Rethinking on Islam
Even Salman Rushdie came out in the open to say something on the issue. He is quoted by the BBC as saying: "What is needed is a move beyond tradition - nothing less than a reform movement to bring the core concepts of Islam into the modern age."
There is a great need for rethinking what Islam is by the Muslims regardless of geographical location, class or occupation. But rethinking should not and must not imply reform. Reform denotes modification, upgrading, changing the reality of what it is to something different in order for it to fit into another paradigm. If we were to do that then we will not have Islam left as the end product but something other than Islam. For example, it is well known that the basis of the Islamic doctrine is yaqeen (certainty) established on reality, if we now reform it to be emotional faith established on introspection alone and blind adoption then it won't be an Islamic basis anymore.
For all latest news, follow The Daily Star's Google News channel. Since Muslims regard Islam as the absolute truth then surely it must be comprehensive enough to be able to deal with modern realities independently, regardless of how technologically advanced the world is or will become.
I also agree with Khaled El Fadl, a Fellow in Islamic Law at UCLA, whom you quoted, when he says that there is no notion of "holy war" in Islam. Jihad is definitely not holy war. This term holy war is borrowed from European Christianity, it is a term coined by the crusaders. The concept of Jihad is quite unique and well established in the Islamic heritage. It's linguistic and technical meanings are very well understood by the learned scholars and by majority of Muslims. So why use an alien term to describe a well understood Islamic concept and confuse its meaning.
For too long Muslims the world over have been borrowing inaccurate terminology from others, especially western thinkers, to describe Islamic concepts and practices even though they were quite clearly explained within their own intellectual heritage. All they had to do was say it as it is instead of taking a defeatist and an apologetic stance.