Islamist Ideology On Suicide Bombings
by David Bukay
Suicide terrorism has been the
scourge of the last quarter century. A suicide bomb attack on the U.S. marine
barracks in Beirut compelled Ronald Reagan in 1983 to withdraw peacekeepers
from Beirut. Palestinian leaders deploy suicide bombers to force Israeli
concessions, and Iraqi insurgents use suicide bombings to derail the new
political order. Al-Qaeda terrorists attacked the U.S.S. Cole in Aden in 2000 and, on September 11,
2001, the World Trade Center and Pentagon. While some scholars argue there is
no religious component to suicide bombing[1]—often
citing Sri Lanka's Tamil Tigers, who are not Muslims—they are wrong. All Muslim
suicide bombers justify their actions with their religion and, more
specifically, with the concept of jihad.
What Is Jihad?
Muslim
self-justification of suicide bombing lies in interpretation of jihad. While
Western scholars of late argue that jihad refers primarily to internal
struggle,[2]
Islamic writings feature jihad as physical warfare.[3] Historian Bernard Lewis finds that "the overwhelming majority of classical theologians, jurists and traditionalists ... understood the obligation of jihad in a military sense."[4]
Islamic writings feature jihad as physical warfare.[3] Historian Bernard Lewis finds that "the overwhelming majority of classical theologians, jurists and traditionalists ... understood the obligation of jihad in a military sense."[4]
Islamic
jurisprudence has distinguished four different ways in which a believer may
fulfill jihad obligations: 1) with faith in his heart; 2) by preaching and
proselytizing with his tongue; 3) by good deeds with his hands; and 4) by
confronting unbelievers or enemies with the sword.[5] In practice, the first three are part
of the da'wa (missionary activity), actions that
support jihad by the sword.[6]
Muslim theologians
were explicit in the combination of nonviolent and violent jihad to spread
Islam.[7] Jihad is central to the Muslim
perception of the world, dividing it into dar
al-Islam (abode of Islam) and dar al-harb (abode of war) which is destined to
come under Islamic rule.[8] Jihad both purifies the dar al-Islam and is the tool to shrink and
eradicate the dar al-harb.
As a doctrine, the aim of jihad is clear: to establish God's rule on earth by
compelling non-Muslims to embrace Islam, or to force them to accept second
class status if not eradicate them altogether. Such an understanding
constituted one of the main ideological bases of the dynasties that ruled the
Islamic world from the late seventh century until Mongol hordes put an
effective end to their control in the thirteenth century.
A
comparison between the concept of martyrdom in Islam on one hand and in Judaism
and Christianity on the other illustrates the emphasis on violent jihad within
Islamic jurisprudence. In Islamic practice, the martyr is one killed in jihad.
He is entitled to special status in paradise and on Judgment Day. In Judaism
and Christianity, a martyr is someone who endures torture and death rather than
renounce his or her belief.[9]
Jihad against Unbelievers
All four
schools of Sunni Islam as well as mainstream Shi‘ism consider idolatry (shirk),
apostasy (irtidad), and hypocrisy (nifiq, munafaqah, or riya') to be capital offenses.[10] In each case, jihad is a means to
counter such threats and assert the predominance of Islam.
There is
little tolerance for idolaters within Islam: the first article of faith is the
profession, la ilah illa-llah (there is no deity but God).[11] Muslim jurisprudence considers shirk to be the worst form of disbelief.[12] The Qur'an commands Muslims to kill
those who commit shirk[13] and is replete with examples calling
for jihad against idolaters. For example, sura (chapter) 9:5 reads, "When
the sacred months have passed, slay the idolaters whenever you find them, and
take them captive or besiege them."[14] Sura 8:39 reads, "So fight them
so that sedition might end and obedience is wholly Allah's"; and sura
9:123 states, "Fight the unbelievers who are near to you, and let them
find ruthlessness in you."[15] Muslims living under the rule of
idolaters are obliged to fight their rulers.[16] The Qur'an likewise commands believers
to conduct jihad against hypocrites,[17] seize them, and do away with them.[18] All infidels, unbelievers, and
hypocrites—those who commit blasphemy or treason—are relegated to hell.[19]
Prominent
Muslim scholars consider the general jihad declaration against the unbelievers
to be crucial to Islamic success.[20] Those who sacrifice their material
comfort and bodies for jihad win salvation.[21] By their sacrifice, they obtain all
the pleasures of paradise, be they spiritual—the close presence of God—or
material.[22] As an additional incentive, Muhammad
promised those mujahideen who fight in a jihad war a reward of virgins in
paradise.[23] Importantly, those conducting suicide
bombings do not consider themselves dead but rather living with God. As sura
2:154 explains, "Do not think that those who are killed in the way of
Allah are dead, for indeed they are alive, even though you are not aware."[24] Therefore the prohibition on suicide
need not apply to bus bombers or other kamikaze jihadists. Martin Lings, a
British scholar of Sufism, argues that this linkage between martyrdom and
paradise was probably the most potent factor that Muhammad brought to the
annals of warfare,[25] for it transformed the odds of war by
offering a promise of immortality.[26]
Jihad in the Hadith
The
Hadith collections, the second important source of Shari‘a after the Qur'an,
devote considerable attention to jihad, most often in terms of military action
against non-believers. Indeed, most Islamic theologians in the classical period
(750-1258 C.E.) understood this obligation to jihad as military.[27]There
is a whole genre of hadith known as fada'il al-jihad (the merits of the holy war),[28] based on the nine-volume Hadith
collection of Muhammad ibn Isma‘il al-Bukhari (810-70) and considered to be the
most respected and authoritative collection. He dedicates almost one-third of
his fourth volume on jihad as physical holy war against infidels. For example,
