Jihad defined by Pakistan’s High Court

LAW

JIHAD
Defined by the West Pakistan HighCourt

Report of the Court of Inquiry constituted under Punjab Act II of 1954 to inquire into the Punjab Disturbances of 1953 – Published by the Superintendent, Government Printing Press, Punjab. 1954. Part IV

“There are various theories about Jihad which vary from the crude notion of a megalomaniac moved by religious frenzy going out armed with sword and indiscriminately slaughtering non-Muslims in the belief that if he dies in the combat he becomes a shahid and if he succeeds in killing attains the status of a ghazi, to the conception that a Musalman throughout his life is pitted against kufr, kufr here being used in the sense of evil and wrong, and that his principal activity in life is to strive by argument and where necessary by force to spread Islam until it becomes a world religion. In the later case he fights not for any personal end but because he considers such strife as a duty and an obligation which he owes to Allah and the only recompense for which is the pleasure of Allah” (p 222)… “Generally accepted view is that (9:5) abrogated the earlier verses revealed in Mecca which permitted the killing of kuffar only in self defense. As against this the Ahmadis believe that no verse of the Qur’an was abrogated by another verse .. that both sets of verses have different scopes and can stand together.. that the doctrine of Nasikh and Munsukh is opposed to the belief in the existence of an original scripture” (pp 223-224).

“We are wholly incompetent to pronounce on the result to which the doctrine of Jihad will lead if, as appears from … writings produced before us including one by Maulana Abul Ala Maudoodi and another by Maulana Shabbir Ahmad Usmani, it involves the spread of Islam by arms and conquest. ‘AGGRESSION’ and ‘GENOCIDE’ are now offences against humanity for which under sentences pronounced by different International Tribunals at Nuremburg and Tokio the war lords of Germany and Japan had to forfeit their lives. And there is hardly any difference between the offences of ‘aggression’ and ‘genocide’ on the one hand and the doctrine of spread of Islam by arms and conquest on the other” (p 224).

“Each of the verses in Soorut-ul-Kafiroon which contains thirty words and no verse exceeds six words, brings out a fundamental trait in man engrained in him since his creation while the La Ikraha verse, the relevant portion of which contains only nine words, states the rule of responsibility of the mind with a precision that cannot be surpassed.  Both of these texts which are an early part of the Revelation are, individually and collectively, the foundation of that principle which human society, after centuries of conflict, hatred and bloodshed, has adopted in defining one of the most important fundamental rights of man.   But our doctors would never disassociate chauvinism from Islam” (p 220).

“As to the doctrine of Jihad, the Ahmadi view is that what is called jihad-bis-saif is permissible only in self defense and that in stating his own view on this question Mirza Ghulam Ahmad merely expounded a doctrine which is based on, and directly follows from, the several texts in the Qur’an and that he did not profess to repeal or abrogate any rule or injunction of the Qur’an” (p 192).

See our Commentary titled as Islaam – 303 – Jihad is no road to Peace which is the hub-post and refers to about a dozen other Commentaries related to different aspect of Jihad.