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Taliban’s Jizya is
Extortion, Nothing to Do with Islam:
Indian Muslim
leaders:
Indian Muslim religious
leaders have unanimously condemned in strongest terms the Pakistani
Taliban’s kidnapping, extortion of huge amounts of money from Sikh
community as “Jizya” and demolition of the houses and shops of...Read
Full
Muslim
Intellectuals reject
Taliban Ban on Female Education
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Broadly speaking, there have been two
opposite reactions to the recent announcement about the purported
enforcement of the Islamic shariah in the troubled region of Swat in
northwestern Pakistan. Some Muslims celebrate it as a major
‘victory’ for Islam and for the group spearheading the agitation,
the Tehrik-e Nifaz-e Shariah-e Muhammadi (TNSM). They hail it as
nothing short of a great historical development. In contrast, many
other Muslims see the development very differently. They consider
the movement that supposedly aims at the enforcement of the shariah
to be nothing of the sort actually. Instead, they argue, it is a
movement led by some tribal leaders who want to capture power and
resources by cynically manipulating the emotions and religious
sentiments of gullible people. Frankly, this is what I myself
believe.
It may be that the head of the TNSM, Sufi Muhammad, is himself not a
worldly man and that he is sincerely committed to what he thinks is
the cause of Islam. God knows best. However, as far as such radical,
self-styled jihadist movements today are concerned, it cannot be
denied that the vast majority of their leaders use them as a means
for advancing their own personal interests. Stirring up religious
emotions, they are able to attract a following among socially
marginalized Muslims, who are led to believe that supporting these
leaders is the way for them to attain a place in heaven. And then,
very often, these people are led on to engage in acts that have
absolutely no sanction in the shariah, despite the fact that,
ironically, their leaders claim that the enforcement of the shariah
is their sole purpose. So, in the case of the Taliban in Swat, we
first heard that some of them were forcibly marrying local women
against their will. And now news is coming in of these self-styled
mujahids compelling the local Sikhs to cough up millions of rupees
in the name of jizya. From these two developments one can get a
clear idea of what these so-called ‘lovers of Islam’ are really
like.
In today’s world, the imposition of jizya on non-Muslims is
absolutely wrong and indefensible. In today’s world in every
country, people, no matter what their religion, pay the same sets of
necessary taxes to the state. As citizens of their respective states
they are expected to abide by the same sets of duties. Hence, it is
absolutely absurd to impose jizya on any community. Today, the whole
world can be said to be an ‘abode of agreement’, or, in Arabic, dar
ul-ahad. All the nations of the world are bound together by this
agreement. Leading Deobandi scholars such as Maulana Anwar Shah
Kashmiri and Maulana Ashraf Ali Thanwi had made this declaration
decades ago. The majority of the ulema today also uphold this view.
This is why jizya is not imposed on non-Muslims in any
Muslim-majority country in the world. No Muslim country today
enforces jizya as a law.
Jizya is not a sort of Islamic law in which changes cannot be made.
This is illustrated by the report that on the death of his son
Ibrahim the Prophet Muhammad (may peace be upon him) said that if
Ibrahim had stayed alive he would have lifted, once and for all, the
jizya on the Coptic Christians. Similarly, on the request of some
Christians the Caliph Umar dropped the term jizya to refer to the
levy that was made on them.
In the early Islamic period jizya was levied on those non-Muslim
peoples who were defeated in battle by Muslim armies in what was
considered to be dar ul-harb or ‘abode of war’. But today’s context
is vastly different. Today no country can be called dar ul-harb or
even dar ul-islam (‘abode of Islam’). Nor does the notion of, or
even the need for, religious war still exist. And so, just as
leading ulema now oppose slavery and do not want it to be
reinstituted, they also consider that jizya has no relevance at all
in today’s age.
