Tariq Ramadan, when the preacher deviates from his morals

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CHRONIC. How the preacher developed a rhetoric on conjugal morality… from which he freed himself to offer himself sexual largesse.

By Djemila Benhabib*

IDo talkers always end up winning depending on the circumstances? Is deception more forgivable when dressed in Islamic guise? Can religious sentiment excuse a desire for domination? Supported by a religious posture of the most rigorous, Tariq Ramadan has developed over time an abundant rhetoric on marital morality from which he freed himself to offer himself sexual largesse which he prohibited to his co-religionists.

When there was a contradiction between his precepts and his more down-to-earth demands, he compromised with his own morality and happily transgressed it. In this, Ramadan is a prophet, that is to say an ordinary man who “legislates for all and makes exceptions for himself”, according to the famous formula cons…