Islam & Terrorism: An Indian Shia Muslim Perspective

By ‘Khatib-e Akbar’ Maulvi Mirza Muhammad Athar
(Translated from Urdu by Yoginder Sikand)


Today, a series of recent tragic developments have given Islam a bad name, causing many people to imagine that Muslims as a whole are bad people who have no respect whatsoever for human life and peace. It is true that behind these developments as well as the mounting anti-Islamic sentiments the world over are the hands of sinister politicians, personal interests, international politics and so on. Yet, simply to state the problem is not to solve it. We must recognize that many people now see Muslims as their enemies, and that Islamophobia, based on erroneous claims, has rapidly escalated throughout the world. These are among the various problems that we are now suddenly afflicted with, and we must seriously consider possible solutions to them.

Respected friends! We generally take great interest in describing or recounting our problems but focus little attention to their solutions. For this we must clearly understand what Islam really is, what it has forbidden us from, what it teaches us to do, and what path we must adopt so that we can succeed in solving our the challenges that we are faced with. In this context, we must examine if the great personages we claim to follow and in whom we have faith have left behind any guidance for us applicable to such a situation as we are faced with today.

For this year’s 10-day majalis for the month of Muharram, I will deal with this issue of Islam and terrorism, about which I have recently devoted much attention to.
All religions teach the need for humans to seek to understand God. Obviously, for us to fully comprehend God is impossible. Even if we were to spend a thousand years seeking to understand God, we would not be able to go beyond a mere drop in an entire ocean. Naturally, then, God will not ask us if we could fully understand Him as He is. Rather, what He will ask is if we have understood Him as much as we could possibly as humans. In the same way, I recognize that my voice is feeble and cannot be heard throughout the world. But, yet, I should try and make it be heard as far as I possibly can. For this purpose I feel it imperative to present the true Islamic position on the issue of terrorism, for I feel that Islam, a glorious religion, is being wrongly vilified.

As far as terrorism is concerned, we (Shia Muslims) have been the brutal victims of terrorism for the last one thousand and four hundred years. Throughout this long period, we have been cruelly oppressed. Indeed, we cannot express the stories of many of the heinous crimes that have been committed against us, for by doing so we might fall prey to those crimes once again.

In this first majlis, I will simply introduce the subject, focusing on the following points: 1. The crimes that have been committed against Islam 2. The teachings of Islam [as regards war and peace and dealing with people of other faiths] 3. The basic mission of Islam 4. How politics has subverted that mission.
The month of Muharram is when the name of the great martyr Imam Hussain and his companions are commemorated, and, naturally, it is essential that I focus on them in my lecture. This is also because it is through the light kindled by these noble and valiant people that we can truly understand what Islam is, for without this light we cannot see through the darkness that characterized the last one thousand four hundred years.

The issue of terrorism has an inextricable relationship with the events of Muharram, for the martyrdom of our heroes at Karbala in the month of Muharram was a result of terrorism. This incident highlights what religion is and what politics is. Had these heroes not been martyred we would have been left without the light to understand the truth. It is this incident that has provided us proper guidance to understand what true Islam or true religion is, and to appreciate the teachings of religion and the principles of politics.
In today’s majlis I wish to deal with the truth of Islam and the truth of religion. From this you can gauge what true Islam has done for humankind, and how people have sought to twist it to serve their own personal interests and how rulers and false mullahs have tried to misinterpret it. You will be shocked to learn how the very spirit of Islam has thereby been sought to be subverted, and used for legitimizing gross oppression, thereby completely undermining its universal message, which has been confined owing to the proliferation of numerous sects. God does not belong to any particular sect. It is not that God has made only some people and that others have been made by Satan. No, all humans have been created by God alone. This means that they all belong to God. This is the universal message of Islam, which has been narrowly confined by the mullahs for their own political motives.
In actual fact, Islam’s message is for all human beings. It is not restricted by sect, region, ethnicity, language, race or colour. However, people have not understood it properly. They have not seen its true face. Instead, for the last several hundred years, people have seen a sort of ‘Islam’ through the lens of monarchy (mulukiyat), and so they have not been able to see its reality. Hence, my focus will be on the true Islam, the Islam that is so compatible with human nature and life, and on how, over the last fourteen hundred years Islam has been grossly misused for political purposes. We must identify and recognize the faces of those who have misused Islam for their political ends. It was this that led to the oppression, and, finally, the martyrdom of Imam Husain in Karbala in the month of Muharram.

First Majlis
As I had mentioned yesterday, the topic for this year’s Muharram majlis is Islam and Terrorism. I have chosen this theme so that our children and youth do not fall prey to the wrong propaganda about Islam that is so widespread all over the world today. At the very outset let me clarify that my intention is not to abuse or belittle anyone.

The word ‘Islam’ is related to the world taslim, which means peace. Islam is peace. It also means submission, to bow one’s head and completely and unconditionally to submit to God. In other words, Islam’s message is that of peace as well as total surrender to God. The religion of Islam, the religion of peace and submission to God, has been taught by all the prophets of God, from the first of them, Adam, to the last, the Prophet Muhammad. Its focus is on how human beings should lead a proper life, how to live in peace and security and how to serve and obey God.

Since all the prophets taught the same religion, of peace and submission to God, it is wrong to brand many of those who follow earlier religious traditions (as taught by prophets prior to the Prophet Muhammad) as kafirs. The image of Islam has been grossly distorted by politics. This is the main problem that Islam has been faced with, because it is politics that led to some people being branded as kafirs or disbelievers and others as Muslims or true believers, some as good and others as evil. And because the image of Islam has been thus distorted, people have been unable to appreciate its reality. Islam became a prisoner of the interpretation of the fake mullahs. And the fake mullahs were puppets in the hands of monarchs. In the Arabic language a mullah means one who is knowledgeable, a highly qualified scholar. But, those who simply dress up like scholars of religion and act as intermediaries between religion and rulers are derisively referred to in Urdu as Kath Mullas or fake mullahs. Such people do not have proper knowledge about Islam although they claim to. They simply serve as agents of monarchs. From its very inception, Islam has had to face the calamity of such people.

Religion insists that its place comes first and that it must be obeyed at all costs. Rulers make the same claim. Inevitably, therefore, there is almost always a clash between religion and politics. Religion sees all human beings as equal. It makes no special concessions for the rich or for rulers. On the other hand, rulers want to make exceptions to the rules of religion to suit themselves, but this true religion will never accept. In this situation appears the fake mullah, whose task is to twist religion to suit the rulers. Islam has suffered from this malady from its very first day. In this way the fake mullahs have sought to narrow it down, destroying its universal appeal and message, and sundering it into different sects.
The fake mullahs tried to restrict the message of Islam. But, then, God is not the Lord of Muslims alone. He is not just the Lord of those who worship in mosques. God’s true slaves are found throughout the world. But the fake mullahs sought to conceal this. The Quran refers to God as the rab or Sustainer of all the worlds. But the narrow-minded fake mullahs sought to present Him as the Sustainer only of the Muslims. Similarly, the Quran refers to the Prophet Muhammad as a mercy (rahmat) to all the worlds, but, sadly, Muslims claim him as theirs alone.

Friends! I have until now been unable to understand this mentality of claiming God and the Prophet as belonging only to one’s own community, and seeking to deny access to them to others. This is a reflection of how Islam has sought to be narrowed down. One factor for this has been the role of monarchy and despotism, causing Islam to get a bad name. When Islam was dressed in the garb of mullahdom it appeared as badly stained. This was caused by the nefarious nexus between fake mullahs and despotic rulers.

True religion stresses absolute truth, while politics is based on sheer opportunism. Religion is based on truth, while rulers typically regard their own aims as truth. A monarch will never accept being turned into a slave and sold in the market. But a truly religious person will accept even that, if, under duress and oppression, he is turned into slave, just as the Prophet Joseph allowed himself to be sold in the slave-market in Egypt. This did not make a difference to his prophethood. A ruler will never agree to be tied up and thrown into a fire. A person who is subjected to this sort of treatment will not be called a king. But, the prophet Abraham passed through even this deadly torment and still retained his status of friend of God. To tire of the oppression of one’s opponents and flee one’s land in the dark of night is not something that a king would do. But this is precisely what the Prophet Muhammad did, despite which he remained an exalted prophet. From these examples you can understand that while these are not things that rulers will ever accept, true religion has no problems with them.

This shows that the mentality of religion and that of politics are diametrically opposed to each other. There have been very few cases of truly religious people serving as rulers, and in such cases politics always had to bow down before religion. This was the case with prophets who were also rulers, such as David, Solomon, the Prophet Muhammad. It characterised the last years in the life of Imam Ali and a few months in the life of Imam Hassan.

Friends! Islam is religion, not government. If Islam meant governmental power, then the Prophet Muhammad had the greatest right to be conferred with the title of Emperor. Yet, he was not given such a title. Rather, as we testify when we pray, the title that he was given was that of ‘slave of God’. This proves that religion takes pride in servitude, in humble submission to God, not in power and ruler-ship. And servitude, or total submission to God, was a defining characteristic of the Prophet and his family. This servitude reaches higher and higher stages till such a time comes when God Himself addresses his slave, instructing that soul that rests in a peaceful state to return to Him and join the ranks of His true servants. This is precisely what happened when Imam Husain was martyred in Karbala.

Second Majlis
As I had mentioned earlier, Islam is a religion of peace. It teaches human beings to live with each other in peace and to help one another. In fact, it even exhorts its followers to respect the rights of animals, trees and inanimate objects. Friends! As I had explained yesterday, the greatest tragedy is that people have failed to understand the reality of Islam. That religion which is today being accused of fomenting terrorism is not the real Islam, for Islam has nothing to do with terrorism.
The true Islam is that which is taught in the Quran, and which was explained by the Prophet Muhammad and the Imam Ali. Only if we seek to understand Islam through these sources can we realise what it truly is. While today governments might rate the life of a single human being as being equal to a few lakh rupees, Islam assess its value as equal to that of the whole of humanity. As the Quran says, ‘We ordained […] that if anyone slew a person—unless it be for murder or for spreading mischief in the land—it would be as if he slew the whole people: and if anyone saved a life it would be as if he saved the life of the whole people.’ (Quran 5:32).

Likewise, the Prophet Muhammad declared that he alone can be considered a Muslim or true submitter to God whose hands and tongue cause no harm to anyone. He does not oppress anyone, nor does he say bad things about others. In other words, a true Muslim is he who controls his hands and his tongue. A person whose hands or tongue are not under control is not a Muslim.
The Imam Ali expressed a similar view. In a letter to Malik Ashtar, whom he had appointed as Governor of Egypt, the Imam Ali wrote that he would find in Egypt two types of people: his brethren in faith or fellow Muslims, and others. He was to help both of them, the former on account of their common faith, the latter on account of their common humanity.
Friends! The Imam Ali taught us to cooperate with other human beings on account of our common humanity. This is what true Islam, as understood from the Quran, the Hadith and the Nahj ul-Balagha of Imam Ali teaches. But Islam goes beyond this. Today, there are a number of groups working for the cause of animals, but this was taught by Islam fourteen hundred years ago. It taught us that we should offer water to a thirsty animal rather than using it for ablutions before prayers if need be so that the life of that creature could be saved. In the same spirit, the Imam Ali sent letters to his agents appointed to collect the zakat levy, which also applied to cattle, to treat the animals under their charge kindly. Some of our [Shia] Imams even mentioned animals in their wills, instructing their inheritors to look after their animals well and feed them properly. Just before being martyred, our fourth Imam, Zain ul-Abidin, instructed his son and successor Muhammad al-Baqir, to take good care of his horse for he had travelled on it 25 times to perform the Haj, adding that he had never hit it hard.

Islam also respects the life of plants. According to a Hadith attributed to the Prophet Muhammad, if a person plants a tree this action will be entered into the record of his deeds as a source of merit because a tree provides benefit to people. Likewise, the Imam Ali encouraged people to develop gardens. He forbade people from cutting down green trees. He also insisted on due concern for the earth. He instructed that when revenue is being levied on land, the portion of the revenue that is the due of the land should be given to it so that it could retain its fertility.
By mentioning all this I want to convey to you what the basic teachings of Islam are, and what it lays down with regard to human and animal life and even the earth. These are far as the teachings of the Quran, the Prophet Muhammad and the Noble Imams are concerned. However, as I mentioned before, the great tragedy that struck Islam was that it was captured by the forces of monarchy and despotism. Hence, the evils of monarchy were wrongly attributed to Islam. Islam was captured by those whose aim was to rule. In this way, those who hungered for power gave Islam a bad name.
After the Prophet Muhammad shifted to Medina, he was blessed with leadership of the city. But this was not equivalent to governance of the sort exercised by the despotic Emperors of those times, such as the neighbouring Sassanians in Iran and the Byzantine kings in the Eastern Roman Empire. The mosque of the Prophet was built over a small patch of earth. It had no trace of regal pomp and wealth. Yet, its religious majesty was such that monarchy was forced to bow before it. People who visited the mosque from other lands would go back and report about the Prophet that they had met a simple and pure soul who wore ordinary clothes and who would sit on the floor, like any ordinary person, but who had won the hearts of vast numbers of people, in striking contrast to worldly rulers.

When, at the head of an army some ten thousand strong, the Prophet took over Mecca, which was then populated mainly by non-believers, he proclaimed a general amnesty, for Mecca was where the Kaaba stood. God had made the city a place of peace and safety. It was evening when the Muslim army arrived near Mecca, and so it was decided to spend the night out of the city and enter it the next morning. To get a view of the army, the Prophet’s long-standing enemy and chief of the Bani Ummaiyya clan, Abu Sufiyan, climbed up a hillock with his Muslim friend and uncle of the Prophet, Abbas ibn Abdul Mutalib of the Bani Hashim clan. Surveying the vast army of the Muslims that had spread out below, Abu Sufiyan, who was a hardened unbeliever, addressed Abbas, saying that his nephew, the Prophet, had become a powerful king. At once the Muslim Abbas retorted that his nephew was not a king but a prophet. This is to say that the unbeliever Abu Sufiyan described as monarchy what the pious believer Abbas saw as prophethood.

The next morning, when the Prophet and his companions entered Mecca in victory, Abu Sufiyan hypocritically recited the kalima, the Islamic creed of confession, to save his life and pass off as a Muslim for his own selfish political purposes. I am not alone in saying this. This claim has been made even by such well-known [Sunni] scholars as Syed Abul ‘Ala Maududi and Dr. Taha Husain. And that marked a major turning point in Muslim history, when two types of Muslims emerged: those, like Abu Sufiyan, who sought to use and misinterpret Islam for their own political power; and others, like Abbas, who were genuinely and sincerely committed to Islam’s prophetic mission.

Friends! Unless we carefully examine this phenomenon we will continue to fall prey to numerous misunderstandings. True religion insists that one should not take to the wrong path under any circumstances, while for those who hanker after political power whatever enables them to achieve their goals is considered to be right. Hence, those self-styled Muslims, who considered Islam to be all about power and used it as a means to acquire power, spared no effort in twisting it to suit their nefarious purposes. On the other hand, those who rightly understood its mission refrained from any such actions. In other words, the moment monarchy and lust for power entered Islam, the moment those whose mission was to grab power began wrongly interpreting Islam to achieve their sinister goals, the image of Islam began to deteriorate. This has continued till this day, so much so that many people mistakenly accuse Islam of being synonymous with terrorism.

To counter this image, Muslims must develop and present before others such character as would win their hearts, and desist from any sort of terrorism. Till such time as Muslims remain wedded to the history of Muslim kings they will not be able to openly denounce terrorism. They must remember that the period of Muslim monarchies has gone. They must now desist from identifying themselves with them. Let them live in the real world. Islam has all the solutions, but provided it is the true type of Islam, not political Islam. The genuine Islam is that which has no conception of ‘mine’ and ‘yours’, a law and a means to make human beings truly human and to encourage people to be of service to others and destroy their egos.

How long will Muslims continue to remain stuck in the memory of Muslim kings? Till when will they go on taking delight in harping on the history of Muslim rulers? This is gravely damaging the true Islamic mission. Extricating themselves from the clutches of the history and legacy of Muslim monarchs, Muslims must internalize and present to others, through their personal example, the noble character of the Prophet.


Islam, as I mentioned earlier, is a religion of peace. When the Prophet entered Mecca victorious he held a white flag in his hand. In the past, when a monarch conquered a city, its inhabitants would hold up white flags to beg for peace, while the conqueror would vent his anger on the people and reduce the city to ruins. The Prophet could easily have done that when he captured Mecca , especially since the Meccans had so brutally persecuted him and his followers, unleashed numerous wars against them, and had slain many Muslims, including members of the Prophet’s family. Yet, when the Prophet entered Mecca in triumph he did not set about taking revenge. Rather, holding a white flag in his hand he entered the city and declared a general amnesty for the Meccans, including even for those who had taken shelter in the house of his inveterate foe, Abu Sufiyan.

But this noble face of Islam was later distorted by self-styled Muslim monarchs. This is a tragic story. Monarchs started constructing minarets filled with the heads of people they had slain, laid to waste entire cities, drowned their streets in human blood and turned human lives into mere playthings. They were wrongly lionized as great conquerors and heroes, and because of this Islam got a bad name.

As I had mentioned earlier, Abu Sufiyan twisted Islam to project it as a means for acquiring political power, while Abbas remained faithful to Islam’s actual prophetic mission. The same issue was played out in the battlefield in Karbala . By this time, among the Muslims there had emerged two groups—those who used Islam to grab power, and those who were firmly wedded to its true spirit and mission. These two groups were represented at Karbala in the form of the Bani Ummaiyya and the Bani Hashim respectively. The tyrant Yazid was from the Bani Ummaiyya clan, and the Imam Husain from the Bani Hashim. Yazid was the grandson of Abu Sufiyan, while Husain was the grandson of the Prophet. Those who hungered for power, who were vast in number, were solidly behind Yazid. Those who remained true to the Prophet’s mission numbered only 72, and they were with the Imam Husain. But, hundreds of years after the Battle of Karbala, the former have now all being forgotten, condemned by history, while the latter, who were cruelly martyred, are still remembered, loved and commemorated till this very day.

Third Majlis
Islam is a religion, or what in Hindi is called dharam, but, unfortunately, some people converted it into government, power and despotism for their own vested interests. When these people grabbed power they wrongly claimed that their rule was synonymous with Islam. And, when they went to war they wrongly declared that they were engaging in jihad. Because of this, they were spared any blame, while Islam got a bad name.

To repeat a point I had made earlier, Islam is the religion that was preached by all the 1,24,000 prophets that God had sent to various peoples all over the world, beginning with the Prophet Adam and ending with the Prophet Muhammad. The aim of this religion was to establish peace and security in the world, to make people proper human beings and to establish a virtuous society free from oppression. But, this mission was sabotaged by those who used a distorted version of what they wrongly called Islam to bless and legitimize their tyrannical rule. And so, when their political empires began expanding , when they began building opulent palaces and tall towers and filling their coffers, people were falsely led to imagine that it was Islam that was being strengthened and glorified. And when these empires fell, historians wrongly described this as the fall or decline of Islam.

But, in actual fact, this was no decline of Islam at all, for Islam remained the same. The prescribed number of daily prayers, the number of days specified for fasting in the month of Ramzan, the rules governing the Haj, the number of chapters in the Quran and so on remained the same. So did the truth of the Prophet and the unity of God. These all did not change or decline at all. How, then, can it be said that the collapse of the Muslim empires represented the decline of Islam? This wrong claim is made because people wrongly equated the rise and flourishing of Islam with the emergence and spread of Muslim political power and Muslim dynasties. Islam cannot decline, for it is a truth, and truth never declines. If all the human beings of the world become good Muslims, it would not represent rise of truth or of Islam, but, rather, the rise of human character. Similarly, if all humans turn immoral, it would not represent the decline of Islam or the truth, but, rather, the decline of human character. Thus, one can neither say that Islam experienced a rise nor a fall.

It is wrongly claimed that the Prophet spread Islam with the Quran in one hand and an unsheathed sword in the other. But, undoubtedly, there were monarchs who wrongly claimed to be Muslims and misinterpreted Islam to expand their political realms. In actual fact, the Prophet spread Islam through the Quran, and his mission was carried forward by the Ahl-e Bayt, his family. When people let go off the Ahl-e Bayt, their hands grasped naked swords and wrongly shed the blood of innocents, including of the Ahl-e Bayt themselves.

The basic problem is that the actions of self-styled Muslims were mistakenly taken to represent Islam. True Islam did not spread by the sword, but, rather, through the character of the Prophet and the Ahl-e Bayt. They won the hearts of people through their character. True religion aims at changing people’s hearts and minds, and this cannot come about through force. The mission of religion can never be to change anyone through force. The Quran very clearly states that there can be no compulsion in matters of religion. People can be guided only by convincing them of the difference between right and wrong. This is what Islam teaches. After distinguishing between right and wrong, Islam leaves it to the free will of every individual to choose which path he or she wishes to adopt.

Since Islam does not countenance coercion in matters of religion, wherever such coercion exists or existed one can be sure that this was not as a result of true Islamic teachings. True religion exists where freedom of conscience exists. This principle was well illustrated in the battle of Karbala . On the one hand was the tyrant Yazid, who had assembled an entire army to seek to force Imam Hussain and his followers to accept him as the leader of the Muslims. On the other hand was Imam Hussain, who granted his followers to freely go where they wanted, leave him if they so desired. The former represented irreligiousness, the latter the spirit of true Islam.

Friends! There is no question of any sort of force being used in Islam to compel people to believe. Islam cannot be identified with tyrannical [Muslim] monarchies or the lust for power. Yet, and unfortunately, tyrannical monarchs have routinely raised the banner of Islam for their own protection. By using a religious garb they were able to instill fear in the hearts of people, and scare them with the threat of hell-fire if they disobeyed them. They falsely claimed to be the ‘Shadow of God on Earth’, and instructed people not to go against them, for this, they said, would earn God’s wrath. All this was because these rulers wanted to protect their own selves.