The aims of the Islamic shariah include the establishment of social
justice, freedom for all social groups, equality, prosperity and
peace. In the early Islamic period, the shariah, when it was
properly upheld by sincere rulers, served as a refuge for both
Muslims and others. Sadly, in our times, the issue of the shariah
has been so horrendously exploited that those who cynically
manipulate it for their ends have caused torment and strife not just
for non-Muslims but also for many Muslims themselves. Inhuman,
immoral and patently anti-Islamic acts have been sought to be given
sanction in the name of the shariah, causing the Islamic spirit to
be almost totally submerged and lost. Not surprisingly, this has
caused even many Muslims to be opposed to any moves in the name of
the enforcement of this un-Islamic brand of so-called shariah. The
example of Pakistan well exemplifies this. Despite the fact that
Pakistan has been in existence for the last sixty years, the
majority of Pakistanis do not consider the self-styled advocates of
the shariah as their political leaders. In actual fact, they are
scared of what passes for the Taliban-brand of shariah. They might
verbally support the shariah, but deep in their hearts they hope
that this Taliban-type shariah will never come to be enforced in the
country. It would not be wrong, therefore, to say that the biggest
challenge to the shariah comes from those who claim to be its most
ardent defenders.
Terrible confusion exists about what exactly the shariah is. In
actual fact, what is conventionally understood as shariah is largely
fiqh or the product of the interpretations and works of medieval
Muslim jurists, a product of their ijtihad or reasoning. This
portion of what passes for shariah is, therefore, a human product.
That is why the corpus of fiqh needs to be critically reviewed
today, so that those aspects of fiqh that go against the needs and
demands of today’s age can be excised from it.
Traditional Islamic political thought, which has developed within
the frame of medieval fiqh is, not surprisingly, characterized by
considerable conflict and stagnation. This is readily exploited by
various Muslim political and religious groups, of which the Taliban
in Swat are just one example.
It is crucial to understand the cause of this conflict and
stagnation, for without this the lacunae of traditional Islamic
political thought cannot be addressed. Every form of thought, be it
related to religion, politics or any other sphere of life, is
influenced by its geographical, social and political context and
also responds to it. The biographies of leading classical ulema such
as Imam Malik, Imam Shatibi, Imam Shafi, Imam Ghazali, al-Mawardi,
Ibn Taimiya etc. clearly indicate the influence of the existing
socio-political conditions on their political thought. In order to
combat sectarian divisions and conflicts raging in their times they
gave particular stress to the need for strengthening the central
state authority. Muslim states at that time were faced with numerous
threats, such as wars, insurrections and other such challenges, from
non-Muslim forces and rival Muslim sects. This had a major impact on
the minds of the ulema, creating a strongly defensive and combative
mentality. This fear of being attacked or overwhelmed by others
probably explains why, for instance, Imam Ahmad bin Hanbal is said
to have commented, ‘Do you not know that if you did not engage in
war Islam would have been wiped out, and then what would the Romans
have done?’.
These ulema, mainly fuqaha or scholars of fiqh, who were
particularly concerned with maintaining and defending the political
domination of Muslims, accordingly viewed the Quran and the practice
of the Prophet in a particular way that would lend further strength
to their particular perspective and mentality. That is why they gave
little attention to the ‘Meccan ideal’, the pattern of life and the
ways of the Prophet during the thirteen years he preached in Mecca
despite facing great opposition before he shifted to Medina and
established a polity. This period was considerably longer than the
Medinan phase of the Prophet’s life. Likewise, the fuqaha did not
keep before them the model of the Prophet’s early political life in
Medina, which was based on tolerance and broad-mindedness. Instead,
their views about Islamic politics were heavily influenced by their
perception of the last stage of the Prophet’s life in Medina, when
he had become the unchallenged ruler of the state. This, to a large
extent, explains the general drift of traditional Muslim political
thought.
