His Majesty King Abdullah on Saturday said addressing disunity among Muslims is the first step towards protecting and uniting the Islamic nation.

“Without this, it would be unreasonable to call for the solidarity and cooperation of Muslims, countries and peoples, on the basis that we are one nation,” he told the 17th annual Islamic Fiqh Academy Conference, which opened on Saturday.

In the speech, which was delivered on his behalf by HRH Prince Ghazi, personal envoy and special adviser to the King, king Abdullah urged hundreds of eminent Muslim scholars from 43 countries to fight takfiri ideology and fatwas (religious edicts) issued by ineligible individuals and groups.

“If there are those among us who declare the adherents of any madhahib an apostate, or who dare to issue fatwas without being qualified or who do not respect the sanctity of Muslim blood, honour and property, then there should be those who stand up to all these matters that fracture the nation and abuse our faith,” the King said.

He said Jordan is hosting the high-profile meeting at a time when the Muslim nation is going through a crucial stage of its history, “an era that challenges and threatens its existence, identity and civilisation. This places on the nation's ulama (scholars) and fuqaha (Islamic jurists) an additional and tremendous responsibility.”

The King highlighted the academy's new responsibilities, citing recommendations made at the third extraordinary session of the OIC in Mecca at the end of last year, when the OIC called upon the academy “to emphasise the importance of dialogue among the adherents of madhahib (schools of fiqh), of the commitment to moderation and tolerance and of confronting religious edicts (fatwas) that distance Muslims from the immutable principles of the Islamic faith and all that has been established by the madhahib.”

In his speech, King Abdullah also referred to the Amman Message and the International Islamic Conference held in Amman last summer.

“Our sense of responsibility and duty as members of Al al Bayt... led us to issue the Amman Message which defines for the world the essence of our faith and counters all that distorts our faith, whether it be ignorance, hatred, or wrongful practices by some in the name of Islam... We invited [to the July conference] the nation's ulama and fuqaha to meet on the principles and rules carried in the Amman Message... After listening to more than twenty fatwas issued by a number of fiqh authorities in the Muslim world, the scholars stated in the final recommendations that all eight madhahib must be respected and that whosoever is an adherent to any of the eight madhahib is a Muslim whose blood, honour and property are sacrosanct.”

The Fiqh Academy members and other scholars started discussions on working papers focusing on the unity of the Muslim nation regardless of the diversity in its schools of fiqh, the eligibility for issuing fatwas and Islam's position on extremism and terrorism.

During the five-day conference, they will also discuss how Muslim communities outside the Islamic world can strike a balance between the constants of their faith and their duties as citizens in non-Muslim countries.

The Jordan Times