he relates a hadith of Muhammad commenting that there are
one hundred stages in paradise for those who fight for the way of God. [29] Only those who participate in jihad
deserve paradise without any checks and reservations. To exemplify this notion,
Bukhari relates a story of a woman asking Muhammad if her son, who was killed
in the battle of Badr, is in paradise, and he replied that her son is in a
higher paradise.[30]
Consistent
with the Qur'an, these hadith generally demonstrate the necessity
for Muslims to spare no means to spread Islam by force and strike terror into
the hearts of the enemies of God. The main motif of jihad in the Hadith
reinforces the concept that death on the battleground in the cause of God leads
to paradise and receipt of a "sacred wedding" to black-eyed virgins.[31] From among 262 traditions that are
mentioned by Abdallah Ibn al-Mubarak (736-97), a renowned Khorasani scholar who
concentrated on jihad warfare as the most important method to Islamic success,
thirteen reinforce the concept of virgins in paradise as a reward for
martyrdom.[32]
The
Hadith also emphasize the necessity for all believers, whenever called upon, to
commit to a jihad war.[33] In one example, Bukhari cites Ibn
‘Umar, one of the transmitters of accounts about the Prophet traditionally
accepted by Muslims, who relates, "Muhammad said: ‘I have been ordered to
fight against all the people until they testify that there is no god but Allah
and that Muhammad is Allah's messenger, and offer the prayers perfectly, and
give the obligatory charity. So if they perform all that, then they save their
lives and property from me and their reckoning will be done by Allah.'"[34] And, in another, a
transmitter narrated, "O Allah, you know that there is nothing more
beloved to me than to fight in your cause against those who disbelieved your
messenger."[35]
Just as
in the Qur'an, the Hadith give ample justification for those who would fight
heterodox interpretations of Islam within their own society. Muslim jurists in
four schools of law have agreed that the apostate should be given three days to
repent and, if he did not, he was to be killed by believer's jihad.[36] Bukhari cites Abu Musa, another
accepted transmitter, who related how "a man embraced Islam and then
reverted back to Judaism. Ibn al-Mu'azz, one of the Hadith story tellers, said:
‘I will not sit down unless you kill him, as the verdict of Allah and his
messenger.'"[37] In another hadith, Ali bin Abu Talib,
Muhammad's nephew and son-in-law, narrated, "I heard the Prophet saying
... whenever you find the apostates, kill them, for there will be a reward on
the Day of Resurrection."[38] The Hadith are graphic about
punishment for such apostates. According to Anas bin Malik, an Arab thinker and
theologian from Medina (d. 795) and founder of the Maliki School of Islamic
jurisprudence, "The
Prophet ordered the apostates to have their hands and feet cut off. Then he
ordered nails, which were heated and passed over their eyes, and they were left
in the Harra [a rocky land in Medina], till they died."[39]
Not as
theologically important and seldom cited by modern jihadists are the Assassins,
a twelfth and thirteenth century Shi‘ite movement which staged assassinations
against prominent political leaders who did not share their ideas. While their
actions do not directly affect the intellectual evolution of contemporary
suicide bombers, their actions demonstrate precedent and the ability of
theologians to interpret Islamic doctrine to justify suicide terrorism. As with
today's terror masters, the group's founder Hasan al-Sabbah (d. 1124) promised
its members paradise if they died in the course of their missions.[40]
Contemporary Jihad
Early interpretations of jihad contributed a theological framework
which proponents of suicide bombing adopted. First was the idea that jihad was
violent. It was a tool not only to purify the domains of Islam and purge the
heterodox but also to defeat non-Muslims. Today, academics and scholars may
argue that jihad is peaceful and represents internal struggle,[41] but they either obfuscate or
misunderstand that for most Islamic theologians and as described in detail by
Islamic historians,[42] the first three nonviolent components
of jihad form a larger, more violent aggregate.
Those
who argue that jihad is peaceful base their assertions almost entirely on
Qur'anic verses from the Meccan period,[43] in which Muhammad and his band of
followers were small and relatively weak and so prone to compromise.[44] Islamists, though, justify their
violence with verses revealed to Muhammad after his December 623 expedition to
Nakhlah.[45] Prominent classical scholars
acknowledged the principle of nasikh
wa-mansukh (abrogation) which
placed greater emphasis on later Medinan verses of violence and jihad.[46] For contemporary Western scholars and
journalists to down play Medinan verses suggests a critical misunderstanding of
Qur'anic studies.
Many
Islamists are unapologetic about violent jihad. They use Qur'anic
interpretation to justify terrorism, suicide bombings, and beheadings.[47] They seek to emulate the aggressive
jihad waged by Muhammad and his successors from 626 to 740 in their own
struggle.[48] These are the Islamic apocalyptic
terrorist groups of today who agree with the idea that jihad is so important
that every believer must accept it as a compulsory duty, even when unbelievers
have not started it.[49]
While
some academics and commentators argue that jihad is restricted to religious
wars, from an Islamic perspective, all wars against non-Muslims (or Muslims
redefined by jihadists as non-Muslims) are religious. This is the reason why
some Muslim scholars regard jihad as the sixth pillar of Islam, as it is in
Shi‘ite doctrine.[50] The most influential Islamist thinkers
of the twentieth century—Abu al-A'la al-Mawdudi (1903-79), Hasan al-Banna
(1906-49), and Sayyid Qutb (1906-66)—have addressed the centrality of jihad at
length.[51] Activists such as Muhammad Abd al-Salam
Faraj, an Egyptian electrical engineer and a follower of Qutb, call it
"the neglected duty,"[52] and interpret it to justify a fight
against any ruler or government that does not adhere to the Shari‘a.