Friends! You will find in Islamic history two types of characters: one, those who, when Islam is being attacked, stand up to take the blows on themselves in order to protect the faith; the other, those who, when faced with attack or threat, shield themselves with Islam, so that Islam is attacked but they are saved.

Numerous descendants of the Prophet were brutally slain while trying to defend Islam. Their killers, who resorted to terror in the name of Islam, did so simply in order to defend themselves. Why was the noble Imam Ali, who was faithful to God and the Prophet, and who served the needy and the poor, killed? Why did many people bear enmity and hatred towards him? It was because he was a faithful follower of the Prophet and foiled the attempts of the Prophet’s enemies to kill or harm him simply because he exhorted people to give up idolatry and to worship the one God instead. The truth of the matter is that people began opposing Ali because he had protected the Prophet from their attacks. And those people sought to attack the Prophet simply because he proclaimed the one God, He alone who is worthy of worship. And, to stir up hatred against Ali, the friend of God, these people began delivering speeches against him in the mosques, in Friday sermons and in public gatherings.

This is the crux of a long and bloody story. Islam is viscerally opposed to monarchy and despotism. And that is why many members of the family of the Prophet were brutally slain by tyrannical rulers who falsely claimed to be Muslims. These members of the Prophet’s family were noble people of high character, who dealt kindly even with their enemies. But they were slaughtered simply because, following true Islamic teachings, they opposed monarchical despotism, which tyrannical rulers wrongly sought to legitimize as Islamic. This is the tragedy that Islam has for long faced.

If Yazid, the murderer of the Imam Hussain, had simply called himself an Emperor it would have been an entirely different matter. An Emperor can claim to follow any religion. He can belong to any community. He who grabs power can call himself an Emperor. The character of an Emperor is not taken as a model for people to emulate. Even today there are numerous Muslim monarchs, but no Muslim considers them models to follow or imitate. The question arises as to why Yazid, who had become a monarch, went on to declare himself to be the Leader of the Believers (amir ul-mumineen) and the Caliph of the Muslims (khalifat ul-muslimeen) and demanded that his name be taken in the Friday sermons in the mosques? Why did he want to force Imam Hussain to accept him as the amir ul-mumineen and the khalifat ul-muslimeen, as the leader of Islam and the deputy of the Prophet? Had Yazid been accepted as such, what would have happened to Islam?

In actual fact, it was Ali who was the amir ul-mumineen and the khalifat ul-muslimeen, because he was designated as such by the Prophet himself. He had made great sacrifices for Islam and served the Prophet faithfully. But in a short span of fifty years after the passing away of the Prophet, the tyrannical forces of monarchical despotism, represented by Yazid, played a cruel game. Yazid was known for his irreligious ways, for his regular bouts of drinking, for grabbing the wealth of the poor and so on. When such a debauch and cruel tyrant claimed to be the leader of the Muslims, you can imagine what others might think about ordinary Muslims. How can we ever accept the sort of Islam that Yazid stood for or represented? If the shariah was what Yazid championed, how can anyone ever hope for salvation? We must rise above the party-line and critically examine this issue. How could anyone ever consider Yazid to be the amir ul-mumineen, the khalifat ul-muslimeen, the successor of the Prophet? How can one consider the sort of Islam that he championed to be the true Islam? No, the true Islam was that championed by his enemy, the Imam Hussain and his followers, who numbered just 72, and who were brutally slain by Yazid and his army for championing the truth and speaking out against Yazid.

Fourth Majlis

As I had earlier mentioned, some ambitious people sought to convert Islam into a doctrine of despotism in order to suit their own purposes and even resorted to terror, for which Islam was wrongly blamed. These people falsely claimed to be working for the cause of Islam. When they grabbed power, they blessed it as ‘Islamic’, and when they set out to wage war they falsely claimed to be engaged in jihad. This represented a gross misuse of religion for promoting the personal interests of these tyrants.
And this tradition continues even today. Consider, for instance, the wrong use of the term and concept of jihad. Many people have misused the notion of jihad for promoting their own interests. When some countries went to war with others they labeled their wars as jihads. And there are those foolish ones who constantly raise slogans of jihad, thereby giving Islam a bad name. It is tragic that the Muslim world remains silent on this misuse of the concept of jihad. It is the duty of the leading Muslim ulema to openly declare that this is not jihad at all but, rather, is actually a means for some selfish people to promote their own interests. Yet, sadly, even these leading ulema remain silent.

Friends! Sometimes one thing gets so muddled up or mixed with another that is becomes very difficult for people to understand a particular matter. When a person fights against another, he seeks an excuse or a support for his action. For instance, suppose I have a plot of land, and my neighbor starts building a wall along the line dividing my land from his. I begin to fear that the wall might take up six inches of my land, and so I start fighting with my neighbor. I cannot garner much support if I fight in my own name. At the most, in that way I can get the help of a few family members and some friends. Many of my friends might refuse to come to my assistance, thinking it to be none of their concern. So, at once I change my strategy. It so happens that my neighbor is a non-Muslim and I am a Muslim, so I immediately start raising Islamic slogans. I start crying hoarse, ‘Oh Muslim brothers! A non-Muslim is grabbing the land that belongs to a Muslim.’ And, in this way, I at once succeed in turning the matter into a religious battle. Because of my appeals to religion, Muslims rush to my rescue. Then, they start shouting Islamic slogans and in a short while they come to imagine that Islam itself is under threat. And so, what started off as a dispute over six inches of land becomes a massive battle involving Islam. All because my six inches of land were under threat, and I converted it into an issue of Islam being allegedly under threat. I dragged Islam into the whole affair simply to save those measly six inches of land! And, in this way, I was able to attract hordes of Muslims to rush to my assistance.
In precisely the same way, people have converted their own personal conflicts, disputes over property, over power, politics and governance into what they project as Islamic causes or issues. Islam has earned a bad name in exactly this unfortunate way.
Friends! Let me clarify the distinction between war and jihad. Jihad is a form of Islamic worship and service of God. Jihad does not simply mean wielding a sword and attacking the enemy. The first stage of jihad is to engage in battle against one’s baser self or ego. This sort of jihad should happen on a daily basis, from the moment one awakes to the moment one goes to sleep at night. Early in the morning one is woken up from slumber by the muezzin’s call to prayer. One’s heart says, ‘Go back to sleep’, but one’s inner voice insists, ‘Get up and say your prayers.’ At once a jihad starts. What the heart says is the utterance of the army of the disbelievers; what the inner voice suggests is the suggestion of the army of Islam. The battlefield of this jihad is one’s body. The jihad continues. If one goes back to sleep, the Muslim is defeated and disbelief is victorious. If one gets up and prays, the flag of Islam flies high and disbelief is vanquished.

Islam tells us that Muslims must first engage in jihad against the evils within our own selves, against our bad habits, against the habit of lying, against the habit of not praying regularly, against engaging in acts that God and the Prophet have forbidden. This jihad is called the jihad al-nafs or the struggle against the baser self. First vanquish your own baser self and become a true Muslim. After this, you can ascend to the second stage of jihad, that of sacrificing one’s wealth, the jihad-e maal. Human beings love wealth and money. Give up that love, and spend your money instead on building mosques and Imambargahs, water fountains for the public, assisting orphans and widows and the poor. This is the second type of jihad. If you sacrifice your wealth in this jihad-e maal for causes such as these you have succeeded. If you do not, you have failed in your jihad.
The third jihad is the ‘jihad of the sword’ (jihad ba-saif). A true jihad of this sort can never be offensive. It can only be defensive, fought in defence when one’s religion is being attacked. If the attack is not on Islam as such or if the attack does not pose any threat to Islam, fighting back in defence cannot be called a jihad. One must here make a crucial distinction between an action that might be a threat to Muslims and that which might threaten Islam. The two are very different. Islam is the name of a religion, and Muslims are those who follow that religion. Always maintain and recognize the difference and distinction between these two words ‘Islam’ and ‘Muslims’. As an Indian, I can say that if all the Muslims of India are slaughtered it is true that Muslims would thereby be under threat, but even after this it would be wrong to claim that Islam was under threat.
Friends! Jihad of the sword can only be waged when Islam, as distinct from Muslims, is under threat. Islam is the religion preached by the Prophet Muhammad. If we Muslims all die, still the religion of Islam will remain. It can never die. Hence, one must use the phrase ‘Islam is in danger’ very carefully and not in a loose manner, as is often the case. And, it must not be forgotten, jihad by the sword can be engaged in only to defend Islam, if the need so arises, and not for any offensive purpose.

Let me illustrate my point with the help of examples from the life of the Prophet. The Prophet engaged in several jihads, the most famous of which are the jihads of Badr, Uhd, Khandaq and Khaibar. The norms governing jihad must be based on these four major jihads in which the Prophet participated, because the Prophet’s actions exemplify Islamic teachings. Now, as emerges from his conduct in the course of these jihads, true Islamic jihad does not allow for killing innocent people or for humankind to be disgraced. Jihad is not the naked display of raw power. The Prophet explicitly commanded his followers before every jihad never to initiate the fighting, and to restrain from war as long as their opponents remained peaceful. He ordered them that in the course of jihad they must never hunt down any opponent fleeing from the battlefield, never kill the injured, never rob a woman of her modesty, and never harm children. He instructed them to provide protection to their opponents if they sued for peace, and not to kill them. A true Islamic jihad must abide by all these rules.

Look at the matter from another angle. Carefully examine the jihads of Badr, Uhd and Khandaq. These three jihads were fought in the vicinity of Medina. In these instances, the disbelieving Meccans had marched all the way towards Medina in order to attack the Muslims. This clearly shows that these three jihads were fought by Muslims in defence, in the face of offensive actions of the disbelieving enemies. They were by no means offensive wars. The case of the battle of Khaybar was slightly different. In this case, the Muslims went all the way to Khaybar from Medina because the disbelieving enemies had holed themselves up there and had started killing Muslims one by one. If the Muslims had not marched to Khaybar, the disbelievers would have continued killing Muslims. In other words, in order to quash this challenge to peace the Muslims were forced to head to Khaybar to take on their enemies. This cannot be considered an offensive war unleashed by the Muslims.

In order to properly appreciate the philosophy of jihad, one must consider various developments that occurred in the course of these battles. In the aftermath of the Battle of Badr, the Prophet agreed to release the Meccan prisoners of war if they were able to pay a certain sum for their freedom. Those who were unable to pay this sum but were educated were to be granted freedom if they could spend a year teaching Muslim children how to read and write. The job of a teacher carries much prestige. A teacher can even beat his students. A teacher exercises an enormous influence on his students’ minds. It is a mark of the great importance placed on education in Islam that the Prophet allowed for even non-Muslim enemies to teach Muslim children and gave them the honored status of teachers. In fact, these non-Muslims were those who had physically engaged in war against Islam and the Prophet. Those prisoners of war who could neither afford the ransom nor teach children were to be given freedom after a year doing physical labour.

The Battle of Uhd also powerfully highlights the fact that jihad does not mean to wield a sword in one’s hand and go about indiscriminately killing others. During the battle, Imam Ali, who was then a young man of a little more than 26 years of age, confronted a powerful enemy. Imam Ali asked him to accept Islam, but the man refused. Yet, Imam Ali did not draw out his sword. This shows that religion is not another name for emotionalism. Rather, true religion is based on reason, reasoning and careful thought and deliberation. Wild emotionalism has no place in true religion. Hence, when the man refused to accept Islam, Imam Ali did not rush to kill him, for the Quran very clearly states that there can be no compulsion in religion. Had Imam Ali slain the man on the spot it would have meant going against this Quranic dictum.

In response to the man’s reply, the Imam Ali said that he was free to accept or reject Islam. That was a matter of his own concern. Then, he offered the man a second option—that he and Ali both would desist from fighting or oppressing each other, that they would both continue to freely follow the religion of their choice and that if the man’s heart refused to accept the Prophet he was free to do so. But, the man refused even this offer, and insisted that he would slay Imam Ali. This man was a member of an army that had waged an offensive war against the Muslims, and consistently refused Imam Ali’s offer of what, to use a contemporary phrase, be called a no-war pact. After this, naturally, the time came for the man and Imam Ali to physically confront each other.

It so happened that Imam Ali was seated on a horse, while the man was standing on the ground. The man said that they could not fight in this way, and that Imam Ali must dismount from his steed. The Imam willingly did so. Then, the two began fighting. In a short while, the Imam lopped off the man’s legs with his sword. Then, when the man fell on the ground, the Imam pounced on his chest. Just then, the man spat on the Imam. Instead of retaliating at once, the Imam got up from the man’s chest, although one might have thought that he should have chopped the man’s head off at that moment.

The people who had gathered around were surprised at Imam Ali’s behaviour. They were shocked that although the Imam had succeeded in overpowering such a powerful enemy, he had released his hold on him by lifting himself up from his chest. They complained to the Prophet, saying that Ali had made a very grave mistake. The Prophet replied to them saying that they should ask Ali to explain his action himself when he returned.

The people saw Imam Ali walking around, but, after some time, he went back and slew the man. Later, when he was asked why he had jumped off the man’s chest when the man had spat on him, he replied that the man had insulted him by spitting on him, and that this had kindled his anger. He leapt off the man’s chest at once, for if he had slain him then the action might have been motivated by his own personal desire or emotion. That would have nullified the jihad that he was engaged in as a form of worship and service to God, for once worship gets tainted by the urgings of the baser self it is no longer engaged in for the sake of God alone. And, if war is engaged in for the sake of exacting personal revenge it does not qualify to be considered as jihad. What Imam Ali was engaged in was jihad, not war. He leapt up from the man’s chest so that his jihad was not tainted by the urgings of the self. This clearly explains the philosophy of jihad. The man who Imam Ali killed was armed with costly armaments, but the Imam did not carry these off with him, or even touch them, because this was not a war, but a jihad fought in God’s way, in order to earn His pleasure. That is what a true jihad is, not a war that aims at amassing wealth and power.

Friends! The battles engaged in by the Prophet and Imam Ali were true Islamic jihads, not the wars blessed as jihads by fake, self-styled ulema. Those who slaughtered the Imam Hussain were not engaged in any jihad whatsoever, contrary to what they might have claimed, for the Islam that Yazid claimed to stand for was not true Islam.

Fifth Majlis

Friends! A true Islamic jihad is one that is fought solely in the path of God. It is a form of worship. It is regulated by certain rules and regulations, as is specified in the Quran. In our [Shia] community, a declaration of jihad can be made only by the Infallible Imam (imam-e masoom), and if the Imam is in occultation (ghayba), the leading living Islamic jurisprudent (marja-e taqlid) has the prerogative of doing so. Thus, not everyone has the right to declare jihad. And, then, those who have the right to do so can do so only at the right time. Thus, the Prophet felt it was not advisable to engage in jihad while he was still in Mecca, and so he refrained from it. Later on, in Medina, he felt the time for engaging in jihad had come, and he did so. On the occasion of the Treaty of Hudaibiyah, he felt that the time for jihad was not ripe, so he put his sword aside. In Hunayn he felt jihad was required, and so he unsheathed his sword. After the demise of the Prophet, Imam Ali felt that it was not the time for jihad, so he put his sword back in its scabbard, but when, at Siffin, he felt the time for jihad had come he took out his sword. Similarly, when, after Imam Ali, Imam Hussain felt the time for jihad had passed he desisted from fighting, but when, at Karbala, he knew the time for jihad had come, he drew out his sword.

Not every war fought by Muslims is a jihad, despite what may have been claimed about them. Wars fought for political power, for wealth and status, cannot be considered to be jihads. Weapons and violence are used both in war and in jihad, but there is a crucial difference between the two. Some things are illegitimate in jihad but are permissible in war, and vice versa. Thus, when Ali got up from the chest of his opponent, it was something demanded by religion, but not by the rules of ordinary war. It is crucial to understand the difference between war and jihad so that the minds of those who constantly raise slogans of jihad can be cleansed and cleared. In this way they can realize that not all wars that Muslims engage in are legitimate jihads.

True mujahids participate in jihad in the hope of martyrdom, not for the sake of saving their lives. Such a true mujahid was Ja‘far, elder brother of Imam Ali, who participated in the Battle of Muta’ and was martyred. When his body was found it was discovered that he had received deadly numerous blows on his chest, but none at all on his back. As long as he remained on the battlefield he kept advancing forward, never turning back. This is how a true mujahid is, a man who does not escape in order to save his own life, but, rather, actively searches for his own martyrdom. I am making this point because my heart is heavy at the thought that very often people raise fiery slogans of jihad but do not observe its rules. If he [probably a reference here to Osama bin Laden, who, along with the Taliban, is said to be notoriously anti-Shia—YS] was truly engaged in jihad, why did he flee from the battlefield so that even now people are still searching for him?
Jihad is that battle wherein the mujahid offers his own life to God. Swords are wielded both in war and in jihad. People lose their lives in both. When a man stabs another with a knife, he tears his body, causing loss of blood. When a doctor performs an operation he also uses a knife-like object and cuts the body of the patient, who loses some blood. Yet, the two actions are entirely different. The former action is illegal, the latter legal. The former is a punishable crime, while the latter is something laudable.

Friends! War can be likened to stabbing someone with a knife, and jihad can be compared to an operation or surgery performed by a doctor on a patient. When an attacker stabs an innocent person he does not care to ensure that the knife he wields is sterilized and that it will not cause his victim to fall prey to tetanus or that his wound will not become septic. Rather, he stabs simply in order that his victim should die. He will not hesitate to use an old, rusted knife for this. On the other hand, when a doctor operates a patient, he makes sure that the scissor or knife that he uses is properly sterilized. He undertakes to operate the patient only when he feels there is no other way to cure him. Only a qualified surgeon can decide whether a patient needs to be operated upon or not. Ordinary people, who have no proper medical knowledge, no matter how many they may be, cannot decide this, but this single qualified person can. This shows that in some matters such as this, consensus of the majority (ijma) has no value.
So, as I was saying, it is only a surgeon who can decide about undertaking an operation on a patient. But, before he begins the operation, he checks several things, such as the patient’s general condition, whether or not he is suffering from diabetes and various other problems, and so on. Both the man who stabs another person as well as the doctor cause slits in a person’s body, but while the former stabs indiscriminately, so as to cause his victim to die, the latter wields his instrument carefully, gently tearing only that much skin on the patient’s body as is needed to make the operation successful and enable the patient to survive and be healthy. While the murderer uses an instrument to kill a person, the doctor uses it to save a person by cutting off that part of his body that has caused his illness.
From this analogy it will be clear that true jihad is like the work of a doctor. It aims at saving humanity, not destroying it. It aims at removing that part of the body that causes the entire body to suffer grievous illness and threatens it with death. By removing that part, the rest of the body can survive and thrive. From this analogy you can understand that true Islam does not aim at destroying innocent people in the name of jihad, but, rather, to provide relief and succor to humanity, like a doctor does. And, just as only a qualified surgeon can decide whether to operate upon a patient or not, in [Shia] Islam only one of the Infallible Imams can decide whether or not jihad should be waged.
The model jihad is that fought by Imam Hussain at the Battle of Karbala in the month of Muharram. In this battle, the grandson of the Prophet fought till his death to save Islam. Imam Hussain explained, in practical terms, the philosophy of true jihad at Karbala, when he and his small band of followers valiantly fought the vast army of the tyrant Yazid, the despotic ruler of a vast empire. The night before the war began, Imam Hussain told his followers that they were free to leave him and go wherever they wanted to. But, they refused, saying that they were ready to sacrifice even their lives for the cause. After the war of Karbala, Yazid was dumped in the dust-bin of history, and everyone now recognizes him as a monster. The world has not witnessed a true jihad again after the jihad of Karbala waged by Imam Hussain and his followers. The wars that were waged thereafter in the name of jihad were mainly for the sake of acquiring power and for conquest and territorial expansion, and so these were not legitimate jihads.

My message to the Muslims is that if they truly love Islam, they must not behave in a controversial manner. Instead, they must present and abide by Islam as taught by the descendants of the Prophet. To non-Muslims, my appeal is that if they sincerely wish to understand true Islam they should search for it not in the Islam of monarchs and despots, but, rather, in the Islam of the martyrs of Karbala. My message to both Muslims and others is that the battle of Karbala in the month of Muharram represents nothing but a war against terrorism. For, thousands of terrorists had gathered together under the banner of Yazid at Karbala in the name of Islam, and they were exposed by Imam Hussain. He proved to the world that the Islam that they championed was not the true Islam. This Yazid’s soldiers also proved through their brutal actions on the battlefield, including against members of the family of the Prophet, the cruelties of which are still recounted by people 1400 years after the event.

Sixth Majlis

At the battlefield of Karbala, Imam Hussain’s innocent six month-old child, Ali Asghar, was dying of thirst. He had not had even a drop of water to drink for three days. The small band of Imam Hussain and his followers had been cut off from water supplies by the enemy army. Taking him in his arms, Imam Hussain approached Yazid’s army, asking them to let him get some water for the baby otherwise it would perish. But, those brutal tyrants refused, and one of them, a man called Harmala, pierced the innocent child’s throat with a deadly arrow and he died.
It is one thing for a single individual to be bad, but it is an entirely different matter if an entire society supports him. When Harmala killed the baby Ali Asghar, the entire army of Yazid remained silent. They did not protest. This shows that Imam Hussain was not set against just a single Harmala but, rather, an entire vast army of terrorists identical to Harmala who had camouflaged their faces under the veil of Islam. They falsely called themselves the Army of Islam, but their actions had actually nothing at all to do with Islam. That is why the Battle of Karbala constituted a jihad, because if the religion upheld by Yazid and his followers was accepted as Islam and this claim went unchallenged, Islam itself would have been in grave danger. That is why Imam Hussain sacrificed his life, in order to explain to the world the true philosophy of jihad as struggle in the path of God and against brutal oppression as represented by Yazid and his followers. The Imam was willing to even face the death of his infant son but would not allow Yazid and his supporters to give Islam and jihad a bad name. Through his practical example at Karbala, Imam Hussain taught us that jihad is not a war for wealth, power and booty, not a means for instilling fear and terror in people, not a path for territorial expansion and conquest. Rather, as the Imam showed, jihad is a means for upholding the supremacy of God’s way, to sacrifice one’s life for God, to defend oneself when under attack but not to engage in any form of oppression while doing so.

