUMAN RIGHTS AND RESPONSIBILITIES—p. 231

• Kuyperian Perspectives
• Islam and the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC)
• Rights, Community and Culture
• Freedom of Speech
• Freedom of Religion
• Conversion, Blasphemy, Apostasy, Persecution

Chapter 8—FAMILY AND GENDER ISSUES—p. 289

• General Status and Role of Women
• Abductions and Forced Marriages
• Moral Issues and the Question of (De-)Regulation
• Gender Separation
• Dress Codes, Fashions, Modesty

Chapter 9—BANKING AND RELIGION—p. 313

• The Islamic Banking System
• Attitude Shifts Towards Interest
• Sharia, Islamisation, Terrorism
• Nigeria’s Interaction with OIC and Islamic Development Bank
• Inset: Patrick Sookhdeo
• Miscellaneous Banking Issues
• Closing Comments

Chapter 10—SHARIA AND OTHER LEGAL CONSIDERATIONS—p. 341

• The Constitution Factor
• Religious Background to Nigeria’s Laws
• Implications to the Christian Background to Common Law
• Law and Culture
• Distorted Legal Systems
• Double Imposition; Double Repugnancy
• Cultural Change vs Static Interpretation of Sharia
• Legal Pluralism
• Canon Law
• Adequacy of Penal Code
• Government Funding Religious Courts and Laws
• Apostasy and Blasphemy Laws
• Inset: In Dialogue with Philip Ostien

Chapter 11—FAREWELL!—p. 405

APPENDICES—p. 411

NOTE: Two abbreviations reoccur in this list: BZ – Before Zamfara State made its sharia declaration – end 1999. AZ – After Zamfara State made its sharia declaration.

APPENDIX 1 (Chapter 1, Part 1) – MUSLIM REACTIONS TO CHRISTIAN CRITIQUE OF SHARIA

APPENDIX 6 (Chapter 2, Part 1) – MUSLIM PROPOSALS AND SOLUTIONS

APPENDIX 35 (Chapter 3, Part 1) – CHRISTIAN PROPOSALS AND SOLUTIONS

ENDNOTES—p. 421

BIBLIOGRAPHY—p. 475

INDEX—p. 541