Advisers to the Archbishop of Canterbury have been taken aback by the ferocity of attacks on him for his suggestion that parts of Sharia be incorporated into the British legal system.

Their response is a good measure of the atmosphere of other-worldliness that still pervades the higher echelons of the established Church of England.

Dr Rowan Williams, 57, has another 13 years to go, if he remains at Lambeth Palace until he is 70, as he is entitled to do. But increasing numbers believe his moral authority, already damaged by the dispute over homosexuality, is now beyond repair and he will be tempted to go early.

This would enable a return to the comparative safety of academia from whence he emerged, and where he could devote the last decade of his working life to writing more of the complex theological tomes with which he made his name.

Multimedia

• Video Q&A with Archbishop of Canterbury about Sharia

• Churchgoers react to Archbishop's comments

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Intellectual arrogance pervades heart of wisdom

Dr Williams was advised before his speech that the content could prove controversial. He should have listened to that advice

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I've read it so you don't have to

The Archbishop of Canterbury meant well and was quite aware of some of the objections

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The temptation to go may prove especially strong if, as expected, up to a quarter of the Anglican Communion’s 800-plus bishops boycott the Lambeth Conference in July and go to a “rival” gathering of conservatives, the Global Anglican Futures Conference, in the Middle East.

In spite of the clear attempts to downgrade Lambeth from being an “instrument of unity” to merely another talking shop with no legislative powers or effective authority, such a boycott will still look perilously close to the schism the Archbishop is trying desperately to avert.

Heartbroken by the disintegration of his Church around him, and guided by his advisers, Dr Williams has been seeking desperately to move on from the row over gays and use his role as Archbishop in the way he believes God intended it to be used: as a platform from which he can expound his ideas, and, potentially, change the world.

When he was appointed, he seemed unusually well qualified to do just this. Highly intelligent, academically gifted, he even looked the part, akin to a desert father of the kind he has specialised in studying. After the straightforward evangelicalism of his predecessor, George Carey, the Establishment gave Dr Williams a welcome against which it seemed there could be no reverse. But it quickly became apparent that his words were as woolly as his eyebrows.

He made a bad start when he alienated his natural support on the liberal wing of the Church of England by backtracking on the appointment of Dr Jeffrey John, now Dean of St Albans, as Bishop of Reading. And his apparent appeasement of Islam risks alienating the middle ground and conservative wing.

Unlike Lord Carey, Dr Williams likes to write all his own speeches. And unlike Lord Carey’s, the vast majority are difficult for the layman to understand.

This does not matter when a cleric is a tutor or professor of theology. It is even expected. But when he is Archbishop of Canterbury, discussing aspects of a religion that have given rise to some of the greatest threats to world peace, the world needs to be able to understand him.

The confusion caused by his latest intervention was apparent in the clarity of the responses.

Dr Williams made his remarks in the hope of promoting better social cohesion in Britain. David Blunkett, the former Home Secretary, said that formalising Sharia in the UK would be “catastrophic” for social cohesion.

Mr Blunkett told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “I think this is very dangerous because the Archbishop used the term affiliations.

“We have affiliations to football clubs, to cricket teams, to all sorts of things that aren’t central to our citizenship and the acceptance of that in terms of a common society.

“We don’t have affiliations when it comes to the question of the law. And when it comes to equality under the law, we have to be rigorous in terms of making sure people do not find themselves excluded from it because of cultural or faith reasons.”

A spokesman for the Prime Minister insisted that British law should be based on British values, and Sharia would be no justification for acting against national law.

Tariq Ramadan, a prominent Islamic scholar, who teaches at Oxford University, said: “These kinds of statements just feed the fears of fellow citizens and I really think we, as Muslims, need to come with something, that we abide by the common law, and within these latitudes there are possibilities for us to be faithful to Islamic principles.”