Islam does not permit or approve of oppression and terrorism. It does not allow for people to be terrorized by fear. Instead, Islam strives to establish peace. People have been subjected to terror on account of many things—poverty, colour of their skin or whatever—but Islam declares itself the protector of all, including slaves, the poor, the weak and people of dark skin. It boldly announces that the strong cannot oppress and terrorise the weak, free men cannot terrorise slaves, white men cannot terrorise black men. But, when monarchical despotism sought to twist Islam to serve its nefarious ends, the situation underwent a drastic transformation.

Friends! Let me elaborate as to how Islam has forbidden terrorism, based on the teachings of the Quran. A crucial distinction must be made here between terrorism, punishment in retaliation and struggling for one’s rights. Terrorism is oppressing innocent people. Revenge or retaliatory punishment is to give the criminal the punishment that is due to him for his actions. So, if I murder an innocent person, I should be punished for the crime. This is what the Islamic law of qisas or retaliation says. But, if my brother is punished instead of me for the crime that I have committed, it would constitute terrorism, oppression and injustice. Islam stresses that the oppressor must be suitably punished for his actions, but in no way should innocent people be punished for them. That is why the Quran says that no person can bear the burden of another’s actions. That is to say, if I have murdered somebody, my brother cannot be held responsible for the crime that I have committed. If I am killed because I have killed someone else, that is to be considered as the punishment that I deserve. But, if my brother is killed because of my action, it would be tantamount to terrorism.

This point is also made by Imam Ali in his Nahj ul-Balagha. When Imam Ali was brutally attacked while praying in the mosque, because of which he later died, he made out a will, which is included in the Nahj ul-Balagha. Addressing the sons of his grandfather Abdul Mutallib, he wrote, ‘O people of Bani Abdul Mutallib. If I do not survive this wound and I meet my death, do not take up the sword against innocent people, saying that the leader of the believers has been martyred. Beware! Do not touch any innocent people. In retaliation for my death, take action only against the person who attacked me and no one else’.

This is the true Islamic approach, which Imam Ali announced to the world 1400 years ago. To kill innocent people was the way of the inveterate foes of Imam Ali, of despotic rulers, and not of true Muslims.

To his son, Hassan, Imam Ali instructed on his death-bed, ‘My son, Hassan! If I survive this attack I have the right to deal with my attacker in any which way I deem fit, and if I die then you should slay my attacker with just one blow. Do not administer two blows because he has delivered just a single blow on my head, not two.’ This well exemplifies the Islamic principle of justice and fair-dealing, even for a murderer.

I wish Muslim thinkers would present all these facts about true Islam before the world so that the misunderstandings that many people have about Islam could thereby be dispelled. It is time for Muslims to decide whether they want to remain faithful to Islam or to mere human beings. They have to choose one of them. As a result of various developments, including the emergence of various movements, we Muslims have earned a bad name, and others look at us with hatred. Muslims constantly repeat and claim that they have been made the target of conspiracies hatched by others. My point is that this is because Muslims have abandoned the path of Imam Ali, the ‘Lion of God’.

All the religions of the world teach good values. They aim at moulding good human beings. Yet, bad qualities inhere in most persons, even though most people claim to follow some religion or the other. But, this does not mean that if a Muslim commits a robbery, the action should be called ‘Muslim robbery’. If a Hindu commits a robbery it will not be called ‘Hindu robbery’. That is to say, robbery has no religion, and nor does a robber or a murderer. A robber is a robber, a murderer is a murderer. If a Muslim commits a murder, the act will not be called ‘Islamic murder’. If a Hindu commits a murder, the act will not be called ‘Hindu murder’. No, a murderer is a murderer, and it is wrong to associate his act with the religion that he claims to follow. The same applies in the case of terrorism. A terrorist is a terrorist, and to associate him with any religion is wrong. Everybody who commits terrorism must be condemned, but do not associate terrorism with any religion. But, then, the question arises as to why people so often use the phrase ‘Islamic terrorist’.

The international media routinely refers to what it calls ‘Islamic terrorism’. Muslims cannot evade the issue simply by saying that this is because the media is an enemy of the Muslims and that is why it uses such terms. Of course, it is true that this could be one factor. I do not deny this. But there could be something else behind it. While looking out for external causes, we also need to introspect and search within to see if there is something wrong with Muslims that lends weight to the anti-Islamic propaganda. We must admit that we, too, have committed certain wrongs that have given an opportunity to our foes to criticize and condemn us. It is an undeniable fact that some self-styled Muslim organizations and movements that are indeed engaged in terrorism use the name of our Prophet Muhammad or some other such Islamic terms as part of their names, in order to falsely claim Islamic sanction for their acts and thereby bring into their fold potential supporters. They resort to Islamic-sounding labels and false religious arguments to build support for themselves. Consequently, Islam gets blamed for their misdeeds and earns a bad name. This is something that we Muslims must deeply ponder over.

Besides this, Muslims must reflect on what sort of character they actually present before others. We must not get swayed by passionate emotionalism, heated rhetoric and empty sloganeering by self-styled mujahidin. To do that would reflect a lack of serious understanding of Islam.

Friends! It is true that the Indian Muslims suffer several problems, which may be different from those faced by Muslims at the global level. For this, we must seek guidance from the character of the family of the Prophet, the Ahl-e Bayt. If some people [a reference probably to some Sunnis—YS], on account of a long-standing dispute [with the Shias on the matter of the Ahl-e Bayt—YS], do not wish to do this, let them instead emulate the example of the Sufis, who preached the message of love. We all have noble role models to emulate such as these. Present and follow the models of renowned Muslim scholars and intellectuals. Why do you [Muslims] take such interest in the character of Muslim conquerors instead of such personages?

Friends! My complaint is that, unfortunately, Muslims have accepted as their heroes conquerors like Mahmud Ghaznavi, Salahuddin Ayubi, and Aurangzeb. These people were concerned with acquiring political power for themselves. Mahmud of Ghaznavi, who attacked India several times, did not engage in any sort of jihad in the path of God, although he might have claimed so. Rather, he was motivated simply by the desire to conquer India for himself. Nor did Salahuddin Ayubi walk the path of jihad for the sake of God, for he was responsible for the destruction of the [Shia] Fatimids in Egypt. Likewise, the Indian Mughal ruler Aurangzeb was responsible for the destruction of the [Shia] kingdoms of Golconda and of the [Shia] Qutbshahis in the Deccan. So, my appeal to Muslims is that they must seriously ponder on this issue of who they have wrongly come to consider as their heroes. It is wrong to accept people as heroes like this, getting swayed by spurious claims and arguments, which then forces Muslims to later regret their foolishness. So, Saddam Hussain, who was responsible for the death of literally thousands of Muslims and Islamic activists, suddenly became the hero of the [Sunni—YS] Muslims. Is this not absurd? Where are the Muslim intellectuals who should explain these issues to the people? Islam is not so cheap that those who claim to follow it should blindly consider just about anybody who speaks in its name to be its hero.

The true Islamic philosophy cannot be understood from those who have little grounding in it. So, how can just anybody who claims to speak in the name of Islam be considered a hero of the faith? And, then, is it not stupid that when this person himself faces a threat, Muslims start imagining that it is actually Islam that is threatened? Does this not greatly tarnish the fair name of Islam? Does this not cause Muslims to hang their heads in shame? My appeal to Islamic scholars, the ulema, is that they must come forward and uplift and reform the thinking of the Muslims, and teach them the true principles of Islam. Sadly, today Islam has become so cheap that in a cricket match if [a Muslim batsman] scores a six, Muslims start raising Islamic slogans to celebrate! Today, things have fallen to such deplorable levels that the truth of Islam is seen as being decided through a mere cricket or hockey match! We must admit, with full honesty, the nefarious game that is being played with Islam. We must seriously introspect as to how Muslim thought has so badly deviated. To get ourselves out of this situation, Muslims must seek inspiration from the Quran, from the life and teachings of the Prophet, from the character of true men of God who related with love and compassion with non-Muslims too.

We have two aspects of the Prophet Muhammad’s life before us. The first relates to the Meccan period of his life, when his followers were few in number, vastly outnumbered by his opponents. The second relates to the Medinan period of his life, when his followers greatly outnumbered his opponents in Medina. The Prophet’s behaviour in both phases of his life are a model and inspiration for Muslims. If Muslims live in a country where they are in a minority, they must seek inspiration and guidance from the Meccan phase of his life. Where Muslims are in a majority they should emulate the Medinan phase of his life. The Meccan phase of the Prophet’s life teaches us not to change or dilute our faith despite being marginalized and bereft of political power. The Medinan phase of the Prophet’s life teaches us that having political power must not lead us to oppress others.

Let me cite an instance from the life of the Prophet in Mecca, when his supporters were much less in number than his opponents. An old woman would throw garbage on top of the Prophet every day when he passed under her house. The Prophet did not react. He would simply lower his gaze and walk ahead. He did not fight with her. Nor did he change his route. It could be argued that fighting with her was not possible given the precarious situation that the Muslims were faced with then. But, had he chose to, he could have changed his route. Yet, he did not do this. If he had done this, how would he have succeeded in finally guiding that woman? So, he took the same route, day after day, and met with the same treatment at the woman’s hands.

It so happened that one day, when the Prophet was passing under the woman’s house, she did not throw garbage on him. The next day and the day after that, too, the woman failed to appear. Surprised, the Prophet asked someone what had happened to the woman, and was told that she was sick. At once, the Prophet went to her house to enquire about her health.

When the woman saw the Prophet coming to her house, she feared that he was set on taking revenge on her, and said so to him. Putting her fears at rest, the Prophet replied that he had come to find out how she was doing. The woman doubted what he said, but when she saw that he was not scolding or beating her, she believed him. She fell ashamed of how she had treated the Prophet for so many days. Her heart melted, and she pleaded with him to instruct her in the faith of Islam, for she had realised from his behaviour towards her that he was indeed true.

Friends! The reason why I cited this instance from the life of the Prophet was to impress upon you that true religion spreads only through noble actions and character, through tolerance and large-heartedness, not through anger and hatred. Let the Muslims of India learn from this example from the life of the Prophet in Mecca.

Let me cite another instance, this time from the life of the Prophet in Medina. This was a time when the Prophet had made numerous disciples and had won numerous victories. At this time, it so happened that a group of Muslims came across a poet who used to write poems mocking the Prophet. They bound him up and brought him before the Prophet, telling him that they had caught a man who routinely vilified him. Thereupon, several companions of the Prophet offered to slice the man’s tongue off, but the Prophet refused to allow this.

Just then, Ali appeared on the scene, and the Prophet instructed him to cut the man’s tongue. Ali took the man out of the mosque and untied his hands and feet. A camel belonging to Ali was standing nearby. He told the man to mount the camel and escape as soon as he possibly could. The man did so, fleeing at once.

Some people then went to the Prophet and complained to him about Ali’s action, saying that he did not cut off the man’s tongue, but, instead, had given him a camel and had enabled him to escape. They wanted the Prophet to get furious with Ali. However, the Prophet smiled, and said to them that they would not be able to understand what he had actually instructed Ali to do, although Ali had properly comprehended his order and had rightly acted upon it.

O Prophet of God! If many people did not understand the truth of your teachings in your very lifetime, how will those who came after you passed away understand them properly? Peace be upon the Prophet and his descendants!

So touched was the poet by the treatment meted out to him by the Prophet that he appeared before the Prophet the next day and accepted Islam at his hands. He told the Prophet that he had not been able to sleep for even a moment the previous night, having spent the entire night writing a poem in praise of the Prophet. He asked the Prophet for permission to read out the poem. The Prophet gave his consent. The man stood up and read out the poem. That is how that tongue of his that used to vilify the Prophet was ‘cut’, and, in its place, the man received the tongue that praised the Prophet.

Friends! These examples that I have cited should inspire you to follow the noble example of the Prophet. Muslims should present and reflect good morals and character, rather than dreaming of or recounting conquests made by [Muslim] rulers. These conquests were, in actual fact, not made for the sake of Islam, but, rather, for promoting the personal interests of [Muslim] rulers. These conquests did not promote or help Islam at all. Rather, they promoted or helped only despotic monarchy. If Muslims have any concern for Islam, they should be inspired by, and reflect in their own lives, the example of the oppressed, the most noble instance of which was the martyrdom of Imam Husain and his followers at Karbala.

Seventh Majlis

Friends! As I mentioned earlier, Islam is a religion of peace and security. It insists on respect for the life and property of all human beings. It has no relation whatsoever with oppression, injustice and terrorism. Please understand Islam as a religion. Understand it through the Quran, through the teachings of the Prophet and the character of the Ahl-e Bayt. Only then can you understand and appreciate true Islam.

The biggest tragedy that Islam has faced is that rulers have routinely referred to their regimes as ‘Islamic’. They tried to justify all their deeds, even heinous actions, through appeals to Islam. Naturally, then, Islam earned a band name. And, this sinister political game of manipulation of Islam continues unabated even today, causing poor Muslims and Islam to be vilified. The only way out of this is for Muslims to understand and abide by the true teachings of Islam. It is their duty for them to communicate true Islamic teachings to others through noble character. That is what Islamic mission really is. It is not, contrary to what some groups believe, to wear a cap and to keep one’s pants above one’s ankles and set out on tours to do missionary work [a reference here to the Sunni Deobandi Tablighi Jamaat, known for its hostility towards Shias—YS]. No, Islam should be communicated to others through one’s own personal example, by impressing them by one’s noble character, by trustworthiness in one’s dealings and work, by always upholding the truth. Then only will people begin to admire you, and so you can explain to them that you abstain from wrongdoings because the Prophet also abstained from them. You can then tell them that your good deeds and noble character are because the Prophet whom you follow always performed good deeds and led a noble life.

Respected Friends! If you truly want to serve Islam, then serve it through noble character and actions. Islam is not a religion of terrorism. Islam is not a religion of obstinacy, fanaticism and polemics. Islam is not a religion of anger and hatred. Unfortunately, however, the actions of Muslims have given Islam a bad name. This has given the enemies of Islam the opportunity to vilify Islam. Please think seriously over what I have just said.

Friends! There is no room for extremism or compulsion in religion. The Quran very clearly states, ‘There shall be no compulsion in religion’. The path of true guidance has been clearly distinguished from those that lead people astray. The role of religion is to inform people that a certain path leads to goodness and another path to evil. It then leaves it entirely up to people to freely decide which path they want to choose. This clearly means that no one can be forced to accept Islam. No one’s house can be set alight in order to prove the superiority of Islam. No one can be shot dead in order to prove the truth of Islam. Those who commit such deeds in the name of Islam are grossly misusing Islam. They are defaming Islam.

Friends! Whether it be Islam or any other religion, the moment extremism and compulsion creep into a religion it blows up into a major danger, an enormous threat. Politicians then begin to work in tandem with people who regard themselves as religious leaders in order to wrongly use religion for their nefarious purposes. We have seen this tragedy repeatedly taking place all over the world. This still continues even today. Extremism in the name of Islam, oppressing innocent people in the name of Islam, is not true religion. It is not Islam. It is politics, pure and simple. It is the lust for power. We must remember that whenever extremism and oppression have been sought to be legitimized by unscrupulous, power-hungry people in the name of Islam, our religion has received a bad name.

In recent years, some groups have been engaged in acts of terrorism in the name of Islam. We must be clear that this is not Islam. Is prohibiting education [a reference here probably to the fiercely anti-Shia Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan—YS] Islam? Is imprisoning women Islam? Is oppressing people Islam? Is dealing harshly and cruelly with people Islam? No. Definitely not. How can it be when the Prophet Muhammad is himself referred to as rahmat al il alameen or ‘mercy unto all the worlds’?

Friends! This is the complex problem that we are today confronted with. I am constantly repeating the same points because I want Muslims to realize that it is their duty to present the glories and truth of Islam before the entire world, to impress upon them that Islam does not sanction oppression, coercion, extremism and terrorism. We must recognize, as some important [Sunni] scholars have, that, following the death of Imam Ali, despotic monarchism consistently sought to infiltrate into Islam, posing a grave danger to it.

Friends! When Islam was turned into an instrument for bolstering Sultanic despotism, it was the duty of Islamic religious leaders to openly declare that Islam had nothing whatsoever to do with the actions and behaviour of Muslim Sultans. However, for some strange reason that I cannot fathom, they did not care to distinguish the actions of rulers, like the Umayyads, the Abbasids and other Muslim kings and Sultans, from Islam.

The Prophet Muhammad engaged in missionary work for several years. He announced his prophethood at the age of 40, and continued his missionary work till he passed away at the age of 63. This means that he spent 23 years doing missionary work, at the end of which the whole of Arabia turned Muslim in his own life time. He won over the hard-hearted Arabs in such a short time. On the other hand, Muslims ruled India for almost a thousand years. Yet, the majority of Indians did not accept Islam. Why was this so? This was because what was spread in Arabia by the Prophet in those 23 years was true Islam, and what did not manage to spread much in India in 1000 years was because it was politics in a pseudo-religious garb that was sought to be spread by Sultans. If you read history you will realize that some [Muslim] rulers engaged in terror and oppression and even built tall minarets filled with the skulls of people whom they killed. We [Shias] are the worst victims of this sort of terrorism in history. Was not the murder of Imam Ali while he was praying in a mosque terrorism? Was not the brutal slaying of children and women by soldiers in Basra, who were enemies of Imam Ali, terrorism?

When the image of religion becomes unduly harsh and people begin to think in a very narrow and restricted way it becomes a grave danger to that religion. Religion is supposed to create gentleness, not harshness. But, when religion is misinterpreted, it causes people to become harsh and cruel. They become selfish and insular, even hostile to others. This happened early in the history of Islam, starting with the emergence of the Khawarij, who upheld an extremely distorted vision of Islam. They took the name of God and the Prophet and they also read the Quran. But theirs was a distorted form of Islam. They considered everyone but themselves to be kafirs, including even Imam Ali himself. Imam Ali tried to reason with them but they refused to listen, and, after that, they fought against the army of Imam Ali at the Battle of Nahrwan. The Imam fought them because they proved themselves to be a danger to Islam, for, in actual fact, what they upheld was not religion. Rather, they were enemies of religion who had donned a religious garb.

When Imam Ali ordered his followers to fight the Khawarij, some of them stopped and said to him that those whom he had commanded them to fight were reading the Quran. See how the Quran and the Hadith can also be misused! Imam Ali answered his followers, saying that it was true that the Khawarij were reading the Quran, but that the Quran had got stuck in their necks and would not go further down than that. In this way, Imam Ali highlighted the fact of how some people will not hesitate to misinterpret Islam for their own nefarious purposes.

Friends! Try and objectively survey the present conditions of the Muslim world. If you honestly do so, you will have to admit that today the entire worldwide Muslim community is drenched in blood. There is bloodshed and war going on in Palestine, in Afghanistan, and elsewhere. Yet, despite the fact that we Muslims are ourselves drenched in blood we continue to blame only others for our plight. We must now also introspect and look within our own selves to honestly gauge to what extent we, too, are responsible for this tragic fate. We need to indentify and admit our weaknesses. We need to understand the mistakes we have made and continue to make.

Friends! My intention in saying all this is to inspire us Muslims to reform ourselves, not to promote strife. I want the message to go out to the world that Islam is spotless. If anyone is to blame, it is the [Muslim] rulers, who, in actual fact, have nothing to do with Islam. How long will Muslims continue to go along with political manipulations that are actually destroying their religious objectives and responsibilities? How long will they continue to remain toys in the hands of those who manipulate them? It is true, as I said earlier, that Islam has nothing to do with terrorism, so it is tragic when one even hears of Muslims condemning other Muslims as kafirs [a reference here probably to a large number of Sunnis who consider Shia Muslims as unbelievers—YS] or killing other Muslims. They do not even desist from slaughtering other Muslims while they are praying in mosques simply because they follow a different sect, stupidly imagining this to be a great service to Islam. What sort of Islam is this? What sort of religion is this? Today, the Muslim world is passing through a very dangerous phase. Yet, despite all these dastardly acts, people’s eyes have not yet opened.

Because we [Shias] are in a minority, we have consistently been the victims of terrorism and extremism for the last 1400 years or so. Our story is that of a people whose blood has been shed on a massive scale by oppressors. I do not want to recount that tragic story here, but my question is: Does Islam not have even that basic tolerance as to bear ideological and sectarian differences?

Friends! I do not want to delve into our history. I simply want to stress that if anyone wants to know what true Islam is, he or she must not seek to do so by looking at Muslims, because there are both good as well as bad Muslims. There are murderers among Muslims as well as hapless victims of murder. There are oppressors among Muslims as well as victims of oppression. If anyone wants to understand Islam, he or she must not seek to do so by examining the life and character of Muslim kings and rulers, past and present, because kings and other rulers always seek to promote their own interests. If you truly want to understand Islam, do not try to do so through the actions, lives and behaviour of Muslim Sultans and conquerors, because they used Islam for their own interests. They sought to legitimise their despotism with a so-called ‘Islamic’ garb so as to prevent people from opposing or rising up against them. It is just like if I want to commit a crime, I capture a mosque and start living there. Outside the mosque, I put up a big banner, announcing that this is a mosque. So, when Muslims see the banner they will pass by the mosque with respect and awe. Hence, I can carry on with my nefarious plans while sitting comfortably in the mosque.

Friends! Many Muslim rulers unfurled ‘banners’ of Islam of this sort in order to deceive people and win their loyalty, using this to carry on with their dirty political intrigues. Consequently, Islam has received a bad name. That is why it is now incumbent on the Muslims to themselves understand as well as to explain to others what true Islam actually is. They must also speak out against the misuse of Islam, or other religions for that matter, for political purposes, for this can only result in conflict, destruction and bloodshed. It is wholly wrong to mix religion and politics. I do not suggest that Muslims should stay away from politics altogether. Muslims must actively participate in politics to ensure, protect and promote their rights. But, please do not mix religion with politics. Do not play the religious card. Sadly, this practice continues today unchecked, reducing religion into a mere plaything.

