New Muslim Mujtahids

We need to understand ijtihad broadly as, quoting from Dr. Khan, “freedom of thought, rational thinking and the quest for truth through an epistemology covering science, rationalism, human experience, critical thinking and so on.” (See Muqtedar Khan’s “Two Theories of Ijtihad” in his blog Ijtihad [http://www.ijtihad.org/ijtihad.htm]).

With this new understanding of ijtihad, we may say that the door of independent reasoning is no longer shut; it is re-opened again. The participants in this new ijtihad are not limited to the ulama in a traditional sense, but to include modern Muslim scholars whose academic training and specialization span a broad range of field and expertise.