Islamic Revival or Political Islam Against the Occupiers?: A Broad View

Political Islam in the Middle East

Are Knudsen

R 2003: 3

© Chr. Michelsen Institute 2003 (Development Studies and Human Rights)

ISSN 0805-505X
ISBN 82-8062-043-5

[Out of seven world regions, the Arab countries had the lowest freedom score in the late 1990s (UNDP 2002: p. 27).]

Introduction

The resurgence of Islam, now commonly referred to as “political Islam”, is generally attributed to the crushing military defeats of Arabic countries suffered at the hands of Israeli forces in 1967 (Milton-Edwards 2000: p. 123). This defeat marked the end of panArabism and the start of an Islamic revival that grew to challenge nation-states in the Middle East.


Old Islamism” or “New Islamism

This report has shown that most of the contemporary research is devoted to what may be termed the “Old Islamism”, whose main attribute is the alleged threat Islamic fundamentalism poses to secular regimes in the Middle East and Western democracies
considered enemies of Islam. This essentialist “gloom and doom” approach foregrounds what John Esposito has called the triple threat of Islam: demographic, political and civilisational. As François Burgat (2002: p. xvi) has noted;

"by confining itself to this misleading perspective, the West is depriving itself of understanding that at least part of the demands voiced by this generation of Islamists is no more illegitimate than those expressed by their nationalist fathers in their time (who also had to revert to violence mutatis mutandis)”.

Many analysts will, however, consider Burgat’s approach apologetic” and conveniently masking the fact that the inherent programme of political Islam is undemocratic and totalitarian (see, Salla 1997). As James Craig notes (2001), Islam, which should otherwise be considered an “enviable asset” of Muslim countries, is castigated as a scourge that keeps people forever stuck in a medieval and barbaric past or, at best, as an obstacle to peaceful progress and economic and democratic liberalisation. The fronts between these two opposing views on Islam are harsh and uncompromising and the battle between the “apologists” (contingenists) and “orientalists” (essentialists) is set to dominate research on Islamism for years to come (Milton-Edwards 2002: p. 39).

In order to move the debate beyond this divide, there is a need for a more nuanced perspective on the Islamist movements in the Middle East. First, while most of the scholarly work is on the fringe Islamist movements known for their use of violence, there is a tendency to neglect the quietist groups that condemn the use of violence and are committed to peaceful protest despite the brutal suppression of political dissent that is common to many Middle East countries. In order to get a better grasp of the breadth of the Islamist movement, there is a need for a new perspective along the lines suggested by Beverley Milton-Edwards (2002: p. 48), who advocates a greater emphasis on long-term fieldwork to build first-hand knowledge of Islamist groups, their leaders and adherents. Moreover, there is also a need to engage with scholars in the Middle East whose research is often ignored or passed over.

This also fits in with the fact that we know comparatively little about the grassroots’ members of the Islamist movements and the popular sentiments they embody. There is, hence, a need to continue along the lines of Saad Eddin Ebrahim’s (1980) pioneering study of the populist bases of Egyptian Islamists as well as more recent work on the sociospatial dimension of contemporary Islamism (see, Ismail 2000, on Egypt). Such studies may also contribute to developing theories of Islamist movements in general.In particular there seems to be a need for studying the dynamics of contemporary social movements as vehicles of the Islamist revival. While the study of Islam and social movements is not a novel theme (see, Lapidus and Burke 1988, Zubaida 1993), and in fact Islam began as a social movement, more attention needs to be paid to modern Islamic movements (see review by, Edelman 2001). Especially, it seems important, as Moaddel (2002b: p. 379) has suggested, to engage in a comparative analysis of Islamic movements in the Middle East.

As Moaddel (2002b) has pointed out, there is a range of competing theories as to what are the driving forces behind the Islamist revival. None of them is capable of accounting for the diversity of the popular support for political Islam throughout the Middle East (see, Woltering 2002), but each seeks to explain them as an outcome of a combination of social (injustice), political (oppression) and religious (secularism) factors. Most probably the revival is caused a number of contingent factors, hence the importance of cautioning against simplistic accounts of what is in reality highly complex phenomenon (see, MiltonEdwards 2000: p. 134). Research that attempts to highlight this complexity wouldtherefore be particularly important.

There is also reason to caution against research on “Islamic terrorism” that reiterates dogmatic accounts of Islam and the Sharia’s inherent tendency towards violence and terrorism. This is reflected in the tendency to give precedence to the most violent movements (Bangstad 2002: p. 6) and to portraying the views of their leaders (Appleby 1997, JPS 2002) rather than those of their members and supporters. There is as yet little serious research on violence perpetrated in the name of religion (but see, Juergensmeyer 2000) compared to the many simplistic accounts touting the threat of a “holy war” based on a biased reading Islam’s founding texts.
This also fits in with the call for a greater concern with the Muslim discourse rather than Islamic beliefs per se. This line of reasoning takes as its starting point that rather than shared beliefs, “political Islam became a potent revolutionary force precisely because it meant different things to different people” Moaddel (2002b: p. 379). This view is echoed by Graham Fuller (2002: p. 50), who finds that “Islamism has become, in fact, the primary vehicle and vocabulary of most political discourse throughout the Muslim world”. From this perspective, Islamism is not a spent force locked in decline, but able to articulate political dissent and popular discontent in such a way as to remain a potent political
movement. It is exactly this capacity for development within the Islamist movement that is suggested by James Piscatori (2002), who argues that:

"One way is to assume that ideological rigidity or perhaps incoherence renders Islamism incapable of real development; it is, therefore, destined to fail. Another possibility, however, is that the very ambiguity of Islamist thought, in addition to providing the practical advantage of attracting a broad constituency, allows space
for the flexible development of talismanic ideas such as the Islamic state.” If this view is taken, then, far from being destined to decline, Islamism is capable of adaptation and growth."

The latter perspective is central to the prospect for a democratic transformation of the Islamist movement, what has been termed the “New Islamism” (Langohr 2001). This perspective has been advanced among others by Anthony Shadid (2002), who in particular emphasised the transformation of the Lebanese Hizbollah as well as the Egyptian Centre Party as examples of the current democratic trend. Shadid is not alone in seeing Islamic movements being recast. In a forthcoming book Oliver Roy (2003) argues that the Islamist movements are relinquishing their international agenda in favour of a nationalist framework. More research on this and other aspects of the remaking of the Islamist movement in the Middle East is important not only for its theoretical implications, but more so, to counter the stereotypical portrayal of the Islamist movements as irrational, undemocratic and violent.

Theories

There are currently a large number of books and articles on all aspects of political Islam in the Middle East, but it is rarer to see any explicit theorising aimed at explaining the Islamic revival itself. In many studies there is an implicit assumption that the revival is a result of relative deprivation (see, Gurr 1970), in particular oppressive state policies and social injustice. A general problem with these assumptions is that they may explain the revival in some countries in the Middle East but not in others. At the moment, there seems to be no single theory that can account for the many “faces” of political Islam in such diverse settings as, for example, Turkey (democratic Islamism), Iran (Islamic revolution), Egypt (Islamist opposition) and Algeria (Islamist terror). In this section a range of theories (or rather, theory clusters) are presented under three broad headings: civilisational, social and textual.

The first theory cluster is made up of macro-sociological theories aiming at explaining the dynamics of Islamic civilisations internally (dynastic theories), and externally vis-à-vis an external power (civilisational theories). Next, a second cluster of theories that focus on social processes is reviewed. They locate the Islamic revival not in religion but in the social and political context in which it embedded (crisis theories, cultural duality theories, state culture theories and resurgency theory). The third theory cluster locates the Islamic revival in Islam’s founding texts and doctrine as well as religious worship. In the first instance, Islam is considered a shared discourse (beliefs, rituals and symbols) that is shaped by local socio-political conditions (discursive theories). Alternatively, the starting point is that Muslim activists are united by a shared belief in Islam as an alternative to secular ideologies, creating a potent socio-political force (textualist theories).

Dynastic theories

The first sociological theory of the foundations of the Islamic state and the tension between political (royalty) and religious leadership (caliphate) was developed by the medieval historian Ibn Khaldun (1333–1406) in his masterpiece, Muqaddimah (1377 (1967)). In this book he developed a sociological and historiographic account of the cyclical rise and fall of urban civilisations. The main reason for this, Khaldun argued, was the gradual erosion of the cement of society so to speak, namely “group solidarity” (asabiyya). Group solidarity and military prowess was a defining feature of nomadic tribes and this enabled them to overwhelm and conquer urban civilisation and develop a new dynasty on its ruins. Over time, however, the new dynasty would itself succumb to weakening solidarity among its populace and excesses by its rulers and fall prey to nomadic conquerors. Importantly, Khaldun argued that the only way to create an enduring state was to find a lasting alternative to asabiyya, one that was based not on social solidarity but on the religious authority of the Sharia. Nonetheless, we find in Khaldun’s work an early argument in favour of “the differentiation between religious and secular leadership” (Moaddel 2002b: p. 367), a philosophical problem that had engaged Muslim thinkers since the end of the reign of the Rightly Guided Caliphs (632–1258).

Civilisational theories

Ibn Khaldun’s seminal work may be considered a precursor to the civilisational theories with its emphasis on the antithetic relations between opposing entities destined for an apocalyptic conflict. The idea of a civilisational clash has long been a powerful metaphor in which to interpret the Islamist revival and the Islamic Middle East as a predatory civilisation threatening the West (Ahmed 2002). This notion was elevated to scientific theory with the publishing of Samuel Huntington’s article in Foreign Affairs, titled “The Clash of Civilizations?” (1993). In this article and the subsequent book with the same title, he warned that the fault lines of modern conflict will be not empires or states but “civilizations” (Huntington 1996).

Huntington lists a total of eight discrete civilisations and proposes that conflict between them will result in a cataclysmic endgame threatening world peace. This in particular will occur along the fault lines between the “Islamic” and the “Judeo-Christian” civilisations. Huntington’s thesis has been debunked both on normative (Salla 1997) and empirical grounds (Fox 2001, Russett et al. 2000). In order to understand the normative aspect of Huntington’s position it seems important to consider Michael Salla’s (1997) distinction between “essentialists” and “contingenists”. In short, Salla argues that “essentialists” such as Huntington, Daniel Pipes and Bernard Lewis give prominence to the textual interpretation of Islam, which they consider an enduring and immutable insight into the essence of Islam and the Muslim world. They maintain that Islam is a monolithic threat to the West (see, Knudsen 2002a: pp. 10-11). It is therefore important to find ways to neutralise this threat, especially for the US, which is the principal target of Islamist terrorism (Pinto 1999). Opposed to this view we find scholars insisting on the diversity of Islamic movements and on their being shaped by contingent factors, hence the label “contingenists”. Among its most prominent members we find John
Esposito, Edward Said and James Piscatori. They advocate a more cautious approach, one that acknowledges that Islam can serve as a vehicle for social progress and that Islam’s diversity is both more liberal and more democratic than is often acknowledged (see DEMOCRACY). Among its many detractors, this view is often criticised as being “apologetic” and failing to acknowledge the intimidating side of political Islam that curbs freedom of expression and threatens legitimate governments.

Crisis theories

The crisis theories take as their starting point that the Islamic revival is a response to various forms of economic, political and cultural crisis (Moaddel 2002b: p. 371). In general, this approach includes a large number of explanatory variables but lacks a model for how they may be interconnected. The theory can also be questioned on empirical grounds. Neither the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt (1920s, 1930s), the growing Islamic activism in Iran in the 1960s, nor radical Islamism in Algeria, Jordan and Syria in the 1960s and 1970s were periods characterised by profound economic crisis. These examples, hence, show that the Islamic revival cannot be explained as a popular response to economic decline and the failure of modernisation. Moreover, the bulk of the supporters and leaders of the Islamist movements belonged to the new middle class, further undermining the view that fundamentalism was simply a result of popular discontent by the disenfranchised lumpenproletariat (ibid.).

Cultural duality theories

Seeking to overcome the many shortcomings of the crisis theories, the cultural duality theories posit a tension between the power of the state and the religious leadership (Moaddel 2002b: p. 372). When the state seeks to limit the authority of the religious clergy and remove their privileges, this sparks a countervailing reaction of political opposition. The theory is especially applicable to Shia Islam, where the clergy has a more autonomous position than in Sunni Islam. The cultural duality models have been used to explain, first of all, the rise of revolutionary movements in Iran. This theory seeks to explain the Iranian revolution (1977–79) by reference to the independent religious position of the Shii ulama (clergy), which accounts for their ability to challenge the state successfully. While the theory does show the tension between religion and regime, it fails to explain the broad-based appeal of political opposition expressed through revivalist Islamic movements (ibid.).

State culture theories

Like the cultural duality theories, state culture theories seek to explain Islamic revival as an outcome of the tension between regime and religion, but adopt a more dynamic approach to shifts in state policies and religious discourse (Moaddel 2002b: p. 373). Attempts by the state to invade the religious domain, constrain religious expression or otherwise shift the balance of power in their favour are believed to cause an Islamist backlash. Empirical examples in favour of this theory are the rise of radical Islamism in Algeria in the early 1970s following land reform and leftist polices that alienated large sections of society from the regime (see POLITICAL VIOLENCE). In the same vein the radicalisation of the Egyptian Muslim Brothers was a response to increasing authoritarianism after the military coup in 1952. The assassination of the MB founder Hassan al-Banna, and torture of its members served to further radicalize the MB as well as its chief ideologue, Sayyid Qutb (see
INTRODUCTION). These incidents induced the MB to abandon its former policy and develop a militant agenda that was in stark contrast to the movement’s moderate stance in the 1930s and 40s (Kepel 1985). On a more general level, the state culture theory may be used to explain a cultural conflict between Islam and secularism, and how extreme examples of the latter, what Esposito has termed “militant secular fundamentalism”, provoke an Islamic revival. Examples of this phenomenon may be found in Egypt, Syria and Iran. In Jordan, on the other hand, the non-ideological nature of the regime precluded the formation of an Islamic opposition (see, Moaddel 2002a). Instead, the Islamist movement in Jordan has been a force in democratic expansion (Robinson 1997). Despite the success of representative democracy in Jordan, women are under-represented there as in most other Arab countries (Faqir 2001).

