Yahya Birt analyzes the recent “defection” and clarifications of Imam Suhaib Webb, with a detailed study of the new ethics of Islamic debate on the Internet.

The “competition for the mike”, as Sheikh Nuh Keller has pithily termed it, has been crucial in shaping religious authority among Muslims today. The mass media and the internet have changed the way in which religious teachings are disseminated and indeed how religious disputes are projected and replicated to a vast audience. This is not new but arose two hundred years ago when the ulema began to write treatises addressed to the literate constituency of the Muslim masses through the medium of print.

This is quite a long essay, but touches on a number of important points regarding the ethics of disagreement, the historical precedence of Islamic debate, and the different interpretations of unity.