{"id":3265,"date":"2008-10-19T22:29:50","date_gmt":"2008-10-19T22:29:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/victorhanson.com.108-166-28-151.mdgnetworks.com\/wordpress\/?p=3265"},"modified":"2013-03-25T22:30:45","modified_gmt":"2013-03-25T22:30:45","slug":"islam-and-innocence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/islam-and-innocence\/","title":{"rendered":"Islam and Innocence"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Raymond Ibrahim<\/p>\n

Jihad Watch<\/em><\/p>\n

Just recently, a high ranking Pakistani cleric, one Munib ur-Rehmen,asserted<\/a>\u00a0that \u201cIslam does not allow anybody to take lives of innocent people by any means.\u201d However, when he was grand mufti, two years earlier, he alsosaid<\/a>\u00a0that \u201ctruly Islamic\u201d states must kill the apostate from Islam. Considering his former statement, that Islam forbids the taking of \u201cinnocent\u201d lives, has Munib been caught fibbing? Either way, this anecdote occasions the question: who is \u201cinnocent\u201d in Islam?<\/p>\n

Whereas other Muslims may shy away from this question, opting for the na\u00efve Westerner to simply assume that \u201cinnocence\u201d in Islam is akin to the liberal West\u2019s notions of \u201cinnocence,\u201d al Qaeda \u2014 which seems to be supported bynearly half<\/a>\u00a0of the Muslim world \u2014 has been only to happy to clarify this matter.<\/p>\n

Back in December, the terrorist organization\u2019s primary media conduit, al-Sahab (the \u201cclouds\u201d) announced that al Qaeda\u2019s number two, Ayman Zawahiri, would be taking questions from the public and that he would \u201crespond as soon as possible.\u201d<\/p>\n

Then, a few months later in April, according to the\u00a0Associated Press<\/a>, Zawahiri released a 90-minute audio tape, \u201cbilled as the first installment of answers to the more than 900 questions submitted on extremist internet sites by al-Qaeda supporters, critics and journalists.\u201d<\/p>\n

In response to a question that suggested al Qaeda was responsible for the deaths of innocents in Baghdad, Morocco, and Algeria \u2014 Muslim areas where countless terrorist attacks in the name of al Qaeda still occur daily \u2014 Zawahiri adamantly maintained that \u201cWe haven\u2019t killed innocents,\u201d not in any of those regions mentioned; \u201cnor,\u201d added Zawahari, \u201canywhere else\u201d \u2014 which obviously includes 9\/11, the London and Madrid bombings, and the rest.<\/p>\n

Was Zawahiri being facetious, or does he truly deem all those killed in the aforementioned attacks as not \u201cinnocent\u201d \u2014 that is, guilty?
\nAs for Western infidels, Osama bin Laden himself has announced on various occasions that, since America is a democracy, and thus responsible for its government (which is always portrayed as one of the greatest enemies of Islam), \u201cEvery American man is an enemy \u2014 whether he fights us directly or pays his taxes,\u201d (The Al Qaeda Reader<\/a>\"\"The Al Qaeda Reader, 281). Accordingly, al-Qaeda issued its famous fatwa in 1998 concluding that \u201cThe ruling to kill the Americans and their allies \u2014 civilian and military \u2014 is an individual obligation incumbent upon every Muslim who can do it and in any country\u201d (AQR, 13).<\/p>\n

What of women and children? What of fellow Muslims? Surely all these are innocent? In fact, Zawahiri, in one of his major treatises written for Muslim-eyes only, \u201cJihad, Martyrdom, and the Killing of Innocents\u201d (see AQR,141-171), demonstrates the opposite. After quoting several anecdotes from authoritative\u00a0hadith\u00a0<\/em>and\u00a0sira<\/em>\u00a0sources documenting Muhammad legitimizing haphazard attacks against infidel strongholds \u2014 including by utilizing catapults (al-manjonil<\/em>) and fire \u2014 even though women and children were known to be sheltered there, Zawahiri quotes the observations of a prominent exegete: \u201cIt is well known that whoever follows such a course, bombarding infidels, will inevitably hit their women and children, who are otherwise forbidden from being killed. Likewise, the same goes if Muslims are among them. It is compulsory that this [the possibility of hitting women, children, and Muslims] not dissuade the launching of an incursion against them\u2026 even if one dreads hitting another Muslim\u201d (AQR, 165).<\/p>\n

