Abdolkarim Soroush Quotes
Religion forbids us from assuming a God-like character. This is especially true in politics and government, where limiting the power of the state, division of powers, and the doctrine of checks and balances are established in order to prevent accumulation of power that might lead to such Godly claims.
Soroush, Abdolkarim. Reason, Freedom, and Democracy in Islam: Essential Writings of 'Abdolkarim Soroush. Translated by Mahmoud Sadri and Ahmad Sadri, Oxford UP, 2000, p. 153.
Commenting on the concept of democracy and it's lack of Biblical justification:
Abdolkarim Soroush, is an Iranian Islamic thinker, reformer, Rumi scholar, public intellectual, and a former professor of philosophy at the University of Tehran and Imam Khomeini International University. He is arguably the most influential figure in the religious intellectual movement of Iran. Soroush is currently a visiting scholar at the University of Maryland in College Park, MD. He was also affiliated with other prestigious institutions, including Harvard, Princeton, Yale, Columbia, the Leiden-based International Institute as a visiting professor for the Study of Islam in the Modern World (ISIM) and the Wissenschaftskolleg in Berlin. He was named by TIME as one of the world’s 100 most influential people in 2005, and by Prospect magazine as one of the most influential intellectuals in the world in 2008. Soroush's ideas, founded on Relativism, prompted both supporters and critics to compare his role in reforming Islam to that of Martin Luther in reforming Christianity.