Resurgence theory

Resurgence theory borrows aspects from both crisis theories and state culture theories. The theory takes at its starting point that the Islamic revival is foremost a reaction to the failure of modernisation in Middle East countries (Milton-Edwards 1996a: p. 4ff). The starting point is the colonial era which created a number of artificial nation states whose leaders embraced Western-oriented secular ideologies and pan-Arabism to forge a national identity and legitimize their grip on power. The defeat of Arab forces by Israel in 1967 led to a widespread identity crisis that made the masses turn away from the secular nation-state and embrace Islam as a vehicle towards spiritual renewal and a revival of the Islamic state. Discussing the relevance of this theory to the Palestinian case, MiltonEdwards finds that rather than linked to the chain of events after 1967, it was a result of traits inherent in the Palestinian situation itself that served as a catalyst for political Islam, mainly after 1982 when the PLO was defeated in Lebanon. The radicalisation within Palestine was in large part spurred by Israeli policies meant to suppress and eradicate the nationalist movements, but was neither defeatist nor the result of an identity crisis (ibid.).

Discursive theories

Moving away from social processes, an alternative way to approach the study of Islamic revival is through the symbolic role of religion. This approach is premised on Clifford Geertz’s (1973) definition of religion as “cultural system”, and on the powerful, evocative potential of religious symbolism. In this approach, Islamic texts and doctrine become secondary to the main question, which is how Islam is played out in the daily lives of Muslims, especially how Islam is used as a vehicle for political mobilisation (Moaddel 2002b: p. 375). Important figures within this tradition, Eickelman and Piscatori, point to two processes that shape Muslim politics. The first is objectification, which means that Islam is no longer simply practised, but questioned by its practitioners. The second process is fragmentation, meaning that the clergy (ulama) are no longer the sole interpreters of Islamic doctrine, but challenged by a mixed breed of professionals (doctors, lawyers etc.) who likewise seek intellectual control of Islam. In themselves, however, these processes cannot alone account for the rise of Islamic activism (ibid.: p. 376). The symbolic approach to the study of religion was borne out of a conviction that Islam
was about humans and not religious dogma. This served to legitimise most anthropologists’ ignorance of scripturalist Islam (Lindholm 2002). This ignorance was also based on a pragmatic division of labour between the different disciplines: the Orientalists’ textual exegeses and Quran studies were complemented by anthropologists’ focus on Islamic symbols and popular belief.

While anthropologists now show a greater concern for history and scripturalist Islam (Lindholm 1999), the importance of the scripturalist as opposed to popular interpretations persists, as well as the tension between Muslim dogma and political life (Lindholm 1995: p. 815). Still, most of the studies undertaken by anthropologists in the Middle East tend to focus on key disciplinary issues such as tribalism (Gellner 1969), feudalism (Gilsenan 1996) and honour (Abu-Lughod 1986) rather than targeting Islam and its adherents as such (but see, Donnan 2002, Gilsenan 1990a). In general, anthropological accounts have been validated by the importance of orthopraxy (correct conduct) rather than orthodoxy (correct beliefs) in the Islamic faith and Muslim religious worship (Lindholm 2002: p. 113).

[Religion is: “A system of symbols which acts to establish powerful, pervasive, and long-lasting moods and motivations in men by formulating conceptions of a general order of existence and clothing these conceptions with such an aura of factuality that the moods and motivations seem uniquely realistic” (Geertz 1973)]

Textual theories

Unlike the discursive theories outlined above, the textual theories seek find the answer to the growth of political Islam in religion itself (orthodoxy), that is the founding religious texts (Quran) and traditions of the Prophet (Sunna, Hadith). Often identified simply as Islamic studies, this approach has been boosted in the current “post 9/11” climate: there is a general tendency in academia to revert to scripturalist scholarship and textual exegesis as a means of uncovering the hidden meaning of the Islamic revival and the roots of the fundamentalist revolt (see, Lewis 2002). Among scholars engaged in textual analysis there is currently no consensus as to whether Islamic texts are compatible with “an ideal typical conception of rationalisation and political modernisation” (Moaddel 2002b: p. 380). In order to advance textual studies of Islam, Moaddel argues for a broader approach that not only considers the Islamic texts in isolation, but compares them with those of other cultural traditions (e.g., Western tradition) as well as other literary genres (narrative, legends) found in the Arab world (ibid.).

Nonetheless, in order to move beyond mere “representations” of the Muslim world, Fred Halliday has advocated a middle ground between “textual” and “discursive” approaches in order to uncover the “real” Muslim world. Likewise, Michael Salla (1997) has advocated a convergence approach where political Islam is not seen as temporary aberration to be contained and eventually stamped out, but, on a theoretical level, as a much needed critique of the deficiencies of the Western liberal democratic paradigm, thereby allowing political Islam, as religious revival, to develop into a genuine political force.

Political Islam

The problem of understanding “political” Islam begins already at the level of definition: what is political Islam and hence how can it best be “defined”? Because of this problem, many authors dispense with a definition altogether, leaving it to the reader to infer the many meanings of political Islam. This is also reflected in the common practice of “prefixing” Islam to create a bewildering conceptual plurality, which, to name but a few, includes; radical Islam, militant Islam, extremist Islam, revolutionary Islam and fundamentalist Islam. This diversity points both to the many aspects believed to characterise political Islam, as well as to the problem of finding an appropriate term.

The shortest (and most encompassing) definition of political Islam is that it denotes “Islam used to a political end”. A general problem with the term political Islam is that it tends to imply “an illegitimate extension of the Islamic tradition outside of the properly religious domain it has historically occupied” (Hirschkind 1997: p. 12). Another problem with the term political Islam is that Islam fuses religion and politics (din wa dawla), which is not captured by the term political Islam. A final point is that there is a tendency to condemn all forms of social protest as illegitimate and conflating legitimate protest and the use of militancy and violence (ibid.).

As Kari Karamé (1996) points out, because of the many shortcomings of the term political Islam there is increasing resort to the term “Islamism” (and Islamists), which also conforms to the common Arabic reference to the Islamic movement (al-harak al-Islamiyya) and its adherents as Islamists (Islamiyyun). There is hence a shift from a more abstract approach to one that considers the broader goals of the Islamist movement and the Islamist awakening (al-sahwa al-Islamiyya). A wide range of movements may fall within this general category but according to Bjørn Olav Utvik (1993: p. 201) the Islamist movement can be delimited by the three following traits. First of all they refer to themselves as the Islamic movement, secondly they call for an Islamic state ruled in accordance with Sharia and finally they organise themselves for the purpose of achieving these goals.

A defining feature of Islamists is that they embrace the concept ijtehad, that is, independent reasoning and reinterpretation of the Quran and Islamic traditions and the need to reinterpret the Holy Scriptures and apply them to today’s world. In this sense
Islamism is a modernist project, although as Utvik (1993) has noted, Islamists tend to embrace modernity (technological advances, industrialism etc) but reject modernism and its concomitant strong belief in science and reason. As Khan (2001) shows, the Islamist “project” is premised on three interrelated forms of critique: of modernity, of the west and of the state. More importantly, the current Islamist movement finds that although Islam is a “complete system” it is not a ready-made blueprint for a modern Islamic society. Thus the have adopted a reconstitutive dimension based on reinterpreting the sacred texts (ijtehad) and a programmatic dimension that seeks to translate key Islamic concepts into practical policy. There is, Khan argues, a general move towards more democratic means among those he labels “second-generation Islamists”. Example of this democratic shift can be found among the Islamist parties (Turkey’s Welfare Party) and olitical-cum-religious leaders (Iran’s president Muhammad Khatemi).

In general, the democratic transformation of political Islam, by some termed the “New Islamism” (Langohr 2001: p. 593), is still inadequately understood and as yet little studied (see CONCLUSION). Views are divided as to whether this is caused by an ideological shift, or whether the lessons of the past decade have taught them that overthrowing secular governments is impossible and that this approach has weakened the movements and robbed them of their leaders. This also ties in with the important question of whether political Islam is now a spent force or capable of continued growth. The charismatic period of political Islam can be placed around 1970–82 and the high point of the period was the revolution in Iran (1977–78) with Ayatollah Khomeini as the charismatic and messianic leader. As Sami Zubaida has argued, the Islamic movements have since their heyday in the 1970s become routinised.

and integrated into regular politics (Zubaida 2000). When the charismatic period came to an end, political Islam was gradually stripped of its political stamp to be replaced by conservative moralism. It was this transformation that prompted Olivier Roy’s claim to The Failure of Political Islam (1994). A similar argument has been advanced by Gilles Kepel (2002), who claims that the Islamist movement went through a first phase of expansion (c. 1966–89) that was followed by a decade of decline (1990–present). It may be invoked against Kepel’s analysis that he applies a very narrow definition of what may be considered proof of Islamism succeeding, namely that the Islamists have been brought to power through popular vote or by force. It seems that this criterion may prevent us from seeing the many ways in which political Islam manifests itself in the contemporary world. In an attempt to clarify the ideological basis of Islamic movements, Sami Zubaida (2000) has suggested a tripartite typology that includes conservative, radical and political Islam. Zubaida argues that conservative Islam primarily seeks moral and social control of its citizens. The foremost representative of this type is the Gulf States, in particular Saudi Arabia. The second type is best exemplified by the Egyptian Islamic groups building on the ideology of Sayyid Qutb that seek to overthrow unjust rulers. The third type, political Islam, differs from the two others by seeking to reform society and politics and representing a continuity with nationalist and leftist agendas.

In a twist on the old Orientalist debate (Said 1978), Sabet (2000: p. 897) argues that much of the scholarly work on political Islam is written within the confines of Western social theory and has to obey what he terms its “discursive parameters”. As an example of this problem Sabet includes the tendency to fix the label fundamentalist” to any regime that seeks to apply the Sharia in accordance with Islam. The implication is that religion should be separated from politics as in Western participatory democracy. The implied assumption is that fundamentalism’s (or political Islam’s) unitary approach to religion and state (din wa dawla) is suspect and opposed to Islam simply as a moral system separated from the state (din wa dunya). This argument is sometimes extended to the bigoted conclusion that there are “good Muslims” and “bad Muslims” (Mamdani 2002), something that may account for the current rise in what Halliday (1999) has termed “anti-Muslimism” in the West.

Jihad

An understanding of the concept of jihad is vital to understanding the ideological legitimisation of political Islam. The concept has a complex and contested history (evident in Quran and the Hadith), which reflects that it was interpreted according to changing socio-political circumstances (Euben 2002: p. 21). This made the true meaning of the term ambiguous. Nonetheless, there is a tendency to reify jihad, making it synonymous with armed struggle (“holy war”). This has caused it to become perhaps the most used (and abused) term in the political Islam vocabulary (see, Knudsen 2002a: p. 12). Thus, the term is now often used as a conventional shorthand not only for the Islamic revival in the Middle East (considered a “jihadist backlash”), but also for the alleged threat this represents to Western democracies in Islam’s quest for world hegemony (“global jihad”). While the notion of a “global jihad” can easily be discounted, a more difficult question is whether the Islamist movement is premised on an armed (“jehadist”) struggle against opponents and enemies.

The importance of jihad to the Islamist movement can be traced to the radical ideas of Sayyid Qutb and the radicalisation of the Muslim Brotherhood in 1960s (see INTRODUCTION). The revolutionary ideology of Sayyid Qutb tied the concept to the struggle to overcome jahiliyya, a Quranic term which refers to the pre-Islamic condition combining ignorance and savagery. Qutb and the Islamists following in his footsteps argued that current Muslim societies had reverted to jahiliyya (Roy 1994: p. 41), a social condition (rather than an epoch or period) that must be defeated through a jihad in order to re-establish divine rule (hakimiyya). The importance of this becomes evident when considering that by redefining jihad from a defensive war against foreign unbelievers to an internal quest deposing un-Islamic governments and tyrants, Qutb had redefined jihad from an external fight against Islam’s enemies to an internal quest for control of the state. As Khan (2001: p. 221) points out, this gave the Islamists a “powerful moral weapon: the modern jihad, the just rebellion”. This explains two features of Islamism: although antiiWestern it is not primarily concerned with attacking the West. Rather, anti-Western sentiments are to a large degree channelled towards the autocratic regimes in the Middle East and also explain why they have made efforts to stamp out, co-opt or accommodate the Islamist movements (see, Moustafa 2000, Zeghal 1999, on Egypt). In general, any study of the growth of political Islam needs to consider the role of the state. Two aspects of the Middle East states stand out: first, the prevalence of autocratic regimes which has spurred the growth of political Islam; and second, the failure of secularism and pan-Arab nationalism which has caused an Islamist backlash (see THEORIES).

[It is worth noting that (to some) jahilyyia implies that members of society were no longer considered Muslims but termed takfir (impious). Excommunicated, they could legitimately be killed (Kepel 2002: p. 31)]

Democracy

The relationship between Islam and democracy is a complex one. Especially, there is disagreement over whether the Islamist movement is committed to democracy or inherently illiberal and undemocratic. As Vicky Langohr (2001: p. 591) notes, those who are sceptical about the possibility of a democratic Islamism generally advance one of two arguments. The first is procedural: that although some Islamists have seemingly opted to effect change through the ballot box, they have chosen this method only because they do not yet have the power to use more forceful ones. The second argument is that Islamists seek to impose Sharia, but considering that Sharia itself is discriminatory (against women, non-Muslims etc.) it follows that Islamists will seek to impose undemocratic policies.

The failure of liberal democracy in most of the Arab world has been attributed to Islam’s inadequate conception of individual rights (Moaddel 2002b). One the one hand it is argued that the lack of individual rights causes a lack of legislative functions that in turn explains the dearth of legislative institutions. This, in the final instance, explains why there is no need for any principle of (public) participation. The second explanation links this to the Islamic view of personhood where, it is argued, Islam is based on a positive view of the person who only needs proper guidance (By contrast Christianity is based on the concept of man as an evil sinner who must be controlled.) In classical Islamic political theory, such guidance is provided by the rightful caliph. After he is installed, following him is a Muslim duty (ibid.: p. 365). However, against this view it might be argued that there is another side to Islamic political theory which stresses the duty to depose a tyrannical leader as well as contains the conceptual elements of democracy (ibid.). They include the consultative assemblies or bodies (shura), consensus (ijma) and utility (masliha). The problem, as Moaddel sees it, is not the lack of democratic theory, but the lack of procedural rules in Islam that could be used to determine when installing or rebelling against a ruler is justified and when consensus can be used to settle a disputed matter of jurisprudence (ibid.).

