Jahaberdeen Mohamad Yunos said they must also hold themselves accountable to Allah by reading and understanding the Quran.

The lawyer, who made it clear that he was not speaking as a religious scholar, said he feared it could lead to strife and disunity among Muslims if the current mindset was not changed.

“The feudal mentality and blind loyalty to political and religious leaders has to be removed if they want to progress,” he said at an event titled “Freedom of Religion and Freedom to Manifest One’s Religion: Balancing the Scales of Secularism”, held in conjunction with the International Malaysia Law Conference here.

Muslims make up close to two-thirds of Malaysia’s 33 million population.

Jahaberdeen said over the past 30 years, Muslims had been “intellectually imprisoned” by politicians and the religious elite.

“If left unchecked, third parties will dictate how you are going to lead your life,” he added, referring to such figures.

He quoted Surah 6 verse 94 in the Quran which, loosely translated, means: “We return to Allah alone, we are answerable to Him”.

“This means I am responsible for my faith. This is a universal message in the Quran,” he said, adding that faith was a matter between individuals and God.

He also said there was no example of compulsion in Islam, adding that this had come about in Malaysia due to the politicisation of the religion.

Another speaker, Suri Kempe, said religion was used to oppress Muslim women, which was against the teachings of Islam.

“Many human rights violations are perpetrated and justified in the name of religion, with approval from the state, society, community and even individuals,” she said.

She added that the 14 different sets of codified state “shariah” laws in Malaysia showed that there were differences in interpretation and that they were not divine.

“Discriminatory laws can and must be reformed in the direction of justice and equality for women.”

She said the concepts of equality and justice in Islam were also consistent with the first article of the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights which states: “All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights”.