Mahjoubi affair in Bagnols-sur-Cèze: “Today’s imams are not in phase with French Muslims”

Olivier Roy, politologue et expert de l'islam. Jerome Panconi – Jerome Panconi

Political scientist and specialist in Islam, Olivier Roy is a recognized expert on religion. For him, the episode of the imam of Bagnols-sur-Cèze, far from being exceptional, is part of a long history of duality between the secular state and the discourses religious. But this controversy above all highlights the major problem of the training of imams. Interview.

Tunisian imam Mahjoub Mahjoubi risks expulsion for preaching calling for hatred. Is this a new fact ?

The first expulsions of foreign imams date back to Charles Pasqua, in 1994. To expel a foreign imam, one can simply justify a disturbance to public order. There is no need to demonstrate the real radicality of the incriminated speech. There is therefore a bluster effect in these announcements, to which all Interior Ministers have resorted to at one time or another. The problem is knowing what we call radical preaching or a call to hatred. When there are anti-Semitic comments, for example, this does not pose a problem as long as it falls within the scope of the law. But what to do in the face of anti-feminist, misogynistic or homophobic considerations ? It’is much more complex to qualify.

How is that ?

How, for example, can we define an "attack on the values ​​of the Republic" ? When the Catholic Church refuses to ordain women, does it place itself outside the values ​​of the Republic ? There is a problem there: we know what it is ;is only the law and we know how to apply it; we know much less what the “values ​​of the Republic” cover. Generally speaking, religions consider the word of God to be superior to that of men. This was said very explicitly by Pope Francis, who is not strictly speaking an extremist. It is also not surprising that religions do not spontaneously defend secular values! If everyone was secular, there would be no religion. This reference to more or less definable values ​​is therefore more about morality than religion. And in court, this ambiguity inevitably emerges.

But Mahjoub Mahjoubi's words shocked!

I am sorry but, subject to what he may have said in other sermons, what he said is totally banal. He said "don't line up behind national flags, think about the community of Muslims because ’one day there will be resurrection". That’s what the Catholic Church says, that’s what evangelical preachers or rabbis say. We cannot ask these people to renounce their religious beliefs under the pretext that they contravene values ​​that no one can precisely define. Once again, there is a problem of legal qualification in this case. However, we are a country that accepts religious freedom, as long as it remains within the framework of the law.

Why make such a speech with the risk of it being made public ?

This is a proselytizing speech. These people are preachers, who consider that what they say is not illegal. For them, calling believers to live as pure believers, to think only of salvation, is part of their mission. You will find priests, pastors and rabbis on the same line. The problem is that we live on the one hand in a powerfully normative secularism, which accepts less and less that it is contested, and on the other hand with forms of religiosity of more and more radical. These positions become irreconcilable.

Has the training of imams officiating in France been neglected ?

Imams trained abroad are a problem. But who signed the agreements that allowed this with Turkey, Algeria or Morocco ? The Ministry of the Interior! Moreover, the sermons of these imams are not radical. They do not preach terrorism. On the other hand, they are very conservative and, above all, opposed to integration. Their goal is to control a diaspora, therefore a part of French society. This is what must be put to an end, and this is what is being done. But afterward, what do we do ? I remind you that the law of 1905 ensures that the State is neutral in religious affairs. There is therefore obviously no question for the French State of training imams.

It is difficult to understand how and by whom the word of the imams can be validated…

The reality today is that an imam earns very little money. A believing Muslim, well trained theologically, with a Bac+5 level, will not want to become an imam. Result: today's imams are absolutely not in phase with second and third generation French Muslims. Their level is very low, their mastery of French sometimes approximate. There are no intellectual, trained imams with a truly structured discourse as can be found in other religions. There is a real gap between the educated French Muslim middle class and its clergy. The only solution to remedy this is the emergence of places of training, within the university framework, otherwise we will witness new slippages.

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