In general, there is considerable scepticism as to whether Islamists are committed to democracy. The historian Elie Kedouri has even claimed that “democracy is alien to the mind-set of Islam” (cited in, Anderson 2001). The same goes for the question of popular vote, where some claim that Islamists only believe in “one man, one vote, one time” (Langohr 2001: 591). However, there are many examples that prove the opposite, in particular the recent Turkish Welfare party experience and leading Islamists claiming that Islamisation is best achieved through democratisation (Khan 2001: p. 223)

[A detailed discussion of Sharia and the state in the Modern Middle east can be found in, (Brown, 1997)}

Most of the Middle Eastern states are run by autocratic regimes bent on keeping Islamists from gaining power, both through denying them a popular vote and by brutal suppression of their leaders and followers. To many analysts, it is exactly the prevalence of autocracy in the Middle East that has given rise to Islamist movements, which are seen as a way of expressing popular sentiment against illegitimate rulers. The countries in the Middle East have pursued different strategies vis-à-vis the Islamist threat. They have either tried their best to suppress them periodically as in Egypt (Alterman 2000) or permanently (as in many Gulf states) or tried to prevent them from gaining power through participation in the popular vote. As Vicky Langohr (2001: p. 592) notes, “what is actually on offer to most Islamist movements, as well as other opposition movements, is participation in electoral contests for political office within regimes that remain highly authoritarian”. Still, the reasons for embracing democratic elections among Islamist movements vary from country to country. Islamic organisations such as the Muslim Brothers in Egypt, the Islamic Salvation Front in Algeria and the Welfare Party (Refah or RP) in Turkey all “accept a pluralist political system and an electoral path to power” (Al Sayyid 2002: p. 178).

While these organisations have always sought political power using peaceful methods, only rarely are Islamist organisations transformed from violent to non-violent ones. An especially interesting case in this regard is the gradual pacification of the Lebanese Hizbollah, long a leading (Shia) Islamist group that became infamous for its violent guerrilla tactics that included the abduction of Western hostages, suicide missions and bomb attacks against foreign missions, most notably the attacks on the US embassy (63 persons killed) and US Marine barracks (241 killed) in Beirut in 1983 (see POLITICAL VIOLENCE). As Anthony Shadid (2002) explains it, one of the reasons for Hizbollah’s renunciation of political violence is a pragmatic concern with the high costs associated with the use of violence and, as developed over many years, that more could be achieved through the ballot box.

Following the peace accord in 1989 (Ta’if Agreement) that ended 15 years of civil war (1975–90), Hizbollah participated in two consecutive parliamentary elections (1992 and 1996) and won eight and seven seats respectively out of 128 parliamentary seats.
Although this was a mere symbolic representation in the Lebanese parliament, Hizbollah remained committed to Lebanon’s consociational democracy. Hizbollah in particular had developed a large network of social services that in many instances eclipsed those of the Lebanese state (Langohr 2001: p. 597). This provides the rganisation with a solid platform that it can rely on in municipal elections. As Nizar Hamzeh (2000) shows in his detailed article on the municipal elections in Lebanon in 1998, Hizbollah succeeded in winning the majority of Lebanon’s municipalities either through “party lists” made up of its own candidates or through the formation of “coalition lists” in a strategic alliance with independent candidates, secular and confessional parties (Sunni, Christian) as well as influential families (ibid.: p. 745ff). Overall, the main reason for Hizbollah’s stunning victory was its commitment to grassroots work and providing social welfare services to reduce poverty. The organisation runs three hospitals and more than 17 medical centres in addition to a large commercial network consisting of shopping malls, petrol stations and construction companies (ibid.: p. 743). Partly for this reason, Hizbollah is able to command a large section of the popular vote in local elections. Hezbollah’s election victory is also the result of having developed a professional campaign committee with a large salaried staff and hundreds of volunteers that ran pre-election trials and transported voters to the voting stations. A final reason for Hizbollah’s political dominance is that in the rural areas of Lebanon the central government remains weak, thus allowing Hizbollah to take over state functions, including the settlement of conflicts and meting out punishment (Hamzeh 1994). Taken together, these elements are important reasons for the scale of Hizbollah’s electoral victory in municipal elections. It is important to keep in mind, though, that despite the “gradualist-pragmatic formula” that Hizbollah has adopted (ibid.: p. 741), the organisation remains firmly committed to creating an Islamic state in Lebanon (Langohr 2001: p. 598). This is especially poignant since Lebanon is still struggling to overcome years of civil war that have caused political instability (Haddad 2002), economic turmoil (Norton 1999) and lingering tensions between the country’s multiple confessional identities (Barak 2002, Johnson 2001).

The pragmatism of Lebanon’s Hizbollah becomes even more interesting when compared with another Islamist group infamous for its use of extreme violence, namely the Palestinian Hamas (see POLITICAL VIOLENCE). Like Hizbollah, Hamas is a key provider of social welfare in the Palestinian Occupied Territories and protecting this welfare network is so important that the organisation tailors its violent tactics to prevent a backlash from the Israeli forces or the Palestinian Authority aimed at destroying or disrupting the welfare system itself (Mishal and Sela 2000). Likewise, Hamas’ covert participation in the Palestinian Legislative Council elections in 1996 was a calculated decision aimed at avoiding conferring credibility on the Oslo Accords (and the Declaration of Principles, DOP) while at the same time securing a future role in the subsequent municipal elections. A classified Hamas document from 1992 shows that the organisation initially considered four possible options: participation, boycott, boycott as well as undermine and disrupt elections, and participation under a name other than Hamas (Mishal and Sela 2000: p. 124). During the coming years the Hamas leadership softened its initial decision to boycott the elections and ask its supporters to refrain from casting their vote, to one of “refraining from participation” in the 1996 elections to the Palestinian Authority Council. At the same time, the organisation tacitly encouraged its members to run as independents and for the rank-and-file to vote for these candidates as well as Fatah candidates known for their good relations with the Islamic opposition. Exit polls found that an estimated 60 to 70 per cent of the Hamas supporters participated in the elections (ibid.: p. 136). By unofficially participating in the council elections, Hamas was able to exercise its influence without comprising its principled stand against the DOP, the opposition to the PA leadership and the prospects of Israeli domination of the elections. This strategy was also borne out by the fact that only those registering their vote in the PA elections were allowed to vote in the subsequent municipal elections, which Hamas not only contested but expected to win (Langohr 2001: p. 596).

[In general, Islamist parties have fared badly in popular elections and referendums (Appendix II).]

However, there are important exceptions to this general trend. The first country where the Islamists came to power through electoral processes was Algeria (Vandervalle 1997). After gaining independence from France in 1962, Algeria remained under quasi-military one-party rule that ended in the late 1980s due to a widening economic crisis that eventually lead to widespread demonstrations against the government in October 1988. This prompted a process of emocratisation that began in 1989 with a national referendum opened up to multi-party elections. The municipal and provincial elections proved a humiliating defeat for the socialists and a stunning victory for the Islamist party Front Islamique de Salut (FIS). The unexpected victory gave FIS control of most of Algeria’s local authorities (Milton-Edwards 2000: p. 169). Two years later, in 1991, the first round of elections to the national assembly was held. FIS, again, took a stunning lead, almost wiping out the more than 49 other parties contesting the election. Algeria was now within inches from having the “first democratic accession to power by a militant or fundamentalist party” (ibid.). Under growing pressure to suspend the second round of elections the government imposed a state of emergency in February 1992 and arrested the FIS leadership. In the coming years this gave rise to an Islamist insurgency that over time developed into a virtual civil war (see POLITICAL VIOLENCE).

In general, many analysts are sceptic of the prospects for developing Arab democracies (see, Anderson 2001). A special problem of participatory democracy is that many Arab states, in particular those labelled “rentier states,” are based not on public participation but on abstention from public from political participation. Awash with oil revenues, they tend not to tax their citizens, who are provided public benefits (or goods) free of charge. The principle “no taxation, no representation” means that the state is not constrained by the interests of its populace (Moaddel 2002b: p. 376). This fact may explain why democracy in Arab countries reverses prevailing theories (that there is a positive correlation between income and democracy): it is the poorer, not the richer, Arab countries which have taken steps towards democracy (Sadiki 2000: p. 88).

This may help explain why foreign aid has done little to promote democracy in the region (Carapico 2002): the United States alone has for the past decade spent more that US$ 250 million on democracy programmes with little impact (Ottaway et al. 2002: p. 7). This also ties in with the findings of Regan and Henderson (2002), who show that states with intermediate levels of democracy (semidemocracies) have the highest levels of political repression. A Middle East country that fits this general description is Egypt (Alterman 2000). These examples should not, however, be construed as proof that Islam and democracy are mutually exclusive (Midlarsky 1998).

Instead, it is worth remembering that while the evidence as to whether Islamists are committed to democracy are (as yet) inconclusive, there is ample evidence that most secular regimes in the Middle East are not (Langohr 2001: p. 608).

Political violence

The growth of extreme political violence in the Middle East is often attributed to the tendency to suppress democratic expression and freedom of speech. The use of extreme violence is often considered a defining feature of the Islamist movement in general, whereas in actual fact, it remains an aberration. The level of political violence naturally depends on how it is defined, and especially how to separate terrorism from acceptable political violence (the concept of just war, in Islam and in Christianity). At present, a normative problem is that there is no readily accepted definition of terrorism.

This problem becomes especially acute when violence targets innocent victims and bystanders. An example of this problem is a recent report by the Human Rights Watch, which caused an uproar because it concluded that the Palestinian suicide bombers belonging to the armed wing of Hamas (the Qassam Brigades) were systematically targeting civilians, and therefore committing war crimes (HRW 2002). A review of the reasons why terrorism occurs shows that they can be grouped into the following broad categories: psychological explanations (pathology, deprivation), societal explanations (economy, governance) and state explanations (sponsorship, hegemony, failed states) (Lia and Skjølberg 2000). It might seem that the most common explanations of so-called “Islamic terrorism” (in itself a misnomer) often combine these three explanations. In short, it is argued fundamentalist beliefs make adherents psychologically predisposed to use violence and surrender their lives (Taylor and Horgan 2001), that abysmal social conditions and frustration promote extremism (Andoni 1997), and that authoritarianism and secularism as well as political persecution have spurred a violent backlash from Islamist movements. We find here a contradiction between explanations which consider the use of violence a result of internalizing Islamist beliefs and those that locate them in the externalizing socio-political conditions (Langohr 2001: p. 591): The question of whether to resort to violence to achieve its goals is inherent in the Islamist project (that what some Islamists understand as a divine mandate to implement shari‘a ultimately sanctions the use of force against dissenters) or contingent (that the violent exclusion of Islamists from the political arena has driven them to arms, best expressed by François Burgat’s contention that any Western political party could be turned in to the Armed Islamic Group in weeks if subjected to the same repression and Islamists had endured) looms large in this debate.

[A standard definition of (insurgent) terrorism is: “the deliberate and systematic use or threat of violence against instrumental (human) targets (C) in a conflict between two (A, B) or more parties, whereby the immediate victims C – who might not even be part of the conflicting parties – cannot, through change of attitude of behaviour, dissociate themselves from the conflict” (Schmid and Graaf 1982: p. 15).]

Nonetheless, there is often a general assumption that fundamentalist beliefs predispose a person to violence (act violently, seek violent means). It has been claimed that Islam is based on a “binary world view” where the “Land of Islam” (Dar al-Islam) is contrasted with “The Land of War” (Dar al-Harb) or the “Land of Unbelief” (Dar al-Kufr). In important ways, it is argued, this particular world view predisposes Islam and believers of the faith to defeat the latter in order to promote the former (Lia and Kjøk 2001: p. 14). It has long been acknowledged that a defining feature of terrorist attacks and other forms of extreme violence is that the ultimate purpose is not the carnage itself, but the communicative message this conveys to a set of spectators (local and trans-local) (Schmid and Graaf 1982). More concretely, it may be delineated as a transmitter (the terrorist), the intended recipient (target), message (bombing, ambush) and feedback (response of target) (see, Lia and Skjølberg 2000). There is, hence, what may be termed “the triangle of violence”, which includes the relationships between performers, victims and witnesses. In conventional (military) combat, the opposing armies do everything in their power to limit the number of casualties, often resorting to high-tech wizardry to limit loss of life. In suicide missions the opposite applies: there is a 100 percent willingness to sacrifice one’s life and the attacks are technologically simple (ibid.: p. 24). A typical example is a single person (male or female) setting off a home-made bomb strapped around the body in a crowd of innocent bystanders.

An important reason why such attacks are not condemned is that from an Islamic perspective, the terms “suicide missions” and “suicide bombers” are inappropriate. Islam forbids suicide (intihar), therefore the perpetrator is considered to have been a martyr (mujahid, shahid) who will embrace martyrdom (shahadah) (Euben 2002: p. 28). Etymologically the term mujahadid is related to the jihad, hence the act of sacrifice needs to be understood within the context of jihad itself. We can illustrate this by considering how jihad was interpreted by Palestinian Islamist groups such as Hamas and Islamic Jihad, which are perhaps the most prominent perpetrators of extreme political violence. Hamas was formed in 1987 in the wake of the Palestinian uprising (intifadah) as an outgrowth of the Palestinian Muslim Brotherhood (Abu-Amr 1993: p. 10). Hamas was an ideological heir to the so-called Mujamma movement led by Sheikh Ahmad Yasin, whose main concern was Islamic preaching (da’wa) and teaching (tarbiya) in the Gaza strip. The movement had been involved in sporadic violence, but then only against fellow Palestinians.

In an excellent article detailing the shift in Hamas’ strategy from 1988, Beverley Milton-Edwards (1992) shows how the Palestinian uprising made Hamas popularise the notion of jihad. The details of Hamas’ new strategy were laid out in the Hamas Covenant issued in 1988, which is the organisation’s main ideological document
(Hamas 1988). The covenant underlines the importance of jihad, but, importantly, delimits the concept by applying it to ending the Israeli occupation of Palestine. According to the charter, there is no solution to Palestine problems except through jihad, and Article 15 in the covenant reads: “When an enemy occupies some of the Muslim lands, jihad becomes obligatory on every Muslim” (ibid.).

