Rached Ghannouchi — “Secularism and the Relation between Religion and the State” (CSID lecture, Tunis), 2 March 2012 (English translation of Arabic original)

This leads us to ask the following question: are we in need of secularism in its procedural aspect? Perhaps the most important idea in the ensemble of these procedures is the idea of the state's neutrality i.e. towards religions and its abstention from interfering with people's consciences. […] In other words, the state is the guarantor of all freedoms be them religious, political or otherwise. And the state should not interfere in favor of this or that party.

Islam, since its inception, has always combined religion with politics, religion and state. The Prophet (peace be upon him) was the founder of the religion as well as the state. […] The most important concept offered by such scholars as Muhammad Salim Al 'Awwa and Muhammad 'Umar is the distinction between the religious and the political as corresponding to the separation between state and religion. […] Whereas the religious is the sphere of observance and obligation, the political is the sphere of reason and Ijtihad.

It is due to the absence of a church in Islam that what remains is the freedom of thought and interpretation. This will naturally lead to a diversity in interpretation, and there is no harm in that except when we need to legislate, at which time we are in need of a mechanism, and the best mechanism that mankind has come up with is the electoral and democratic one which produces representatives of the nation […]. […] the nation is the only manifestation of divine will through its interactions and not any particular scholar, party, or state.

While the problematique in the west revolved around ways of liberating the state from religion and lead to destructive wars, in our context the problem is one of liberating religion from the state and preventing it from dominating religion, and keeping the latter in the societal realm […]. But should Muslims be in need of laws, the democratic mechanism is the best embodiment of the Shura (consultation) value in Islam.

There is no value to any religious observance that is motivated through coercion. […] People are created free and while it is possible to have control over their external aspects, it is impossible to do so over their inner selves and convictions.

This is exactly why we saw two models in dealing with issue of the headscarf/veil, the first is a veil that is dictated and imposed by the state and the second is a veil forbidden by it. […] In Ben Ali's Tunisia, women were forbidden from wearing the veil […] through the state's coercive means. This was also a failure.

[…] I have opposed the coercion of people in all its forms […] and have defended the freedom of people to either adhere to or defect from a religious creed, based on the Qur'anic verse that says: 'there is no compulsion in religion'.

[…] we ought to accept the principle of citizenship, and that this country does not belong to one party or another but rather to all of its citizens regardless of their religion, sex, or any other consideration.