The limits of Islamic academic studies

This article constitutes a concise, critical review of today‘s situation in Islamic studies with potential suggestions as to how to develop academic discourse on Islam and Muslims in the further research. Beginning with a critique of the usage of the term religion and its misapplication to Islam, it argues whether it is more suitable to replace it with discourse tradition. Further, the article discusses the possibilities of finding an essence of Islam and adopts a critical stance. The same applies to the tendency of some anthropologists to dismiss the existence of Islam as a holisitic phenomenon. As the article's main point shows, Islam is most understandable by way of hermeneutics, in the prism of its own categories, in the terms of how it makes sense for its believers. On the other hand, Islamology or the scientific study of Islam and Muslims should never be reduced to simply re-articulating theological discourses but to explaining motivations and causes behind the actions of Muslims with the priority on the simplest possible explanation. As a scientific endeavour, it must remain within scientific methods and standards enabling comparisons, predictions, and formulating potentially verifiable hypotheses.This article constitutes a concise, critical review of today‘s situation in Islamic studies with potential suggestions as to how to develop academic discourse on Islam and Muslims in the further research. Beginning with a critique of the usage of the term religion and its misapplication to Islam, it argues whether it is more suitable to replace it with discourse tradition. Further, the article discusses the possibilities of finding an essence of Islam and adopts a critical stance. The same applies to the tendency of some anthropologists to dismiss the existence of Islam as a holisitic phenomenon. As the article's main point shows, Islam is most understandable by way of hermeneutics, in the prism of its own categories, in the terms of how it makes sense for its believers. On the other hand, Islamology or the scientific study of Islam and Muslims should never be reduced to simply re-articulating theological discourses but to explaining motivations and causes behind the actions of Muslims with the priority on the simplest possible explanation. As a scientific endeavour, it must remain within scientific methods and standards enabling comparisons, predictions, and formulating potentially verifiable hypotheses