As Milton-Edwards shows, Hamas therefore applied jihad differently from the competing Palestinian Islamist movement, the Islamic Jihad. Although the goals of the two organisations overlap, Islamic Jihad tends towards a more universal application of jihad, including restoration of the Caliphate in all Muslim countries (ibid.). Hamas, on the other hand, shied away from an encompassing definition of jihad, restricting the term to opposition against Israel. Nonetheless, detailed studies of Hamas and its militant wing show that violence is used pragmatically, more often than not, in the form of calculated titfor-tat retaliation against Israeli forces and more recently, civilians. According to the leaders of Hamas, “they are legitimately waging a jihad against foreign occupation” (Milton-Edwards and Hinchcliffe 2001: 50). The Hamas leaders are not alone in defending the use of extreme violence. The Egyptian cleric Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, current in exile in Qatar, has argued that suicide bombings are fully in accord with Islamic teachings and represent “the most exalted form of martyrdom” (cited in, El-Affendi n.d.). Although this clearly is a minority view that is also opposed by reputed clerics such as the Grand Sheikh of Al-Azhar (Muhammad Hussein Tanawi), the popular support for Palestinian suicide missions is strong in all the Arab countries. In April 2002 the Saudi Ambassador in London, Ghazi al-Qusaibi, created a stir when he published a poem in a London-based Arabic newspaper which paid tribute to Palestinian suicide bombers as dying “to honor
God’s word” (MEMRI 2002). In particular, Al-Qusaibi hailed the teenager Ayat Akhras, a quiet schoolgirl, who detonated explosives strapped to her body at a Jerusalem supermarket, killing two Israelis and injuring twenty-five (in March 2001). The Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a militant group allied with Yasser Arafat’s Fatah movement, said it was responsible for sending Ayat to kill herself.

The willingness to use extreme violence is something that many, including those sympathetic to the goals of the organisation and the plight of the Palestinians, find unacceptable. Overall, the field known as “terrorism studies” tends see violence perpetrated by Islamist radicals as a special type that has been branded the “new terrorism” (Lia and Kjøk 2001: p. 8). They are set apart from ordinary terrorists by their personality, rationality and organisation. They are portrayed as more violent than “secular terrorists”, the attacks are considered irrational, that is, defying rational cost-benefit calculations, and the attackers belong to closed circles led by a spiritual leader and linked to other groups of similar persuasion through informal networks (ibid.: p. 8). On closer inspection, however, the first two assumptions appear questionable when compared with available data. For example, the case given above (Ayat Akhras) defies the claim to a terrorist personality. She had no previous history of violence abuse, she was not a member of any Islamist organisation – in fact two organisations refused her plea for help to carry our her mission – until she finally persuaded the Al-Aqsa Brigades to assist her. The second assertion, that “Islamic terrorism” defies cost-benefit calculations, also appears wrong. For example, if we look at the attacks carried out by the two best known Palestinian Islamist groups, Hamas and Islamic Jihad, they are neither indiscriminate nor irrational but rather carefully planned and executed. As Kydd and Walter demonstrate, terrorist attacks in the Middle East “show a clear and recurring pattern where violence is timed to coincide with major events in the peace process” (2002: p. 263-264). Examining the period 1988–98, Kydd and Walter find that the use of extreme violence reduces the likelihood that peace agreements will be successful. Especially where the parties to the conflict do not trust each other (as in the Israel-Palestine conflict) terrorist attacks are very likely to derail a nascent peace process (ibid: p. 289).

Although, terrorist activity is “patterned” it is not easily predictable, and there is no standard distribution curve (“non-Gaussian curve distribution”); therefore it is difficult to predict when terrorist strikes might occur (Cordesman 2000). This makes preventing terrorist attacks costly and more so because of unregulated money transmissions have made “terrorist finance” very hard to control (Winer and Roule 2002). This may also be linked with a common characteristic of groups involved in extreme violence (religious or secular), that the organisation is loosely structured around a number of independent “cells” that may span several countries, something making them hard to target. In some cases these cells may be considered nodes in a terrorist network that enables them to carry out coordinated attacks requiring
specialist training, informal financing and complex strategic planning. The most prominent organisation of this type is the Al Qaeda (Simon 2002), but sensationalist reportage of the organisation and its leader Osama bin Laden conveniently forgets that most Arab countries and Muslims reject the organisation’s methods and agenda (Al Sayyid 2002). Furthermore, it is worth noting that most militant Islamic groups in the Arab world are not international in scope but dependent on local sources of support, especially money and weapons (Khashan 1997).

Still, the use of violence, and especially extreme violence, varies among Islamist groups. The group often cited as being the most violent is the Algerian “Armed Islamic Group” (Groupe Islamique Armée), better know under its acronym “GIA”. Founded in 1989, it emerged as the leading insurgent organisation, which unlike the rival Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) (see DEMOCRACY), condemned the elections and refused to cooperate with the Algerian regime. Since the elections were suspended in 1991, Algeria has been seized by a wave of violence. Between 1992 and 1998 the country was thrown into a virtual civil war that pitched the military-backed regime against a complex, clandestine opposition derived from the country’s banned Islamist movement, the Front Islamique du Salut (FIS). Official figures put the number of people killed during this period at 100,000, that is about 1,200 deaths per month (CrisisWeb Online). In mid-1997, the armed wing of FIS, the Army of Islamic Salvation (AIS), declared a unilateral cease-fire (Gerges 1999). AIS even collaborated with the Algerian regime in its fight against GIA. Currently most analysts agree that GIA is no longer capable of destabilising the regime and has alienated itself from ordinary Algerians (see, Lia and Kjøk 2001).

Appendix I: Persons met:

Abdelwahab el-Affendi - Centre for the Study of Democracy: London
Farhan Nizami - Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies: Oxford
Mohammed Talib - Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies: Oxford
Robert Spingborg - London Middle East Institute at SOAS: London
Zami Zubaida - Birkbeck College, University of London: London
Emad S. Shahin - American University of Cairo Cairo
Mustapha Al-Sayyid American University of Cairo: Cairo
Amr Hamzawi - American University of Cairo: Cairo
Dia’a Rashwan - Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies: Cairo
Muhammad A. Khalidi - American University of Beirut: Beirut
Ahmad Mousalli - American University of Beirut: Beirut

References

Abu-Amr, Z. 1993. Hamas: A historical and political background. Journal of Palestine Studies 22:5-19.

Abu-Lughod, L. 1986. Veiled Sentiments: Honor and Poetry in a Bedouin Society. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Ahmed, A. 2002. Ibn Khaldun's understanding of civilizations and the dilemmas of Islam and the West today. Middle East Journal 56:20-45.

Al Sayyid, M. 2002. Mixed message: The Arab and Muslim response to ‘terrorism’. The Washington Quarterly 25:177-190.

Alterman, J. B. 2000. Egypt: Stable for how long? The Washington Quarterly 23:107-118.

Anderson, L. 2001. Arab democracy: Dismal prospects. World Policy Journal 18 (Fall):53-60.

Andoni, L. 1997. Searching for Answers: Gaza's Suicide Bombers. Journal of Palestine Studies 26:33-45.

Appleby, R. S. Editor. 1997. Spokesmen for the Despised: Fundamentalist Leaders of the Middle East. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.

Bangstad, S. 2002. Palestinian Islamist Movements: An Annotated Bibliography.

Bergen: Chr. Michelsen Institute, CMI Report R 2002-21 (Available:
http://www.cmi.no/pdf/2002/Reports/R%202002-21.pdf).

Barak, O. 2002. Intra-communal and inter-communal dimensions of conflict and peace in Lebanon. International Journal of Middle East Studies 34: 619–644.

Brown, N. J. 1997. Shari‘a and state in the modern Muslim Middle East. International Journal of Middle East Studies 29:359-376.

Burgat, F. 2002. Face to Face with Political Islam. London: I.B. Tauris.

Carapico, S. 2002. Foreign aid for promoting democracy in the Arab world. Middle East Journal 56:379-395.

Cordesman, A. 2000. Asymmetric warfare versus counterterrorism: Rethinking CBRN and CIP defense and response. Available: http://www.csis.org/homeland/reports/cbrnassymetric2.pdf Accessed: 24 January 2003.

Craig, J. 2001. A life with the Arabs. British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 28:141-150.

CrisisWeb. Online. Egypt and North Africa: Project overview. Available: www.crisisweb.org/projects/project.cfm?subtypeid=2 Accessed: 24 January 2003.

Donnan, H. Editor. 2002. Interpreting Islam. London: SAGE.

Ebrahim, S. E. 1980. Anatomy of Egypt’s militant Islamic groups: Methodological notes and preliminary findings. International Journal of Middle East Studies 12.

Edelman, M. 2001. Social movements: Changing Paradigms and Forms of Politics. Annual Review of Anthropology 30:285-317.

Eickelman, D. F. 1998. The Middle East and Central Asia: An Anthropological Approach. Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Prentice Hall.

El-Affendi, A. n.d. Terrorism, Despotism and Democratic Politics: An Investigation into the Pathologies of Contemporary Middle East Politics. Mimeo.

Euben, R. L. 2002. Killing (for) politics: Jihad, martyrdom, and political action. Political Theory 30:4-35.

Faqir, F. 2001. Engendering democracy and Islam in the Arab world. Third World Quarterly 18:165-174.

Fox, J. 2001. Two Civilizations and Ethnic Conflict: Islam and the West. Journal of Peace Research 38:459-472.

Fuller, G. 2002. The future of political Islam. Foreign Affairs 81:48-60.

Geertz, C. 1973. "Religion as a cultural system," in The Interpretation of Cultures, pp. 87–125. New York: Basic Books.

Gellner, E. 1969. Saints of the Atlas. The nature of human society series. Chicago, Ill.: University of Chicago Press.

Gerges, F. A. 1999. The decline of revolutionary Islam in Algeria and Egypt. Survival 41:113-125.

Gilsenan, M. 1990a. Recognizing Islam: Religion and Society in the Modern Middle East. London: I.B. Tauris.

—. 1990b. "Very like a camel: The appearance of an anthropologist’s Middle East," in Localizing Strategies: Regional Traditions of Ethnographic Writing. Edited by R. Fardon, pp. 222-239. Edingurgh and Washington: Scottish Academic Press and Smithsonian Institution Press.

—. 1996. Lords of the Lebanese Marches: Violence and Narrative in an Arab
Society. London: I.B. Tauris.

Gurr, T. R. 1970. Why Men Rebel. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.

Haddad, S. 2002. The relevance of political trust in postwar Lebanon. Citizenship Studies 6:201-218.

Halliday, F. 1999. Review article: ‘Islamophobia’ reconsidered. Ethnic and Racial Studies 22:892-902.

Hamas. 1988. The Covenant of the Islamic Resistance Movement. Available: www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/mideast/hamas.htm Accessed: 22 January 2003.

Hamzeh, A. N. 1994. Clan conflicts, Hezbollah and the Lebanese state. Journal of Social Political and Economic Studies 19:433-446.

—. 2000. Lebanon’s Islamists and local politics: A new reality. Third World Quarterly 21:739-759.

Hirschkind, C. 1997. What is political Islam? Middle East Report Oct/Dec:12-14.

HRW. 2002. Erased in a Moment: Suicide Bombing Attacks against Israeli Civilians. New York: Human Rights Watch (Available: http://www.hrw.org/reports/2002/isrl-pa/ISRAELPA1002.pdf). Huntington, S. 1993. The clash of civilizations. Foreign Affairs 72:22-49.

Huntington, S. P. 1996. The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order. New York: Simon & Schuster.

Ibn Khaldun. 1377 (1967). The Muqaddimah: An Introduction to History. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.

Ismail, S. 2000. The popular movement dimensions of contemporary militant Islamism: Socio-spatial determinants in the Cairo urban setting. Comparative Studies in Society and History 42:363-393

Johnson, M. 2001. All Honourable Men: The Social Origins of War in Lebanon. London: I.B. Tauris.

JPS. 2002. 11 September, terrorism, Islam, and the Intifada: An interview with Shaykh Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah. Journal of Palestine Studies 31:78-84.

Juergensmeyer, M. 2000. Terror in the Mind of God: The Global Rise of Religious Violence. Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press.

Karamé, K. 1996. Social and economic reasons for the recruiting to political Islam (in Norwegian). Internasjonal Politikk 54:199-213.

Kepel, G. 1985. The Prophet and Pharaoh: Muslim Extremism in Egypt. London: Al Saqi Books.

—. 2002. Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam. London: I.B. Tauris.

Khan, M. A. M. 2001. The political philosophy of Islamic resurgence. Cultural Dynamics 13:211-229.

Khashan, H. 1997. The new world order and the tempo of militant Islam. British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 24:5-24.

Knudsen, A. 2002a. Political Islam in South Asia. Bergen: Chr. Michelsen Institute, CMI R 2002:14 (Available: http://www.cmi.no/pdf/2002/Reports/R%202002-14.pdf).

—. 2002b. Valgets kvaler [National elections in Pakistan]. Sunnmørsposten Lørdag 26. oktober 2002, Available: http://www.smp.no/arkiv/artikkel.asp?id=42451&ka=6.

Kydd, A., and B. F. Walter. 2002. Sabotaging the peace: The politics of extremist violence. International Organization 56:263-296.

Langohr, V. 2001. Of Islamists and ballot boxes: Rethinking the relationship between Islamisms and electoral politics. International Journal of Middle East Studies 33:591-610.

Lapidus, I. M., and E. Burke. Editors. 1988. Islam, Politics, and Social Movements. Berkeley, Cal.: University of California Press.

Lewis, B. 1990. The roots of Muslim rage. The Atlantic September.

—. 2002. What Went Wrong? Western Impact and Middle Eastern Response. New York: Oxford University Press.

Lia, B. 1996. The Society of the Muslim Brothers in Egypt: The Rise of an Islamic Mass Movement 1928-1942: Ithaca Press.

Lia, B., and Å. Kjøk. 2001. Islamist Insurgencies, Diasporic Support Networks and their Host States: The Case of the Algerian GIA in Europe 1993-2000: Forsvarets Forskningsinstitutt (FFI), Report 2001/03789 (Available: www.mil.no/multimedia/archive/00002/Lia-R-2001-03789_2134a.pdf).

Lia, B., and K. H.-W. Skjølberg. 2000. Why Terrorism Occurs: A Survey of Theories and Hypotheses on the Causes of Terrorism. Kjeller: Forsvarets Forskningsinstitutt (FFI), Report 2000/02769 (Available: http://www.mil.no/multimedia/archive/00004/Lia-R-2000-02769_4938a.pdf).

Lindholm, C. 1995. The new middle eastern ethnography (Review article). Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 1:805–820.

—. 1999. The Islamic Middle East: An Historical Anthropology. Oxford: Blackwell.

—. 2002. "Kissing cousins: Anthropologists on Islam," in Interpreting Islam. Edited by H. Donnan, pp. 110-129. London: Sage.

Mamdani, M. 2002. Good Muslim, bad Muslim: A political perspective on culture and terrorism. American Anthropologist 104:766-775.