A very pertinent saying is attributed to Imam Ali. He is reported to
have said, ‘The Quran is such a book that speaks through the human
tongue’. This clearly indicates the role of individuals’ own
mentalities in moulding their perceptions or interpretations of
texts. This factor is also one of the major causes for the striking
differences among the fuqaha as regards their interpretation of the
Quran and their understanding of the shariah.
In other words, the corpus of fiqh, which represented human effort
to understand the shariah, was heavily influenced by, among other
things, the personal outlook of the medieval fuqaha. This inevitably
had a seriously deleterious impact on Islamic thought generally,
including Muslim political thought. This also played no small role
in undermining Islam’s moral and spiritual message and universal
appeal.
This negative development was further reinforced by the theory of
naskh or abrogation, according to which some verses in the Quran
allegedly abrogated certain other verses that had been revealed
before them. This theory was so badly misused that key tenets of the
Quran, such as patience, tolerance, freedom of faith and conscience
and cultivating good relations with people of other faiths, were
declared by some ulema to have been abrogated! The allegedly
abrogated parts of the Quran included verses that stressed religious
freedom, such as one that lays down that there is no compulsion in
religion, or another one, according to which people are free to
choose or reject Islam. Some fuqaha went to the absurd length of
declaring around 140 Quranic verses as abrogated in order to
interpret a single verse, known as ‘The Verse of the Sword’), in the
Surah At-Tauba, a chapter in the Quran, in a particular way.
The stern authoritarianism and exclusivism of traditional Muslim
political thought also arises from a sternly literalist
interpretation of the Quran and a slanted and extremely subjective
understanding of Muslim history. This has created a certain
exaggerated and unrealistic utopianism that has indelibly influenced
Islamic thought in a negative way. This utopianism is further
reinforced by the widespread despair and strife generated in
reaction to dictatorial regimes in Muslim countries. The
marginalized and oppressed classes are thus easily attracted to
utopian movements that promise to recreate the ‘Golden Age’ of early
Islam where all their problems, so they are told, would be put an
end to. It is this utopianism that dominates the thinking of those
who call themselves Islamic revivalists.
Because Muslim political thought developed in an authoritarian mode,
it was unable to properly reflect the Quranic spirit of
universalism, especially with regard to people of other faiths.
Furthermore, because the ulema were so obsessed with the
nitty-gritty of fiqh rules, in many cases the actual intent or aim
of the shariah (maqasid-e shariah) was lost, particularly that of
justice. This is readily apparent in the fiercely negative and
demeaning approach to non-Muslims in much of the corpus of
traditional fiqh.
There is no doubt that traditional Muslim political thought, as
reflected, for instance, in the case of the Taliban in Swat,
urgently needs to be re-examined and reformulated. Muslims must
realize that the present system of states being based on nations
rather than religion is a great blessing from God. Muslims should
respect and honor this blessing. This blessing provides Muslims, no
matter in which country they live, the right and the opportunity to
live up to their duty of calling people to God’s path.
Obviously, what the Taliban are doing in Swat with regard to the
Sikhs is a deviation from God’s way. It can in no way be termed
Islamically legitimate. Imagine if the same sort of treatment began
being meted out to Muslims living in lands where they are in a
minority. The Taliban would obviously be gravely agitated. It
behoves them, then, to do unto others what they would have others do
unto them.
In this regard, it is imperative for the ulema and other Muslim
leaders in South Asia, particularly Pakistan, to stand up and
fiercely denounce all moves, such as those recently made by the
Taliban, that are based on wrong and subjective interpretations of
the shariah and that only give Islam a bad name. Failing to do so
can only further reinforce anti-Islamic and anti-Muslim feelings
among people of other faiths, with deleterious consequences for
Muslims themselves.
A graduate of the
Deoband madrasa, Delhi-based Maulana Waris Mazhari is the editor of
the monthly Tarjuman Dar ul-Ulum, the official organ of the Deoband
Madrasa’s Old Boys’ Association. He can be contacted on ws_mazhari@yahoo.com
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