Islam as a political system, Islam as a social order and Islam as a faith are all the same unified structure.

I think that we've reached a consensus, Didymos; but to say 'so what' in reference to my point about the role of scientific skepticism and enlightenment humanism's role in this historical event is unnecessarily dismissive.

I would like to ask whether it would also be fair for me, if I were a devout Muslim, to be forced into accepting secular law - if I perceived the law as being unfair (according to my world-view)?

The middle ages were ruled with religion. The Church itself did not have as much actual authority as did Christianity have nominal authority. The church did have to go by means of secular leaders, but the 'secularism' of the leaders is generally suspect. Perhaps the leaders were secular in the sense that they dealt with non-religious matters but they were not secular in the sense we would term someone secular nowadays.

In any event; from a historical perspective Islam and the Arab world was far more tolerant and far less hotheaded about religious issues (with some notable exceptions) until modern times. Actually one of the alleged motives of the renaissance was to combat the Islamic renaissance. Political Islam and Islamism is a construct borne of the 20th century, (fascism, and) nationalism -

In any event, getting to the argument; as was noted, the Sharia court is optional, but hue-man made a claim about the Sharia courts not being fair and balanced, and also that people would be under community pressure to go with the Sharia court instead of civil court, and that would be 'unfair'.

However I would like to ask whether it would also be fair for me, if I were a devout Muslim, to be forced into accepting secular law - if I perceived the law as being unfair (according to my world-view)? Should I be forced to accept the validity of secular courts and deny validity of my own religious system? Furthermore, religious courts when reduced to a merely ceremonial role would give impetus for me to seek something more 'concrete' and would be de facto pressuring me to abandon my tradition.

We have not reached a consensus, my friend. My response of "so what" is not "unnecessarily dismissive given the paragraphs of explanation provided beyond said phrase. Sighting rejection of divine revelation and opposition to theocracy as the two causes of the 'Separation of Church and State' is misleading, and ultimately inaccurate.

Excellent, we've cleared up our history.

Now, perhaps, we should address this 'no knowledge from mysticism' claim which seems patently false. Objections to mysticism? Fine, but to say we have learned nothing from the tradition is a stretch. I have objections to rationalism (Descartes, ect) but we certainly have learned a great deal from the tradition.

I mean that we've learned nothing directly from mysticism and fideism. The former mistakes feeling for knowing, and the latter doesn't really care much about knowing at all.

You're speaking of learning in the sense that we learn what the idea says about human beings or what is says about other ideas. I'm talking about actually acquiring knowledge from mysticism as a methodology.

Feeling is not a kind of knowing? . . . . No, I do very much mean to include acquiring knowledge from mysticism as a methodology as well.

Feeling is not a kind of knowing? If I feel a pain in my leg, it is unreasonable of me to conclude that my leg is in pain?

I'm sorry that I didn't provide you with an example of mysticism mistaking feeling for knowing.

Here's an example: A guy goes into a cave for a month with little to no light, no food to eat, and only water to drink. The guy eventually starts to have distortions of perception that leads him to believe that he has had personal experience with the divine. He now claims to know that there is an immaterial reality, but that we can only know it through personal experience. In reality, this man just had a hallucination due to an imbalance in his brain chemistry that was caused by his not seeing much light and eating no food for a month. The man has mistaken his feeling in the cave for knowing what happened to him in the cave.

Yes, but that's not an example of mysticism, that's hallucination. People tend to lump all sorts of crazy stuff in the "mysticism" category, but I am certain it wasn't what Didymos Thomas was referring to. In religious studies, mysticism includes a type of knowledge pursuit that derives from very specific inner practices; many Christian monastics, for example, became expert in this epistemology.

Criticizing mysticism on the basis of eccentrics is like characterizing all of science by listing pseudoscience practices. Your understanding of mysticism is exactly what I was referring to in my previous post. You haven't taken the time to understand what it is, yet you have no hesitation offering opinions about it. How hard is it to study a bit before opining uninformed in such a public setting as a forum? For example, Mysticism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

That is an example of mysticism. It may be bad mysticism in your eyes, but it's mysticism nonetheless. The belief in personal experience with the divine is mysticism.

It wasn't want DT was referring to however. It seems disrespectful and unfair to present facts that support your views with the highest conscientiousness, and then to poison the well by portraying the other side of the discussion with the lowest possible characterizations. Are you participating to "win" the debate, or are you exchanging ideas for the sake of possibly producing genuine insight?

Well I'm going to be honest and say that I don't expect to get anymore insight from DT's perspective, but I'm open to the possibility that I will gain more insight. I gave DT an example of a mystic mistaking feeling for knowing, and maybe he will give me an example of gaining knowledge directly from practicing mysticism when he responds, which is why you should have at least waited for him to speak for himself.

...and the virtual entirety of Muslim parts of Africa (the sole exceptions being Mauritania and a northern province in Nigeria), the people in those countries wanted secular states...

...no ones forcing muslims to live in a secular country.What you should be asking is why in certain muslim countries such as Iran you have no rights to even stand for election if you are not a muslim...

Okay, I retract my guess of what he meant; I assume I knew from earlier interactions with him, and reading what he's written in the past.

But that doesn't change the fact that you seem to know nothing about religious mysticism, yet you are asserting strong opinions about it. How is that worthy of an aspiring philosopher? Aren't we obligated to be well-informed when we reason?

You're assuming that I know nothing about mysticism. What have I said about mysticism that is incorrect?