MEMRI. 2002. The Saudi Ambassador to London's ode to suicide bombers. The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) Special Dispatch Series - No. 372, Available:
www.memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Page=countries&Area=saudiarabia&ID=SP37202 Accessed: 31 January 2002.

Midlarsky, M. I. 1998. Democracy and Islam: Implications for civilizational conflict and the democratic peace. International Studies Quarterly 42:585-511.

Milton-Edwards, B. 1992. The concept of jihad and the Palestinian Islamic movement: A comparison of ideas and techniques. British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 19:48-53.

—. 1996a. Islamic Politics in Palestine. London: I.B. Tauris.

—. 1996b. Political Islam in Palestine in an environment of peace? Third World Quarterly 17:199-225.

—. 2000. Contemporary Politics in the Middle East. Cambridge: Polity Press.

—. 2002. "Researching the radical: The quest for a new perspective," in Interpreting Islam. Edited by H. Donnan, pp. 32-50. London: Sage.

Milton-Edwards, B., and P. Hinchcliffe. 2001. Conflicts in the Middle East since 1945. London: Routledge.

Mishal, S., and A. Sela. 2000. The Palestinian Hamas: Vision, Violence and Coexistence. New York: Columbia University Press.

Moaddel, M. 2002a. Jordanian Exceptionalism: An Analysis of State-Religion Relationship in Egypt, Iran, Jordan and Syria. New York: Palgrave.

—. 2002b. The study of Islamic culture and politics: An overview and assessment. Annual Review of Sociology 28:359-386.

Moustafa, T. 2000. Conflict and cooperation between the state and religious institutions in contemporary Egypt. International Journal of Middle East Studies 32:3-22.

Nome, F. 2002. Martyrbrigadene: De Palestinske Selvmordsbomberne. Oslo: Cappelen.

Norton, A. R. 1999. Lebanon's malaise. Survival 42:35-50.

Ottaway, M., T. Carothers, A. Hawthorne, and D. Brumberg. 2002. Democratic Mirage in the Middle East. Washington D.C.: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace; Policy Brief 20; (Available: http://www.ceip.org/files/pdf/Policybrief20.pdf).

Paley, J. 2002. Toward an anthropology of democracy. Annual Review of Anthropology 31:469-496.

Pinto, M. d. C. 1999. Some US concerns regarding Islamist and Middle Eastern terrorism. Terrorism and Political Violence 11:72-96.

Piscatori, J. 2002. The turmoil within - The struggle for the future of the Islamic world (Book review). Foreign Affairs 81.

Regan, P. M., and E. A. Henderson. 2002. Democracy, threats and political repression in developing countries: Are democracies internally less violent? Third WorldQuarterly 23:119-136.

Robinson, G. E. 1997. Can Islamists be Democrats? The case of Jordan. Middle East Journal 51:373-387.

Roy, O. 1994. The Failure of Political Islam. London: I.B. Tauris.
—. 2003. Globalised Islam: Fundamentalism, De-territorialisation and the Search for the New ‘Ummah’. London: Hurst.

Russett, B. M., J. R. Oneal, and M. Cox. 2000. Clash of civilizations, or realism and liberalism déjà vu? Some evidence. Journal of Peace Research 37:583-608.

Sabet, A. G. E. 2000. Feature review: The end of fundamentalism? Third World Quarterly 21:891-902.

Sadiki, L. 2000. Popular uprisings and Arab democratisation. International Journal of Middle East Studies 32:71-95.

Said, E. 1978. Orientalism: Western Conceptions of the Orient. London: Penguin.

Salla, M. E. 1997. Political Islam and the West: A New Cold War or convergence? Third World Quarterly 18:729–742.

Schmid, A. P., and J. d. Graaf. 1982. Violence as Communication: Insurgent Terrorism and the Western News Media. London: Sage.

Shadid, A. 2002. Legacy of the Prophet: Despots, Democrats, and the New Politics of Islam. Boulder, Co.: Westview Press.

Shadid, M. K. 1988. The Muslim Brotherhood Movement in the West-Bank and Gaza. Third World Quarterly 10:658-682.

Shepard, W. 1987. Islam and ideology: Towards a typology. International Journal of Middle East Studies 19:307-335.

Simon, S. 2002. The terror. Survival 43:5-18.

Saad-Ghorayeb, A. 2002. Hizbu’llah: Politics and Religion. Critical studies on Islam. London: Pluto Press.

Taylor, M., and J. Horgan. 2001. The psychological and behavioural bases of Islamic fundamentalism. Terrorism and Political Violence 13:37-71.UNDP. 2002. Arab Human Development Report 2002: Creating Opportunities for Future Generations. New York: United Nations Development Programme (Available: http://www.undp.org/rbas/ahdr/CompleteEnglish.pdf).

Utvik, B. O. 1993. Islamism: Digesting modernity the Islamic way. Forum for Development Studies 2:197-210.

van Ess, J. 2001. Political ideas in early Islamic religious thought. British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 28:151-164.

Vandervalle, D. 1997. "Islam in Algeria: Religiion, culture, and opposition in a rentier state," in Political Islam: Revolution, Radicalism, or Reform? Edited by J. L. Esposito, pp. 33-51. Boulder, Colo.: Lynne Rienner.

Web document. Online. Islamist Performance in Parliamentary Elections, 1965-1995.
(Available: www.unc.edu/~kurzman/colloquium/elections.htm).

Winer, J. M., and T. J. Roule. 2002. Fighting terrorist finance. Third World Quarterly44:87-104.

Woltering, R. 2002. The roots of Islamist popularity. Third World Quarterly 23:1133-1143.

Zeghal, M. 1999. Religion and politics in Egypt: The ulama of al-Azahar, radical Islam, and the state (1952–94). International Journal of Middle East Studies 31:371-399.

Zubaida, S. 1993. Islam, the People and the State: Political Ideas and Movements in the Middle East, Rev. paperback edition. London: I.B. Tauris.

—. 2000. Trajectories of political Islam: Egypt, Iran and Turkey. Political Quarterly 71:60-78.

Önis, Z. 2001. Political Islam at the crossroads: From hegemony to co-existence. Contemporary Politics 7:281-298.

http://www.cmi.no/publications/2003/rep/r2003-3.pdf

Islam vs Secularism

AlJumuah [The Friday Report], vol III, no. 10.



Secularism is defined in the Webster dictionary as: "A system of doctrines and practices that rejects any form of religious faith and worship" or "The belief that religion and ecclesiastical affairs should not enter into the function of the state especially into public education."

There is no doubt that secularism contradicts Islam in every aspect. They are two different paths that never meet; choosing one means rejecting the other. Hence, whoever chooses Islam has to reject secularism. In the following, we go in the details of explaining why.

1- First, secularism makes lawful what Allah has made unlawful.

The Rule of Allah (Shari`ah) is compulsory and has basic laws and regulations that cannot be changed. Some of these laws are concerned with the acts of worship, the relations between men and women, etc.

What is the position with regard to these laws?

Secularism makes adultery lawful if the male and the female are consenting adults.

As for Riba (interest on money), it is the basis of all financial transactions in secular economies. On the contrary, Allah says (s.2 A. 278): "O you who believe, fear Allah and leave what comes from Riba if you are believers. If you do not do so, then wait for a war from Allah and His Messenger."

As for alcohol, all secular systems allow the consumption of alcohol and make selling it a lawful business.

2- Second, secularism is clear unbelief (Kufr).

Secularism is based on separating religion from all the affairs of this life and hence, it rules by law and regulations other than Allah's laws. Hence, secularism rejects Allah's rules with no exception and prefers regulations other than Allah's and His Messenger's. In fact, many secularists claim that Allah's laws might have been suitable for the time they were revealed but are now outdated.

As a result, most of the laws governing the daily affairs of life in the countries ruled by secular systems contradict Islam. Allah says (S.5 A.50): "Do they seek a judgment of Ignorance? But, who, for a people whose faith is assured, can give better judgment than Allah?"

Ibn Katheer said in the Tafseer of this verse that Allah is denouncing those who reject His ruling and accept other rulings that are not based on the Shari`ah of Allah. Whoever does so is indeed a non-believer. Indeed, belief in Allah can never go with the acceptance of other than His rulings in one's heart. Allah says (S.5 A.44): "If any do fail to judge by what Allah has revealed, they are non-believers."

From the above, the status of secularism and its relation to Islam are clear. But the ignorance about the Islamic truth is still dominating the Muslim's mind. Most secular systems repeat slogans like "no religion in politics and no politics in religion" or "religion is for Allah, and the state is for the people." Such sayings portray their view of Islam as a religion to be practiced in the mosque only, and that it should not be allowed to rule life outside the mosque. Furthermore, they try to deceive people with democratic slogans like "personal freedom" and "people governing people." That means that people come first and no place is made for the ruling of Allah.

This is why secularism is clear Kufr, this is why secular systems have no legality and authority and should be rejected by Muslims.

Modernism in Islam

Based on "Modernism in Islam" lecture series by Jamaal al-Din Zarabozo

WHAT IS MODERNISM AND WHERE DID IT COME FROM?

We can relate, ideologically, the modernist movement spreading these days to one sect in the past. This sect is called the Muta'zila, which is dated back to the third Islamic century. Although those people accepted the Qur'an and Sunna they made ta'weel (their own interpretation of the Qur'an) and said 'aql (intelligence) takes precedence over naql (guidance of the Prophet). However, this school died out. The modernist movement did not evolve from them, but they are very similar to them. The modernist movement actually originated in Europe (middle-ages). At the time when the scientific method came about in Spain, it was seen that what the church was teaching was not true. This led to a slow revolt.

The basic view of modernism (in all religions) is that: the religion should change according to the circumstances, and that it is not fixed. There is no such thing as absolute truth. The Jewish and Christian modernist responce in Europe tried to explain how the religion was still relevant for the people. They made innovations to keep people interested in the religion (such as singing in church, introduced only in the 1900's). They tried to say the divine and the human is mixed in the Bible and that the parts that are true must be the ones that are not out of date. Also, the religion is improving over time and there is no absolute truth in the Bible.

This is the time in history when many Muslims were looking to Europe. This led to three choices for those Muslims: accept the West; reject the West; or mix the two (reform Islam). Those who followed the third (the modernist) developed in, and focused on: Turkey - because it was under British influence; and Egypt - because Al-Azhar was the seat of Islamic knowledge.

The people of this modernist movement judge Islam according to their 'aql. Some of their faults in regards to it are:

1) use it for things which it can't comprehend;

2) refer everything to it: accept what agrees with it, reject what does not;

3) judge the revelation by it. However, Ahl As-Sunna Wal Jamaa' believes that using the sound 'aql should lead one to the conclusion that the Qur'an and the Prophet are true and that their teachings should take precedence over pure 'aql.

THE INFLUENCE OF MODERNISM IN AMERICA

Modernist are saying that the West and the world has changed, and that Islam must become "civilized". Modernism has spread the most in the U.S. because:

1) there are no scholars available to refute them, or they won't refute them because people don't want to criticize them;

2) it allows Muslims from overseas to become part of American society and they do not have to be recognized as Muslim. Also, new American Muslims will not have to change their old lifestyle;

3) much of the literature, scholars, and institutions in the U.S. reflect the modernist thinking.

In tafseer, Yusuf Ali is the most popular translator of the meaning of the Qur'an, even though he denies what the 'aql can't see (of the unseen). In seerah, one book is saying the Prophet is like anyone else. Another tries to say the sunna is not for the shariah and that sometimes we have to throw away the hadith because Allah did not correct the Prophet's mistakes when he made ijtihaad.

In Fiqh, modernists say interest is permissible, menstruation women can pray, and Muslim women can marry kaafir men. They say the face of women was not covered until 150 years after the time of the Prophet, even though it existed in his time, and that women should always pray in the mosque, even though hadith only show women in the mosque at Ishaa and Fajr because they could not be recognized in the dark. They also say the hadith that a people with a woman ruler will not succeed is not true today and polygamy is forbidden except under certain conditions (which do not exist). Finally, it should be mentioned that this movement is organized and has resources such as magazines, television, conventions, and literature.

SOME OF THEIR VIEWS

Modernists influence the thinking of people, and that person spreads their views on unknowingly. Their way of thinking is the most dangerous thing about them. None discuss aqeedah (belief) because it is not important to them ('aql judges naqal). They are also trying to remove the sunna and say that the system of the old muhadditheen is insufficient. Most say (as do critics of the Bible) that we need a "higher criticism" of hadith and the earlier conclusions (ijmaa) of scholars are not sufficient, yet they give no new way to judge hadith. However, we as Muslims understand that the Prophet was guided by Allah and that we may not be able to understand everything in the hadith with our 'aql.

It is common for the modernists to question the role of the sunna in the shariah. One said all of the sunna is of this world and not deen, even in the Prophet's time, therefore it is all a matter of shoora (consultation) and ijtihaad (therefore changeable). Another says we need to make ijtihaad for what is to be followed, and changes of time and place make sunna difficult to use. All of this is mentioned to weaken the view of the sunna. The Jews and Christians tried to differ the human from the divine. Modernists try to point out the differences between the Messenger as a human and as a Prophet. They also avoid following the sunna by dividing his life into parts (imam, judge, military leader, prophet, etc.), saying some are not divine teachings and not law. Some say everyone is free to make ijtihaad, and later restrictions on it were imposed by the people. Another said a ruling may change even if it is from the Qur'an and Sunna.

HOW DO MODERNISTS GO ASTRAY?

The observer can easily point out the following points as the driving force for this trend:

1) Their premises and assumptions are wrong. Modernists look to the West and try to reinterpret the "old religion" with modern science and modern times. They assume that:

a) the present situation is advanced or different (i.e. "this is not the Prophet's time!"). However, the idea of progress and that things are better now is Marxian and Hegelian. It is against the hadith, as the Prophet said each generation is getting worse. They must prove that there has been progression (no definition of it given). Islamically the advanced society is the one that comes closer to Allah, and understands and applies Islam better (such as the sahaaba). In fact, the current societies have the things of the old societies (such as homosexuality, etc.) as mentioned in the Qur'an;

b) religion is relative to time and place (i.e. "therefore we need to judge Islam in light of modern science"). Modernists are "people of science" and judge Islam according to modern science. They think that the West is based on science, but they fail to notice that not all science is based on fact. In reality, much of science is only hypothesis (not a fact). Also, every science has its own philosophy, which will lead to its own conclusions;

c) the way of thinking of a society is based on (is a product of) its enviroment. Modernists say most of religion is from the people and their environment and it can be judged by later times, and hadith are related to that time only. However, there is no proof for the modernist hypothesis that religious truth is relative. Allah says the Qur'an is Haq (truth). Modernists are saying (by inference) that if the Qur'an is not true now, then it was never true.