Most
recent jihadists have relied on Qutb to justify their own theories of violent
jihad. ‘Abdullah Yusuf ‘Azzam (1941-89), a Palestinian who fled to Jordan after
the Six-Day war, adopted many elements of both Ibn Taymiya, an early fourteenth
century Islamic scholar who laid the philosophical groundwork for the Islamic
fundamentalism adopted by Saudi Arabia centuries later, and Qutb to promote the
belief in an inevitable clash of civilizations. He emphasized the necessity of
violent revolution through jihad against both secular governments in majority
Muslim states and against the West. He is credited with being the first Sunni
Islamic figure to instill the Islamic community with a divine myth of invincibility
of jihad and terrorism.[53]
‘Azzam
was a major intellectual influence upon Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda.[54] In his bookKnights under the Banner
of the Prophet, bin Laden's number two, Ayman al-Zawahiri, identified his
organization's goals as da'wa and violent jihad against both an
"internal enemy," i.e., existing Arab infidel regimes, and an
"external enemy" in areas not controlled by Muslims. To Zawahiri,
Muslims who accept Western values such as democracy and those who renounce
jihad as a means to establish the Islamic state are infidels deserving of
death. The Islamic nation, he maintained, would be established only through
jihad for the sake of God, compulsory duty vested upon all the Islamic
community. He believed that a "Crusader-Jewish" alliance would mobilize
all its resources to counter Islamic power.[55]
Bin
Laden embraced similar logic. Beginning in August 1996, he used verses from the
Qur'an and the Hadith to argue that jihad was compulsory to expel non-Muslims
and Westerners from Saudi Arabia.[56] On February 23, 1998, though, he
expanded his jihad when, with Zawahiri at his side, he announced the creation
of the International Islamic Front for Jihad against the Jews and Crusaders.[57]
The
writings of Qutb also influenced Abu Mus‘ab al-Zarqawi, the late leader of
Al-Qaeda in Iraq. Zarqawi peppered his speeches and declarations with verses
from the Qur'an and Hadith to demonstrate God's promise of the inevitability of
the creation of a pure Sunni Islamic state so long as Muslims fight jihad
against the enemies of Islam by jihad. Zarqawi called jihad "the crest of
the summit of Islam."[58]
Bin
Laden granted Zarqawi permission to kill Iraqi security forces and Shi‘ites in
order to achieve a "state of truth" and uproot the "state of the
lie."[59] Zarqawi did so with both car bombs and
suicide bombers. On May 18, 2005, Zarqawi legitimized the killing of Muslims
under the principle of overriding necessity and the victory of jihad.
"Islamic law states that the Islamic faith is more important than life,
honor, and property," and the Shi‘ites are worse than the Crusaders, he
argued.[60] He declared both collateral killing of
Muslims and murder of noncombatant non-Muslims legitimate[61] and, on September 14, 2005, declared
jihad war on the Shi‘ites.[62]
In the
words of Rudolph Peters, an expert on contemporary Islam, the ultimate aim of
jihad is the subjection of the non-believers and the eradication of non-belief.[63] Islamic law is the ultimate solution,
and it has full answers to all possible situations and problems, present and
future. This is why the fanatic Muslims of today—religious, ideologists, and
practitioners—denounce all the existing political systems and demand their
liquidation. The current Arab-Islamic system represents a "new age of
ignorance" and the Western political systems are "the new
Crusaderism," all doomed to extermination by jihad warfare.
Jihad
becomes a binding duty on all Muslims as individuals. Abdulaziz A. Sachedina,
an Indian Muslim expert on the Shi‘ites who lives in the West, explained,
"There is no doubt that the Muslim jurists conceived jihad in the sense of
engaging in a war to increase the Dar
al-Islam as an integral part
of Islamic faith ... with the essential aim of uprooting unbelief and preparing
the way for a creation of Islamic order on earth."[64]
The
violence of contemporary jihad was also apparent in the reaction of Islamists
to cartoons published in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten.
Muslim rioters and Arab and Islamic governments seized upon the contention that
it is against Islam to depict the Prophet Muhammad and to argue that the
apostates and non-believers should be punished. Violence accompanied
demonstrations in Europe and in Muslim countries. By far the greatest number of
fatalities was in Nigeria, which is neither European nor Muslim. In London,
protestors marched under banners reading, "Slay those who insult
Islam," "Butcher those who mock Islam," "Behead those who
insult Islam," "Exterminate those who slander Islam,"
"Massacre those who insult Islam," "Europe is the cancer, Islam
is the answer," "Europe take lessons from 9-11," "Europe
you will pay. Your 9-11 is on its way," "Be prepared for the real
holocaust," and "Islam will dominate the world."[65] To many jihadists, such threats are
literal, not hyperbole. Suicide bombing becomes a legitimate technique to carry
them out.
The Islamic Roots of Suicide
Bombings
What is
the connection between religious sources of over a millennium ago to the
suicide bombings of today? There is a direct link between the jihadists of
yesterday and contemporary jihadists. Many jihadists cite the works of Taqi
al-din Ahmad Ibn Taymiya (1263-1328), an Islamic scholar born in Harran, in
modern-day Turkey, who wrote extensively on the need for jihad and exalted it
even above the Islamic obligations of fasting and pilgrimage (hajj).[66] He attacked many practices prevalent
among Muslims of his time and favored a literal interpretation of the Qur'an.
Modern jihadists have used his fatwas
commanding Muslims to fight the Mongols as precedents legitimizing suicide
bombing. Mawdudi, Banna, and Qutb have also developed Ibn Taymiya's philosophy,[67] writing extensively on jihad as the
means to fight the re-emergence of the age of ignorance, with its tribal
savagery and anarchy. They also suggested that the Islamic order can be
maintained and protected, if not expanded, through violence.
