The politics of Jihad

A two par series article on 'Johad' by Yale Global.

The Jihad and the West – Part I
Before defining or reacting to the word “jihad,” the meaning must be considered in its historical context. This two-part series debates the meaning and role of “jihad” in a modern global society. In Part I, sociologist Riaz Hassan cautions that any interpretation that dismisses jihad as merely a violent manifestation of religious fanaticism strips the term of its complexity. Throughout history, jihad has connoted the personal goal of the betterment of oneself, the nationalist goal of the glorification of a state, the theological struggle for the purification of Islam and the political struggle for the restructuring of society in an Islamic fashion. Recognizing the political, and therefore worldly, implications of jihad allows for the hope that resolution can come through dialogue and negotiation. Constructive dialogue, however, can only take place with the elimination of mutual oversimplification and misperception. – YaleGlobal


The Jihad and the West – Part I

Jihad is ultimately political action that can be influenced by dialogue and negotiations



Riaz Hassan
YaleGlobal, 21 September 2006


ADELAIDE: The need for a dialogue between Islam and the West has never been more acute than now, but Pope Benedict XVI’s recent description of Islam as “evil and inhuman” is clearly not the best approach. In his lecture on “Faith and Reason” at Regensburg University, the pope quoted the 14th century Byzantine Christian emperor Manuel II Palaeologus as saying, “Show me just what Mohammad brought was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by sword the faith he preached.” Notwithstanding the Vatican’s statement that the pope meant no offense and, in fact, desired dialogue, in the eye of many Muslims his remarks only reinforced a false and biased view of Islam – not conducive to dialogue.


In his lecture the pope made several references to Islamic theology on the nature of God, reason and faith, but his passing reference to jihad presents the stereotypical Western view of the concept, which totally ignores extensive Islamic debates on the topic. The word “jihad” appears in more than 40 verses of the Koran with varying connotations. No single “reading” of the verses can claim primacy. It is surprising that a theologian of the pontiff’s stature sees jihad as an Islamic holy war in the Christian tradition. In Islamic theology, war is never holy: It is either justified or not, and if it is justified, then those who are killed are regarded as martyrs.






The meanings of “jihad” in Islamic history have been profoundly influenced by the prevailing social, political and material conditions. “Jihad,” in other words, is not a fixed category of Islamic thought, but has a complex and contested history that refracts changing understandings about the scope and meaning of worldly action. The meanings of “jihad” in Islamic jurisprudence have included, first, personal striving for achieving superior piety; second, justifications for early Arab conquests of non-Muslim land; third, struggle for Islamic authenticity; fourth, resistance against colonialism; and finally, now, the struggle against the perpetrators of, what sections of Islamists have labeled, “Muslim holocaust.”


For contemporary Islamists, jihad is neither simply a blind and bloody-minded scrabble for temporal power nor solely a door from which to pass from this life into the hereafter. It is, in fact, a political action in which the pursuit of immortality and martyrdom is inextricably linked to a profound endeavour in this world to establishing a just community on earth. It is a form of political action whose pursuit realizes God’s plan on earth and immortalizes human deeds in its pursuit. The penultimate focus of jihad is, Human beings must change so that they may change the world. From this perspective, jihad can be viewed as a revolutionary process with stages that proceed from the spiritual to the temporal realm of politics.






This interpretation is counter to the prevailing conceptions, primarily Western and like the one given by the pope, which view jihad in terms of destruction and suffering inflicted by religious fanatics on civilian populations. It is seen as a pure and simple expression of violent impulses born of religious conviction. Such interpretations ignore the political dimension of the action. In doing so, they also ignore the violence, genocide and coercion undertaken in the name of political convictions such as democracy, with the war in Iraq just one example. American sociologist Michael Mann has called this method of implementation “the dark side of democracy.”


Throughout history humans, inspired by faith, have undertaken action to gain for themselves and their group immortality. In this respect, the modern-day Muslim jihadists such as Al Qaeda, Islamic Jihad, Hizb ut-Tahrir al-Islami, Laskar-i-Taiba have much in common with the “constant warfare” waged by Puritan saints of the European Reformation. They fought their own natural inclinations to fulfill their visions of an ordered society and improve their chances for divine salvation. The Puritan Christians, by linking military action and politics to scripture, according to American philosopher Michael Walzer, were transformed into political revolutionaries, instruments of God for whom action in pursuit of the Holy Commonwealth on earth became the ultimate expression of faith.






The irony of modern jihadists is that the West contributed to building structures and institutional frameworks that sustained their Jihadist consciousness and these structures continue to exist to this day. In the 1980s, with the assistance of Western governments, jihadists were recruited from across the Muslim world, asked to support the people of Afghanistan in resisting the cruel and unjust occupation of the Russian “infidels.” President Reagan called them freedom fighters battling an evil empire, stating, “To watch the courageous Afghan freedom fighters battle modern arsenals with hand-held weapons is an inspiration to those who love freedom.” These jihadists have since turned into Frankenstein’s monsters, taking on the task of destroying their one-time sponsors.


