Muslim-majority delegates split rather than uniformly opposed freedom of proselytism

Evidence

It would nonetheless be mistaken to portray the debates over this right as a ‘clash of civilisations’ between Christianity and Islam. Such a position not only ignores a history of mutual borrowing and interactions among Christians, Jews and Muslims, but, as Asad writes, it attributes to a people an identity (European, Islamic) that ‘depends on the definition of a selective civilizational heritage of which most of the people to whom it is attributed are in fact almost completely ignorant’. Moreover, delegates from countries with Muslim majorities were split on the right to change religion. Pakistan’s representative and foreign minister, Sir Mohammed Zafrullah Khan, actively embraced the missionary implications Baroody saw in Article 18, arguing that, as Islam was also a proselytising religion, Muslims must insist that conscience is free and able to change its judgment. In support of this position, he cited the Koran: ‘Let he who chooses to believe, believe, and he who chooses to disbelieve, disbelieve.’ — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 137

Categorization

• ADDENDUM: Supports the ‘Complaints About Immodesty’ article’s method: surface religious-civilizational clashes often dissolve on closer reading into strategic, interest-driven and internally divided positions.
• XREF: connects to: The religious-freedom debates were not a Christian-Muslim clash but split Muslim delegates too.; Pan-Islamic solidarity overrode intra-Muslim sectarian and political divides

Broader Connections

• The religious-freedom debates were not a Christian-Muslim clash but split Muslim delegates too. #corroborates (0.95)
• Pan-Islamic solidarity overrode intra-Muslim sectarian and political divides #contradicts (0.75)