Friends! I must frankly state that many Muslims severely lack tolerance for others. This is completely against the Quranic dictum that lays down, ‘Unto you your religion and unto me my religion’. Islam thus clearly states that we should respect the right of everyone to follow the religion of his or her choice. This means that non-Muslims should not be troubled or oppressed on account of their religion. If Muslim Sultans flouted this Quranic law, the blame lies with them, not with Islam. Is it, then, not a cruel irony that despite the fact that the Quran insists on religious tolerance, even for non-Muslims, we [Shia Muslims], who accept God and the Prophet Muhammad, are being targeted and attacked [by Sunni extremists—YS]?

Friends! A terrifying form that this persecution is sought to be justified in a particular interpretation of Islam [probably a reference here to Wahhabism, which is fanatically anti-Shia—YS] that first emerged in a holy land [a reference here probably to Saudi Arabia, on account of it being home to Mecca and Medina—YS] and that is now taught in numerous madrasas in a country neighbouring India [a reference here probably to Pakistan—YS]. This version of Islam has caused much destruction throughout the world. Advocates of this version of Islam inflict cruel punishments on other Muslims who express their reverence for holy personages in a way that they do not approve. What sort of Islam is this that forbids people, Muslims and others, from worshipping according to their religious precepts? The Prophet Muhammad allowed non-Muslims freedom to worship in accordance with their beliefs. Then why do these [Wahhabis] not allow followers of the Prophet [Shias], who are Muslims, to pray according to their religious rules? Muslims must reflect on this ideology that underpins much of the conflict and strife that now prevails in large parts of the world today. Where will this ideology take them? What must be done to combat this vicious campaign of hatred [launched by certain radical Sunni groups—YS] against the Shias that goes to the extent of even branding them as non-Muslims and unbelievers?

We Shias do not need a certificate from these people to prove that we are Muslims. They may keep declaring us to be kafirs. Okay, even if we are really kafirs, when did we ever ask them to certify us as Muslims? Our problem is really unique: Some people are angry with us because we are Muslims. Others are angry with us because we are, in their view, kafirs. As the saying goes, ‘The narrow-minded mullah thought me to be a kafir, while the Brahmin thinks I am a Muslim’.
We Shias are, as I said, victims of a strange tragedy. We are a minority that is being attacked from both sides. We are those Muslims who refuse to believe in terrorism in the name of religion. That is because our history is that of spreading our faith by sacrificing our own lives, rather than by taking the lives of others.

Friends! Every year we commemorate the martyrdom of Imam Hussain, grandson of the Prophet and son of Ali and Fatima, in the month of Muharram, who sacrificed his life to protect the glory of Islam. By giving up his own life, Imam Ali saved Islam. He did not do this by killing anyone else. No, he saved Islam by sacrificing himself and his 72 companions at the Battle of Karbala. Our Islam is one of giving sacrifice of our own selves, not one that exacts or causes the sacrifice of others.

The criminal oppressors who fought Imam Ali and his companions at Karbala heaped all sorts of barbarities on them, even on helpless infants. They even blocked their drinking access to drinking water. Can this be called Islamic behaviour at all? Was it not actually naked terrorism? Was not the resistance put up by Imam Hussain at Karbala a battle against extremism and terrorism?

Eighth Majlis

Friends! Religion and political domination are two different things. Unfortunately, [some] Muslim rulers misused Islam for their own purposes. Because of this, Islam got a bad name, as the crimes committed by these rulers were wrongly attributed to Islam itself. Rulers have always used religion as a shield to cover up their crimes and to protect themselves, their power, privileges and status. This has been the story of Muslims for 1400 years. So, today how can we discern what true Islam is? How do we now distinguish between religion and political domination?

I have a very simple solution to this complex puzzle. And that is: true religion is where there is tolerance, soft-heartedness and compassion for other human beings. Contrarily, if innocent people are killed, if the weak are oppressed, that is not true religion. Rather, it is political domination, although it might use a religious garb to legitimize such crimes. It is not true religion, although its proponents might claim it to be such, because true religion can never tolerate oppression and exploitation. God wants people to be secure, to preserve human life, freedom and peace. God does not seek the destruction of human life.

God is our Creator, and true religion belongs to Him. First understand God, and then you can understand what Islam really is. God loves His creatures. You can call Him by various names—Allah, or Bhagwan, God, Parmatma or by whatever other name you want, it is the same. He has created us all, and He is the maker of true religion. If you want to understand God, try and do so by reflecting on your mother. A mother plays a similar role to that of God in some ways. When a woman becomes a mother, she becomes a reflection of some of the attributes of God. God is the creator of the newborn child, and He uses the mother to bring the child into the world. God provides food to the child, using the mother as the means for this. God is the Most Merciful, and the mother reflects some of this mercy in her behaviour towards her child. God is the Nourisher, and the mother also nourishes her child. A mother is not just a woman. Rather, she is a character, a set of attributes. She is the first to agree to the requests of her child, and the last to refuse and get angry. Even if all other people in the neighbourhood and within the family get cross with the child, the mother will not. She will continue to shower her love on it and protect it. Even if she loses her temper, her heart soon melts and she embraces her child in her arms.

Now, the mother’s heart was made by God, and He has emptied an entire sea of love into her heart. This being the case, will not God be even more compassionate towards His creatures than a mother, who is also His creation? Yes, certainly. Naturally, then, the religion that truly comes from God must also be grounded in compassion, love and mercy. In contrast, religion contrived or distorted by those who lust for worldly power will be grounded in oppression, extremism and cruelty. Everyone must ponder on this matter, and not just Muslims alone. Let everyone choose whether to adopt and follow the religion of Allah or Bhagwan or God or, otherwise, the religion of politicians. If you want the religion of Allah or Bhagwan or God, you will find it in the shade of compassion, mercy and love.

Friends! A major tragedy that struck Islam was that while it was the religion of God, politics reduced it into the religion of the mullahs. God is absolute mercy, an ocean of compassion that can never be emptied. But, unfortunately, we [Muslims] completely lack this understanding in our dealings with others. We doggedly refuse to tolerate any differences. We want to impose our views and force others to hold the same opinions as we do. And, if someone disagrees even very slightly with us we get inflamed.

Friends! One of the major reasons for the problems that Muslims are today afflicted with is a certain strand of thinking that has developed in Islam that is extremely intolerant. I do not want to hurt anyone’s sentiments here. I respect everyone’s feelings. But, still, I must respectfully submit that if you believe something to be correct, you are free to follow it, but please do not try to forcibly stop others from believing what they feel is right. I do not say that you must do what I order. No. You do what you feel is right, but let me also do what I feel is right. God has not appointed you as a ruler over me to decide if what I am doing is right or wrong. If what I am doing is right, God will reward or bless me for it. If what I am doing is wrong, I will be punished by Him for it, not you. At the very most, you can simply suggest to me that in your view what I am doing is wrong. Your responsibility stops there. To seek to force people to agree to your religious views grossly violates the Quranic dictum that there is no compulsion in religion.

Friends! Please ponder on the fact that true Islam upholds religious tolerance and acceptance. It lays great stress on ethics and morals. Yet, some [Muslims] have invented an alien school of thought and have given it an Islamic label [a reference to Wahhabism—YS], and an entire country [a reference here probably to Saudi Arabia—YS] is devoted to promoting this school. And, in a second country [a reference probably to Pakistan—YS], madrasa students are being reared on this ideology, which insists that, besides its adherents, all people others are kafirs. This tragic development is giving Muslims a bad name the world over.

To repeat a point I have made several times before, there is no room for oppression and extremism in true religion. A truly evolved person is he who understands and appreciates the worth of human life. What is the use of a religion that does not preach humanity? What is the use of a religion that exhorts its followers to kill others, to wage war against others, to burn others to death? Lamentably, in our age religion has come to be commonly deployed as an instrument to protect rulers and help power-hungry politicians. It is the poor who suffer most from this sinister manipulation of religion. And, then, there are those who fervently believe that they alone are following God’s path, and that the rest of humankind shall be thrown into the fires of Hell so that just a few people—they themselves—can relax in heaven.

Friends! This sort of mentality that has developed is proving to be a great danger to Islam. This ideology is based on the belief that all those who do not subscribe to it are kafirs, doomed to perdition in Hell. This reflects a completely warped interpretation of Islam. The true religion of God, as I said before, can be found only where there is love and goodwill towards others. Where views are sought to be forced on others, through coercion, extremism and oppression, it is definitely not God’s religion. Rather, it is a political gimmick in the name of religion.

This brings me back to the question of true jihad. The sword wielded by truly religious people alone is qualified to be called jihad. Jihad is inseparable from love. Jihad is like a mother who takes her child for treatment to a doctor when he is ill. The child might even need to have an operation. There is no enmity at all involved in this. She arranges for his operation in order to save his life. So, if some of the Infallibles—the prophets and the [Shia] Imams—wielded the sword, it was because of their concern for humanity, an expression of love, and not out of hatred.

Friends! If you want to truly understand the love that underlies true jihad, consider the conduct of Imam Hussain, who expressed love even for his foes who fought with him at Karbala, who denied him and his followers water to drink for three whole days, who slew his children and other members of his family. This is a reflection of the fact that true religion is based on justice, and so when a true jihad is waged it observes the principles and rules of justice. In Imam Hussain’s army of 72 men there was one man, Abbas, who was stronger than the entire army of Yazid put together. Yet, because of his insistence on justice, Imam Hussain did not let him take part in the battle.

Ninth Majlis

Friends! I have been constantly stressing the need to distinguish between religion and politics, between Islam and the wrong interpretation of Islam. We need to ponder over some crucial issues. What is true Islam? Does Islam allow for the killing of innocent people? Does Islam consider human blood to be treated like water? Does Islam exhort its followers to kill everyone who differs from them? There is nothing at all to suggest that such heinous actions are sanctioned by the Quran, the Prophet and the Ahl-e Bayt. So, if anyone commits such terrible deeds in the name of Islam, it means that he is defaming Islam, that he is not a Muslim, and that he is excommunicated from the Muslim fold. It is crucial that the ulema of Islam stand up and announce this boldly to the world, even if they feel that their voice may not be heard by everyone. If thousands of such voices are put together, they will surely make a major difference. The ulema must also work to provide the Muslim public a correct understanding and vision of Islam, one that is based on respect for human life, irrespective of religion. Islam exhorts its followers to protect and save human lives. It does not say that they should protect only the lives of Muslims. No, it says protect all human lives, because it values and respects all human life.

Friends! I would like to cite to you a Hadith attributed to the Prophet that suggests that under certain conditions a man has to think beyond his own religion. The Prophet sternly forbade the burning to death of any living being, including humans as well as animals. The Hadith goes on to say that such an act can be legitimately committed by God alone, the Master of the Fire. So, if any person burns to death any other human, no matter what the latter’s religion, or an animal, he has committed treason against Islam. From this one example, you can appreciate the fact that Islam stresses universal brotherhood. It is our fault that we have not presented this true Islamic perspective before the world, before people of other faiths. It is also the fault of others that they have not sought to understand us properly. They view or judge Islam on the basis of the actions of [Muslim] despots and rulers. This is the warped understanding of Islam that the mass media continues to highlight. They never approached us directly to know what Islam truly is.

Friends! The thing that Islam is most severely opposed to is strife, chaos and conflict (fitna). Fitna is regarded as the worst possible act in Islam. According to a Hadith attributed to the Prophet, fitna is even worse than murder. This is because in a case of murder it is just one person who is killed, while fitna can cause an entire city or even an entire country to go up in flames. In this regard, I would like to appeal to all human beings, irrespective of religion, to reconsider the way they view the entire humankind. As regards their view of Muslims, I appeal to non-Muslims not to judge Islam by the actions of Muslim despots who falsely used Islam as a means to justify their wrong deeds. Their actions were in no way truly Islamic. The future of humankind critically depends on us all living together in peace. The different communities in the world are like different parts of a single body. If a thorn gets stuck in the foot, it causes the entire body to writhe in pain. The head, the highest part of the body, bows down for the sake of the foot, the body’s lowest part, and the hand removes the thorn from the foot. The entire body focuses on the foot and shares its pain. Our human body teaches us a valuable lesson—that no part of our body is superior or inferior to any other. The whole of humankind is like a single body. Naturally, then, for someone to kill innocent people and even rejoice in this barbaric act is a horrendous crime. It becomes even more heinous if this person claims that he was motivated by his religion to do so.

Let me repeat: There is no room for extremism and terrorism in Islam. I want to elaborate on this point with reference to the Battle of Karbala, where Imam Hussain was brutally slain. This battle clearly brings out the distinction between Islam and despotism. The Battle of Karbala was not fought between Hindus and Muslims. It was not a war between Christians and Muslims. It was not a conflict between Jews and Muslims. It was not a battle between Zoroastrians and Muslims. Imam Hussain did not fight against Zoroastrians or Christians or Jews or Hindus or Buddhists or Jains, the major religious communities of his times. Hussain did not fight against any of these people. Then, what was the religion of Yazid? Who was Yazid? He was a Muslim. He was a king. Yazid was a Muslim king, while Hussain was the religious leader of the Muslims.

The battle between Yazid and Imam Hussain was fought some 1400 years ago. It was a war between Muslims themselves. Because of this, till the Day of Judgment non-Muslims will understand that Muslims are of two types, who fight against each other on the battlefield. These types are represented by Imam Hussain, on the one hand, and Yazid, on the other.

Compare the characters of Imam Hussain and Yazid. Imam Hussain entered Iraq and advanced towards Kufa through the Iraqi desert. There, he was confronted by Yazid’s army. He saw that the soldiers in the enemy army were greatly distressed. Touched by their plight, he asked them the reason. They answered that they were very thirsty, that they were dying of thirst. Imam Hussain ordered his followers to give water to the enemy soldiers to slake their thirst as well as that of their animals. Imam Hussain himself gave water, with his own hands, to some of these soldiers to drink. This was the noble character of Imam Hussain, who even slaked the thirst of his enemy’s soldiers in the desert.

These were the same soldiers who, when they faced Imam Hussain and his followers at the battlefield in Karbala, refused to give them water to drink. Imam Hussain’s six-month old child suffered without water for three days. When Imam Hussain asked Yazid’s army to give his innocent child some water, one of Yazid’s soldiers shot dead the child with his arrow.

You can now understand the stark difference in the character of these two sets of Muslims. One group helps their enemies by slaking their thirst. The other refuses to give their opponent’s six-month old child even a drop of water for three days and then brutally slays it.

Friends! Both of these groups were Muslims. Yazid was a Muslim, and so was Imam Hussain. But, believe me, Islam definitely does not have room for both types of characters. Only one of them can be considered Muslims. So, now let the ulema of Islam decide if they want to consider Imam Hussain a Muslim or Yazid a Muslim.

I have a serious complaint against the [Sunni—YS] ulema of Islam. If they had collectively issued a fatwa announcing that Yazid was out of the fold of Islam, this major blot on Islam could have been removed. Yet, political compulsions did not allow them to do so. Because of this, the despicable character of Yazid came to be wrongly associated with Islam. So, if today the whole world accuses [Muslims] of terrorism it is the echo of their own past actions that the Muslims are hearing.

For what purpose has the mission of Muharram been carried down for the last 1400 years? The answer is: So that the world comes to know what the Islam of Muhammad really is, what the Islam of the Ahl-e Bayt is, what the true Islam is, that teaches its followers to behave well even with their foes, the Islam that exhorts its followers to even sacrifice their lives for God and justice. Muharram is not a mere month. Rather, it is a crucial lesson for those who uphold a wrong understanding of religion. If you want to truly understand Islam, understand it from the life and deeds of Imam Ali, who respected humanity. If you want to understand Islam, understand it from the lives of the Noble [Shia] Imams, who related with compassion and love even with their foes.

Let me cite an instance in this regard. Once, a person who was opposed to Imam Hussain passed by him and uttered some bad words. Instead of getting angry or striking him, Imam Hussain stopped and addressed the man with kindness, asking him what the matter was. Was he a traveller with no money left, he asked? If so, he said, he could give him some money. Had anyone threatened him, he wanted to know? Was his life in danger? If so, he said, he would place him in his shelter. Was he hungry? If so, he offered to provide him food. If he was sick, he said, he would help cure him. He had no enmity with the man, the Imam said to him. At once the man fell at his feet, and for the rest of his life remained as his faithful follower.

This, my friends, is true religiosity. Religion’s purpose is to reform human beings, to make them truly human. But, if that which was intended to reform people and society itself gets corrupted, will it not it be the greatest possible tragedy? Surely, the right way to bring people to the right path is not by lopping off their heads, but to explain to them the philosophy and ideology of true Islam.

Friends! I want to reiterate that as long as Muslims continue to love and cling to the Islam of despotic rulers, they will continue to receive a bad name. They will continue to be accused of wrong deeds. They will continue to suffer. They will continue to be embroiled in conflicts. The day Muslims see the light and accept the Islam of the Ahl-e Bayt, peace can begin to be established in the world on its own. This is because the Islam that we express through Muharram is not the Islam of murderers. It is the Islam of martyrs. It is not the Islam of oppressors. It is the Islam of the oppressed. This Islam has no quarrels or conflicts with anyone. This Islam is large-hearted. At the time of the Battle of Karbala, there were very few Muslims in India. But, despite this, Imam Hussain told Yazid’s forces that if they did not like him they should not stand in his way. He would head for India, he said, far away from them, to a land that was well beyond the reach of Yazid. He offered to go to India. If I were present on that occasion, I might have folded my hands and said, ‘O Master! There are no Muslims in India, why should you go there?’ To which the Imam might have replied, ‘Muslims do not live there but surely human beings do!’

But, later, other Muslims came to India, and there were conflicts and wars. Muslim armies invaded the country. l I do not wish to repeat the story of all that happened. Everyone knows this story. But please note one thing—that the practice of the lamentation (azadari) of Imam Hussain’s martyrdom also spread to India. Many non-Muslims also participated in the azadari, mourning the Imam’s tragic death. Even today many Hindus mourn the Imam’s death in the month of Muharram. They also assisted [Shias] in performing azadari. Some people might cynically claim that in the past this was simply a means for these non-Muslims to curry favour with Muslim rulers. But, today these rulers are no more and their descendants live in pathetic poverty. Yet, still the non-Muslims’ participation in azadari for Imam Hussain continues across India till this day. In this way, Imam Hussain brought Hindus and Muslims in India closer together. Let Hindus and Muslims continue to participate in the Muharram azadari together. In this way, they will begin to understand each other better. I wish to state that in India non-Muslims have never opposed our azadari. Wherever it has been opposed, the opposition has been from [some Sunni—YS] Muslims alone.


The Muharram azadari recounts a bloody story of oppression. And, this story has important lessons for India today. Our country has been faced, off and on, by the threat of powerful external forces and some self-styled religious groups. The Battle of Karbala provides a clue to help us stave off both these threats. Yazid had political power, and he also cynically manipulated religion to bolster his power. Yet, Imam Hussain valiantly defied him and fought his army, so much so that today Yazid is widely remembered as a cruel tyrant and a false claimant to religious authority. In fact, his name has become a term of abuse. On the other hand, Imam Hussain continues to be deeply revered across the world. His life and his death powerfully exemplify the true Islamic spirit. They boldly announce to the world that true religion can never bow down before power and wealth. It cannot ever give up its right to transform people’s lives. It insists on upholding the truth and what is right in the face of even fierce odds. Imam Hussain had a band of only 72 followers, but they valiantly fought against Yazid’s army which numbered, at the very least, thirty thousand men, according to writers vociferously opposed to the Imam, or probably many more than that. By bravely fighting the tyrannical Yazid and his army, Imam Hussain sent out a message to the entire world: Do not support oppression under any cost. When oppression and tyranny cross all bounds, turn your face in the direction of the storm and bravely fight.

In a very systematic way Imam Hussain expressed and explained before the entire world the religion of the martyrs of Karbala. The brutal manner in which Abbas, Ali Asghar, Imam Hussain’s six-month old son, Imam Hussain himself, and his many companions were slain by the army of Yazid proved before the world that Yazid’s soldiers were not Muslims at all. In fact, they were not fit to be called human beings. They were fierce beasts in the garb of Islam. Imam Hussain saved Islam from those beasts.

Tenth Majlis

Friends! Today is the last majlis in this series for this year’s Muharram. I have, all this while, being trying to impress upon you that true Islam upholds peace and security, and that it has nothing whatsoever to do with terrorism, oppression and strife. True Islam preaches respect for every human being, crossing religious and other boundaries, based on recognition of our common humanity. It seeks to stop conflicts and bloodshed, not to promote them. The God of Islam is the Lord of all the worlds. He takes care of every human being. He does not oppress anyone. The Prophet of Islam is called as ‘the mercy unto the worlds’ (rahmat al il-alameen). Mercy demands peace and sharing, not shedding blood.
Friends! Islam has not even the remotest connection with the crimes that [Muslim] rulers and governments have committed in the name of Islam in order to legitimize their power. A false Islam has been invented in order to support these tyrants. This false Islam has caused true Islam to earn a bad name. Because this false Islam was championed by most [Muslim] rulers and their armies, the world has seen largely only this sort of so-called Islam, and even today continues to erroneously imagine that this is the real Islam. That is why the martyrdom of Imam Hussain and his followers took place at Karbala, in order to highlight the distinction between false Islam and true Islam. The two armies that fought each other at Karbala both claimed to be Muslim. The soldiers of both armies said prayers according to the Islamic fashion. Both raised the same sort of religious slogans. Both had studied the Quran. Both considered God to be one. So, when they had so many beliefs in common, why did they go to war?

The reason was that, in actual fact, their religions were totally different. One group upheld the Islam of the Prophet, while the other represented the fake Islam of tyrannical despots. Every year, commemorations continue to be organized, even 1400 years after the Battle of Karbala, in the month of Muharram precisely so that people can understand the crucial distinction between the Islam of the Prophet and the Islam of tyrannical rulers.