After having won the war against the Russian “infidels” in Afghanistan, jihadists have turned their attention to the sufferings of their fellow Muslims in other “occupied” Muslim countries. My recent study of 6000 Muslim respondents in Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan, Iran, Turkey, Egypt and Kazakhstan suggests that this is a significant component of contemporary Islamic consciousness. For its strategic success, the US-led war on terror relies on the overwhelming economic and military superiority of the West, but its very asymmetry will likely continue to inspire the jihadists to improvise their own weapons and strategies. Thus the war on terror will go on in the foreseeable future.






To understand what is driving large sections of Islamist jihadi movements around the world would require an understanding of the political nature of their action. To portray jihadists as incarnations of evil and as “Islamic fascists” is counterproductive because it only reinforces the pervasive view in the Muslim world that the “war on terror” is a “war on Islam.” This acts as a powerful catalyst for the recruitment of potential jihadists. If war is the failure of politics, then it would seem that political action is a prerequisite to prevent war. Again in the course of my research on Islamic consciousness, I was struck especially in the Middle East by an all-pervasive sense of humiliation arising from the inability of the Arab countries to match the military and economic superiority of Israel. This sense of humiliation is a major underlying cause of Islamic militancy and terrorism.


The sense of humiliation is reinforced by the economic power and absolute technological superiority of the West vis-a-viz Muslim countries. For jihadists, their actions are not simply motivated by impulsive bloody-mindedness or by an overwhelming desire to book a comfortable place in the life hereafter. For them, their jihad is fundamentally a political action through which they pursue the establishment of a just society as ordained in the scriptures and in the process seek to immortalize their own actions beyond their own earthly lives. From this perspective, jihad is ultimately a this-worldly political action and, therefore, amenable to resolution through negotiations as equal citizens of a globalizing world. Such a dialogue and the negotiations it will entail would alleviate some, if not all, of the mutual suspicions between Islam and the West.

Riaz Hassan is ARC Australian Professorial Fellow at Flinders University, Adelaide, Australia. He is the author of “Faithlines: Muslim Conceptions of Islam and Society,” published in 2003 by Oxford University Press. His new book “Inside Muslim Minds: Understanding Islamic Consciousness” will be published this year.



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© 2006 Yale Center for the Study of Globalization

The Jihad and the West – Part II

Jihad as armed struggle was associated with early expansion of Muslim territories and then took on a more defensive connotation in the 19th century, after Muslim nations were subjected to colonization by European powers. This two-part series explores the role of jihad in modern society, and the second article calls on Islamic scholars to consider dispensing with the term when it comes to politics or analysis of wars over national boundaries. Mohammed Ayoob, professor of international relations, traces the history of the term, offering a reminder that the most profound form of “jihad” is one’s internal struggle to undertake moral choices. Muslims cannot allow militants who rely on coercion or violence to appropriate the term for selfish goals. Sadly, as Ayoob writes, the struggle to become a better individual carries little influence in a world of politics where ethnic and religious conflict wins attention and rallies supporters. – YaleGlobal








The Jihad and the West – Part II

Muslims could benefit by removing the word “jihad” from the vocabulary of politics



Mohammed Ayoob
YaleGlobal, 26 September 2006

EAST LANSING, Michigan: In the last few years, and particularly since 9/11, “jihadism” has become synonymous with “terrorism” and “jihadists” with “terrorists.” Consequently, many Muslim intellectuals and public figures have gone into a defensive mode, trying to point out that the greater jihad is the struggle inside oneself to do what is morally right while armed struggle is merely the lesser jihad, secondary to the struggle to control one’s baser instincts.


While all this may be true, it is also the case that the greater jihad, since it does not occupy public space, is of little significance in the current global debate about the use of the term “jihad” and its offshoots “jihadism” and “jihadists.” The irrelevance of greater jihad in public life is self-evident. Fighting temptation, striving to become a better human being, may be a laudable project, but is of marginal concern in the political arena.






“Jihad” has been an intensely political term from the early years of Islam, associated as it has been with the expansion of Muslim empires and justified by the argument that Muslims had the obligation to spread the word of God to humankind. The early Muslim empires were not particularly concerned about converting non-Muslim subjects to Islam and were, therefore, tolerant of religious diversity to a greater extent than their medieval counterparts in Christendom. However, they often used the term “jihad” to justify territorial expansion usually undertaken for economic or strategic gain.


Use of religious terminology to provide a veneer for secular projects is not unique to Islam. Expansionist wars, both of the universal and sectarian variety, conducted in the name of Christianity were usually far more ferocious and destructive of life and property than those undertaken in the name of Islam. Muslim rulers at least did not kill infidels to save their souls. They preferred taxing them to raise revenues for the state, one reason for their lukewarm attitude toward conversion of subject peoples to Islam.






