Secularism and Human Rights: Is There More to Life?
Human rights are not, and cannot be, grounded in religious conviction. Such a contention is factually and historically mistaken, and it is conceptually imperialistic. The human rights ideology is a fully secular and rational ideology whose very promise ofsuccess as a universal ideology depends on its secularity and rationality. No one can expect merger or full comfortable cooperation between religious and human rights organizations.

Here, Henkin is representing a secular approach. If the secularists are willing to make such clear and unequivocal statements, it is high time that the Muslims also recognize that such is truly the case. One can argue that two distinct religions or ideologies are being spoken about when comparing the contemporary human rights doctrine with Islam. It will not work if one tries to bend Islam such that it fits the contemporary human rights schemes, in particular the more extreme versions of it, nor will it work if one tries to bend and manipulate the human rights platform to fit with Islam. In both cases, the contradictions and illogical arguments will be such that it will weaken the resolve of all concerned.

Later, actually, Henkin completely contradicts himself probably because his conception of religion or ideology is very restricted. At the same time, he points out a very important reality: the contemporary human rights schemes cannot offer humankind all of what it needs.


He writes,
In fact, however, the idea of rights is not, and does not claim to be, a complete, all-embracing ideology. It is not, in fact, in competition with other ideologies. Religion explains and comforts; tradition supports; development builds. The human rights idea does none of these. In today's world—and tomorrow's—there may be no less need for what religions and traditions have always promised and provided. Representatives of religion have been right to reject any claims for human rights as a total ideology. Human rights—cold rights—do not provide warmth, belonging, fitting, significance, do not exclude the need for love, friendship, family, charity, sympathy, devotion, sanctity, or for expiation, atonement, forgiveness. But if human rights may not be sufficient, they are at least necessary. If they do not bring kindness to the familiar, they bring—as religions have often failed to do—respect for the stranger. Human rights are not a complete, alternative ideology, but are a floor, necessary to allow other values—includingreligions—to flourish. Human rights not only protect religions but have come to serve religious ethics in respects and contexts where religion itselfhas sometimes proved insufficient. Human rights are, at least, a supplemental "theology" for pluralistic, urban, secular societies. There, religions can accept if not adopt the human rights idea as an affirmation of their own values, and can devote themselves to the larger, deeper areas beyond the common denominator of human rights. Religions can provide, as the human rights idea does not adequately provide, for the tensions between rights and responsibilities, between individual and community, between the material and the spirit.  

Henkin is recognizing the vacuum of the human rights paradigm but, at the same time, he is failing to recognize that once the authority of religion is undermined, then the religion can actually no longer fulfill the other roles that he is describing in the passage. By accepting the human rights doctrines as paramount over the religious doctrine, what does it then mean to be worshipping and submitting to God? An individual cannot have two gods or two ultimate authorities in his heart. As An-Na’im once said, “The most serious objection to secularism as the foundation of the universality of human rights is its inability to inspire or motivate believers, who are the vast majority of the world.”  Similarly, those believers will not be willing to relegate their belief system to a secondary role, second to the demands of the human rights paradigm.

Unless, of course, as a secularist, Henkin is thinking of religion from a secularist perspective. “Religion” simply provides those other aspects, like “comfort” but it does not provide a complete way of life. In this way, the human rights advocate is once again, ironically, forcing his view of religion upon others in the name of universal human rights. This simply cannot work and is illogical in its premise.

Eventually, one must reign supreme: the secular theology of the human rights movement or the theology of one’s religion.


There is a definitely a “theology” behind the human rights movement:
Max Horkheimer, an early exponent ofthe critical theory ofthe Frankfurt Institute for Social Research, and an existentialist and atheist, suggested that “behind every genuine human endeavour stands a theology.” He argues that a political and ethical paradigm that “does not preserve a theological moment in itself, no matter how skilful, in the last analysis is mere business.”

This “theology” behind the human rights movement cannot take a back seat to any other type of theology. In the words of Donnelly,
If human rights are the rights one has simply because one is a human being, as they usually are thought to be, then they are held “universally,” by all human beings. They also hold “universally” against all other persons and institutions. As the highest moral rights, they regulate the fundamental structures and practices of political life, and in ordinary circumstances they take priority over other moral, legal, and political claims. These dimensions encompass what I call the moral universality of human rights.

One can find these admissions throughout the theoretical literature on human rights but one has to be a devoted researcher to find them. They are not part of the message that the human rights proponents are stating to the masses when they speak of their glorious human rights platform.


This “secular religion” of human rights has become the religion of contemporary times. In the words of Ignatieff,
Fifty years after its proclamation, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights has become the sacred text of what Elie Wiesel has called a “Worldwide secular religion.’ UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has called the Declaration the “yardstick by which we measure human progress.” Nobel Laureate Nadine Gordimer has described it as “the essential document, the touchstone, the creed of humanity that surely sums up all other creeds directing human behavior.” Human rights has become the major article of faith of a secular culture that fears it believes in nothing else. It has become the lingua franca of global moral thought, as English has become the lingua franca of the global economy.