2) The methodology they use is wrong. The methodology of the modernists is the way they mislead people to the wrong conclusions. They claim to be scientific, but they are usually inconsistent or have no proof or foundation for their beliefs. Some of the means and principles they use include:

a) Sunna and Hadith. They claim the Qur'an is authentic and they only follow "authentic" hadith. This implies that they have a way to judge hadith (different from that of the traditional scholars), yet most give no new way to judge hadith, and are using their 'aql (intelligence) to determine this (like the female ruler hadith). Modernists especially dislike hadith which have specific meanings and prefer ones which only have general principles.

b) Use of weak hadith to help their points and arguments (while they are calling for the use of authentic hadith). For example, in the area of women in Islam (the two areas the modernists try to change the most are the sunna and women) they like to quote two stories from the time of Umar: 1) when Umar was giving a Khutbah he tried to restrict the amount of dowry, a woman opposed, and Umar corrected himself and thanked the woman, and 2) Umar appointed Umma Shifaa as a market-regulator (used by modernist to say women can work in the government). However, both of these stories are not authentic.

c) Use vague terms without defining them. Modernists use terms like democracy, freedom, and equality, but they do not define what they mean by them. The danger in using vague terms is that a knowledgeable person will pass over the word or concept, thinking they meant the Islamic or acceptable definition while in fact they did not, while others may believe what they are saying is true.

d) Do not present all of the relevant information that is available on the subject. That is, from Qur'an, sunna, etc. They only present that which will support their views. This tactic is used to avoid unliked beliefs, so they just do not mention them.

e) Force their interpretation onto the text. This is what the Muta'zilla did, when they said 'aql takes precedence over what is from the Prophet. Many modernists say Islam is the "rational" religion. This is true if you mean everything is from Allah and there is no contradiction, but to say that we can study everything in Islam by judging it with only our intellect is unacceptable and there is also no proof for this. To avoid implementing what the Qur'an and sunna says, the modernists say we need to follow the "spirit" of Islam and not worry about the laws specifically. But it is clear from the Qur'an and Sunna that we are to take both. They will argue that the text of the Qur'an only says for women to dress modestly and they do not like to talk about the specific details of hijaab and say we only need to follow the "spirit" of the law.

f) They tend to oppose scholars by saying they meant something else. They say that the door to ijtihaad is open, which is something accepted by the Ahl As-Sunna Wal Jamaa'. However, it is not open to everybody on any subject. Modernists claim that anyone would make ijtihaad until Imam Shaffie narrowed the qualifications (not true), and today anyone can do it. In one magazine, on the question of polygamy and divorce, some said that these two can be restricted by ijtihaad. They often misquote scholars and give their own meanings for what they said.

g) Often follow strange and rejected opinions. They try to revive some of the old opinions because they like it and say that this writer said it in the past. Modernists try to open the door to these opinions and choose what is the most suitable and easy to follow. However, we are supposed to look for the fiqh opinions that are the closest to the truth. They usually bring bad hadith such as "The differences in my Ummah is a mercy" or reject authentic hadith such as the one about the breakup of the Ummah into 73 sects.

h) Follow their desires. They often make rulings and fatawa without permissible daleel (evidence). One said music is permissible because he did not see something wrong with it, so it is halal. But he did not check what the Qur'an and the sunna say about this subject.

ISLAM AND MODERNISM

Ahl As-Sunna Wal Jamaa' believes that there is only one true Islam. This is proven in Qur'an and Hadith. One hadith shows the straight line as leading to Allah, and branching paths leading off it with a devil at each one calling to it. Also, the umma will break into 73 sects, and the true way is the one who follows Muhammad and his companions. Modernists are differing from Ahl As-Sunna Wal-Jamaa' in:

1) everything in accordance with Qur'an and Sunna is Haq (truth) and what disagrees with it is false (some modernists disagree with this). Also, statements consistent with the Qur'an and Sunna are accepted;

2) Ijmaa (consensus) of the sahaaba (and early generations) is a hujja (proof) for all Muslims. Modernists say sahaaba are men and we are men, and even matters agreed on by them are open to ijtihaad;

3) anything in the Qur'an and Sunna cannot be opposed by 'aql, rational thought, opinion, or qiysas. This is supported in the Qur'an and is not open to discussion or vote. One modernists said the cutting of the hand of the thief is a "Khomeni Islam" and is unethical;

4) there are constants in Islam related to belief, worship, etc. and these are good, sound, proper, and correct for all places and times. This view is accepted by the Ahl Sunna, but not by many of the modernists, saying that all truth is relative and there is no constants. However, these constant principles are basic aspects of the Ahl Sunna and are traced to the Qur'an and Sunna and Sahaaba. They are not questionable or changeable things. In many of these things, modernists say we need ijtihaad and tajdeed.

DANGERS

1) Many are influenced by it and do not know it. Also, their views are unacceptable and should be refuted.

2) Many people do not recognize it as a movement of munkar or bida' and do not evaluate its writings and speeches, so they try to defend it. Many of their writings are from rationalization (which has no end or conclusion), and the effects of this are seen in the Christian church (that is, they now have no relationship to their religion, and it has no practical value or purpose).

3) This group is also playing into the hands of the kuffar. They are happy with it because their effort is to bring the Muslim women out of the home to change them. The last 200 years has been a colonialist and orientalist attack on the position of the woman in Islam (to destroy her and the society).

CONCLUSIONS

1) The modernists movement as a whole (what it is based on) is from Bida' (innovation). They have their own principles and ways, which contradicts that of Ahl-Sunna. They say we want ijtihaad in the basic principles of the deen (religion) which are constant.

2) They are very willing to reject and contradict the ijmaa of the sahaaba on clear points (such as stoning of the adulterer and the apostate is to be killed) and hadith are dealt with as if they are not important (women ruler hadith is common).

3) One of the main points of modernism is to change the role of women. They say it is permissible to mix men and women and to not wear hijaab. The modernists are impressed by the West and their conclusions always seem to agree with the views of the West.

****

Most of the information used for this article is from a seven part cassette series which is available from: Dar Makkah: 2040 S. Oneida #2A. Denver, CO 80224. The speaker frequently pointed out that his purpose was to warn about the dangers and mistakes of this movement and not to defame individual Muslims. Also, his information came from their writings, speeches, and discussions with these individuals, and not from what he heard from other people.

Extracted from Islaam.com

Challenge of Post Modernism: The Islamic Perspective

By Salman Ahmed Shaikh

(An extract)

Introduction

Postmodernism refers to a cultural, intellectual, and artistic state lacking a clear central hierarchy or organizing principle. It embodies extreme complexity, contradiction, ambiguity and diversity. It is a reaction to modernism, but it is not a different ideology from modernism in every sense. It is critical of few ideas of modernism and it proposes emancipation from oppression manifested in culture, language, laws, customs, religion etc. Eclecticism and freedom of expression, in reaction to the rigidity and aesthetic limitations of modernism, are the hallmarks of the postmodern thought.

Deconstruction is a term which is used to denote the application of postmodern ideas of criticism, or theory, to a "text" or "artifact". A deconstruction is meant to undermine the frame of reference and assumptions that underpin the text. Postmodernism philosophy is also critical of Enlightenment universals.

Postmodernism philosophy asserts truth doesn't exist in any objective sense but is created rather than discovered.” The postmodernists have given a new secular trinity of tolerance–diversity–choice.

Post Modernism ideas appear to have been conducive to, and strongly associated with, the feminist movement, racial equality movements, gay rights movements and even the peace movement, as well as various hybrids of these in the current anti-globalization movement.

--

History does not give us a regular pattern of human struggle towards a just and fair political, social and economic setup as described by Marx. Kant also did not tell when we will be able to say that we are living in an enlightened age. These views of Marx and Kant were more relevant to Europe only. (On the other hand,) the Muslim world provided a socially, economically and politically just system to the world for at least 50 years in the rule of Caliphates. In the period after caliphates too, Muslim world provided (to the Dark ages) most things Kant asked for in an enlightened age.

However, one clear difference has to be appreciated between Muslims and Islam. Most of the laws in Christianity were mainly developed by humans themselves like St. Paul. Therefore, when thinkers of 15th century and afterwards criticized the church and the clergy, their criticism was also on religion and it was justified as the Christianity and the Clergy were the one and the same thing.

This is not the case with Islam and Muslims. Islam was not invented or created by Muhammad (P.B.U.H). It was the message of God as was Christianity with the difference that the divinity of Christianity was obscured and later modified by Christians. Islam as a message of God remained pure. However, Muslims as all other human beings have not been and are not perfect in their acts and systems. But, the acts of Muslims can not said to be representative of what Islam is as Islam was not invented by Muslims.

Therefore, a distinction is to be made between the Muslims and Islam. Muslims may or maybe acting truly on Islam and hence their actions do not determine what Islam is. When we study the ‘Pure Islam’, we will find that there is not a single thing in Islam that is irrational or unjust. In the following lines, I will just give the brief highlights of Islamic teachings which may or may not be truly present or found in Muslim world as Islam is the word of God and not how Muslims act and lead their lives.

The Building Blocks of Islamic Philosophy and Teachings which are viewed as most controversial and misunderstood dare briefly summarized hereunder:

1. Islam gives the following right to women:

a. Muslim women must educate themselves.
b. Choose an occupation and earn their livelihood
c. Own a property.
d. Choose their husbands and right to separate from their husbands.
e. Entitlement to ‘Mehr’ (wealth at the start of marriage), ‘wirasat’ (wealth at the death of husband, children or father).
f. Islam does not make it obligatory on women to earn for their family. However, they can earn for the family and yet they are not obliged to spend their earnings on the family. However, men are obliged to spend their earnings on the family and they are made responsible for earning the livelihood for their children and wives.
g. Mother must be respected three times more than the father.
h. No man is allowed to have extra-marital relationships with other women.
i. Adultery is a severe crime in Islam.

2. Islam gives following rights to non-Muslims:

a. Non-Muslims can worship at their worship places.
b. No non-Muslim can be forcibly converted to Islam.
c. Muslims believe in all Prophets sent by God including Moses and Christ.

3. Islam’s concept of Jihad

a. Holy Quran says that Jihad can only be for the sake of eliminating injustice.
b. It is not q fight against non-Muslims. It is fight against injustice.
c. It can only be undertaken as a last resort to eliminating injustice.
d. It can only be undertaken by the government and not by the community on its own.
e. In all great battles of Badr, Uhud, Ihzab etc., Muslims in the leadership of Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H) fought a defensive war as the war was imposed on Muslims.
f. Jihad can not be for the expansion of the state, against innocents, against noncombatants, against the contract of peace if it has been signed and it can not be sudden and unannounced. So, suicide bombing against civilians is unislamic.

4. Islam concept of equality:

a. All men are equal. No white has superiority over a black.
b. Only Piety and Righteousness are the attributes that will distinguish us before God.
c. No rich has superiority over a poor.
d. All men should have equal chance to earn their livelihood.
e. Interest which results in concentration of wealth is prohibited.

Responding to Post Modernism: The Islamic Perspective

1. Knowledge was the main reason why Muslims fared so well in history for almost a millennium. Knowledge is the basis of progress. Greek philosophers regarded Knowledge as virtue. Similarly, the west also took lead from east with progress in knowledge. By knowledge, I mean not only the knowledge of religion and its related fields, but also the knowledge in sciences including social and technical sciences.
2. Ijtihad was an important element in Islamic world in heydays. It kept Muslims updated and pace with the world. The decline in Muslim civilization resulted from refraining from Ijtihad later on.
3. Freedom of expression is necessary in Muslim societies to pave the way of Ijtihad. In revitalizing the process of Ijtihad, not only the Muslims scholars begiven the chance to contribute, but the philosophers and experts of material sciences be given a chance to contribute in Ijtihad.
4. The institution of Family system is the basis of the social order in Muslim society. Muslims should not lose it at any cost.
5. Muslims should relate their philosophies with philosophies like Humanism, Liberalism, Democracy and show that they are in line with Islamic teachings and hence Islam is not opposed to liberty, human rights, women rights, minority rights, etc.
6. The economic teachings of Islam in a period when late capitalism is weakening can provide an alternative system to the world economy.
7. Extremism as a matter of principle be avoided and non-violence should be the strategy in domestic and international politics.
8. West has made trade blocs to unite and gain from synergy. Muslims should also need to be on one platform so that if future gives them the opportunity to give a new system, they can offer the Revitalized and Restructured Islamic thought from one platform.

Postmodernism and "the Other"

Postmodernism and the Other

The New Imperialism of Western Culture

Reviewed By Joanne McEwan

Author : Ziauddin Sardar
Publisher : Pluto Press, London, 1998
Pages : 345


Postmodernism is one of the most difficult subjects to define and probably the most overplayed at that. With the multitude of academics from different disciplines contributing to the discourse it can be a dry and tediously deep subject.

Sardar, however, presents its definition in plain English. Not only that, he directly exposes postmodernism for what it really is and what it means to those of the non-west (the Other) it claims to champion.

Sardar states the principles of postmodernism clearly.

The first is that truth is relative, where fiction and narrative provide a better diction on human behavior than religion, philosophy and theory.

The second principle is the denial of reality where we see what we want to see.

The third is that the world is simulated into imagery and representations rather than a world that is real and tangible.

On this point Sardar states, “This means that the world has been transformed into a theatre where everything is artificially constructed. Politics is a stage-managed for mass consumption. Television documentaries are transformed and presented as entertainment. Journalism blurs the distinction between fact and fiction. Living individuals become characters in soap operas and fictional characters assume real lives. Everything happens instantaneously and everybody gets a live feed on everything that is happening in the global theatre.” (p. 23)

The fourth and fifth principles are life has no meaning and everything is doubtful which naturally follow from the previous three.

The fifth and last is that postmodernism is concerned with the multiplicity of everything. All differences are welcomed and privilege is replaced with equality in race, class, gender, ethnicity, religion, and sexual orientation.

The effect of these principles on the non-west is shown to be negative and threatening. The fifth principle, although appearing to be positive in concept, in reality, reeks with duplicity and hypocrisy.

Sardar removes these principles from the constraints of academia, and brings them all to life in vivid examples from international politics, film, literature, consumer lifestyle, popular culture, science and religion. Catchy and somewhat satirical headings make it lighter reading.