The term “jihad” regained currency in the 19th century when the tide turned and European powers began to subjugate Muslim lands; jihad then took on defensive connotations. The quintessential jihad of the 19th and first half of the 20th century was resistance to colonial domination and war of national liberation. As nationalism in the Muslim world became equated with Muslim identity vis-à-vis the Christian colonizer, the term came to be defined in context-specific terms. The boundaries of the colonies, later to become the borders of post-colonial states, defined the geographic scope of specific jihads. Sudan, Algeria, Somalia, British India, all saw proto-nationalist Muslim resistance wars against European efforts to subjugate Muslim populations termed “jihad.”


The colonial era nationalized jihads as a result of a paradigmatic change in international affairs associated with the development of the modern sovereign state and its corollary, the rise of nationalism in Europe, and its exportation to the colonies. Decolonization universalized the model of the nation-state, confining the notion of jihad further within national boundaries. This paradigmatic change cried out for ijtihad, interpretation based on reasoning to suit changed circumstances, but unfortunately none was forthcoming from the scholars of Islam at least as far as the notion of jihad was concerned.






The Muslim world is now in the era of nation-states and the attachment to national symbols in post-colonial societies is even stronger than in the original homeland of the nation-state, Europe. Wars are conducted on behalf of nations and primarily for reasons of state. Wars of nation- and state-building have become the norm throughout the post-colonial world, including its Muslim component. Wars among contiguous states over disputed territories have also become common. There have been several wars between neighboring Muslim states, the eight-year Iran-Iraq War being the prime example of this phenomenon.


Furthermore, the post-colonial world, including its Muslim component, is awash with ethnic conflicts and subnational revolts. Islamic terminology, including “jihad,” have been used to justify both interstate and intrastate conflicts. Saddam Hussein announced that he was fighting the battle of Qaddasiya, the 7th century battle in which the Arab Muslims defeated the Sassanid Empire of Persia, against the Islamic republic of Iran, an irony lost on most Western observers with scant knowledge of Muslim history.


Kashmiri extremists have waged a jihad against India in the name of Islam to achieve national self-determination, another irony since national self-determination is a recent concept that belongs to the era of nationalist, not religious wars. Sectarian strife has also taken on the nomenclature of jihad. The Sunni Arabs of Iraq wage a jihad against Iraqi Shia Arabs by blowing up their holy sites and causing carnage in crowded markets. The Shia retaliate by waging their own jihad, blowing up Sunni mosques and sending death squads to kill Sunnis where the latter are vulnerable.






All this mayhem in the name of Islam makes one wonder why some conflicts in which Muslims are engaged are called “jihad” and others are not despite the fact that they basically share the same characteristics. After all, what is the difference between secessionist/irredentist wars waged by Muslim Kurds against Turkey or the Muslim inhabitants of Darfur against Sudan from similar wars waged by Kashmiris or Chechens against India and Russia? Why was the liberation movement in Bangladesh in 1971 against the atrocities committed by the Pakistan army not termed “jihad” despite its obviously just nature? Clearly, all of these conflicts are products of demands for ethno-national self-determination, often triggered by accumulated grievances resulting from their respective governments’ discriminatory policies. But why does one not hear of a Kurdish jihad or a Darfuri jihad or a Bengali jihad?


All this leads to the conclusion that the term “jihad” has been and continues to be grossly misused and deserves to be removed from the vocabulary of Muslim politics. It obfuscates rather than clarifies issues, and, worse, the use of the term to justify terrorist acts against civilians demonizes Islam and Muslims. The problem of saving Muslims from the negative fallout of all these jihads will not be solved by the kind of apologetics that elevates the personal jihad over the political jihad, calling one greater or lesser. The world is not taken in by such sophistry. It is time Muslims totally abjure the use of the term “jihad” in the contemporary context.


“Jihadist” and “jihadism,” derivatives from “jihad,” have become derogatory terms used to describe the most violent and extremist groups who have arrogated to themselves the right to declare jihad against all and sundry. The only way to remedy this situation is for the scholars of Islam to reach a consensus and declare publicly that the term “jihad” no longer applies in a world of nation-states where conflicts take place over issues of territory and ethnicity rather than on the basis of the simple dichotomy between dar-al-Islam and dar-al-harb.


In fact, that simple dichotomy did not exist in the classical age of Islam as well, as intra-Muslim wars going back to the early years of Islam testify. But that is another matter and not really relevant to the present discussion. What is evident, the concept of jihad is irrelevant to the current epoch of political relations, and it is the duty of Muslim scholars to make this clear. This is an ijtihad that is long overdue.

Mohammed Ayoob is University Distinguished Professor of International Relations at Michigan State University. This article is based on a presentation he made at IslamExpo in London on July 7, 2006.



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© 2006 Yale Center for the Study of Globalization