"The golden era", is the biggest lie of all islamic myths perpetrated in the West.
A golden era for muslims, perhaps. Hell on earth for everyone else. And this is what we accept as a moderate religious viewpoint now in the west?
Does anybody even bother to understand what something is before they get on board with it? The so called "golden era" of islam is the period of time when violent jihad (the only jihad ever spoke of in the koran - the fluffy "greater jihad" defined as a person's inner struggle is a foreign concept introduced by conquered Hidus) was able to be succesfully waged on Europe, Africa, the ME, and all of the near east. The golden era is when muslims where able to dominate Christians and Jews, forcing them to wear armbands in public under the Abbasid caliphate. Oh, how the muslim yearns for the good old days indeed. Heck, I remeber the good old days in America, when those uppity blacks and silly women were'nt allowed to vote and were kept in their place. Ahhhhh.....sweet memories. And the the good old days in Nazi Germany, when those nasty Jews, Gypsies, and JW's were collected and kept away from the good German population. Ahhhhh, the golden era........alas, I digress - for it could have been worse for the Christians and Jews under the early caliphates of the golden era I suppose. They could have been non-believers (atheists or infidels) or worse yet Hindus! *gasp*
No armband required in such cases.
This "golden era" that you here muslims desiring a return to is imply a return to power over the lesser peoples and faiths, and that is specifically why reform is such a silly statement. Reform to what? Christianity reformed to something more closely resembling it's roots because from the protestant perspective the message had gotten lost through years of empire and collusion in politics. Mohammadanism IS politics and the "golden age" is nothing remotely worthy of return. The reform of Judaism is the only comparative case to use with islam for analysis but folks generally are thinking of the Christian case when the puke up "reform" comments. Can you imagine any Christian seriously proposing a return to 15 century Spain, and referring to it as a "golden era"? Westerners need to get their head around such a perspective before attempting any further analytical steps such as the possibility of "reform".