In the chapter “A Grand Memory for Forgetting” Sardar shows how history has been restructured to the tastes of postmodernism. Taking Disney's animated film Pocahontas as an example, he describes how the film is very different from the true story. This is not the first time we have heard this from critics but Sardar takes the discussion further.

He identifies the hints of the colonialist and orientalist past forming a film that stands for nothing more than white supremism. In approximately 40 pages Sardar analyses this film and the related historic content.

For example, he says, notice also how in the role of Pocahontas, the Native American girl, is meaningless until she has a white man to save from savages. Also, unlike any other Disney film, the animals don't talk to the human being, in this case Pocahontas. This realistic touch has added to a sense of ‘truth' in the tale.

Despite the common errors in the story, Disney is at the same accurate in many other aspects – for example, John Smith's compass and Pocahontas cart-wheeling around (historic records state these particular incidents, among others).

As Sardar surmises, “Their magical confabulation makes it possible to revisit history in a new, improved fashion, simultaneously it makes it more difficult to disentangle the mythical refashioning from recorded history and both confidence tricks operate to distract attention from the main import of the exercise…” (p. 92)

The images from this film are now fixated on the minds of children to the extent that the fairytale has become fact and the true story has become a myth.

Consumer lifestyle, which so dominates our lives, is discussed in the chapter “Recycling Shampoo.” In true postmodern fashion, the west absorbs the identity of the ‘Other' through consumerism in both the west and non-west.

Take a walk down the city high street in any western town and observe how the non-west is fashioned to the tastes of consumers. In the U.K. and the U.S. you will find the colonial past romanticized and glorified through cool, cotton, casual clothing in shops like Banana Republic, Safari Clothing, East India Company and British India. All sell merchandise that suggests an aura of nostalgia for the imperialist, triumphant past rather than a whiff of disgust for its barbarism.

The Body Shop is another example of postmodern hype. It exists solely from appropriating the products and experiences of cultures of the non-west. Its creams, oils and lotions are cleverly marketed as natural, ethnic and exotic with the help of the minimal packaging and short descriptions of their origins.

Now they have found their way ‘back' to non-western countries. But, as Sardar says, “it is when these products are exported back to the Third World that they lose their innocence. When Body Shop products arrive in a non-western country, they are no more natural than any other processed commodity. They have the cachet of a western product and are consumed by the natives as such: the inferiority of the indigenous product becomes worthy of consumption by the locals only when it is refined by the west is further entrenched.” (p. 125)

The non-west is a growing market with their proliferation in a youthful population compared to the diminishing youth in the west. Unlike during the modern period, where the Third World was told just to buy, in the postmodern period they are told to buy and change their culture. The Marlboro Man is an example, which not only sells a product western doctors have proven to be detrimental to one's health, but sells the complete get-up and image that goes along with it: the cowboy look with that distinct coolness.

Postmodernism's affect on the ‘Other' has a bleak prognosis. One can hardly imagine there is much of a cure. But what adds to the appeal of this book is the last chapter, “Surviving Postmodernism,” in which Sardar offers modest and positive conceptual ways for those of the non-west to counter this force.

He states that from the perspective of the non-western cultures, surviving postmodernism means moving towards tradition. This is apposed to traditionalism.

Tradition is, according to Sardar, changeable and proactive, whereas traditionalism is passive, rigid and reactionary. Sardar indicates the knee-jerk type reaction of movements (although he doesn't give any examples) that dwell on the past and hold fast to rules and regulations that are no longer appropriate.

This concept of turning to tradition to quell the wave of postmodernism is further explained with reference to the poetry and philosophy of Muhammad Iqbal on the Islamic concept of fitrah or innate nature.

This is unlike postmodernism where the individual's ego takes center stage. Says Sardar, “The notion of fitrah is the antithesis of western individualism, not because it denies individual freedom, personality, identity and responsibility – all these are basic ideas fundamental to an Islamic outlook – but because in the Islamic purview the individual is only conceivable within a web of essential relationships wherein their individuality is neither dominant nor the only significant consideration if the person is to be true to his or her innate nature.” (p. 275)

Sardar states that, according to Iqbal, a community can only be self-aware if it holds on to its memory, tradition and living history. Despite its Islamic roots this concept can be applied to non-Muslim cultures of the non-west.

Sardar also suggests the need for cultural autonomy and authenticity that should not be drowned by the dominant western culture that is over-shadowing the non-west today.

Lastly, the author suggests that the affected cultures and countries have to be aware and admit to the darker side of their past. The non-west has cultures that are valuable enough to hold on to, but there are aspects from the political to the social, that need to be addressed. And it is through self-assessment that they can improve and achieve.

Postmodernism and the ‘Other' is an immense read. It is packed with anecdotes and analogies referring to everyday life in the western or non-western world. Throughout the book, it is difficult not be appalled at the injustices and moral relativism of postmodernism.

As a Muslim academic, author and editor of some well-respected books on Islam, one can sense Sardar's convictions to Islamic thought; meanwhile appreciate his objectivity and interest in non-Muslim cultures, and other religions. The sections on the plight on the Native Americans and Aboriginals are good examples.

What is also impressive is the author's extensive knowledge on just about every discipline from popular culture to religion to the annals of science. Sardar's discourse is bold, polemic and objective: he doesn't mince his words. A trip to the Body Shop, or anything of similar import will never be the same again.


http://discover.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=Article_C&cid=1153698300038&pagename=Zone-English-Discover_Islam%2FDIELayout#ixzz0y8XMgql6

Islam, Muslims and Multiculturalism

Islam, Muslims and Multiculturalism: Conference Report

Yoginder Sikand


Much has been written about conflicts involving religious communities across the world by journalists, academics and security ‘experts’. Although these conflicts have local roots, and owe to a host of causes, some locally-specific, others regional and even global, a common factor that links all of them are supremacist notions of the religious ‘self’ and, associated with these, negative images of the religious ‘other’ that are deeply-rooted in dominant understandings of religion. Efforts to resolve these conflicts must, some time or the other, necessarily address head-on the notion of the ‘other’ in religious thought, to critique understandings that brand all non-believers as ‘enemies’ and dismiss their faiths as of no worth at all. This critique needs to go hand-in-hand with efforts to promote more positive understandings of the religious ‘other’ and of other faith traditions and belief systems. In short, while most conflicts involving people of different religious communities are rooted in political and economic factors, they cannot be reduced entirely to them. The crucial role that negative, exclusivist, intolerant and supremacist understandings of religion and the religious ‘other’ play in creating and in fanning these conflicts cannot be denied.

That, in short, was what I learnt at a conference in Singapore that I recently participated in. Organised by the official Islamic council of Singapore, the Majlis Ugama Islam Singapore (MUIS), the conference brought together several dozen academics and activists, Muslims as well as others, from across the world to deliberate on the vexed issue of Islam, Muslims and multiculturalism in our globalised world.

‘Islam is not simply about Muslims alone,’ stressed the well-known Oxford-based Islamic scholar Tariq Ramadan in his opening remarks. ‘Rather, it is about us and others working together constructing our common future. We need to dialogue—not just to talk to the other but also to listen to the other and to learn from the other.’ And, he went on, it was not enough just for Muslims and others to talk and listen to each other, but it was also necessary to be open to the possibility of changing and growing as a result of being in dialogic conversation with each other.

That inspiring message was echoed by Ustad Fatris Bakaram, Deputy Mufti of Singapore, who pointed out that multiculturalism was by no means a new experience for Muslims. Medina, where the Prophet and his companions shifted from Mecca, was a thriving multicultural and multi-religious society, as was Christian-ruled Abysinnia, where the Prophet instructed several of his companions to seek shelter, and where, for the first time, Muslims were able to practice their faith free from oppression. Critiquing the claims of radical Islamists (who are, of course, not known for any but the most stern views about non-Muslims and their religions), the Ustaz argued that the intention of the Prophet in migrating to Medina was not to set up ‘Islamic rule’ or Islamic political supremacy, as is often claimed. Rather, it was simply to seek a place where Muslims could practice their faith freely. It was thus wholly erroneous to argue, as Islamists do, the Ustaz explained, that only in an ‘Islamic state’, ruled according to shariah laws, and where Muslims were politically dominant, could Muslims willingly accept multiculturalism.

‘Muslims must learn to live with, and relate to, others amicably,’ the Ustaz insisted, arguing that unless this happened conflict, violent or otherwise, was inevitable. Muslims simply could not afford to continue to live in denial of the extremist tendencies that existed, he added, arguing that it was necessary for Muslims to critique and denounce radicalism and supremacism in the name of Islam that has now emerged as a global menace. ‘We cannot remain isolationist by seeking refuge in the comfort of our own communities,’ he argued. He lamented the fact that many Muslims, even in ‘progressive’ Singapore, hesitated to have close interaction with people of other faiths, with some even fearing that this was prohibited by Islam and that it was a threat to their identity as Muslims. A major issue that urgently cried out to be addressed in this regard, he said, was the widely-prevalent notion that Islam seeks or demands Islamic or Muslim domination over others. This powerful tool in the repertoire of self-styled Islamic radicals, he said, was a potent threat to multiculturalism.

The Ustaz was, likewise, critical of the marked tendency among Muslims to romanticize their past through which they implicitly sought to deny the very real problems in traditional Muslim thought and historical practice about the place and role of the religious ‘other’. In this regard, he insisted that several fiqh or juridical rules developed by the classical Islamic scholars in the early and medieval period with regard to non-Muslims urgently needed to be revised as not only were they not relevant to today’s context but they also conduced to conflictual relations with people of other faiths. The classical notion of non-Muslim territories or lands not ruled by the shariah as dar ul-harb or ‘land of war’, he opined, was, in today’s age, ‘unrealistic and archaic’. Arguing against those who might claim that his stance was tantamount to distorting the shariah, he pointed out that the notions of dar ul-islam and dar ul-harb find no mention at all in the Quran. Rather, he said, they were the product or ijtihad of later jurists, whose readings were based on the particular social and historical context in which they lived and to which they responded. To blindly accept their views, he opined, was sheer ‘ignorance’. The division of the world into dar ul-islam and dar ul-harb, so favoured by Islamists, he insisted, represented a binary thinking that had no basis in the Quran. It was also, he added, a major challenge to Muslims living as minorities, who were made to feel ‘guilty’ for living in what was termed dar ul-harb.

The Ustaz spoke about the need to understand Islamic injunctions by focusing on what are called ‘the intentions of the shariah’ (maqasid-e shariah), which would facilitate a much-need shift from a sternly literalist approach to legal matters. Accordingly, certain fiqh rules might need to change in changing contexts to uphold the underlying aims of the law. Critiquing scripturalist and legal literalism, he argued that numerous fiqh rules to do with relations with people of other faiths needed to be subjected to ijtihad or creative reasoning and re-interpretation in a contextually-appropriate manner in order to promote inter-community and inter-faith relations. This, he cautioned, was not a means to discard scripture, unlike what some Muslims might claim, but, rather, to re-read the scripture in today’s context in ‘an enlightened manner’. It was not tantamount to abandoning the shariah. Rather, it was a plea to realize the underlying aims of the shariah, which included justice, equality and friendly relations with others, in a contextually-sensitive manner.

While rethinking fiqh rules and received notions of other faiths and their adherents was a crucial task for Muslim scholars and activists to engage in so as to improve relations between Muslims and others, the Ustaz added that it was also crucial for Muslims to think beyond their own communities and work for the general good, collaborating together with people of other faiths in this task. In this way, he said, Muslims would learn to accept, even celebrate, religious diversity, to contribute to the welfare of the entire society (and not just of their own community), and to be, as he put it, ‘inclusive and adaptive, no matter in which environment they live in.’

Further dwelling on the importance of the task of critiquing supremacist notions of Islam and Muslim communal identity and of promoting alternate, more open interpretations of the religious ‘other’ in Islamic thought, Abdullah Saeed, Director of the National Centre for Excellence in Islamic Studies, Melbourne, Australia, pointed out that no religious tradition, Islam included, was a fixed, permanent and homogenous entity that had not undergone any transformation since its inception. Rather, he said, religious traditions are like living beings that emerge and grow over time and adapt to different contexts—although, of course, this is not how religious literalists and other ‘fundamentalists’ imagine them to be. In this regard, he added, in today’s context, where communities are in closer proximity than ever before, it was imperative for Muslims to develop new, and more positive, understandings of people of other faiths and their belief systems and of relations with them. A marked feature of today’s global context was the notion of common and equal citizenship, which is something entirely new. This, he said, necessitated the revision of several traditional Muslim understandings of the ‘other’, because these were rooted in a context of fundamental inequality between Muslims and other people. Mere tolerance of other faiths and their followers would no longer suffice, for it was not based on a positive value for engaging with the religious ‘other’. Rather, he argued, Muslims need to move beyond, to accept the ‘other’ and to champion religious pluralism based on common citizenship, while at the same time recognizing and respecting cultural differences. Yet, he said, multiculturalism has its clear limits, for, if stretched too far, it could lead to religious ghettoisation. It should be tempered, he suggested, with active engagement with people of other faiths for the common good.

Multiculturalism must not mean or lead to freezing communities into separate boxes or reifying religious traditions, argued Reuven Firestone, a trained Rabbi, who heads a centre for Jewish-Muslim Understanding in the USA. It must go beyond respecting cultural and religious differences to actively learning from and sharing with people of different faiths and cultures. This, he said, was precisely what the early Muslim Arabs did, because of which they were able to make marvelous strides in various fields of human activity. One of the major reasons for the later decline of Arab-Muslim civilization, he pointed out, was the shift to more exclusivist notions of the religious ‘other’ that did not conduce to learning from or interacting with them.


Lived Islam is a diverse discursive tradition, understood and expressed in diverse forms, and thus offers a variety of responses to, and interpretations of, other faiths and their adherents and relations with them, stressed the noted Indonesian scholar Azyumardi Azra, Professor at the Syarif Hidayatullah State Islamic University, Jakarta. These responses ranged from sternly exclusivist and hostile to open and inclusive, each of which presented itself as authoritatively and authentically ‘Islamic’. Critiquing exclusivist and hostile notions of the other in Muslim thought was a necessary task, Azra said, and there were tools available within the broader Islamic tradition, such as tajdid (renewal) and islah (reform) that could be used for this, although not in the strictly literalist manner as advocated by self-styled Salafis and the Wahhabis. This task needed to go along with attempts to ‘indigenise’ Islam to make it part of, and responsive to, local cultures instead of appearing to be a foreign, specifically Arab, cultural import. What he was probably hinting at was the tendency of Muslims to conflate Islam with Arabic language and culture. In this way, he opined, Muslims would be able to understand and live their faith in a manner suitable to the local cultural context that they shared with people of other religions and thus be culturally more integrated with them. Alongside this task of the ‘indigenisation’ of Islam in local cultures what was also required, Azra suggested, was for Muslim scholars to promote the Quranic concept of Muslims as the median or balanced community (ummatan wasatan), followers of the ‘middle path’. This ‘wasatiya Islam’, as Azra termed it, could serve as a powerful counter to Muslim or ‘Islamic’ exclusivism and supremacy.