In
recent decades, the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas has embraced suicide
bombings to lethal effect. Its 1987 charter shows its intellectual and
theological justifications. It cites the Qur'an[68] to promote the idea of Muslim
exclusivity and hadith from Bukhari and the Sahih Muslim calling for the murder of Jews to
hasten the Day of Judgment. More recent exegesis also influenced Hamas. The
charter cites Banna's call for Islam to obliterate Israel and is explicit about
the violent nature of jihad: Article 13 argues that there is no solution to the
Palestinian question but through jihad, and Article 15 declares the necessity
to instill jihad in the heart of the Muslim nation.
The 9-11
suicide attacks sparked significant debate in the Islamic world about the
merits of suicide attacks.[69] Sheikh Muhammad Sa'id al-Tantawi, head
of Cairo's Al-Azhar, the most prestigious university for Sunni jurisprudence,
declared that the Shari‘a rejects all attempts on taking human life, and Sheikh
Muhammad bin ‘Abdallah al-Sabil, a member of the Saudi Council of Islamic
Clerics and imam at the Grand Mosque in Mecca, decried the suicide attacks on
the basis that Islamic law forbids killing civilians, suicide, and protects
Jews and Christians. But both Tantawi and Sabil sidestep the question of
"martyrdom operations." Because preserving the life of dhimmis (Jews and Christians)
is conditional to their acceptance of Muslim rule, suicide attacks upon
Israelis or Jews and Christians outside majority Muslim countries may be
permissible. Indeed, other Al-Azhar scholars, for example, ‘Abd al-'Azim
al-Mit'ani, say it is permissible to kill Israeli civilians in the cause of
jihad.[70]
Today's
Al-Qaeda splinter and successor groups and their fellow travelers use the
writings of Ibn Taymiya and those influenced by him. The linkage is concrete.
They often cite the same Qur'anic passages and hadith that justified the violent jihad of
the seventh century. Religious clerics issuefatwas citing them. Perhaps
the most prominent of these is Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi,[71] who has built upon such
interpretations to justify suicide bombing, other acts of terrorism, and the
murder of civilians, all in the cause of jihad. He has called suicide bombing a
supreme form of jihad for the sake of God and, therefore, religiously legitimate.[72] Those who object to his ideas he
labels as agents of ignorance.[73] While he argues that the Qur'an does
not allow attacks against the innocent,[74] his definition of innocence is so
narrow as to obviate such assurances.
September
11 hijacker Muhammad Atta's last will and testament[75] shows how deep such interpretations of
jihad have penetrated Muslim life as his verbiage and instructions for burial
showed how he believed himself a good Muslim, even as he participated in an
event which murdered almost 3,000 civilians.
Conclusion
Suicide
bombing in the Muslim world cannot be separated from religion. Its perpetrators
believe jihad to be synonymous with war and mandate Muslims to strike not only
at non-Muslims but also at co-religionists deemed insufficiently loyal to their
radical cause. The ideological basis of such an interpretation has deep roots in
Islamic theology, but it came to prominence with the twentieth-century rise of
Muslim Brotherhood theorists such as Banna and Qutb and was further developed
by their successors. While much of the exegesis developed out of Sunni
jurisprudence, the Islamic Republic in Iran encouraged the phenomenon. Many of
Tehran's proxy groups embraced the tactic.
It is
fashionable among Western analysts and academics to explain away suicide
bombing with discussion of "root causes" that omit religion. Many
cite a history of exploitation by Western powers, Israel's existence,
government oppression, poverty, lack of education, and alienation as reasons
why desperate individuals decide to blow themselves up to murder others. But
attention to suicide bombers' own justifications suggest that, for them, Islam
and its call for jihad is the primary motivation.
Source:
David Bukay is a lecturer in the school of political
science at the University of Haifa.
[1] See, for
example, Robert Pape, Dying to
Win: The Strategic Logic of Suicide Bombing (New York: Random House, 2005).
[2] See, for example, John L. Esposito, Unholy War: Terror in the Name of Islam (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002), pp. 32-8.
[3] See, for example, Muhammad Jarir al-Tabari, The History of al-Tabari (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1987-1988), vols. 7 and 8; Alfred Guillaume, The Life of Muhammad: Ibn Ishaq's Sirat Rasul Allah (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1955), part 3; Muhammad Ibn Sa‘d, Kitab at-Tabaqat al-Kabir (New Delhi: Kitab Bahavan, 1981), vol. 2, which details all Muhammad's military expeditions; Abd al-Rahman Ibn Khaldun, Al-Muqaddimah: An Introduction to History (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1967), vol. 1, p. 309, vol. 2, pp. 65-79, 220-1; Muhammad Ibn Isma'il al-Bukhari, Sahih al-Bukhari (Lahore: Kazi, 1979), partly vol. 1, but mainly vol. 2; Ibn al-Hajjaj Muslim,Sahih Muslim (Cairo: Dar al-Kitab al-Misri, n.d.), includes many hadith, partly the same as those cited by Bukhari. For scholarly interpretation based on these exegetes, see Reuven Firestone, Jihad: The Origin of Holy War in Islam (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999).
[4] Bernard Lewis, The Political Language of Islam (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988), p. 72.
[5] Bukhari, Sahih al-Bukhari, vol. 2, p. 199.
[6] Muhammad Ayoub, "Jihad: A Source of Power and Framework of Authority in Islam," Bulletin of the Institute of Middle Eastern Studies, 6 (1992); Firestone, Jihad, pp. 37, 84; Moulavi A. Cheragh,The Critical Exposition of Popular Jihad (Karachi: Karinsons, 1977), pp. 62-6, 51-5, 123-5.