Friends! Our country, India, is like a bouquet that contains a variety of flowers of different colours. When many different types of flowers come together, they form a bouquet. Why do some people want to destroy this beautiful bouquet by setting the different flowers apart from each other or against each other? They are enemies of the nation, even if some of them may claim to be great patriots [probably a reference here to Hindutva extremists—YS].

I appeal to Muslims to seek to understand the true Islam. I also call upon non-Muslims and political parties and governments that routinely demonise Muslims as terrorists to understand this true Islam. To repeat a point that I have made many times before, if anyone wants to understand true Islam, it is not the Islam of tyrannical despots that he should study. Nor should he understand Islam from the brutal actions of these rulers. Rather, it is in the Islam of the martyrs of Karbala that one can find the real Islam. I am confident that those who do this will change their opinions about Islam, and will disabuse themselves of the belief that true Islam legitimizes terrorism.

The Calamity of Extremist Thought: The Responsibilities of the Ulema and Muslim Intellectuals

By Maulvi Yahya Nomani
(Translated from Urdu by Yoginder Sikand)

Starting from the recent past, Muslims have fallen prey to certain absurd psychological weaknesses and aberrations in response to various forms of oppression and exploitation that they have suffered and from which they have not been able to free themselves. One of these weaknesses is the marked tendency to resort to empty sloganeering, heated rhetoric and an extremist approach in seeking to solve our problems. Such emotionally-driven sloganeering sways Muslims off their feet, and can easily lead them astray and into terrible destruction. There is no need for me to cite any examples in this regard. Every knowledgeable person is aware of this obvious fact.
This particular communal disease that I refer to is found at every level of Muslim society and almost every place where Muslims live. Indeed, heated rhetoric, empty, boastful sloganeering and extremist thinking is so rife among Muslims that even level-headed and serious intellectuals, who realize the worthlessness of this approach, can scarcely keep themselves free from their impact.

To illustrate my point about emotionally-driven extremism in Muslim circles, let me cite the case of the storming of the Lal Masjid and the Jamia Hafsa, a girls’ madrasa attached to it in Islamabad, the capital of Pakistan, two years ago. This is a tragic and bloody tale, an incident that was thoroughly avoidable.

The managers of the mosque and madrasa had demanded that the Government of Pakistan immediately impose the shariah as the law of the country. The response of the Government was so brutal that even those who are habitually opposed to the mullahs denounced its excesses. One hardly expected anything different from the Government of Pakistan, which, after all, listens only to instructions from its American masters. At the same time, however, few can dispute that the extremist stance taken by those in charge of the Lal Masjid was simply suicidal. It was obvious from the very beginning that it would lead nowhere but their own destruction. I shudder to imagine what the future holds for Pakistan if things continue in this way.

Extreme emotionalism and sensationalism, of the sort exhibited by the clerics associated with the Lal Masjid and its madrasa, has now taken the form of a deadly disease. It is causing unimaginable damage and destruction to the Muslims themselves. Yet, and unfortunately, few serious efforts are being made to destroy this illness from its roots. Muslims derive much more pleasure from emotionalism and empty sloganeering than from realistically examining themselves and their situation. Even some of our leaders and ulema are swayed by this misguided approach, further causing our community to be overpowered by emotionalism and extremism. This mentality is a product of a long series of defeats and of a long period of subjugation. It is now exhibiting deadly side-effects and consequences for the Muslims throughout the world. That is why this approach must be abandoned, difficult though this might be. There is simply no other alternative.

To come back to the simply suicidal stance of the clerics of Islamabad’s Lal Masjid, who, in the name of struggling for the enforcement of the shariah in Pakistan, caused the deaths of dozens of people—it was a foolhardy attempt by a single madrasa to take on the entire army of a country. Is this at all permissible according to the shariah? And, from the point of view of the shariah, is it allowable to engage in such acts that are not just suicidal but are also bound to create greater problems for, and suspicions of, madrasas, Islamic movements and Islamic activists, not in Pakistan alone but also in the rest of the world? Would not the killing of several Pakistani army personnel in the course of the siege of Lal Masjid have created enmity in the hearts of a large section of the Pakistani Army for the madrasas? Would not this sort of action pave the way for the Pakistani Army to become like Turkey’s, which is vociferously opposed to Islamic movements and institutions?

Yet, lamentably, as far as I know, although leading Pakistani Islamic leaders did not approve of the tactics of the clerics of the Lal Masjid, they did not sufficiently critique the extremist mentality of these clerics. Instead, many of them lauded what they considered to be their ‘sacrifice’ and ‘martyrdom’. In the face of this glorification, what hope remains that the dim-witted can see the light? In fact, they would continue to believe that the extremist approach and methods used by the clerics of the Lal Masjid are correct and that those who distance themselves from them are weak in faith.

The fact remains that the two brothers in-charge of the Lal Masjid and their scores of students are products of Pakistani madrasas. Obviously, their crazed, suicidal extremism must have at least something to do with the general environment in many madrasas in that country. The teachers and students of madrasas are indelibly influenced by the environment of their institutions. As Maulvi Zahid ul-Rashdi, the editor of a noted Pakistani journal Al-Shariah, remarked in a recent issue of his magazine, the number of people in Pakistani madrasas who display this sort of extremist approach is considerable, and they are spread throughout the country. Maulvi Zahid ul-Rashdi rightly comments that the Government of Pakistan should seek to dialogue with them. But, now that the Pakistani Government has identified itself as an ally of America and an enemy of the ‘jihadists’, can the extremists’ approach of inviting death for themselves and for many others, in the process leading to unimaginable destruction, be at all defended? Certainly not. Yet, unfortunately, even some of our leading ulema, including several who are said to be aware of the demands of the times, continue to search for excuses for this sort of dangerous and destructive extremism that, totally unmindful of the interests of Islam and its followers, is an emotionally-driven path to collective suicide.

Some ulema sought to defend the extremist approach of the clerics of Lal Masjid with regard to the enforcement of the shariah in Pakistan by arguing that this was the only option available in the face of the reluctance, even refusal, of the Pakistani Government to do so on its own and the inability of existing Islamic institutions to ensure this. Those who argue in this absurd fashion seem to believe that the Lal Masjid tragedy was somehow inevitable and inescapable. They seem to suggest that if the Pakistani Government and the existing Islamic institutions and movements in the country continue to drag their feet with regard to the immediate enforcement of the shariah in the country, such tragic and bloody confrontations will continue to erupt, which even the ulema will not be able to stop.

We must understand that if we continue to search for excuses, such as this, for extremism, we can never save ourselves from the menace that it is. The growing wave of attacks on the Pakistani armed forces from extremist elements is only making the problem even more intractable. These are suicidal attacks that are also destroying the Muslim community itself. Obviously, these cannot be excused at all. These are stupidities that only strengthen the hands of our foes, who obviously stand to gain as a result of Muslims killing themselves. Therefore, while the Pakistani ulema were justified in their criticism of the Government’s handling of the Lal Masjid issue, they should have also unambiguously declared that the clerics of the Lal Masjid had engaged in acts that were totally forbidden or haram according to Islam. These clerics had openly defied and opposed the leaders of the community, including the ulema, and were guilty of going against the community. Their stupidity drove them to cause their own deaths and that of hundreds of their students. They wrongly sought to arrogate for themselves the power of enforcing the law and establishing legal punishments (hudud), in the process, caused great strife (fitna). All this should have been explicitly pointed out by the Pakistani ulema, so that in future innocent people would not lose their lives in this tragic way and the fair name of Islam would not be spoiled, which is what the Lal Masjid confrontation led to.

Besides this, the clerics of the Lal Masjid went beyond the limits in defaming the ulema. One of the leading clerics of the mosque and madrasa, Abdul Aziz, sought to escape by disguising himself in a woman’s burkha after causing the deaths of several of his students. When he was caught, he admitted that he had given an interview to the media while disguised in that garment. And to add to his brazen shamelessness, he said all this with a smiling face. After disgracing the concept of jihad and the ulema in this despicable fashion, he had the gumption to deliver an emotionally-driven speech, calling for what he termed jihad, at the funeral of his brother.

It is tragic that few Pakistani ulema expressed their anger at this sort of disgusting behaviour. Obviously, then, elements among Muslims who have been driven to such extremes by the oppression of Muslims by others and the betrayal of Islam by Muslim elites, will not be goaded into changing their attitude and methods that are causing such destruction to themselves and other Muslims as well. Nor will they feel forced to obey the rules and regulations of the shariah that prohibit illegitimate violence. Nor, too, will they be willing to accept and concede the tragic fact that their approach is making any sort of Islamic activism even more difficult and the possibility of the establishment of Islam and the shariah even more remote.

I have pondered over the issue of the roots of this extremist mentality. Why do some people continue to be attracted by something that is so obviously destructive? One major factor is the seductive power of extreme emotionalism, which has been reinforced by repeated defeats that Muslims have suffered. This has now become the communal disease of the Muslims, so much so that seeking to cure the disease is thought of as cowardice. In actual fact, however, Islam does not condone or promote uncalled-for sacrificing of one’s life when there is no realistic possibility of victory. Till then, Muslims are supposed to remain bravely steadfast.

Another factor, and one that needs to be closely and critically examined, is a marked extremist approach among a significant section of Muslims to various issues. For instance, many Muslims have a strange sort of obsession with the notion of the enforcement of the shariah by the state, with the concept of the ‘Islamic state’ and with the call for the establishment of ‘The Caliphate of the Glorious Caliphs’, in that they consider these as the basis of religious progress. They even imagine that if these are not brought about, a Muslim cannot do anything much at all for Islam, although he might still be able to guide people from disbelief to faith.

This is a wrong approach. It is undoubtedly true that Muslims must, as a duty, seek to mould the state on the lines of Islamic teachings, but this task is certainly not their only concern. In fact, there are numerous other things that Muslims need to do before this.

Lamentably, some recent Muslim scholars have interpreted Islam in quite the contrary way, thereby promoting extremism and excess. In fact, their interpretations have also influenced many Muslim thinkers who were fiercely opposed to them. In this context, it must be asked if in today’s age and context of immorality and corruption, is it at all possible to establish an Islamic state without cultivating people’s faith and piety and the fear of the life after death? Certainly not. To seek to set up such a state in the absence of cultivating a morally upright society can only end in failure and strife. It is counter-productive, like banging one’s head against a massive rock. The prophets of God never established Islam in this fashion. Islam certainly cannot be established in this manner. To think otherwise is to adopt an absolutely unnatural and unrealistic approach. In fact, one can even say that an Islamic state cannot be established all at once, through the fiat of the state or a group of individuals, as many extremists imagine. Rather, it is something that evolves over time, an outcome of a long process. It is like a garden that slowly grows. First, seeds are sown in it. Then, as the saplings emerge they are protected from harmful insects. Thus, an Islamic society slowly emerges. Its members’ faith is built up and strengthened. As long as this is tended to, like a garden carefully looked after by a gardener, it remains fresh and verdant. But, if this task is overlooked, the society falls prey to corruption, just as a neglected garden is soon overtaken by insects that finally destroy it. To stretch the analogy further, the branches of the trees in the garden that is the Muslim community have, for a considerable period now, dried up because of our neglect, and their leaves have dried and fallen. Naturally, to expect this garden to suddenly, and all at once, turn fresh and vibrant is unrealistic. So, too, in the case of the quest for establishing an Islamic state.

In the light of this, it can be seen how unrealistic the extremist approach to the establishment of Islam is. In the case of the Lal Masjid, a handful of clerics of a madrasa sought to use force to compel the state of Pakistan by giving its rulers an ultimatum to enforce the shariah. This was as unrealistic as hoping to leap all the way up to the moon from the terrace of one’s home. Obviously, the commotion raised by these clerics could easily have been solved by the local police station, but then this would not have served the purposes of the Government, which was playing into the hands of those who thrive on fanning the flames of Islamophobia. The Pakistani rulers handled the situation in such a way as to fan further hatred for the ‘mullahs’ and the madrasas, not just among non-Muslims but also among Muslims as well. The global media rushed in to highlight the Lal Masjid agitation, thus leading further weight to Islamophobic discourses, while it maintained a studied silence on the fact that the majority of the Pakistani ulema did not approve of the stance taken by the Lal Masjid clerics. In fact, a delegation of the Pakistani Federation of Madrasas, including its head, Maulvi Salimullah Khan and the top-ranking scholar Maulvi Muhammad Taqi Usmani, travelled to Islamabad to meet and discuss matters with the clerics of the Lal Masjid, but the latter insisted that they would not change their approach to seeking to establish Islamic laws in the country, no matter what the repercussions. Finally, the Deobandi Madrasa Federation took the step of cancelling the membership of the madrasa associated with the Lal Masjid, and in this way announced that it had nothing to do with it.
Although, in general, the Pakistani ulema distanced themselves from the extremist clerics of Lal Masjid, their announcement of doing so so was insufficient. The fact of the matter is that the sort of extremism that the clerics of the Lal Masjid had resorted to is wrong and illegal according to the shariah. Anyone with a modicum of knowledge of the shariah and a bit of common sense will know that it is not at all permissible for any actor other than the state to seek to enforce shariah laws in this manner. The question here is not just the legality or illegality of this action according to the shariah. Rather, it is also a question of an issue that has wrought great damage to Pakistan, and indeed to Islam and Muslims the world over. Far from succeeding in ‘establishing Islam’, such extremism will only make it easier for America to succeed in its efforts to clamp down on Islamic activism in Pakistan.

In this context, it is imperative that we seriously study the roots of extremism in our midst. We must also make serious, well-organised plans to uproot this disease from our society.

Let me cite another recent case from Pakistan to further stress my point. Amir Cheema, a Pakistani youth, travelled to Germany for higher technical education. When a German paper published some despicable cartoons insulting the Prophet Muhammad, Amir Cheema approached the editor of the paper and warned him that if did not repent he would kill him. Consequently, Amir Cheema was arrested and thrown into jail. In that supposedly ‘civilised’ European country, he was so badly tortured in prison that he died. His corpse was brought to Pakistan, where he was given a hero’s burial. Several Pakistani Islamic magazines published stories about him, showering praises on him. They went to the extent of even congratulating him on his martyrdom, projecting him as some sort of role model for Muslims to emulate in the face of any future events involving insults to the Prophet Muhammad.
In connection with this incident, a Pakistani columnist wrote, ‘This incident bears striking similarities to the killing of the Dutch artist who presented a nude woman with Quranic verses painted on her body as an art item. This accursed man was soon dispatched to hell, slain by a Moroccan Muslim lad, who, when he appeared in court, proudly announced that he would do the same to anyone else who dared to insult the Prophet.’

It must be noted here that, purely from the point of view of the shariah, the action of this Moroccan youth was absolutely wrong. His love for Islam is another matter, but the shariah did not give him permission to take this step, which violated the peace treaty that the man’s country had with the country where he was then residing. By taking a visa to enter Holland he had implicitly agreed not to damage in any way the life and property of Holland’s citizens. He had, in effect, agreed and undertaken that he would obey the laws of Holland. The shariah did not at all permit him to violate this agreement, which he did by killing the artist.

Those who traduce the Prophet might be eligible for punishment, but this it is for the courts and the state to decide. Those who take the law into their own hands and inflict punishment, such as killing, of traducers of the Prophet undoubtedly commit wrongful murder, because for the imposition of such hudud punishments one must have the legal authority to do so, which is not the prerogative of any private individual, that is to say anyone but the courts and the agencies of the state.

Lamentably, however, being swiftly swayed off our feet by emotionalism we lose our reason and allow emotional-driven rhetoric and actions to take us where they will. That is why no one dared to announce and clarify that the action of the deceased Amir Cheema should not be something that other Muslim youth should emulate. Nor did anyone declare that it was wrong, even haram or impermissible, from the point of view of the shariah, for even lovers of the Prophet to take the law in their own hands and kill those who insult the Prophet.

Our opponents well know of our susceptibility to emotionalism, and they make full use of it. Consequently, our emotion-driven acts of desperation boomerang on us ourselves. At the bottom of this all is the undeniable fact that a certain streak of extremism does exist in the Muslim community, one that is fuelled by high-sounding sloganeering and claims. This deadly disease can only be cured through concerted efforts by our intellectuals, foremost among them being the ulema. It is particularly the ulema that one looks to in this regard to chart a middle-path, for they know better than most others the limits and possibilities of rigidity and flexibility in religious matters. They are also aware of the sensitivities and finer aspects of religion. At the same time, and lamentably, it must be admitted that few of our ulema have been bold enough to correct the misguided emotionally-driven extremism of some Muslims, like Amir Cheema, who have been responsible for destructive and un-Islamic actions, ironically in the name of Islam itself, which are being glorified by many Muslims.

And God alone is He from whom we ask for help.

Maulvi Yahya Nomani is an Islamic scholar associated with al-Furqan, an Urdu journal based in Lucknow. He can be contacted on yahyanomani@yahoo.com

Islam, Peace and Jihad

By Maulvi Yahya Nomani

(Translated and edited by Yoginder Sikand)

The basic law underlying inter-community relations in Islam is peace and reconciliation (sulh). Ideally, the relations that a Muslim state should enjoy with other states in the world should be based on peaceful reconciliation. At the same time, however, the Quran gives Muslims permission to fight under some circumstances. It mentions that fighting is permitted to those who have been made the target of war by others and because they are oppressed.

As the Quran very rightly points out, ‘Tumult and oppression are worse than slaughter.’ (Quran 2:217). In the same Quranic verse, Muslims were for the first time instructed to take to fighting in the following words:

Fight in the cause of Allah those who fight you but do not transgress limits; for Allah loveth not transgressors. And slay them wherever ye catch them, and turn them out from where they have turned you out; for tumult and oppression are worse than slaughter.

From these Quranic verses, it very clearly emerges that Islam regards war as, being in essence, something bad or negative. At the same time, it concedes that war might sometimes become essential for eliminating what it calls fitna. This is why, following the Battle of Badr, the Quran, in Surah Anfal, ordered Muslims to fight the pagans of Mecca so that the religious persecution and oppression by the latter came to an end and the hurdles that the Meccans had put in the path of inviting people to Islam in Arabia were removed. The Quran went further in exhorting Muslims to wage war:

“Against them make ready your strength to the utmost of your power, including steeds of war, to strike terror into (the hearts of) the enemies of Allah and your enemies and others besides whom ye may not know but whom Allah doth know.” (Quran 8:60).

After this, the Quran exhorted Muslims to spend their wealth in making preparations for war, but, at the same time as it inspired them to take to the battlefield, it also proclaimed:

“But if the enemy incline towards peace, do thou (also) incline towards peace, and trust in Allah: for He is the one that heareth and knoweth (all things). Should they intend to deceive thee― verily Allah sufficeth thee.” (Quran 8:61-62).

The particular background and specific context of the revelation of the above-quote verse needs to be noted. Just before this verse, other verses exhorted the believers to make preparations to wage war against the oppressors. On the other hand, this verse instructed them to accept peace if their enemy inclined towards it. Now, it could be possible that doubts could arise as to the intention of the enemy in suing for peace, for the enemy might use this as a deceptive stratagem. In response to this, this verse says that Muslims should incline towards peace and place total trust (tawwakul) in God, adding that this trust alone is the true support for the believers.

These verses of the Quran were revealed with regard to the Jewish tribes of Medina or the pagans of Mecca with whom the Muslims were then at war with. They were stiff opponents of Islam. They had conspired to extirpate Islam and destroy the citadel of Islam, Medina. The Jewish tribes were hand-in-glove with the Meccan pagans in this venture. The actual aim of these verses was to exhort Muslims to go to war in defence, but yet, in the same context, the Quran advised Muslims that if their enemies inclined towards peace, they must do the same, and place their trust in God. At the same time, it also suggested that, despite this, Muslims should make suitable preparations since the enemy was untrustworthy and that it was possible that it could renege on its promise and betray them.

On the basis of these verses, we can say that it is wrong to suppose that peace between Muslims and others is conceivable only when the Muslims’ position is so weak that they are unable to wage war. The background of these verses that speak about the need to accept the offer of peace of the enemy indicates that the Muslims’ position at that time was certainly not weak. In fact, the verses exhorted Muslims to fight. One of these verses even declares:

O Prophet! Rouse the Believers to the fight. If there are twenty amongst you, patient and persevering, they will vanquish two hundred: if a hundred, they will vanquish a thousand of the Unbelievers: for these are a people without understanding (Quran 8:65)

It must be remembered that these verses were revealed after the grand victory of the Muslims at the Battle of Badr. So, if at such a time Muslims were ordered to accept the offer of peace made by such a fierce enemy, it obviously indicates that it is completely wrong to believe that peace can only be accepted when Muslims are weak and that it should not be accepted when Muslims are in a strong position. This argument is completely bogus, because at the time when this Quranic verse was revealed the Muslims were not under any compulsion.

Why, then is Peace Considered to be Merely Temporary in the Corpus of Fiqh?

The above-mentioned verses clearly indicate that when the possibilities for peace exist, Islam teaches that peace must be accepted. Yet, at the same time, the corpus of fiqh or Muslim jurisprudence developed by Muslim scholars after the Prophet does not, in general, reflect this notion that the basic principle of Islam underlying inter-community relations is peace. Instead, the books of fiqh create the impression that peace is something to be accepted only as a temporary measure.

The reason for this must be located in the particular historical context when the corpus of fiqh came to be developed, including the then prevailing level of civilization and inter-communal and political situation. It must be remembered that at that time the concept of permanent peace simply did not exist anywhere in the world. In both practical as well as ideological terms, the notion of such a peace was completely foreign for governments and states in that age. The state of human civilization at that time was such that if any state found it possible or feasible to declare war and capture the territory of another state, it considered it its duty to do so.