The thrust of Tariq Ramadan’s presentation was a plea for rethinking fundamental categories in both secular as well as Muslim/Islamic thought. Dwelling on the latter, he argued that ‘reform’ (for which he used the terms islah and ihya) in Muslim/Islamic thought on the question of the religious ‘other’ is an indispensable necessity, although many might balk at this. While the Islamic texts could not be changed or ‘reformed’, what could, he said, were our understandings of them on certain matters. This is because religious understandings are a human product and so can change in response to changing social and historical contexts. Religious traditions, he noted, are a ‘moving reality’ and one’s understanding of one’s tradition is—or should be—also dynamic and open to being transformed with shifts in time and context. The ‘reform’ in Muslim thought with regard to the religious ‘other’ and the fact of religious pluralism that Ramadan suggested was, he said, not to adapt to standards set by others or to be accepted by them but, rather, to make the world a better place for all—for Muslims and for others. Hence, he clarified, what he was advocating was what he called ‘transformational reform’, which was distinct from ‘adaptational reform’. Arguing against those who see the shariah as a closed, fixed body of laws incapable of change and reform, he appealed for a fundamental reform in fiqh rules about people of other faiths and religious pluralism and a concomitant shift in focus in Islamic thought from the rules of fiqh to the basic ‘principles of fiqh’ (usul al-fiqh), through which more appropriate and positive fiqh rules could be formulated to promote inter-community dialogue and solidarity in accordance with today’s context of religious pluralism.

Echoing what several speakers before him had stressed, Ramadan called for the Islamic texts to be read in context and for what he called a new ‘Islamic applied ethics’ that would conduce to better relations between Muslims and others. Again, like numerous other speakers, he indicated the crucial need to critique and challenge certain classical ‘Islamic’ definitions and terms (most notably, the concept of the dars) that, he argued, were a product of a historical context that no longer exists and that militate against better relations with others. He also suggested that Muslims needed to broaden their imagination of what was ‘Islamic’: for instance, a just, egalitarian law could not be branded as ‘un-Islamic’ or ‘anti-shariah’ simply because it was formulated by a non-Muslim political authority. If it was indeed just and egalitarian, it must also be regarded as in accordance with the shariah or even as part of it.

A similar widening of approach and perspective was needed, Ramadan suggested, in Muslims’ understanding of the notion of the ummah. The Prophet Muhammad, he noted, included the Jews of Medina as part of the same ummah as the Muslims, thus suggesting that widely-held Muslim understandings of the notion were restrictive and narrow in a manner not warranted by the Prophet’s own practice. Likewise, he said, Muslims needed to broaden their horizons and be concerned not only for and about themselves but, indeed, for the whole of humankind. ‘Muslims will be respected by others if they contribute and work for not just themselves but for others as well, working for and with them, for siding with the poor, for struggling for freedom and justice for all,’ he very rightly remarked.

For me, the highlight of the conference was hearing the arrestingly charismatic Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, head of the New York-based Cordoba Initiative, speak. The soft-spoken but extremely articulate Egyptian-born and Britain-educated Imam has been in the forefront of efforts to promote dialogue between people of different faiths, inspired by a truly universalistic—and, so, to me, powerfully attractive—understanding of religion. He began by pointing out that Muslims are today perceived as a ‘problem’ the world over. Owing to the actions of self-styled Islamists, Islam is now regarded by many as a security threat. This perception, he said, cannot be denied or wished away simply through apologetic exercises. Across the world, Muslim groups, using the vocabulary of Islam, have spearheaded violent political movements in the name of Islam. This is why, he said, many non-Muslims perceive Islam to be synonymous with violence and even terror. This undeniable fact, he went on, is a challenge to Muslims concerned about their faith, who must act to rescue it from terrorists who use it to give it a bad name.


The Imam debunked certain key myths that many Muslims, wedded to a narrow, communal understanding of Islam, zealously uphold. He pointed out that the Quran addresses itself not to Muslims as a communal group, but, rather to what it calls ‘believers’ or muminun. And this, he argued, is what the companions of the Prophet Muhammad saw themselves as. Based on his interpretation of certain key Quranic verses, the Imam pointed out that the category of muminun was not limited to those who call themselves by the Arabic term ‘Muslim’, and who generally construe the term as referring to a particular community. Rather, he persuasively argued, the muminun that the Quran talks about, for which any other suitable term could be used in other languages, included everyone, no matter what rituals he followed, what language he worshipped in, or whatever name he called himself by, who believed in the one God and in divine accountability after death and practiced good. This, he said, was the basic religion taught by all the prophets of God. Various prophets might have had their own methods of prayer and rituals, but these should be seen not as separate religions or as the bases of separate communities. Rather, they were more like different schools of thought or, in Arabic, mazhabs, of the same religion, or different sunnahs or paths. ‘The various prophets had different signatures, but they shared the same message’, he explained. All the prophets, the Quran says, were of the same status, and, critiquing Muslim claims to supremacy, he argued that nowhere does the Quran declare the Prophet Muhammad to have been the best among them or the most superior—contrary to what many Muslims contend. In actual fact, he pointed out, the Quran warns people not to make any distinction between the prophets. To imagine that the ‘believers’, in the Quranic sense, referred to a particular community that practiced a particular set of rituals in a particular language, as most Muslims do, was, the Imam argued, not at all in accordance with what the Quran says.

The universalistic understanding of religion and the notion of ‘believer’ that he argued the Quran actually preached (which is in marked contrast to how many of those who call themselves ‘Muslims’ understand them), the Imam suggested, was a powerful counter to the communalistic interpretations of Islam that have been, and still are, powerfully dominant and that inherently conduce to conflict. It was, he contended, also a firm basis to bring together the muminun in different communities, no matter what communal label they defined themselves with, to work together for a better world.

A host of other speakers addressed the two-day conference, which was easily one of the most engaging and enriching that I have attended so far.

Social Transformation in Islam: Reform or Revolution?

By Maulana Waris Mazhari


A crucial issue that needs careful deliberation and clarification is: What is the appropriate method for social transformation according to the principles and teachings of Islam and the model of the Prophet Muhammad? Contemporary Islamic movements display considerable confusion in this regard. They believe that Islam aims at the extermination of falsehood and that it can, in no way, tolerate it. They believe that tolerating falsehood or remaining silent on it is tantamount to betraying the Islamic mission. This is why many of these movements regard revolution as the most important and potent method of social transformation. Accordingly, revolution is at the top of their agenda, or so they claim.

However, it is a bitter truth, and one that activists involved in Islamic groups are themselves increasingly beginning to realize, that the policies and activities of ‘revolutionary’ or radical Islamist groups are, far from advancing the cause of Islam, actually undermining it by creating increasingly insurmountable hurdles in its path. Despite the efforts of radical or self-styled ‘revolutionary’ Islamist groups over the last 70 to 80 years, no such revolution has taken place in the Sunni world. On the contrary, in most cases the radical activities of such ‘revolutionary’ groups and movements have had precisely the opposite results, proving to be entirely counter-productive. A good example is that of the Ikhwan ul-Muslimun or ‘Muslim Brethren’ in Egypt, which participated in the downfall of the regime of King Faruq, only to be later brutally crushed by the regime of Jamaluddin Abdul Nasser, whom it helped to come to power. One can cite numerous more such instances from other parts of the world.

The Islamic ‘revolution’ in Iran was marked by the deep impact of Shia theology. With the help of the doctrine of the wilayat al-faqih or the ‘guardianship of the jurist’, which was developed by Ayatollah Khomeini, the Iranian Shia ulema managed to acquire some sort of theocratic power. Due to major differences in outlook and theology between the Sunni and Shia understandings of Islam, this is not possible in the Sunni world. Nor, to my mind, is this in accordance with the basic principles of Islam. It is undoubtedly true that many Muslims in the Sunni world, particularly among the youth, were indeed inspired by the Iranian ‘revolution’. For its part, the new Iranian regime sought to export its ‘revolution’ to the Sunni world. However, nothing much actually came of this in practical terms, although this certainly emboldened Islamist groups while leading to heightened fears in the West over what was described as ‘the opening of the bottle containing the Islamic genie’, which was regarded as a threat to the West.

Coming to the question of whether or not revolution is the way prescribed in Islam for social transformation, it is crucial to understand what the term ‘revolution’ actually means. What, in reality, are the features of revolution? What are, or should be, its aims and objectives? Without clarifying these complex issues, one cannot discuss the appropriate method of social transformation in Islam.

The fact of the matter is that nowhere do the Quran and the Hadith use any word that connotes revolution. Nor do they advocate any concept of revolutionary transformation of society in the sense that contemporary Islamist movements understand it. The term ‘revolution’ as understood today connotes a struggle that aims fundamentally at the total transformation of the bases of governance and society. It suggests a complete and drastic change. The model for such change in modern times are the communist revolutions in countries such as Russia and China. Communism regards revolution as the means for social change. In contrast, and contrary to what radical or ‘revolutionary’ Islamist ideologues argue, the basis and means for social change in Islam is reform (islah), not revolution.

There are fundamental differences, indeed contradictions, between the reformist and revolutionary paths to social change. The principal objective of revolutionaries is to bring about change at the external level, particularly in the bases of political power, while reformists aim primarily at change at the internal level—in the inner consciousness and behaviour of individuals. While revolution stands for total and sudden change, reform stands for partial and gradual change or, at least, it does not oppose it. Reform is guided by concern and goodwill for others, while, typically, revolutions are fired by feelings of hatred or revenge.

The social change wrought by all the prophets, including the Prophet Muhammad, were instances of reform, rather than radicalism or revolution. Their reformist efforts aimed primarily at the transformation of the inner consciousness, beliefs and behaviour of individuals through education, moral instruction and purification. This is what the Quran regards as the aim behind God sending to humankind a long chain of prophets. As the Quran puts it, referring to the Prophet Muhammad:

‘Allah did confer a big favour on the believers when He sent among them a Messenger from among themselves, rehearsing unto them the signs of Allah, purifying them, and instructing them in scripture and wisdom, while, before that, they had been in manifest error’ (3:164).

The many prophets sent by God to guide humankind, the last of who was the Prophet Muhammad, did not make regime change or the capture of political power their aim. Rather, their primary focus was the reform of individuals, who, when suitably reformed, could form a society inspired to follow God’s teachings. Only then could a government that would rule according to the teachings of Islam. The Prophet Muhammad is said to have declared, ‘Those who rule over you will be just as you are’ (kama ta kununa kazalika yoammaru aleikum). In other words, people get the government or rulers they deserve, because the representatives of people emerge from and are chosen from among them. This clearly indicates that it is only through gradual and sustained reform at the level of individuals that society, and, then, the system of governance can be reformed. This is the natural system of bringing about social transformation.

Over the last 80-odd years, Islamist movements have never ceased from raising emotionally-driven slogans of what they call ‘Islamic Revolution’. Because they ignored the natural method of social transformation, the slogans raised by these movements remained precisely that—mere slogans that could not be actualized. Consequently, today many Muslims are growing weary of such clichéd slogans, and are losing faith in the claims of those who never tire of mouthing them.

In today’s world, political and radical or revolutionary interpretations of Islam are proving to be a major source of chaos, conflict and strife, or what the Quran terms fitna. The major ideologue of this politically-oriented version of Islam was an Indian (who later migrated to Pakistan), Maulana Syed Abul ‘Ala Maududi, founder of the Islamist Jama‘at-e Islami. In his hugely influential, and, at the same time, enormously controversial book Islami Nizam-e Zindagi Aur Uske Buniyadi Tasavvurat (‘The Islamic Way of Life and its Basic Conceptions’), Maududi projected Islam as a revolutionary ideology and the Muslim ummah as a revolutionary party. On this basis, he called for Muslims to struggle for what he termed as ‘Islamic Revolution’ throughout the world. He considered all the prophets of God to have been revolutionary political leaders. If one were to take this obviously erroneous claim to be true, one would have to admit that, with a very few exceptions, none of the prophets were successful in their mission because they were not accepted as political leaders by their people, and nor were they able to establish Islamic political rule. Obviously, no sensible Muslim can believe that the prophets were failures and that they were unable to do what God had sent them to the world to accomplish.

To claim, as Maududi does, that Muslims are ‘not a band of preachers and missionaries, but, rather, a party of soldiers of God’ is to betray ignorance, and, indeed, transgression of, the basic truths of Islam. The major difference between the truly Islamic method of social transformation, as followed by the prophets, and the radical method of present-day politically-oriented Islamist movements is that the former is gradual and aims at reforms from below, from the individual to the social and then to the political plane, while the latter is radical and seeks to impose change in individuals and in the society from above, using political power for this purpose. The latter method is unnatural, unrealistic and impracticable, and inevitably results in strife and much bloodshed and destruction. That, indeed, is the fate of any movement that uses unnatural methods, no matter how noble its aims may be. It is also apparent that any revolution wrought by such means can never be long-lasting. Revolutions are generally sooner or later subverted, ironically often by those who played key roles in bringing them about in the first place.

All this clearly suggests that Islamic movements and groups that are engaged in, or so they claim, in ‘revolutionary’ action to capture power must seriously revisit their methods and their ideology. Such radicalism is proving, as the case of Pakistan today, for instance, so tragically shows, to be entirely counter-productive for Islam and its adherents. If at all any ‘revolution’ occurs as a result of the activities of these ‘revolutionary’ self-styled Islamist groups, the true lovers of Islam will, one can be sure, desperately seek safety from it and from ‘political Islam’, an obvious parody of authentic Islam, on which it would be based.


(Translated from Urdu by Yoginder Sikand/Noor Mohammad Sikand)

----------

Maulana Waris Mazhari is the editor of the New Delhi-based monthly Tarjuman Dar ul-Uloom, the official organ of the Graduates’ Association of the Deoband madrasa. He can be contacted on w.mazhari@gmail.com

Yoginder Sikand works with the Centre for the Study of Social Exclusion at the National Law School, Bangalore.