[7] See, for example, Muhammad Ibn ‘Isa al-Tirmidhi, Al-Jami ‘as-Sahih, vol. 7 (Beirut: Dar al-Kutub al-‘Ilmiyah, 1992), p. 36.
[8] Majid Khadduri, War and Peace in the Law of Islam (Baltimore: John's Hopkins University Press, 1979), pp. 62-6; Cheragh, The Critical Exposition of Popular Jihad, pp. 163-76.
[9] Bernard Lewis, Islam and the West (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), p. 163. For the privileges of martyrs who fall in battle, see Eitan Kohlberg, The Encyclopedia of Islam, vol. 9 (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1960), s.v. "shahid." For specific examples, see Bukhari, Sahih, vol. 4, pp. 53, 72, 216; Muslim, Sahih, vol. 11, p. 2013.
[10] Khadduri, War and Peace in the Law of Islam, pp. 29-30, 33, 84, 98, 135; Taqi al-Din Ahmad Ibn Taymiyah, Al-‘Ubudiyah fil-Islam (Cairo: Al-Matba'ah as-Salafiyah, 1987).
[11] Muhammad Ibraheem Surty, The Qur'anic Conception of al-Shirk (London: Luzac, 1982).
[12] Qur'an, 28:17, 31:13, 36:74, 37:158. All quotes of the Qur'an are from Ahmed Ali, Al-Qur'an: A Contemporary Translation (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001).
[13] Qur'an, 4:4.
[14] See, also, Qur'an, 2:193.
[15] See, also, Qur'an, 2:244.
[16] Qur'an, 22:39; 8:12; 8:60.
[17]‘Ali ibn Muhammad al-Mawardi, Kitab al-Ahkam as-Sultaniyah (Beirut: Wilayat al-Dinn, 1996), pp. 30-1, 44-5, 50-1.
[18] Qur'an, 3:167-8; 4:82; 4: 88-91; 4:145; 9:12; 9:73; 66:9.
[19] Qur'an, 9:73; 47:12; 98:6.
[20] Abu Muhammad ‘Abd al-Malik Ibn Hisham (d. 833), who edited Ibn Ishaq's biography of Muhammad; Abu ‘Abdallah Muhammad Ibn ‘Umar al-Waqidi (d. 823), the author of Al-Maghazi, the Sirah, and the Early Islamic Conquests; Abu ‘Abdallah Muhammad Ibn Sa`d (d. 845), one of the earliest authorities on Muslim biography; Abu al-Walid Muhammad Ibn Ahmad Ibn Rushd (d. 1198), one of the renowned Islamic theologians and philosophers; Abu al-Hasan al-Mawardi (d. 1058) and Abu Muhammad ‘Ali Ibn Ahmad Ibn Hazm (d. 1064) all reference the Qur'an, 2:216-217.
[21] Abdallah Ibn al-Mubarak, Kitab al-Jihad (Beirut: Hammad, 1971), pp. 30-1, 37-46, 48-54, 59-61; Bukhari, Sahih, vol. 2, p. 149; vol. 4, pp. 19-22, 24-5, 39-40.
[22] Qur'an, 3:195; 9:72; 47:4-6, 15; 61:11-3.
[23] Qur'an, 44:51-4; 52:17-20; 55:47, 50, 52, 56, 70, 72; 56:22-4.
[24] See, also, Qur'an, 3:157-8, 169-171; 44:56.
[25] Martin Lings, Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources (Rochester, Vt.: Inner Traditions, 1983), pp. 147-76.
[26] Subhash C. Inamdar, Muhammad and the Rise of Islam (Madison, Conn.: Psychological Press, 2001), pp. 222-3.
[27] Lewis, The Political Language of Islam, p. 72.
[28] See, for example, Ibn al-Mubarak, Kitab al-Jihad.
[29] Bukhari, Sahih, vol. 2, p. 200.
[30] Ibid., p. 202.
[31] John MacDonald, "Islamic Eschatology VI-Paradise," Islamic Studies, 5 (1966): 352-60; Frantz Rosenthal, "Reflections on Love in Paradise," in John H. Marks and Robert M. Good, eds., Love and Death in the Ancient Near East (Guilford, Conn.: Four Quarters Publication Co., 1987), pp. 247-54.
[32] Ibn al-Mubarak, Kitab al-Jihad, pp. 30-1, 37-46, 48-54, 59-61; Jane Idleman Smith and Yvone Haddad, The Islamic Understanding of Death and Resurrection (Albany: State University of New York, 1994), pp. 31-61.
[33] Bukhari, Sahih, vol. 1, p. 26; vol. 4, p. 41, 44-5.
[34] Ibid., vol. 1, p. 25.
[35] Ibid., p. 101.
[36] Bukhari, Sahih, vol. 4, p. 261.
[37] Ibid., p. 107.
[38] Ibid., p. 108.
[39] Ibid., p. 261.
[40] For additional background on the Assassins, see Bernard Lewis, Assassins: A Radical Sect in Islam (New York: Basic Books, 2003).
[41] For example, Mahmoud Shaltut, Al-Qur'an wal-Qital (Cairo: Matba‘at an-Nasr wal-Ittihad ash-Sharqi, 1948); John l. Esposito, What Everybody Needs to Know about Islam (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002); John L. Esposito, The Islamic Threat: Myth or Reality? 3rd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999); Cheragh, The Critical Exposition of the Popular Jihad, pp. 16-27, 114-9.
[42] Tabari, The History of al-Tabari, vol. 7, pp. 17-21; Guillaume, The Life of Muhammad, pp. 281-8; Lings, Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources, pp. 175, 187.
[43] Qur'an, 20:130; 22:49; 38:15, 17; 43:88-9; 52:45, 48; 67:26.
