Civil Religious Pluralism as Political Philosophy

Insights from Nurcholish Madjid

Kyle Justin Wisdom

• Publisher: De Gruyter
• Year: 2025
• eBook ISBN: 9783111324029
• Topic: Philosophie
• Subtopic: Moderne Philosophie

How can various religious traditions interact with the state and how can they engage with each other? Kyle Wisdom addresses this question via a dialog between the Muslim Indonesian philosopher Nurcholish Madjid and classical Western political philosophy.

Rather than accept a classical liberal position, Kyle Wisdom proposes Civil Religious Pluralism as a contribution to political philosophy. To develop this argument the author engages with three ideal types from Western political theory to show how the negotiation of authority has developed.

The argument for civil religious pluralism engages with classical theorists like Machiavelli, Hobbes, Locke, Spinoza and Rousseau; contemporary philosophers like Charles Taylor, Ronald Beiner, and John Rawls; as well as Islamic scholars like Maududi, Abdolkarim Soroush, Fazlur Rahman, and Nurcholish Madjid.

The author uses concepts and texts from these various writers to make his case following integrated themes that compare diverse approaches to political issues. Following themes of selfhood and identity, moral orders and social imaginaries, civil society and pluralism, and the administration of justice, the book proposes a robust engagement between traditions of all kinds which must necessarily inform the state.

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Frontmatter
• Contents
• Table of Abbreviations
• 1 What Does an Indonesian Muslim Have to Say to Political Theorists?
• 2 Theocracy, Liberalism, and Civil Religion in Political Philosophy
• 3 Selfhood, Identity and the Vitality of Public Religious Goods
• 4 Moral Orders, Social Imaginaries, and Their Interplay with Multiple Modernities
• 5 Civil Society, Pluralism, and the Critical Dialogue of Moral Orders
• 6 Moral Dialogue Leads to a Better Administration of Justice
• 7 Civil Religious Pluralism Is a Relevant Political Philosophy
• Index