There was another aspect of the then prevailing system of inter-community relations because of which the ulema of that period felt it their duty to warn Muslim rulers to accept peace only when they were compelled to do so. This had to do with the fact that, in those days, every state was closely allied to and identified with one or the other religion. In fact, every government was based on some or the other religious ideology. Naturally, in that period it was simply inconceivable that any non-Muslim government would open the doors to Muslims to call people in the lands they controlled to God’s path. It was simply not possible. Almost every non-Muslim government resisted, sometimes through force, this mission of Islam in their territories. In this way, they became a major hurdle between God and His slaves, preventing the latter from hearing and accepting God’s message. In such a context, accepting peace as the permanent norm would naturally have meant that Muslims would have to abstain from their duty of calling others to God’s path and His service. Obviously, it was impossible for the Muslim ummah to accept this, for that would have gone completely against the basic role and duty of the ummah. This is why the ulema and scholars of fiqh of those times expressed the view that Muslim states should accept peace with non-Muslim states only on a temporary basis and simply out of pragmatism and the compulsion of circumstance. [Obviously, the conditions in today’s age are very different, where freedom to practice and propagate religion, including Islam, is generally allowed in most countries.]

The Quran’s insistence that war can be declared to overcome the fitna of the agents of falsehood that use force to damage or block the mission of the prophets of God and that are a barrier between God and His slaves is undoubtedly correct. Other than for this, however, it must be noted, peace remains the basic principle underlying inter-community relations, according to Islam.

Some people claim that the above-quoted verse that speaks of making peace with enemies has been abrogated, and that it was replaced by other verses that were revealed after it that command Muslims to wage war against the polytheists. However, most Quranic commentators do not agree with this claim. For instance, with regard to this verse Ibn Jareer Tabari writes:

‘If they [the enemies] agree with you to stop fighting and accept peace, and, irrespective of whether they accept Islam or pay the jizya or reconcile or establish peace in any other way, you [Muslims], too, should incline towards peace and do what you want and give what you want.’

With regard to those who claim that these verses have been abrogated, Ibn Jareer Tabari writes that:

‘No proof of this [claim] can be advanced from the Quran or the Sunnah or from reason (aql) or nature (fitrat).’

In actual fact, the two different types of Quranic verses (exhorting Muslims to fight, and ordering them to make peace) were revealed for different conditions and circumstances. The verses that talk of peace relate to a situation when the opponent wishes to cease fighting and accept peace. On the other hand, the verses that exhort Muslims to fight relate to a situation when their opponents had unleashed a full-fledged war against the Muslims. In that situation, obviously, for Muslims to sit back and not take action would have been tantamount to weakness and accepting degradation. That is why this was forbidden, and the Quran declared:

Be not weary and faint-hearted, crying for peace. When ye should be Uppermost: for Allah is with you and will never put you in loss for your (good) deeds (Quran 47:35).

An Important Clarification

In the above-mentioned verses, Muslims were exhorted to fight the Meccan pagans so that fitna and religious persecution could be ended and religion was for God alone. The Arabic word fitna means to harass, oppress and to force someone. Those commentators who have wrongly interpreted fitna to mean simple shirk or polytheism have done so because, once a series of wars had broken out between the Muslims and the pagan Arabs, the Muslims were ordered to continue fighting until the very roots of polytheism were uprooted from Arabia. In actual fact, however, fitna does not mean polytheism alone.

A major clarification needs to be made here. This relates to the point made in the Quran that war should continue till religion is for God alone. This certainly does not mean that people must be forced, through war, to accept Islam. The fact that the Quran allows Muslims to take jizya from non-Muslims and then enter into a peace treaty [to protect them] clearly suggests that non-Muslims are not to be forced to become Muslim. Further, it also does not mean that the concept of jihad is based on the notion that only Muslims, and no other community, have the right to establish an independent government of their own.

In actual fact, the order of fighting the polytheists [till religion exists only for God] applied only to the Arabian peninsula, where Muslims were told not to allow any government but that based on Islam to exist. The Quran very clearly indicated that the status of Mecca was like an ‘Abrahamic and Ismaili endowment’ [because of its historical association with the Prophet Abraham and his son Ismail] and that the entire land inhabited by the descendants of Ismail—the Arabs—must be reserved only for Islam, the religion of Abraham, so that it could be the centre for the Abrahamic call to faith (da‘wat). Accordingly, the final objective of the series of wars in the Arabian peninsula was to make the whole of that territory to come under the religion of God.


From this detailed discussion, it clearly emerges that if any non-Muslim community sincerely wants to establish peace with Muslims, its offer of peace must be accepted. This also means that if any non-Muslim state agrees to be at peace with Muslims, and allows for the peaceful practice and propagation of Islam in its territories, and does not engage in any force or fitna in this regard, Muslims must accept this offer and use peaceful methods, exerting all their efforts in this path of inviting others to the faith, so much so that the ‘proofs’ (hujjat) of God are established. After this, in accordance with His established ways (sunnat), God will open a way. That He will certainly do when all ‘proofs’ have been established.

*
If something leads to distance from God,

It causes knowledge to be fitna;

Children, Wealth and Lands to be fitna;

The sword that is wielded for the oppressed to be fitna;

Not just the sword, but even the call ‘God is the Greatest’ [Allahu Akbar] to be fitna.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(This is a translation of excerpts from Yahya Nomani's Urdu book, al-Jihad [Lucknow: Al-Mahad al-Ali Lil Darasat al-Islamiya, 2009. Yahya Nomani works with the Lucknow-based Urdu Islamic monthly, al-Furqan)

Islam, Peace and Jihad

By Maulvi Yahya Nomani

(Translated and edited by Yoginder Sikand)

The basic law underlying inter-community relations in Islam is peace and reconciliation (sulh). Ideally, the relations that a Muslim state should enjoy with other states in the world should be based on peaceful reconciliation. At the same time, however, the Quran gives Muslims permission to fight under some circumstances. It mentions that fighting is permitted to those who have been made the target of war by others and because they are oppressed.

As the Quran very rightly points out, ‘Tumult and oppression are worse than slaughter.’ (Quran 2:217). In the same Quranic verse, Muslims were for the first time instructed to take to fighting in the following words:

Fight in the cause of Allah those who fight you but do not transgress limits; for Allah loveth not transgressors. And slay them wherever ye catch them, and turn them out from where they have turned you out; for tumult and oppression are worse than slaughter.

From these Quranic verses, it very clearly emerges that Islam regards war as, being in essence, something bad or negative. At the same time, it concedes that war might sometimes become essential for eliminating what it calls fitna. This is why, following the Battle of Badr, the Quran, in Surah Anfal, ordered Muslims to fight the pagans of Mecca so that the religious persecution and oppression by the latter came to an end and the hurdles that the Meccans had put in the path of inviting people to Islam in Arabia were removed. The Quran went further in exhorting Muslims to wage war:

“Against them make ready your strength to the utmost of your power, including steeds of war, to strike terror into (the hearts of) the enemies of Allah and your enemies and others besides whom ye may not know but whom Allah doth know.” (Quran 8:60).

After this, the Quran exhorted Muslims to spend their wealth in making preparations for war, but, at the same time as it inspired them to take to the battlefield, it also proclaimed:

“But if the enemy incline towards peace, do thou (also) incline towards peace, and trust in Allah: for He is the one that heareth and knoweth (all things). Should they intend to deceive thee― verily Allah sufficeth thee.” (Quran 8:61-62).

The particular background and specific context of the revelation of the above-quote verse needs to be noted. Just before this verse, other verses exhorted the believers to make preparations to wage war against the oppressors. On the other hand, this verse instructed them to accept peace if their enemy inclined towards it. Now, it could be possible that doubts could arise as to the intention of the enemy in suing for peace, for the enemy might use this as a deceptive stratagem. In response to this, this verse says that Muslims should incline towards peace and place total trust (tawwakul) in God, adding that this trust alone is the true support for the believers.

These verses of the Quran were revealed with regard to the Jewish tribes of Medina or the pagans of Mecca with whom the Muslims were then at war with. They were stiff opponents of Islam. They had conspired to extirpate Islam and destroy the citadel of Islam, Medina. The Jewish tribes were hand-in-glove with the Meccan pagans in this venture. The actual aim of these verses was to exhort Muslims to go to war in defence, but yet, in the same context, the Quran advised Muslims that if their enemies inclined towards peace, they must do the same, and place their trust in God. At the same time, it also suggested that, despite this, Muslims should make suitable preparations since the enemy was untrustworthy and that it was possible that it could renege on its promise and betray them.

On the basis of these verses, we can say that it is wrong to suppose that peace between Muslims and others is conceivable only when the Muslims’ position is so weak that they are unable to wage war. The background of these verses that speak about the need to accept the offer of peace of the enemy indicates that the Muslims’ position at that time was certainly not weak. In fact, the verses exhorted Muslims to fight. One of these verses even declares:

O Prophet! Rouse the Believers to the fight. If there are twenty amongst you, patient and persevering, they will vanquish two hundred: if a hundred, they will vanquish a thousand of the Unbelievers: for these are a people without understanding (Quran 8:65)

It must be remembered that these verses were revealed after the grand victory of the Muslims at the Battle of Badr. So, if at such a time Muslims were ordered to accept the offer of peace made by such a fierce enemy, it obviously indicates that it is completely wrong to believe that peace can only be accepted when Muslims are weak and that it should not be accepted when Muslims are in a strong position. This argument is completely bogus, because at the time when this Quranic verse was revealed the Muslims were not under any compulsion.

Why, then is Peace Considered to be Merely Temporary in the Corpus of Fiqh?

The above-mentioned verses clearly indicate that when the possibilities for peace exist, Islam teaches that peace must be accepted. Yet, at the same time, the corpus of fiqh or Muslim jurisprudence developed by Muslim scholars after the Prophet does not, in general, reflect this notion that the basic principle of Islam underlying inter-community relations is peace. Instead, the books of fiqh create the impression that peace is something to be accepted only as a temporary measure.

The reason for this must be located in the particular historical context when the corpus of fiqh came to be developed, including the then prevailing level of civilization and inter-communal and political situation. It must be remembered that at that time the concept of permanent peace simply did not exist anywhere in the world. In both practical as well as ideological terms, the notion of such a peace was completely foreign for governments and states in that age. The state of human civilization at that time was such that if any state found it possible or feasible to declare war and capture the territory of another state, it considered it its duty to do so.

There was another aspect of the then prevailing system of inter-community relations because of which the ulema of that period felt it their duty to warn Muslim rulers to accept peace only when they were compelled to do so. This had to do with the fact that, in those days, every state was closely allied to and identified with one or the other religion. In fact, every government was based on some or the other religious ideology. Naturally, in that period it was simply inconceivable that any non-Muslim government would open the doors to Muslims to call people in the lands they controlled to God’s path. It was simply not possible. Almost every non-Muslim government resisted, sometimes through force, this mission of Islam in their territories. In this way, they became a major hurdle between God and His slaves, preventing the latter from hearing and accepting God’s message. In such a context, accepting peace as the permanent norm would naturally have meant that Muslims would have to abstain from their duty of calling others to God’s path and His service. Obviously, it was impossible for the Muslim ummah to accept this, for that would have gone completely against the basic role and duty of the ummah. This is why the ulema and scholars of fiqh of those times expressed the view that Muslim states should accept peace with non-Muslim states only on a temporary basis and simply out of pragmatism and the compulsion of circumstance. [Obviously, the conditions in today’s age are very different, where freedom to practice and propagate religion, including Islam, is generally allowed in most countries.]

The Quran’s insistence that war can be declared to overcome the fitna of the agents of falsehood that use force to damage or block the mission of the prophets of God and that are a barrier between God and His slaves is undoubtedly correct. Other than for this, however, it must be noted, peace remains the basic principle underlying inter-community relations, according to Islam.

Some people claim that the above-quoted verse that speaks of making peace with enemies has been abrogated, and that it was replaced by other verses that were revealed after it that command Muslims to wage war against the polytheists. However, most Quranic commentators do not agree with this claim. For instance, with regard to this verse Ibn Jareer Tabari writes:

‘If they [the enemies] agree with you to stop fighting and accept peace, and, irrespective of whether they accept Islam or pay the jizya or reconcile or establish peace in any other way, you [Muslims], too, should incline towards peace and do what you want and give what you want.’

With regard to those who claim that these verses have been abrogated, Ibn Jareer Tabari writes that:

‘No proof of this [claim] can be advanced from the Quran or the Sunnah or from reason (aql) or nature (fitrat).’

In actual fact, the two different types of Quranic verses (exhorting Muslims to fight, and ordering them to make peace) were revealed for different conditions and circumstances. The verses that talk of peace relate to a situation when the opponent wishes to cease fighting and accept peace. On the other hand, the verses that exhort Muslims to fight relate to a situation when their opponents had unleashed a full-fledged war against the Muslims. In that situation, obviously, for Muslims to sit back and not take action would have been tantamount to weakness and accepting degradation. That is why this was forbidden, and the Quran declared:

Be not weary and faint-hearted, crying for peace. When ye should be Uppermost: for Allah is with you and will never put you in loss for your (good) deeds (Quran 47:35).

An Important Clarification

In the above-mentioned verses, Muslims were exhorted to fight the Meccan pagans so that fitna and religious persecution could be ended and religion was for God alone. The Arabic word fitna means to harass, oppress and to force someone. Those commentators who have wrongly interpreted fitna to mean simple shirk or polytheism have done so because, once a series of wars had broken out between the Muslims and the pagan Arabs, the Muslims were ordered to continue fighting until the very roots of polytheism were uprooted from Arabia. In actual fact, however, fitna does not mean polytheism alone.

A major clarification needs to be made here. This relates to the point made in the Quran that war should continue till religion is for God alone. This certainly does not mean that people must be forced, through war, to accept Islam. The fact that the Quran allows Muslims to take jizya from non-Muslims and then enter into a peace treaty [to protect them] clearly suggests that non-Muslims are not to be forced to become Muslim. Further, it also does not mean that the concept of jihad is based on the notion that only Muslims, and no other community, have the right to establish an independent government of their own.

In actual fact, the order of fighting the polytheists [till religion exists only for God] applied only to the Arabian peninsula, where Muslims were told not to allow any government but that based on Islam to exist. The Quran very clearly indicated that the status of Mecca was like an ‘Abrahamic and Ismaili endowment’ [because of its historical association with the Prophet Abraham and his son Ismail] and that the entire land inhabited by the descendants of Ismail—the Arabs—must be reserved only for Islam, the religion of Abraham, so that it could be the centre for the Abrahamic call to faith (da‘wat). Accordingly, the final objective of the series of wars in the Arabian peninsula was to make the whole of that territory to come under the religion of God.


From this detailed discussion, it clearly emerges that if any non-Muslim community sincerely wants to establish peace with Muslims, its offer of peace must be accepted. This also means that if any non-Muslim state agrees to be at peace with Muslims, and allows for the peaceful practice and propagation of Islam in its territories, and does not engage in any force or fitna in this regard, Muslims must accept this offer and use peaceful methods, exerting all their efforts in this path of inviting others to the faith, so much so that the ‘proofs’ (hujjat) of God are established. After this, in accordance with His established ways (sunnat), God will open a way. That He will certainly do when all ‘proofs’ have been established.

*
If something leads to distance from God,

It causes knowledge to be fitna;

Children, Wealth and Lands to be fitna;

The sword that is wielded for the oppressed to be fitna;

Not just the sword, but even the call ‘God is the Greatest’ [Allahu Akbar] to be fitna.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(This is a translation of excerpts from Yahya Nomani's Urdu book, al-Jihad [Lucknow: Al-Mahad al-Ali Lil Darasat al-Islamiya, 2009. Yahya Nomani works with the Lucknow-based Urdu Islamic monthly, al-Furqan)

Islamic Perspectives on Inter-Community Relations

By Maulvi Yahya Nomani

(Translated from Urdu by Yoginder Sikand)

The issue of what Islam has to say about inter-community relations is one about which much misunderstanding exists. Anti-Muslim propagandists claim that Islam preaches hatred for non-Muslims, and that the Quran is a menace to world peace. They go so far as to argue that world peace is simply impossible as long as the Quran exists. In order to back their propaganda, they have deliberately twisted and misinterpreted certain verses of the Quran. Many people with little knowledge have fallen prey to this poisonous propaganda, which has been aggressively spread on an enormous scale through the media.

At the same time, we must also admit that some Muslims themselves entertain misunderstandings and extremist views about the issue of relations between Muslims and others that are based on a completely wrong interpretation of the Quran and the Sunnah, the practice of the Prophet. This calls for a detailed study, so that misunderstandings, wrong interpretations and extremist views about Islamic teachings regarding relations between Muslims and others can be countered.

It is true that Islam stresses that Muslims, here understood in the sense of true submitters to God, are distinct from others in terms of their religious views and ethical virtues. It cautions them from imitating others, especially their religious symbols and rituals, which Islam does not accept. It is also true that Islam strictly forbids befriending enemies of the faith and those who conspire against Muslims. At the same time, however, Islam exhorts Muslims to relate to other non-Muslims with softness, good manners, gentleness and love.

Respect for the Human Race

Islam teaches that all human beings, irrespective of community or race, are children of the same set of primal parents, and, so, are bound together by their common humanity. As the Quran states:

“O mankind! We created you from a single (pair) of a male and a female, and made you into nations and tribes, that ye may know each other (not that ye may despise each other). Verily the most honoured of you in the sight of Allah is (he who is) the most righteous of you.” (Quran 49:13).

This basic Islamic teaching about the whole of humankind being children of the same parents stresses the need for consciousness of our common humanity and of us being brothers unto each other. This is why, according to a hadith report, the Prophet would, after finishing his prayers, supplicate with God, saying, ‘O Allah! Sustainer of myself and of everything! I bear witness that all human beings are brothers of each other.’

According to the Quran, human beings are creatures worthy of respect:

“We have honoured the sons of Adam […]and conferred on them special favours, above a great part of Our Creation.” (Quran 17:70)

This clearly indicates that Islam regards human beings as deserving respect, love and concern on the basis of their humanity. A hadith report well illustrates this teaching. Once, the Prophet was present along with some of his disciples when a funeral procession passed by. The Prophet stood up. Seeing the Prophet stand out of respect for the dead man, some of his companions informed him that the man had been a Jew. But, the Prophet responded, ‘Was he not a human being?’ After the Prophet, some of his companions, too, followed this example of his, as is related in the books of Hadith compiled by Bukhari and Muslim.

In another hadith report, the Prophet exhorted his followers to relate with kindness to all creatures thus:

‘God is merciful to those who are merciful. Deal with mercy towards creatures on earth and He in the heavens will be merciful towards you.’ (Sunan Tirmidhi, 1924; Sunan Abu Daud, 4941).

This hadith report very clearly expresses a basic Quranic teaching. The Quran states that the true path to salvation is through showing mercy and love to others:

“And what will explain to thee, the path that is steep? (It is:) freeing the bondman; Or the giving of food in a day of privation to the orphan with claims of relationship, or to the indigent (down) in the dust. Then will he be of those who believe, and enjoin patience, (constancy, and self-restraint), and enjoin deeds of kindness and compassion. Such are the Companions of the Right Hand.” (Quran 90: 12-18)

This is the path of salvation—not simply to be kind-hearted, but also to participate in the mission to promote, in practical terms, kind-heartedness and compassion for others. Such are the steps on the path to salvation. Islam does not restrict good behaviour simply to other human beings. Rather, it insists that Muslims should behave in this way with all living creatures. Thus, according to a hadith recorded in the Sahih of al-Bukhari, the Prophet said, ‘There is merit (sawab) in behaving well towards all living creatures.’

The Bond of Nation/Community (Qaum)

Islam recognizes a certain sort of brotherhood and feeling of oneness among members of the same community/nation as an established fact. This is expressed in the Quran in the form of various prophets, such as Hud, Saleh, Shoeb and so on, addressing the non-Muslim members of their communities as brothers, and, in this way, accepting a relationship of nation- or community-based brotherhood between Muslims and non-Muslims belonging to the same nation or community. When these prophets of God preached His message to their own people (who were not Muslims, or ‘submitters’ to God), they addressed them as ‘ya qaum’ or ‘O my people’, appealing to their hearts and reminding them of the common bond of community that they shared with them. This clearly indicates the sort of concern and love that Muslims should adopt when addressing their non-Muslim compatriots and in seeking to cement bonds with them.

The importance of how concern and love should infuse relations between people belonging to a common race or nationality, despite their religious differences, is evident from the fact that the Prophet Muhammad cared for the (the then non-Muslim) Egyptians just because the mother of the Prophet Ismail (Ishmael), son of the Prophet Ibrahim (Abraham), was from Egypt. The Prophet instructed the Arabs to remember this ancient racial tie, saying that they would soon conquer Egypt and that he wanted them to deal with the Egyptians kindly because they had the right to protection (haq-e zimma) and because their racial ties with the Arabs demanded this.

Kind Behaviour Towards Non-Muslims: Some Examples

Various Islamic teachings and Sunnah or practice of the Prophet indicate the kindness and concern that non-Muslims deserve from Muslims. The Quran mentions that needy non-Muslims are deserving of the financial assistance of Muslims, and that, therefore, they should be helped. In the Surah Al-Baqara of the Quran, God says that guiding others to the faith is not the work of human beings, and that God guides whom He wills. The Quran adds that we must not refuse to help a needy person simply because he or she refuses to accept Islam. It says that we shall be rewarded for whatever we spend in God’s way:

“It is not required of thee (O Messenger) to set them on the right path but Allah guides to the right path whom He pleaseth. Whatever of good ye give benefits your own souls and ye shall only do so seeking the "Face" of Allah. Whatever good ye give, shall be rendered back to you and ye shall not be dealt with unjustly.” (Quran 2:272)

This verse indicates that while providing financial help to others it is not necessary to distinguish between those who accept Islam and those who do not. In other words, all needy people are deserving of such help.

Elaborating on this verse, the noted scholar Imam Ibn Jareer Tabari wrote in his Tafsir-e Tabari that the verse commands Muslims not to deprive non-Muslims of charity. He was of the view that this was how numerous companions of the Prophet and those who came after them in the next generation understood this verse.

This was also the practice of the Rightly-Guided Caliphs. Thus, as mentioned in the Kitab al-Kharraj by Abu Yusuf, the Caliph Umar sent a letter to his governor, instructing him to provide for his poor and needy non-Muslim subjects from the wealth of the Muslims.