[44] See discussion in Tabari, The History of al-Tabari, vol. 8, pp. 93-4, 98-9, 105, 112-3, 115, 118, 121-2, 124-7; Guillaume, The Life of Muhammad, pp. 143, 145.
[45] ‘Abd al-Malik Ibn Hisham, Al-Sirah an-Nabawiyah, vol. 1 (Beirut: Dar al-Kutub al-‘Ilmiyah, 1997), pp. 601-4; Tabari, The History of al-Tabari, vol. 7, pp. 18-9.
[46] See, for example, Mawardi, Al-Ahkam as-Sultaniyyah, pp. 60, 70, 76-7, 192, 200-2; Abu Muhammad Ali Ibn Ahmad Ibn Hazm, Kitab al-Jihad, vol. 3 (Beirut: Dar al-Ma'arif, 1987), p. 68.
[47] Timothy Furnish, "Beheading in the Name of Islam," Middle East Quarterly, Spring 2005, pp. 51-7.
[48] Tabari, The History of al-Tabari, pp. 62-81; Guillaume, The Life of Muhammad, pp. 615-34; Fred Donner, The Early Islamic Conquests (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1981), pp. 17-29; Khalid Y. Blankinship, The End of the Jihad State (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1994), pp. 11-22.
[49] E. Tyan, The Encyclopedia of Islam, vol. 2 (Leiden: Brill, 1960), s.v. "djihad."
[50] Muhammad S.R. al-Buti, Al-Jihad fil-Islam (Beirut: Dar al-Ma‘arif, 1993); Mubarak, Kitab al-Jihad; Muhammad Ibn Hasan as-Shaybani, Kitab as-Siyar al-Kabir, in Majid Khadduri, comp., The Islamic Law of Nations: Shaybani's Siyar (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1966).
[51] Abu al-A'la al-Mawdudi, Hasan al-Banna, and Sayyid Qutb, Al-Jihad fil-Islam (Beirut: Dar al-Fikr and al-Ittihad al-Islami al-'Alami, 1969).
[52] Johannes J.G. Jansen, The Neglected Duty (New York: Macmillan, 1986), pp. 159-230.
[53] Abdallah ‘Azzam, "Al-Qa‘idah as-Sulbah," Al-Jihad, Apr. 1988, pp. 46-9.
[54] Uriya Shavit, "Al-Qaeda's Saudi Origins," Middle East Quarterly, Fall 2006, pp. 3-13.
[55] Ayman al-Zawahiri, "Knights under the Prophet's Banner," Asharq al-Awsat (London), Dec. 2-10, 2001; Al-Jazeera, Sept. 1, 2005, Aug. 4, 2005, June 17, 2005, Nov. 29, 2004, in Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) TV Monitoring Project.
[56] The Washington Post, Aug. 23, 1998.
[57] Al-Quds al-Arabi (London), Feb. 23, 1998, May 14, 1998; interview, Time Magazine, Dec. 24, 1998; ABC News, Jan. 11, 1999; interview, Newsweek, Jan. 17, 1999.
[58] Asharq al-Awsat, July 13, 2004.
[59] "Osama bin Laden to the Iraqi People," MEMRI Special Dispatch, no. 837, Dec. 30, 2004.
[60] "Abu Mus'ab Al-Zarqawi: Collateral Killing of Muslims Is Legitimate," MEMRI Special Dispatch, no. 917, June 7, 2005.
[61] Ibid.
[62] "Leader of Al-Qaeda in Iraq al-Zarqawi Declares ‘Total War' on Shi‘ites," MEMRI, no. 987, Sept. 16, 2005.
[63] Rudolph Peters, The Encyclopedia of Religions, vol. 8 (New York: Macmillan, 1987), s.v "jihad."
[64] Abdulaziz A. Sachedina, The Just Ruler in Shiite Islam (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988), pp. 106-7, 110-1.
[65] Associated Press, Feb. 3, 2006; Reuters, Feb. 3, 2006.
[66] See Ibn Taymiyah's fatwas in Ahmad A.M. Qasim and Muhammad A.A. Qasim, comps., Majmu' Fatawat Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyah, vol. 9 (Riyadh: Matba'at al-Hukumah, 1996).
[67] Mawdudi, Banna, and Qutb, Al-Jihad fi Sabilillah.
[68] Qur'an, 3:109.
[69] Haim Malka, "Must Innocents Die? The Islamic Debate over Suicide Attacks," Middle East Quarterly, Spring 2003, pp. 19-28.
[70] Ibid.
[71] The Economist, Feb. 13, 2003.
[72] Al-Rayah (Qatar), Apr. 25, 2001; "The Qaradawi Fatwas," Middle East Quarterly, Summer 2004, pp. 78-80.
[73] Al-Istiqlal (Islamic Jihad, Gaza), Aug. 20, 1999.
[74] Qur'an, 5:32.
[75] Der Spiegel, Oct. 1, 2001.
[2] See, for example, John L. Esposito, Unholy War: Terror in the Name of Islam (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002), pp. 32-8.
[3] See, for example, Muhammad Jarir al-Tabari, The History of al-Tabari (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1987-1988), vols. 7 and 8; Alfred Guillaume, The Life of Muhammad: Ibn Ishaq's Sirat Rasul Allah (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1955), part 3; Muhammad Ibn Sa‘d, Kitab at-Tabaqat al-Kabir (New Delhi: Kitab Bahavan, 1981), vol. 2, which details all Muhammad's military expeditions; Abd al-Rahman Ibn Khaldun, Al-Muqaddimah: An Introduction to History (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1967), vol. 1, p. 309, vol. 2, pp. 65-79, 220-1; Muhammad Ibn Isma'il al-Bukhari, Sahih al-Bukhari (Lahore: Kazi, 1979), partly vol. 1, but mainly vol. 2; Ibn al-Hajjaj Muslim,Sahih Muslim (Cairo: Dar al-Kitab al-Misri, n.d.), includes many hadith, partly the same as those cited by Bukhari. For scholarly interpretation based on these exegetes, see Reuven Firestone, Jihad: The Origin of Holy War in Islam (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999).