In recent decades, the world has seen a resurgence of religion, “fundamentalist” and even “extremist.” One cannot doubt that part of this resurgence has been in response to this secular religion of human rights that has become so dominant yet strikes at the very core of what so many humans belief about themselves, this world and God. Unfortunately, as human rights proponents become bolder and bolder in their demands, this clash between the secular religionists, especially the extreme among them, and the traditional religionists, especially the extreme among them, will become more and more bitter and, sadly, even violent. Part of the blame for that must fall upon the human rights advocates who are not willing to say openly that they are replacing the people’s religions with a secular religion of their own. Many people realize this fact only when it is too late and the human rights paradigm has been entrenched. Once the human rights paradigm is entrenched, its view of “freedom” does not actually allow any true voice for any competing paradigm. Hence, the friction begins.

It was on these Western traditions of individualism,humanism,and rationalism and on legal principles protecting individual rights that twentieth-century international law on civil and political rights ultimately rested. Rejecting individualism, humanism, and rationalism is tantamount to rejecting the premises of modern human rights.

Individualism, humanism and rationalism is what the human rights movement is truly all about according to Mayer. Humanism, of course, replaces God as the center of one’s life and replaces it with the human. Rationalism—such as it is called although one could argue that it is not truly rational—implies giving preference to human thought over what has been revealed from the Creator.

This passage from Mayer is one of the most explicit and honest passages from a human rights proponent. This author can speak from his own personal experience as a convert to Islam and from the experience of others that he has known that there are many even from the “West” who reject the concepts of individualism, humanism and rationalism as the basis for life. In this one passage, Mayer has aptly described why “modern human rights” morally should not be forced upon any human in this world, not to speak of those who believe in a religion like that of Islam.


Beyond Dogmatism and Blind Faith
Islam, in its essence, is not about blind faith and dogmatism. Muslims should believe in Islam because it is the truth and they can recognize the truth of Islam. This is what true faith (imaan) is about in Islam. One of its founding principles of ilm or knowledge.

The Quran teaches Muslims that if people make claims, especially great claims about life or belief, then they should be asked to present the proof for their claims, if they are truthful in what they are claiming.  In fact, if they can bring a teaching better than the Quran, the Muslim should follow it: “Say: Then bring you a Book from Allah, which is a better Guide than either of them, that I may follow it! (Do so), if you are truthful! But if they hearken not to you, know that they only follow their own lusts: and who is more astray than one who follows his own lusts, devoid of guidance from Allah? For Allah guides not people given to wrong-doing” (al-Qasas 49-50).

The reality, as an earlier chapter demonstrated, is that the human rights theorists do not present any earth shaking new theory that dispels the beliefs of a Muslim and that should convince the Muslim to put the human rights paradigm above the Islamic paradigm, even if he keeps the Islamic paradigm as a secondary source. The proofs are simply not there. It may be a very sincere attempt to establish something that seems very noble and praiseworthy but, like all the other man-made systems that came before it and which these same human rights theorists now scoff at, it falls short. It is admittedly foundationless. In the long-run, it will produce much more harm than good, as it contradicts the truths that have been revealed from God. Contradicting those truths means going against the very nature by which this cosmos was created. As Allah says in the Quran, “If the Truth had been in accord with their desires, truly the heavens and the earth, and all beings therein would have been in confusion and corruption! Nay, We have sent them their admonition, but they turn away from their admonition” (al-Muminoon 71).

In this work an attempt has been made to show that the contemporary human rights schemes, especially the more extreme but widespread and very vocal branch of it, has offered nothing that should convince a Muslim that he should give up tenets of his faith to bend them to meet their demands. Indeed, the opposite is the case. When one realizes how baseless their claims are, the Muslim should be more convinced in the truth of Islam. They have a very noble goal—bringing people the rights that they deserve. But they are lost and confused. They have no way of knowing what rights should be promoted. They do not even know what they should base their claims on. After studying the human rights paradigm in detail, a Muslim should flee quickly and return to Allah, realizing that without Allah’s guidance there is no hope for humanity.

Furthermore, the ultimate question is not whether Islam is compatible with human rights, the question is what is the ultimate truth and way of life that a human should live. Obviously, human rights are calling to a path that is definitely deeply “religious” in its essence—meaning deeply philosophical touching on some core issues of what it means to be human. However, for the most part, one only finds them taking their assumptions as true without argument (very dogmatic, irrational, argument to authority) and enforceable by law. However, truth does not even seem to enter into the picture.

In fact, one can even go a step further than that. If one is truly interested in giving humans the rights that they deserve and need for life, then, according to Islamic beliefs, it is Islam that gives them all of those rights and prepares an entire society around allowing them to take advantage of those rights in the most beneficial manner. Islam does not give humans rights that will eventually be harmful for themselves but it does provide for them all that they need for a sound life, as shall be touched upon in the next section.