Reconciliation and Kind-Heartedness


Islam stresses kindness towards relatives, especially close relations, so much so that it says that God declares war against he who does not fulfill his responsibilities towards his relatives (Masnad Ahmad 1684; Sahih al-Bukhari 5987-5989). It also declares that those who sunder their relations with their relatives will have no place in heaven (Sahih Muslim, 2556).

Kindness towards and reconciliation with relatives applies to all relatives, Muslim as well as non-Muslim. It is their right. Islam seeks to cement relations, not to destroy them. Thus, non-Muslim relatives have all the rights over a Muslim, so much so that the Quran lays down that if a Muslim’s parents are not Muslim themselves, and even if they seek to pressurize their Muslim son or daughter to abandon Islam, they must be treated well under all conditions, although one should not yield to their pressure. As the Quran puts it:

“And We have enjoined on man (to be good) to his parents: in travail upon travail did his mother bear him, and in years twain was his weaning: (hear the command) "Show gratitude to Me and to thy parents: to Me is (thy final) Goal. "But if they strive to make the join in worship with Me things of which thou hast no knowledge obey them not; Yet bear them company in this life with justice (and consideration) and follow the way of those who turn to Me (in love): in the End the return of you all is to Me, and I will tell you the truth (and meaning) of all that ye did.”(Quran 31:14-15).


The mother of Abu Hurairah, a companion of the Prophet, used to say bad things about the Prophet, but Abu Hurairah tolerated this. When he complained about her behavior to the Prophet, the latter prayed for her, rather than expressing hatred for her. Because of this, she was guided (Sahih al-Muslim, 2491).

The mother of Hazrat Asma bint Abu Bakr was a polytheist. In the wake of the Treaty of Hudaibiyah between the Muslims, led by the Prophet, and the Meccan pagans, relatives from both sides were able to meet each other. At this time, Hazrat Asma’s mother came to Medina to meet her, bringing along with her some gifts. Hazrat Asma thought of reciprocating this gesture by giving her mother some presents when she was returning. However, she hesitated for a bit, not sure if Islam allowed for Muslims to present gifts to their non-Muslim relatives. Accordingly, she approached the Prophet and asked him if she should seek to strengthen her ties (silah rahmi) with her mother. In reply, the Prophet said she must, and instructed her to give her gifts. (Sahih al-Bukhari 2602; Fath al-Bari).

Some commentators have claimed that Hazrat Asma’s mother had come to Medina because she was in need of help. But, the fact is that she was a well-off woman, and Hafiz Ibn Hajar and other scholars have written that she herself had brought gifts for her daughter. Thus, it could be that she wanted to restore her bonds with her daughter that had been earlier sundered. In other words, Hazrat Asma’s giving of gifts to her mother appears not to have been an expression of help to a needy mother, but rather, a way of expressing and fulfilling her duty of familial love.

Other Social Relations Between Muslims and Others

While Muslims have been forbidden to engage in such relations with non-Muslims that might undermine or destroy their religious distinctiveness, Islam stresses that Muslims must relate with concern, and a high standard of morality with non-Muslims in order to create a better society. Treating neighbours kindly is such an important Islamic teaching that in the corpus of Hadith, narrations relating to the Prophet, it has been said that not abiding by this teaching can sometimes even lead to the danger of one’s own faith being taken away. The Prophet thrice proclaimed that he who is a source of discomfort to his neighbour is not a true believer (momin) (Sahih al-Bukhari, 6016).

One’s neighbour, who deserves exemplary treatment, can be a Muslim or a non-Muslim, and the above-mentioned principle applies in both cases. This is well-illustrated in the following story. One day, a goat was slaughtered in the home of Hazrat Abdullah Ibn Umar. When he returned home, the first thing he did was to ask if some of the meat had been sent to the house of his Jewish neighbour. ‘I have heard the Prophet stressing the importance of kindness towards neighbours’, he said (Abu Daud, 5152).

One aspect of the life of the Prophet, which serves as a model for Muslims to emulate, is that even if an enemy is in great trouble one should supplicate for him with God. On the one hand, the Prophet would beseech God to punish bloody oppressors, but, on the other hand, we see the Prophet helping the Qureish of Mecca, who stiffly opposed him, when they were faced with a severe famine. In that critical situation, Abu Sufiyan, the Qureish leader who had stridently opposed the Prophet, came to him. Invoking their relationship, he said that the Quraish, the tribe that the Prophet himself belonged to, were dying, and requested him to beseech God. The Prophet prayed to God, and because of his prayer the situation was cured (Sahih Bukhari, 4824).

It is said that if a Jew present in the Prophet’s congregation would sneeze, the Prophet would do the same dua, ‘May God give you guidance and improve your condition’, for him as he would for a Muslim (Sunan Abu Daud 5040). Because they were so fond of this dua, some Jews would pretend to sneeze, but the Prophet still do this dua for them. In the Masannaf Ibn Abi Shiba, the Masannaf Abdur Razzak and the Sahih of al-Bukhari, there are numerous narrations about the Prophet making dua for non-Muslims. This clearly shows that Islam exhorts its followers to deal kindly with people of other faiths.

Commensality or eating together has great importance in building relationships. The Prophet used to invite non-Muslims for meals. Expressing concern for the oppressed and distressed, irrespective of religion, is something basic for good social ties, and the Prophet Muhammad also abided by this. He would visit the homes of non-Muslims when they were sick, to enquire about their health (Sahih al-Bukhari 5657). The Prophet also gave gifts to non-Muslims, and courteously accepted the gifts that they presented him with, as has been recorded in the books of Hadith. It is said that a non-Muslim ruler sent the Prophet a beautiful silken cloak, which the Prophet accepted (Sahih al-Bukhari 2616). He gave it to Ja‘afar bin Abi Talib, saying that he should send it to his ‘brother’, Najashi, the Christian ruler of Abyssinia, who had helped the Muslims (Masnad Ahmad 13214). The Caliph Umar sent a valuable cloth as a gift to a ‘polytheist brother’ of his, and the Prophet knew about this (Muslim 2068). The ruler of Aila sent the Prophet cloth and a mount, which were put to use (Sahih Bukhari 3161). At the time, when the Prophet was departing from this world, he instructed Muslims, especially their leaders, that delegations of guests (who were generally non-Muslims) that would come to them should be given presents while departing, as he himself had done (Sahih al-Bukhari 3053, Sahih al-Muslim 1637).

From these references to the shariah and the Sunnah, the practice of the Prophet Muhammad, it is clear that Islam stands for humanitarianism, love, concern, compassion, large-heartedness and good behaviour with people of other faiths, in general. That is to say, if a person who follows another faith is not an oppressor or an enemy of Islam or a conspirator or is not waging war against Muslims, Islam considers him or her worthy of help and solidarity and stresses respect for his or her humanity.


(This is a translation of excerpts from Yahya Nomani's Urdu book, al-Jihad [Lucknow: Al-Mahad al-Ali Lil Darasat al-Islamiya, 2009)

Clarifications About the Concept of Jihad in Islam

By Maulvi Yahya Nomani

(Translated from Urdu by Yoginder Sikand)

Introduction

Critics of Islam allege that the notion of jihad, as contained in the Quran and Hadith, is a license for cold-blooded murder and indiscriminate killing. Ironically, among the most bitter opponents of Islam who are today in the forefront of a concerted campaign to depict Islam as a bloody religion are influential intellectuals and leaders in the West, the very same West that, for the last three centuries and more has drowned the rest of the world in seas of blood. The West, which has such a bloody record, has today chosen to portray Muslims, who have suffered the greatest loss of innocent lives at its hands, as purveyors of terror.

Had the brutal Western imperialists not been able to craftily manipulate world opinion through their control over the media, the world would have demanded to know how they could arrogate to themselves the right to talk about peace before giving a full record of the brutal crimes that they have been responsible for over the last three centuries. The Westerners killed off almost all the aborigines of Australia and North America , and dealt with the Africans in a manner even worse than wild animals. And now the West has the gumption to ask the rest of the world to uphold human rights! As if the rest of the world has forgotten the history of Western barbarities! The world will not let the West continue trumpeting its rhetoric about human rights, which it is craftily using as a cover to hide its own blood-stained record.


There is a limit to the oppression that people can endure. If unceasing oppression and killing provokes feelings of revenge among some members of an oppressed community and instigates them to exceed the limits and to take wrong steps, it is an indication of the intolerable suffering that the community faces. In the face of enormous and sustained oppression heaped on their community, some Muslims have reacted in an unwise fashion, based on a completely wrong interpretation of ‘struggle in the path of God’ (jihad fi sabil Allah), one that is totally contradictory to the shariah and that violates the limits for jihad that the shariah sets down. Deviating from the opinion of the ulema, they have adopted the path of extremism. This has given Islam and Muslims a bad name. They have given their opponents an excuse to heap even more oppression on the Muslims.

It is true that the number of Muslims who have taken to extremism is relatively small, but that they do exist is an undeniable fact. We must admit that they have engaged in wrong and immoral activities. At the same time, we cannot deny that in several countries, including in the West, ruling establishments and their secret service agencies have been behind some acts of terror which they have wrongly attributed to Muslims.

The situation facing us today is extremely complex. On the one hand is the mounting wave of Islamophobia, based on a false projection of Islamic jihad, which aims to create hatred in the minds of people, Muslims as well as others, for the Quran and Islamic teachings. On the other hand, faced with unenviable conditions and driven by a desire for revenge or having fallen prey to an extremist ideology, are those ignorant Muslims who are either being used by global agencies or are acting on their own, and who, by their actions, are defaming the concept of jihad and creating major problems for the Muslims themselves. It is these people who have provided the pretext to America and their own governments, whom they brand as agents of the West, to clamp down on Islamic movements and institutions.

And there is a third category of people, who, under the pressure of present circumstances and cowed down by the torrent of allegations against Muslims are now altogether denying jihad, a very important part of Islam, or else interpreting it in such a way as to please the West and its client regimes. All this, then, has created an absurd confusion.

The situation thus demands that the Islamic teachings about jihad be properly explained. Islamic teachings are based on wisdom and justice, and this includes jihad as well. In actual fact, jihad, if construed correctly, can be a source of mercy for all humankind, Muslims as well as others.

Reacting to anti-Islamic propaganda by adopting an apologetic stance with regard to the doctrine of jihad is not the right approach. The Quran teaches us that the upholders of the truth are not concerned about fame or insult, their mission being to sincerely communicate God’s message. As the Quran says:

Who delivered the messages of Allah and feared Him, and feared none save Allah. Allah keepeth good account. (Quran 33: 39).

While studying the doctrine, laws and ethics of jihad it is important to bear in mind the process of evolution of civilizations and the international context. This suggests that the conditions in different ages demand that with changing contexts the regulations of jihad be reformulated (az sar-e nau tadveen) accordingly. The Quran, and, then, after it, the practice of the Prophet Muhammad, have given us certain permanent and unchangeable principles with regard to jihad. God has blessed them as sources of justice and welfare. Islamic jurisprudents developed detailed regulations on the basis of these principles, keeping in mind the social conditions and international contexts of their own times. The rules that they produced, as detailed in the books of fiqh or Muslim jurisprudence, can provide us insights, but, as in the matter of other rules of fiqh, it is possible that with the change of customs (urf), the social environment and the international context, the detailed regulations concerning jihad that are a result of the ijtihad or personal interpretation of the earlier jurists can be changed and replaced with new regulations to accord with the demands of wisdom and justice in the light of the Quran and the Prophet’s practice. God has placed this miraculous ability in the Quran and the Prophet’s practice that those who carefully study them can gain appropriate guidance in accordance with the demands of their own times so that they can deduce new regulations that are based on truth and justice. This is precisely what this book seeks to highlight.

In developing detailed regulations for every new age and on every issue it must be kept in mind that Islam champions the best and most balanced system of ethics and morality. Especially in today’s age, the twin issues of jihad and legitimate violence demand that such detailed regulations be derived in the light of the Quran and the Prophet’s practice in such a manner as to prove and reinforce our claim that the Islamic shariah is the best upholder of truth and justice, and that on other ideology and system can represent truth and justice in a better way.

The Truth About Jihad

Respect for Human Life

It must be noted that, according to the Quran and the Prophet’s practice, the doctrine of jihad is meant to promote peace, protection of human life and freedom. The Quran places great value on the life of a single human being, as indicated in the following verse:

On that account: We ordained for the Children of Israel that if anyone slew a person―unless it be for murder or for spreading mischief in the land― it would be as if he slew the whole people: and if anyone saved a life it would be as if he saved the life of the whole people. (Quran 5:32)

All the legal systems of the world consider the killing of innocent people as a grievous crime. Islam not only provides legal protection of human life, seeking to prevent killing of innocent through instilling the fear of the law, but also seeks to develop in people’s hearts a deep respect for the sanctity of human life. In a hadith mentioned in the Sahih of al-Bukhari (6871), the Prophet is said to have declared killing, along with associating partners with God (shirk) as the greatest sin. According to a report in the Sahih of Muslim (1678), the Prophet reportedly said that on the Day of Judgment, God will first settle cases of murder.

This respect for human life applies to every person, Muslim as well as non-Muslim. The Prophet very explicitly stated that if someone slays a non-Muslim who he is not engaged in an openly declared war with or who had the protection of a peace agreement with a Muslim government, that person would never even get to smell the fragrance of paradise (Sahih Bukhari 3166).

Permission to Fight

War wreaks destruction. Bloodshed is inevitable in any war. But, Islam, as has been indicated above, lays great stress on respect for human life. That is why Islam has provided for war only in certain unavoidable and exceptional circumstances. The Quran describes war as something bad or destructive, but, like other religions, it does not ignore the fact that at times groups, communities or governments do resort to such terror and oppression so that the only way to stop them is through defensive war. Such brutal oppression of innocent people is a true fact of life, and Islam is a religion of truth and is not blind to reality. It is not like the ‘Sermon on the Mount’ that insists that if someone hits you on one cheek, you must willingly offer your other cheek for him to slap. Instead, it calls for the hands of oppressors to be restrained, and considers this is a way to serve humankind and to gain God’s favour. Islam permits the oppressed whose very lives are under severe threat to take to arms to protect their lives, property and honour. Likewise, it considers it a duty for any country to react in like manner if it is invaded by any other country.

All legal systems in the world agree that it is the right, and even the duty, of every oppressed country or group to reply if it attacked. Reason and human conscience also agree to this. As the Quran lays down:

To those against whom war is made, permission is given (to fight) because they are wronged― and verily, Allah is Most powerful for their aid (Quran 22:39)

Further, the Quran instructs the believers thus:

Fight in the cause of Allah those who fight you but do not transgress limits; for Allah loveth not transgressors. (Quran 2:190)

These teachings are basic to the preservation of the life, respect and freedom of a community, the denial of which would spell death for it, causing it to fall prey to strife and degradation. Islam aims at character-building and shaping of morals so that people become models of virtue. How, then, can it allow them to sink into degradation by denying them the right to struggle against oppression and persecution? But, it must be remembered, mere fighting in defence against oppression does not constitute a legitimate jihad. Rather, jihad is governed by a host of spiritual and moral principles and laws, observing which alone can qualify it to be truly called ‘struggle in God’s path’ (jihad fi sabil Allah).

The biggest misunderstanding about jihad is that it is a communal struggle or war of Muslims, a war that Muslims launch against other communities to capture power or territory. In actual fact, this has nothing whatsoever to do with jihad, and the Quran condemns such violence as ‘strife on earth’ (fasad fi ‘l ardh). In other words, not every war in which Muslims are involved can be called a jihad. In order for a war to be qualified as a legitimate jihad the Quran lays down that it must be for only certain purposes and conducted according to specified principles and rules. Any war engaged in by Muslims other than for the purposes laid down in the Quran or that violates the rules governing jihad, as specified in the Quran, is not jihad. Rather, it is strife and chaos (fasad), which will earn God’s wrath.

Aims of Jihad

1. Jihad for the Sake of Freedom of Religion

The Quran declared war against the Meccans in order to end their religious oppression. The Meccans had imprisoned Muslims and subjected them to extreme torture and oppression simply because, heeding the voice of their conscience, they had accepted Islam. News of their persecution reached the Prophet in Medina . The Quran then commanded the Muslims thus:

And fight them on until there is no more tumult or oppression and there prevail justice and faith in Allah altogether and everywhere (Quran 8:39)

The Arabic word fitna is used in the above-mentioned verse with regard to oppression. The verse lays down that the aim of war is to end fitna. The word actually means ‘test’ or ‘examination’, and, according to some noted Arabic scholars, where the word is used in the Quran it mostly means, or is related to, this sense. The word fitna has consistently been used throughout Islamic history to describe efforts by the enemies of Islam to use force and oppression in an effort to cause Muslims to stray from their faith or to make to difficult for them to stay on the path of Islam. For instance, the Quran uses a derivate of the word fitna in the context of Pharoah’s use of force and oppression to seek to cause those who had accepted the teachings of the Prophet Moses to abandon their faith and return to infidelity:

But none believed in Moses except some children of his People, because of the fear of Pharaoh and his chiefs, lest they should persecute them (Quran 10: 83).

Elsewhere, the Quran says:


Those who persecute (or draw into temptation) the Believers, men and women and do not turn in repentance, will have the Penalty of Hell: they will have the Penalty of the Burning Fire. (Quran 85:10)

Some Islamic scholars, including in the past, have interpreted the term fitna or its derivatives that are mentioned in such verses to mean shirk or associating partners with God. However, in Arabic fitna does not mean just shirk or shirk without force, oppression and testing. In today’s context, fitna can be described as ‘religious persecution’. Today, the sort of religious persecution that could be called fitna, such as was the torment and testing that the early Muslims faced in Mecca or that those who believed in the Prophet Moses had to contend with, is extremely rare.

The duty of Muslims to continue fighting till religious persecution is no more, as laid down in the above-mentioned Quranic verse, is echoed in another verse of the Quran, in the Surah Baqara. With any doubt, both these verses relate to the polytheists of Mecca . But, yet, who can deny that seeking to forbid people to follow the religion of their choice by oppression or even killing them is such a heinous crime that demands that the defenders of the truth rise up against this, if they have the capacity to do so?

2. Jihad for the Sake of Freedom of the Oppressed.

The Quran repeatedly refers to the people who engaged in fitna in Mecca , seeking to force Muslims to renounce their faith, as enemies of God who were persecuting God’s weak servants and threatening their lives. The cruelly oppressed Muslims had been crying out for help, appealing for assistance to relieve them of their torment. Finally, God permitted the Muslims of Medina to fight in defence in the face of the war that had been unleashed on them and to protect their lives, their faith and the citadel of Islam. They were informed that the conditions had so drastically changed that God’s earlier instruction to them to restrain themselves and patiently and steadfastly endure the tortures inflicted on them was no longer necessary. God now told them to fight against those Meccan opponents of theirs who had declared war on them. As indicated earlier, one of the aims of this war was to put an end to fitna, understood here as religious persecution aimed at preventing Muslims from following their faith. As the Quran says:

And why should ye not fight in the cause of Allah and of those who, being weak, are ill-treated (and oppressed)?―men, women, and children, whose cry is: "Our Lord! rescue us from this town, whose people are oppressors; and raise for us from Thee one who will protect; and raise for us from Thee one who will help!?" (Quran 4:75)


With regard to the above-mentioned verse, it can be asked if, in the face of the desperate cries for help of the oppressed, a community does not rise up to repel oppression or is indifferent to the plight of those who are suffering immense persecution, can it not be said to be totally bereft of human feelings? No divine scripture allows for its followers to sit back and relax in comfort while innocent people are being persecuted in this brutal way.

It is true that the oppressed people referred to in the above-mentioned text, whom Muslims were exhorted to help, were themselves Muslims. Because of the bond of Islamic brotherhood that they shared with the other Muslims they had an even greater claim on their help. Yet, this Quranic verse, as well as statements attributed to the Prophet, clearly indicate that it is the duty of a Muslim state to respond to the cries of any wrongfully oppressed community, no matter what its religion, if it has the power to do so and, for this purpose, to fight against the oppressors of those people. People with a proper appreciation of, and commitment to, Islam need not be reminded that Islam desires that its true followers must rush to the rescue of every wrongfully oppressed person or community, irrespective of religion, without having any other motive. As a hadith contained in the collection of Abu Daud relates, the Prophet is said to have declared:

‘Beware! By God! Keep calling people to the good and preventing them from evil. Catch the hand of the oppressor and force him to ensure justice and keep striving to bring him to the true path. (In this lies your welfare) otherwise God will cause your hearts to clash with each other’s and will curse you, just as He cursed those communities in the past who did not abide by this duty’.

With regard to this sort of jihad to end oppression, the Prophet very clearly stated, as is evidenced in numerous hadith reports, that to make any distinction between the oppressed on grounds of religion, between Muslims and others, is against the spirit of Islam. Thus, according to a hadith report contained in the Sunan of al-Tirmidhi, the Prophet is said to have instructed his followers to help their ‘brothers’, whether they were oppressed or oppressors. His followers responded, ‘We understood [the need to] help the oppressed, but how should the oppressor be helped?’ The Prophet answered, ‘Stop him from oppression. This is the help that you should give him.’


Not War, but Struggle in the Path of God (jihad fi sabil Allah)

War fought in defence and to overcome oppression is a basic human right and duty, but here one point is of extreme significance. In Medina , when the Prophet was receiving revelations and was guiding his followers, the town was attacked by the enemies of Islam. That is why God finally sent down revelations ordering the Prophet and his companions to make preparations to defend themselves in the face of these brutal assaults. Yet, at the same time, these verses made it very clear that this defensive war that the Muslims must fight was not just for their political defence or for protecting their honour or for their political freedom. Rather, the Quran repeatedly stresses that they were not like any ordinary human group that fights for worldly goods and pleasures. Instead, it describes them as a group that had turned its face from the trappings of the world and gathered round God’s Prophet in order to worship God and strive for the welfare of the whole of humankind. It depicts them as a group that had vowed to live in poverty, if needed, and to make major sacrifices so that others could be also guided to the straight path. That is why the sort of war that they were ordered to engage in was not like any war fought for worldly ends. Rather, it was termed as jihad fi sabil Allah or ‘struggle in the path of God’, a war fought for God’s sake.