[4] Bernard Lewis, The Political Language of Islam (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988), p. 72.
[5] Bukhari, Sahih al-Bukhari, vol. 2, p. 199.
[6] Muhammad Ayoub, "Jihad: A Source of Power and Framework of Authority in Islam," Bulletin of the Institute of Middle Eastern Studies, 6 (1992); Firestone, Jihad, pp. 37, 84; Moulavi A. Cheragh,The Critical Exposition of Popular Jihad (Karachi: Karinsons, 1977), pp. 62-6, 51-5, 123-5.
[7] See, for example, Muhammad Ibn ‘Isa al-Tirmidhi, Al-Jami ‘as-Sahih, vol. 7 (Beirut: Dar al-Kutub al-‘Ilmiyah, 1992), p. 36.
[8] Majid Khadduri, War and Peace in the Law of Islam (Baltimore: John's Hopkins University Press, 1979), pp. 62-6; Cheragh, The Critical Exposition of Popular Jihad, pp. 163-76.
[9] Bernard Lewis, Islam and the West (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), p. 163. For the privileges of martyrs who fall in battle, see Eitan Kohlberg, The Encyclopedia of Islam, vol. 9 (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1960), s.v. "shahid." For specific examples, see Bukhari, Sahih, vol. 4, pp. 53, 72, 216; Muslim, Sahih, vol. 11, p. 2013.
[10] Khadduri, War and Peace in the Law of Islam, pp. 29-30, 33, 84, 98, 135; Taqi al-Din Ahmad Ibn Taymiyah, Al-‘Ubudiyah fil-Islam (Cairo: Al-Matba'ah as-Salafiyah, 1987).
[11] Muhammad Ibraheem Surty, The Qur'anic Conception of al-Shirk (London: Luzac, 1982).
[12] Qur'an, 28:17, 31:13, 36:74, 37:158. All quotes of the Qur'an are from Ahmed Ali, Al-Qur'an: A Contemporary Translation (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001).
[13] Qur'an, 4:4.
[14] See, also, Qur'an, 2:193.
[15] See, also, Qur'an, 2:244.
[16] Qur'an, 22:39; 8:12; 8:60.
[17]‘Ali ibn Muhammad al-Mawardi, Kitab al-Ahkam as-Sultaniyah (Beirut: Wilayat al-Dinn, 1996), pp. 30-1, 44-5, 50-1.
[18] Qur'an, 3:167-8; 4:82; 4: 88-91; 4:145; 9:12; 9:73; 66:9.
[19] Qur'an, 9:73; 47:12; 98:6.
[20] Abu Muhammad ‘Abd al-Malik Ibn Hisham (d. 833), who edited Ibn Ishaq's biography of Muhammad; Abu ‘Abdallah Muhammad Ibn ‘Umar al-Waqidi (d. 823), the author of Al-Maghazi, the Sirah, and the Early Islamic Conquests; Abu ‘Abdallah Muhammad Ibn Sa`d (d. 845), one of the earliest authorities on Muslim biography; Abu al-Walid Muhammad Ibn Ahmad Ibn Rushd (d. 1198), one of the renowned Islamic theologians and philosophers; Abu al-Hasan al-Mawardi (d. 1058) and Abu Muhammad ‘Ali Ibn Ahmad Ibn Hazm (d. 1064) all reference the Qur'an, 2:216-217.
[21] Abdallah Ibn al-Mubarak, Kitab al-Jihad (Beirut: Hammad, 1971), pp. 30-1, 37-46, 48-54, 59-61; Bukhari, Sahih, vol. 2, p. 149; vol. 4, pp. 19-22, 24-5, 39-40.
[22] Qur'an, 3:195; 9:72; 47:4-6, 15; 61:11-3.
[23] Qur'an, 44:51-4; 52:17-20; 55:47, 50, 52, 56, 70, 72; 56:22-4.
[24] See, also, Qur'an, 3:157-8, 169-171; 44:56.
[25] Martin Lings, Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources (Rochester, Vt.: Inner Traditions, 1983), pp. 147-76.
[26] Subhash C. Inamdar, Muhammad and the Rise of Islam (Madison, Conn.: Psychological Press, 2001), pp. 222-3.
[27] Lewis, The Political Language of Islam, p. 72.
[28] See, for example, Ibn al-Mubarak, Kitab al-Jihad.
[29] Bukhari, Sahih, vol. 2, p. 200.
[30] Ibid., p. 202.
[31] John MacDonald, "Islamic Eschatology VI-Paradise," Islamic Studies, 5 (1966): 352-60; Frantz Rosenthal, "Reflections on Love in Paradise," in John H. Marks and Robert M. Good, eds., Love and Death in the Ancient Near East (Guilford, Conn.: Four Quarters Publication Co., 1987), pp. 247-54.
[32] Ibn al-Mubarak, Kitab al-Jihad, pp. 30-1, 37-46, 48-54, 59-61; Jane Idleman Smith and Yvone Haddad, The Islamic Understanding of Death and Resurrection (Albany: State University of New York, 1994), pp. 31-61.
[33] Bukhari, Sahih, vol. 1, p. 26; vol. 4, p. 41, 44-5.
[34] Ibid., vol. 1, p. 25.
[35] Ibid., p. 101.
[36] Bukhari, Sahih, vol. 4, p. 261.
[37] Ibid., p. 107.
[38] Ibid., p. 108.
[39] Ibid., p. 261.
