“Laws don’t make people pious,” he observed. “They protect piety when it is already there.” Governments couldn’t legislate their citizens into submission: Iran and Saudi Arabia proved that. Just as trying to impose sharia law wouldn’t make people into good Muslims, imposing the hijab wouldn’t automatically confer modesty. Without fear of God and a true submission to Him, these outward displays of Islamic identities were just about showing off an identity, he explained, not about faith. “There could be people who follow sharia law, but they’re not believers,” he said. “Or there could be someone
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