Every community in the world has the right to defend itself by fighting, in accordance with accepted norms and within acceptable limits. But, the fighting that the Prophet and his followers resorted to was not for freedom or for the communal rights of Muslims. The early Muslims had become, as it were, the salt of the earth at a time when (and this remains so even today) there was no community in the world that was wholly and completely based on devotion to and service of God. Through not just their words, but their actions as well, the Prophet and his followers proved that they had no lust for the luxuries of the world. They adopted poverty for themselves, and took up as their mission the guidance of humankind and the establishment of justice. Caring nothing for worldly comforts, they led a life in service to God and in accordance with His will. So, when they were ordered to fight in defence against those who had launched a reign of terror and oppression against them, they were told by God that this was not simply to defend themselves, but, rather, to defend God’s faith on earth. This is why these wars were termed as jihad fi sabil Allah and were deemed a source of great reward.

The cold hearth of the Prophet’s house and the fact that sometimes the Prophet went to sleep without food, with a stone tied round his stomach, are testified to in the history books. Even when wealth began coming into Medina , the Prophet’s house remained empty. The Prophet passed away from this world in a state of poverty. His daughter Fatima once approached him and spoke of how her hands had become knotted due to constant use of the grinding stone and how her body was weak. She spoke about how her husband, Ali, was suffering from asthma. She asked the Prophet for financial help. His reply to her was that there were still orphans left in Medina , who had to be helped. So, instead of giving her money, he told her to recite Subhan Allah, Alhamdullillah and Allahu Akbar thirty-three times each every day, adding that this was greater than all the wealth of the world put together.

As I mentioned earlier, the sort of fighting that is regarded as legitimate in Islam has been described in the Quran as ‘struggle in the path of God’. To repeat a point I made earlier, such fighting cannot be for the communal or worldly interests or defence of Muslims or for advancing their power and glory. Rather, for a war fought by Muslims to be regarded as a jihad it must be fought, not for communal defence or the defence of Muslims’ lives and properties, but, rather to gain God’s acceptance, protect His faith, guide humanity, promote its welfare and save it from oppression and strife. This is why the Prophet explicitly announced that those who fight for their communal interests are not mujahids.

According to a narration by Hazrat Abu Musa al-Ashari, as recorded in the Sahih of al-Bukhari, once a man appeared before the Prophet and asked him to explain what fighting in the name of God was. The Prophet replied that that fighting carried out for the sake of God alone could be said to be a struggle in God’s path.

The aims of jihad that I have outlined above relate to defence in the face of extreme oppression. All legal systems in the world, as well as common sense, regard this as a reasonable justification for taking up arms. But for such a struggle to be called a jihad it is a must that the vast majority of those who participate in it should be so trained, and their hearts should be so purified by following in the path of the prophets of God, that they should not be motivated in any way by the desire to capture political power for their own community or to enslave another community. Nor should they be driven by lust for booty or for communal supremacy or by the feeling of revenge. Rather, their motive must be to win the pleasure of God, uphold His faith, communicate His guidance to humankind, and help the oppressed.

Unfortunately, in today’s age Muslims have forgotten the real aims of jihad. Their general condition does not at all indicate that in God’s eyes Muslims have anything to do with the goals of jihad that I have mentioned and elaborated upon above. Our condition is now a major cause for our own degradation, and for oppression and misfortune for the rest of humanity. Today, there is no community that genuinely follows truth and champions justice and that has made service of God its mission, for which it is willing to sacrifice its life and worldly luxuries.

The Relation Between Jihad and Faith-based Character

The Quran further specifies that those oppressed people who are given permission to fight back must be so committed to God and the welfare of humanity that if the world were given to them to rule, they would do so in a manner completely different from ordinary rulers. They would use their power and resources for promoting the good and establishing worship of God. Their system of governance would be based on belief in God and on a just distribution of wealth. They would spend on the poor, and make the promotion of virtue and the stopping of vice their guiding principle.

The chapter of the Quran that for the first time gives permission to the companions of the Prophet to engage in physical jihad also mentions:

To those against whom war is made, permission is given (to fight) because they are wronged― and verily, Allah is Most powerful for their aid (39) (They are) those who have been expelled from their homes in defiance of right― (for no cause) except that they say "Our Lord is Allah." [ …] (They are) those who, if We establish them in the land, establish regular prayer and give regular charity, enjoin the right and forbid wrong: with Allah rests the end (and decision) of (all) affairs. (Quran 22: 39-41)

Besides purity of the aims of fighting, proper intention, and strict obedience to Islamic rules and shariah limits in the conduct of war, this verse of the Quran also indicates that those Muslims who take to the path of jihad must be so pure in their service of and commitment to God and so morally upright that, if as a result of their struggle they gain control of any territory, they would use their powers not to satisfy their lusts and base, worldly desires, but, instead, to spread goodness and the service of God and to rid the world of wickedness. Their power would be pressed into the service of God and the reform and welfare of humankind. As the Quran clearly says:


Allah hath purchased of the Believers their persons and their goods; for theirs (in return) is the Garden (of Paradise ): they fight in His cause, and slay and are slain: a promise binding on Him in Truth, through the Law, the Gospel and the Qur'an: and who is more faithful to his covenant than Allah? Then rejoice in the bargain which ye have concluded: that is the achievement supreme. (111) Those that turn (to Allah) in repentance: that serve Him and praise Him; that wander in devotion to the Cause of Allah;― that bow down and prostrate themselves in prayer; that enjoin good and forbid evil; and observe the limits set by Allah; (these do rejoice). So proclaim the glad tidings to the Believers. (Quran 111-112)


Undoubtedly, jihad undertaken by such a group would be a blessing for humanity, and that is why God rewards such a struggle with great merit. To qualify as a legitimate jihad, it must be a struggle for noble aims and engaged in by a group of pure souls, to protect humanity from oppression, as a step to be taken when all other means have failed.


Offensive Jihad?

I have explained the logic and rationale of jihad undertaken in defence and for ending oppression, but the question now arises if offensive jihad is also permissible. Can jihad be declared against a non-Muslim government that does not in any way oppress Muslims? Can such a government be told either to accept Islam or else hand over power to Muslims?

This is a very crucial question. It is necessary to study it in the light of the basic teachings of the shariah. Some Islamic scholars believe that jihad is permissible in self-defence and for ending fitna and oppression, as well as against forces of falsehood that are a hurdle to the spreading of the message and the accomplishment of the mission of the prophets. According to these scholars, after the demise of the Prophet, many of his companions spread out of Arabia into other lands and fought wars for this purpose.

With regard to this issue, it should be kept in mind that in those days all states were identified with one religion or the other. Every state was strictly identified with a particular religion, and so it was simply inconceivable that any non-Muslim government would allow Muslims to invite its subjects to God’s path. This is why the issue was never even discussed then of how Muslims should relate to a non-Muslim state that explicitly allowed Islam to be practiced in its territory or that permitted its subjects to accept Islam and follow it.

In the view of some scholars, in such a situation Muslims must adopt the path of peacefully inviting others to the faith, making use of it to the utmost extent possible so much as to that all the adequate proofs (hujjat) of God be made known. After this, God will decide, in accordance with His practice, which He invariably does after all His proofs have been clearly established, and which can take any form. My own limited understanding leads me to believe that this opinion is in closer accordance with reason, the spirit of the shariah, and the aims and wisdom of God’s revelation. This position can be backed by Hadith reports that insist on the need for peaceful propagation of Islam before fighting can at all be envisaged. And, it must be remembered, today it is no longer forbidden for Muslims to communicate their faith to non-Muslim rulers or non-Muslims in general.

Several Muslims opine that a non-Muslim government would necessarily spread faithlessness, and so God-fearing believers must provide it with just two options: to accept Islam or else to hand over power to them. These Muslims argue that the wars that took place in the early period of Islam against states outside the Arabian peninsula were fought on the basis of this principle.

Many of those who hold this view ignore some of the basic and essential conditions of jihad, and so their warped interpretation of jihad becomes unacceptable to non-Muslims as well as many faithful and pious Muslims themselves. I believe that a careful study of the Quran and the Prophet’s practice can supply an adequate answer to this issue.

It must be kept in mind that Islam’s teachings about jihad have not been revealed for any community named as ‘Muslims’. The basic cause of misunderstanding about jihad stems from conceiving of Muslims as a community, like any other, whose main purpose in life is to lead a life of luxury and grandeur. Unfortunately, like others, many of us, too, define the Muslim ummah in this narrow, communal sense, so much so that it is even reflected in the writings of many Islamic scholars. In contrast, as the Quran conceives it, the Muslim ummah is a group of people who are motivated by success in the life after death, by the desire to serve God and humankind, and by a concern to guide others to God’s path, being ready to exert themselves to the utmost for this purpose.

When this ummah came into being under the leadership of the Prophet Muhammad, it was founded with the following declaration:

Ye are the best of peoples, evolved for mankind, enjoining what is right, forbidding what is wrong, and believing in Allah [Quran 3:110]

The Muslim ummah referred to here was that group that came into being, not on the basis of colour or race or region or land, but, rather for the purpose of promoting the welfare of the whole of humankind and service of God. This ummah was described as ‘the best ummah’ (khair-e ummat) not just because it had the Quran in its hands, but also because, as the above-quoted verse indicates, their character was noble and they led the life of those who had truly submitted to God, as expressed in their words and deeds. It was through this nobility of character and purity of faith that they were able to communicate to others the necessary proofs of God. In other words, this ummah of Muslims, who had truly submitted fully to God, rose to the position of a group charged with the mission of establishing God’s proofs before humankind and upholding the truth. This is indicated in the following Quranic verse:

Thus have We made of you an ummah justly balanced That ye might be witnesses over the nations and the Messenger a witness over yourselves (Quran 2:142)

In other words, the status of the ummah of Muslims, understood here as a group that has sincerely and wholly submitted to God, is that of being witness to the truth and herald of welfare and beneficence. By bearing such witness with regard to God’s path they leave no room for differences or doubts. The Quran explains that this witness of theirs is like the witness established before the Muslims with the advent of the Prophet such that he cleared all their doubts.

Elsewhere, the Quran repeats the same point:

It is He Who has named you Muslims, both before and in this (Revelation); that the Messenger may be a witness for you, and ye be witnesses for mankind! (Quran 22:78)


It is the fulfilling of this mission of bearing witness that is the real aim of true jihad. This is why the companions of the Prophet addressed the Iranians, saying that they had been sent by God in order to deliver humanity from servitude to other beings and guide them to serve God instead.

The crux of this argument is that this ummah of Muslims that had been formed as the deputy of the Prophet to guide and reform humankind and work for its welfare was willing to make every sacrifice for this purpose. If such a group were told that, if they had the capacity, they should demand from the governments of the world to accept their invitation and thereby be allowed to remain in power, or else, if they opposed them, they should forcibly remove them from power so that God’s creatures could be served in accordance with God’s will, would there by anything wrong with this?

The trouble, however, arises from the fact that the Muslims of today are not the same as that pure ummah of true believers of the time of the Prophet. Hence, it is wrong for Muslims today, despite not living up to the high standards of faith and piety of the early Muslims, to interpret jihad in such a way as to demand that if a non-Muslim state does not accept Islam they should declare war against it and replace it with a government of their own. No one can at all doubt that the Muslims of today do not at all measure up to the standard of being witnesses unto humankind, unlike the companions of the Prophet. On the other hand, their condition is so pathetic as to make other people develop negative feelings for Islam. They are almost wholly bereft of faith in God. In contrast to Islamic teachings, they give greater stress to this world than the world to come after death. In fact, the vast majority of those who call themselves Muslims today lead lives that represent revolt against God and open disobedience of Him. In fact, as far as efforts to establish justice and serve humanity are concerned, which are the basic aims of jihad, many non-Muslim communities are far better than them. It cannot be denied that in causing this sorry decline from what should have been their status the biggest culprits have been Muslims themselves. Like other people, we have become slaves of the glitter and glamour of this world. Our general state is not that of a community driven by service to God and the desire for success in the Hereafter. In fact, in terms of morals, we are much worse off than many other communities.

In such a situation, who can at all accept the claim that if the reigns of power be taken away from others and given to the Muslims, the latter would put an end to oppression and conflict, and replace them with genuine human welfare? In fact, if others think that all our talk about disinterested service of humanity and sincere obedience to God is nothing but verbal falsehood, we must accept that our collective hypocritical character alone is responsible for this. Glance at the communal character of Muslims today, at their countries and societies, and think if anyone will at all believe that Muslims actually want to fight other communities in order to end strife on earth and replace it with welfare!

In such a situation, this sort of interpretation of jihad and Islam clearly reflects a very superficial understanding of Islam, a very dangerous violation of the limits set by the shariah. Lamentably, in the recent past several Muslim thinkers and leaders of Muslim movements widely propagated this wrong interpretation of jihad.


Those who have studied the Quran and the Prophet’s practice well know that whenever Muslims betray their role of being witnesses to the truth, stray from the path of Islam and earn God’s anger, they can never get the sort of power or honor needed to launch any offensive struggle. Today, the Muslims are unable to defend even their own freedoms, let alone being able to win God’s pleasure. In other words, according to the shariah, in this period, when the present-day Muslims have strayed away from God, a period characterized by much tumult and destruction, they are not qualified to engage in this sort of offensive jihad. The Quran very clearly and explicitly explains this.


(This is a translation of excerpts from Yahya Nomani's Urdu book, al-Jihad [Lucknow: Al-Mahad al-Ali Lil Darasat al-Islamiya, 2009)

Book Review: On Pakistani Madrasas

Name of the Book: Islam and Education—Conflict and Conformity in Pakistan’s Madrassahs

Author: Saleem H. Ali

Publisher: Oxford University Press, Karachi

Year: 2009

Pages: 214

Price: Rs.495 (Pakistani)

ISBN: 978-0-19-547672-9

Reviewed by: Yoginder Sikand

Much has been written about the role of madrasas, or Islamic schools, in fomenting sectarian violence and terrorism in Pakistan. Today, large parts of Pakistan are faced with the alarming rise of armed vigilante groups, often led and manned by madrasa-trained maulvis, some of which are presently involved in warring against their own government. The link that numerous commentators have made between madrasas and violence in Pakistan is what this book is all about. Based on investigations and comparisons drawn from two selected areas in Pakistan, Ahmedpur East, in the southern Punjab, and Islamabad, the country’s capital, the author seeks to explore if and how madrasas are involved in promoting terrorism, which today threatens to drown Pakistan in the throes of a bloody and seemingly never-ending civil war.

Ahmedpur East is a largely rural area, where landholdings are extremely skewed. Much of the land in the area is owned by ‘high’ caste Shia landlords, while the bulk of the peasantry are from the rival Sunni sect. As in much of rural Pakistan, state services are sorely lacking in the area. The public education system is in a shambles, and in many places landlords do not even allow government schools to function for fear that education will make their peasants restive. This particular context, Ali argues, has provided fertile ground for a rapid rise in the number of madrasas in the area, most of which provide free boarding, lodging and education and so attract students mainly from poor and lower-middle class families. In other words, the pathetic failure of the Pakistani state to provide decent education to the country’s poor is one of the most salient reasons for the mushrooming of madrasas all over the country, including in Ahmedpur East, in recent years.

As elsewhere in the Muslim world, the madrasas of Ahmedpur East are not simply Islamic institutions pure and simple. Rather, each of them represents a particular sectarian brand or version of Islam. One of the many tasks of a madrasa is precisely to articulate and champion the version of Islam that the sect it is affiliated to adheres to, in the face of competing versions. In seeking to do this, madrasas routinely denounce other sectarian versions of Islam as ‘un-Islamic’ and even ‘anti-Islamic’. Sectarianism, therefore, Ali indicates, is endemic, indeed central, to the madrasa system as it presently exists. Not surprisingly, the sectarian hatred actively taught by many madrasas often gets translated into sectarian violence in Pakistan. Ali notes the involvement of various madrasas, belonging to different Muslim sects, particularly the Deobandis, the Barelvis and Shias, in instigating sectarian conflict in Ahmedpur East, which sometimes takes overtly physical forms. Sectarian rivalries in the region are compounded by complex class factors. Since most of the large landlords belong to the Shia minority, Sunni-Shia conflict, instigated by radical Sunni groups that are led by madrasa graduates and leaders, can also be seen as an expression of severe class antagonisms.

It is, however, not simply poverty that has led to the mushrooming of madrasas in Pakistan, Ali notes. Nor is it true that material deprivation necessarily leads to radicalism and violence. Ali compares the madrasas of Ahmedpur East to those in Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad, a city with modern amenities and services, and finds that there, too, sectarianism is endemic to the madrasas in terms of their self-representation. He also notes that the growth of madrasas in Islamabad has actually been facilitated by the state, rather than fuelled by local demand. Almost all the city’s madrasas have been built on state-owned land, many of them illegally, and the vast majority of their students are not from the city, but, rather, from impoverished parts of the North-West Frontier Province, who live, Ali writes, like aliens in the city. Ali mentions various measures taken by successive Pakistani rulers, starting with the military dictator General Zia ul-Haq, to curry favour with the ulema or clerics of the madrasas, which must be taken into account in seeking to understand the enormous growth in the number of madrasas all over Pakistan, including in Islamabad, where, he says, demand for madrasa education now far outstrips supply. In Islamabad, as in Ahmedpur East, Ali notes, numerous cases have been reported of madrasa teachers and students being actively involved in violent political demonstrations, sectarian clashes, bombings and providing refuge to suspected terrorists.

It is not Ali’s case that madrasas are necessarily, and by definition, hubs of terror. Indeed, he argues, relatively few madrasas in Pakistan are actually involved in violent activities or in providing armed training to their students. Yet, he says, this should not cause us to overlook the fact that stern opposition to, or even hatred of, rival Muslim sects and other religions and their adherents is actively instilled in most madrasas, along with a pervasive sense of supremacy of the particular sectarian version of Islam that each madrasa is associated with. This is further reinforced by so-called jihadist literature, websites and mosque sermons that many Pakistani madrasa students are exposed to. It is thus not surprising, Ali tells us, that the majority of the students and teachers in the madrasas that he surveyed favoured violent revolution as an instrument for political change in Pakistan, supported war as a means for resolving Pakistan’s disputes with India, considered women as inferior to men, had extremely negative views about other religions and their adherents, and, in the case of Deobandi madrasas, favoured the Taliban as their role model for what they called the ‘Islamization’ of Pakistan.

This leads Ali to argue that, ‘It is high time that we become more aware of the perils of extremist educational institutions, which have a far broader base in Pakistan than we care to admit. The only way to address the problem is by […] ensuring curricular development in partnership with the reformist ulema’ (176). In this regard, he advocates the inclusion of ‘peace education’ in the madrasa curriculum and the promotion of inter-sectarian and inter-religious dialogue, in which the ulema should be actively involved. That, however, is easier said than done. Ali offers no practical suggestions as to precisely how this should be attempted and how the ulema of the madrasas can be convinced to get involved in these benign activities.

Ali makes a brief survey of the various measures that the Pakistani Government claims to have adopted, particularly after 9/11 and under American pressure, to ‘reform’ the country’s madrasas. He concludes that these measures have been half-hearted and not seriously pursued, and that, consequently, they have miserably failed. That very few madrasas have chosen to register themselves with the government authorities is a sign of the considerable resistance on the part of those who control the madrasas to what they see as unwarranted American and Pakistani Government interference in the realm of Islamic education. Likewise, the few ‘model’ madrasas that the Pakistani Government recently set up, combining secular and religious education, have also had few takers. Matters have been made worse by bureaucratic wrangling and gross mismanagement in the Government-appointed Madrasa Board, which was meant to oversee the process of madrasa ‘reforms’. Ali writes that the Board’s very rationale has been seriously undermined with the Government’s announcement that curricular reform is not part of its mandate. Ironically, Ali adds, Lt. Gen. (retd.) Javed Ashraf Qazi, the person appointed as the head of the Board, whose task is to de-radicalise the militant madrasas, is the former head of Pakistan’s notorious secret services agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), who had himself supervised the recruitment of students from Pakistani madrasas for the radical Taliban in Afghanistan. So much, then, for the Pakistani Government’s ostensible commitment to madrasa ‘reform’ and to clamping down on terrorism in the name of Islam.

Ali wisely remarks that it is not simply religious bigotry that has led to a mounting sense of anti-Americanism and radicalism among large numbers of madrasa students and teachers (besides many other Muslims). Rather, a host of unresolved regional conflicts involving Muslim groups, particularly Palestine, but including other trouble-spots, such as Kashmir, southern Thailand, Chechenya, Iraq and Afghanistan, continue to cause deep resentment among many Muslims. He rightly remarks that solving these conflicts is inextricably linked to countering radicalism in Pakistan’s madrasas.

At the same time, and very lamentably, Ali displays a pathetic optimism in American Government efforts to ‘reform’ the madrasas. He cites, with uncritical approval, the instance of American state funding of Islamic educational institutions in countries such as Indonesia and Uganda, holding these out as examples of positive collaboration for the production and dissemination of ‘moderate’ Islam. Given the fact that Ali’s study was funded by the United States Institute of Peace, known for its close links with the American establishment, it is perhaps not surprising that Ali should laud such cosmetic efforts while ignoring both the politics of this funding and the earlier American funding and support for Islamist radicalism in Pakistan and elsewhere against the erstwhile Soviet Union. Likewise, his argument that American intentions must not be suspected or questioned, even in the face of the record of American support to dictatorial regimes in the Muslim world and elsewhere and the nefarious role of the CIA, is quite unforgivable. So, too, is his claim that ‘The United States has probably learned from its past mistakes and is willing to change’ (142).

As a basic introductory text to some aspects of madrasa education in contemporary Pakistan, this book makes interesting reading, although it fails to provide any new information or arguments. The author claims to have done intensive fieldwork, but the perspective from the field is almost wholly absent—all we have are long tables with cold statistics. The book lacks a central focus and many of its various sections seem hopelessly disjointed. These many lacunae may, however, be forgiven when considered in the light of the pathetic state of social science research in Pakistan.