[40] For additional background on the Assassins, see Bernard Lewis, Assassins: A Radical Sect in Islam (New York: Basic Books, 2003).
[41] For example, Mahmoud Shaltut, Al-Qur'an wal-Qital (Cairo: Matba‘at an-Nasr wal-Ittihad ash-Sharqi, 1948); John l. Esposito, What Everybody Needs to Know about Islam (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002); John L. Esposito, The Islamic Threat: Myth or Reality? 3rd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999); Cheragh, The Critical Exposition of the Popular Jihad, pp. 16-27, 114-9.
[42] Tabari, The History of al-Tabari, vol. 7, pp. 17-21; Guillaume, The Life of Muhammad, pp. 281-8; Lings, Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources, pp. 175, 187.
[43] Qur'an, 20:130; 22:49; 38:15, 17; 43:88-9; 52:45, 48; 67:26.
[44] See discussion in Tabari, The History of al-Tabari, vol. 8, pp. 93-4, 98-9, 105, 112-3, 115, 118, 121-2, 124-7; Guillaume, The Life of Muhammad, pp. 143, 145.
[45] ‘Abd al-Malik Ibn Hisham, Al-Sirah an-Nabawiyah, vol. 1 (Beirut: Dar al-Kutub al-‘Ilmiyah, 1997), pp. 601-4; Tabari, The History of al-Tabari, vol. 7, pp. 18-9.
[46] See, for example, Mawardi, Al-Ahkam as-Sultaniyyah, pp. 60, 70, 76-7, 192, 200-2; Abu Muhammad Ali Ibn Ahmad Ibn Hazm, Kitab al-Jihad, vol. 3 (Beirut: Dar al-Ma'arif, 1987), p. 68.
[47] Timothy Furnish, "Beheading in the Name of Islam," Middle East Quarterly, Spring 2005, pp. 51-7.
[48] Tabari, The History of al-Tabari, pp. 62-81; Guillaume, The Life of Muhammad, pp. 615-34; Fred Donner, The Early Islamic Conquests (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1981), pp. 17-29; Khalid Y. Blankinship, The End of the Jihad State (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1994), pp. 11-22.
[49] E. Tyan, The Encyclopedia of Islam, vol. 2 (Leiden: Brill, 1960), s.v. "djihad."
[50] Muhammad S.R. al-Buti, Al-Jihad fil-Islam (Beirut: Dar al-Ma‘arif, 1993); Mubarak, Kitab al-Jihad; Muhammad Ibn Hasan as-Shaybani, Kitab as-Siyar al-Kabir, in Majid Khadduri, comp., The Islamic Law of Nations: Shaybani's Siyar (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1966).
[51] Abu al-A'la al-Mawdudi, Hasan al-Banna, and Sayyid Qutb, Al-Jihad fil-Islam (Beirut: Dar al-Fikr and al-Ittihad al-Islami al-'Alami, 1969).
[52] Johannes J.G. Jansen, The Neglected Duty (New York: Macmillan, 1986), pp. 159-230.
[53] Abdallah ‘Azzam, "Al-Qa‘idah as-Sulbah," Al-Jihad, Apr. 1988, pp. 46-9.
[54] Uriya Shavit, "Al-Qaeda's Saudi Origins," Middle East Quarterly, Fall 2006, pp. 3-13.
[55] Ayman al-Zawahiri, "Knights under the Prophet's Banner," Asharq al-Awsat (London), Dec. 2-10, 2001; Al-Jazeera, Sept. 1, 2005, Aug. 4, 2005, June 17, 2005, Nov. 29, 2004, in Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) TV Monitoring Project.
[56] The Washington Post, Aug. 23, 1998.
[57] Al-Quds al-Arabi (London), Feb. 23, 1998, May 14, 1998; interview, Time Magazine, Dec. 24, 1998; ABC News, Jan. 11, 1999; interview, Newsweek, Jan. 17, 1999.
[58] Asharq al-Awsat, July 13, 2004.
[59] "Osama bin Laden to the Iraqi People," MEMRI Special Dispatch, no. 837, Dec. 30, 2004.
[60] "Abu Mus'ab Al-Zarqawi: Collateral Killing of Muslims Is Legitimate," MEMRI Special Dispatch, no. 917, June 7, 2005.
[61] Ibid.
[62] "Leader of Al-Qaeda in Iraq al-Zarqawi Declares ‘Total War' on Shi‘ites," MEMRI, no. 987, Sept. 16, 2005.
[63] Rudolph Peters, The Encyclopedia of Religions, vol. 8 (New York: Macmillan, 1987), s.v "jihad."
[64] Abdulaziz A. Sachedina, The Just Ruler in Shiite Islam (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988), pp. 106-7, 110-1.
[65] Associated Press, Feb. 3, 2006; Reuters, Feb. 3, 2006.
[66] See Ibn Taymiyah's fatwas in Ahmad A.M. Qasim and Muhammad A.A. Qasim, comps., Majmu' Fatawat Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyah, vol. 9 (Riyadh: Matba'at al-Hukumah, 1996).
[67] Mawdudi, Banna, and Qutb, Al-Jihad fi Sabilillah.
[68] Qur'an, 3:109.
[69] Haim Malka, "Must Innocents Die? The Islamic Debate over Suicide Attacks," Middle East Quarterly, Spring 2003, pp. 19-28.
[70] Ibid.
[71] The Economist, Feb. 13, 2003.
[72] Al-Rayah (Qatar), Apr. 25, 2001; "The Qaradawi Fatwas," Middle East Quarterly, Summer 2004, pp. 78-80.
[73] Al-Istiqlal (Islamic Jihad, Gaza), Aug. 20, 1999.
[74] Qur'an, 5:32.
[75] Der Spiegel, Oct. 1, 2001.
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