Toward a Civilizational Ethos: from the Homo Moralis to the Homo Ethicus

This chapter offers a new perspective on modernity, anchored in Islamic traditions, that explores its different manifestations, strengths, and limita- tions. The argument here is that Islam is not alone in encountering modern challenges, nor is it thus alone able to find solutions for them. There is now apparently one human civilization that shares the outputs of individual cre- ativity and communal enginuity. High technology and digital world have united the world as never before but has not elevated it to the level of fair interaction and exchanges worthy of global justice. The Islamic moral and ethical paradigm can play an important role in contributing to overcoming some major misunderstandings of what human potentiality can do in relation to the individual, society, the natural world, and the universe at large. Such a state of global relations requires an elaboration of an inclusive normative framework and reexamining major concepts, like faith and religion, moral- ity and ethics, sharia and law, spiritualism and spirituality, and idealism and realism. This essay argues that human beings need to embrace a set of ideas and ideals through a process of “spiritual self-criticism” that engages both the private and public spheres. Classical faith traditions as containers of moral and ethical energies will still have a major role to play in world affairs led by utilitarianism and realism alone. Political Islam as known today is nothing compared to the energies generated by Islamic philosophical understanding of the world and humanity. It is these energies that make the classical spirit of the Islamic civilization and its ethos still vibrant today and continues to be relevant for tomorrow.