As for \u201chitting another Muslim,\u201d in Zawahiri\u2019s April response, he concluded that \u201cIf there is any innocent [i.e., Muslim] who was killed in the mujahedeen\u2019s operations, then it was either an unintentional error or out of necessity.\u201d Again, this response accords perfectly with what he wrote in \u201cJihad, Martyrdom, and the Killing of Innocents\u201d: after discussing the inevitability that faithful Muslims may be \u201caccidentally\u201d killed during the jihad, Zawahiri quoted the renowned Muslim jurist Ibn Taymiyya, who declared some 700 years ago that, \u201cBased on the consensus of the\u00a0ulema<\/em>\u00a0[Islamic scholars], those Muslims who are accidentally killed are martyrs; and the obligatory jihad should never be abandoned because it creates martyrs\u201d (AQR,168). In other words, yes, Muslims who are slain \u201caccidentally\u201d are innocent; however, their recompense is to be deemed \u201cmartyrs,\u201d that is, to attain the highest level of paradise, with all the sensual bliss that only Islam promises.<\/p>\n

Also, the concept of \u201cnecessity\u201d alluded to above \u2014 \u201cany innocent who was killed\u2026out of necessity\u201d \u2014 seems to permeate Islam’s worldview. Quoting yet another prominent sheikh, Zawahiri writes \u201cIf necessity compels one to fire at them [Muslims interspersed among infidels, e.g., the \u201capostate\u201d governments of Algeria, Afghanistan, and Iraq], one should do so with impunity… For if we lay off them, they will emerge triumphant and cause even more harm\u2026. It is better that one group [of Muslims] bear the burden and be destroyed in order to defend Islam and its territory and the welfare [of Muslims].\u201d To this, Zawahiri concludes, \u201cThe evils produced by attacking impetuously [thereby accidentally killing Muslims] is forgiven due to the good of defending Islam\u201d (AQR, 166).<\/p>\n

Finally, as Zawahiri makes clear, the question of whether it is permissible to kill women, children, et al. during the jihad was decided upon by the jurists (fuqaha<\/em>) when Islam was on the ascendancy, and engaged in offensive warfare simply to conquer infidels and usurp their lands; in other words, the question of killing \u201cinnocents\u201d was relevant only when Muslims were the aggressors, invading infidel territory. Writes Zawahiri: \u201cBut when Muslims are defending their religion and their sanctities, and the infidels are surrounding them from every corner, and instead they [infidels] are the ones seeking them out and pursuing them\u2026 \u2014 in these situations it becomes a binding obligation on every Muslim to fight them anyway he can\u2026 [even if] some Muslims might be killed mistakenly\u201d (AQR, 168).<\/p>\n

Indeed, this view is based on “ulemaic” consensus \u2014 which is often seen as binding on the\u00a0umma<\/em>. Ibn Taymiyya makes this clear: \u201cAs for defensive warfare, this is the greatest way to defend sanctity and religion. This is an obligation consensually agreed to [by the\u00a0ulema<\/em>]. After faith, there is nothing more sacred than repulsing the enemy who attacks religion and life\u201d (AQR, 13).<\/p>\n

In other words, in those Muslim countries where infidels and apostates are perceived as having the upper hand \u2014 such as Afghanistan, Algeria, and Iraq \u2014 far from worrying about whether infidel women and children are killed, Muslim women and children themselves are individually obligated to participate or at least support the jihad.<\/p>\n

Most problematic of all is the fact that, neither Pakistani cleric Munib ur-Rehmen, nor Ayman Zawahiri, nor yet Osama bin Laden are responsible for these notions or what constitutes \u201cinnocence\u201d in Islam. Rather, their views are grounded in the verdicts of Islam\u2019s revered\u00a0ulema<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0fuqaha<\/em>, who, in their turn, came up with these conclusions after grappling (ijtihad<\/em>) with Islam\u2019s core texts \u2014 the way all of sharia law has been articulated. In short, though much of what was quoted here comes from the writings of al Qaeda, such notions are not original to al Qaeda but trace back to the\u00a0ulema<\/em>\u00a0and sharia.<\/p>\n

In closing, this somewhat idiosyncratic concept of \u201cguilt\u201d and \u201cinnocence\u201d should better highlight the epistemic difficulties the Westerner may encounter when trying to understand Islam \u2014 a religion, it should be recalled, that deems even the Muslim who simply and peacefully wants to convert to another religion, \u201cguilty\u201d and worthy of execution.<\/p>\n

As the Pakistani Munib indicated at the beginning of this discussion, only the \u201ctruly Islamic\u201d state will execute the apostate, which itself is truly telling about Islam’s notions of innocence and guilt and how radically different they are from Western ideals.<\/p>\n

\n
\n

Raymond Ibrahim is the editor of the\u00a0Al-Qaeda Reader<\/a><\/i>, translations of religious texts and propaganda.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Raymond Ibrahim Jihad Watch Just recently, a high ranking Pakistani cleric, one Munib ur-Rehmen,asserted\u00a0that \u201cIslam does not allow anybody to take lives of innocent people by any means.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[227,738],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-QF","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":6920,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/gen-sisi-religious-discourse-greatest-challenge-facing-egypt\/","url_meta":{"origin":3265,"position":0},"title":"Gen. 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