LAW
Jihad Prohibited As A War
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.
The Arabic root ج ه د carries in it the concept of striving, overpowering a resistance with greater will power or struggling for good cause. Ordinary meanings of the words from this root do not involve any militancy or extremism like attacking, killing, slaughtering, slaying or committing murder or mayhem. Instead, the original meanings imply communicating, talking and settling disagreements by peaceful dialogue and conversation.
The noun from this root ‘Je-haad’ (incorrectly spelled as Jihad) means the aforesaid type of striving hard by exerting strong will. The derivative word ‘Jaa-hid’ (009:073) means the ‘doer of the acts of Je-haad’. It has been used to extrapolate that the Holy Prophet s.a.w (See our Commentary Islam, Qor-aan, Mohammad, Relationship) was ordered to ‘fight’ the disbelievers and hypocrites.
Any reasonable person can pin-point the fallacy of such assertion by looking at the reference to the context and the contents of the two verses before it and the three verses after it reproduced below:
And the believing men and women are friends to each other. They join in doing the good, prohibiting the evil, observing the prayers, paying the poor-due and obeying Allah and His messenger. They are on whom Allah will soon shower His mercy. Indeed Allah is Almighty All-Wise (009:071).
Allah has promised the believing men and women gardens beneath which streams flow. They will abide in clean dwellings in the Gardens of Eden and the greatest pleasure of Allah, the Greatest. That is the supreme triumph (009:072).
Listen Prophet! you too strive with those who don’t yet believe and the hypocrites and be firm with them that not following you they will go to hell and an evil Return (009:073).
They swear by Allah in what they say but they utter words of disbelief after their Islam and pursue what they can’t achieve. And they didn’t hate until after Allah and His messenger had enriched them with His grace. If they believe, it will be good for them. If they disbelieve, Allah will punish them terribly in this life and the Hereafter. And they will have no friend or helper anywhere on earth (009:074).
And among them are those who promised, “We will donate to charity if His grace reached us” (009:075).
But when His grace reached them they hoarded, turned back and were averse (009:076).
These passages make clear that the good fate of Believers is the incentives for others to join them. They urge non-believers to enter the fold by warning of God’s punishment (as all Scriptures, including Torah and Bible, do).
Nowhere is a Moslems ordered to invade the country or homes of non-Moslems to establish his faith. To the contrary, verse 009:074 is explicit: the punishment for non-believers will come from Allah, not from Believers mistakenly wielding a false mandate that God never gave.
In fact, the true meaning of these verses upholds the principles on which United Nations was founded. It prohibits spreading communism, socialism, capitalism or democracy by conquering other sovereign nations to really plunder their natural resources like the South African diamonds, Indian food and spices or middle eastern oil.
To be fair, the verse 002:191 of the Holy Qor-aan clearly confers upon a victim the right of private defense by retaliating against his transgressor. But even that exercise of self-defense is limited (a) to the situation when self-defense advances the cause of Allah, and (b) to the extent it is proportionate to the initial aggression committed against the victim.
This verse (or for that matter, any other verse of the Holy Qor-aan) does not allow, justify, permit or warrant a cart blanch killing of other human beings for any reason whatever — leave alone doing so on the basis of any real or perceived difference in the religion, views, cast, creed or color like Man the animal has always done wanting to ‘conquer the world’ or ‘impose his version of religious, political or economic’ suitability for the whole mankind.
This verse really is an absolute prohibition against initiating, continuing or perpetuating war of any kind. How sad it is that the very prohibition against war has been twisted around by some as a justification to spread their dogmas by crusades, holy wars, Jehad or Jihad, while by others to criticize Islam, which is essentially a message for love, peace and humanism.
This verse merits to be studied along with other verses mentioned in the Law of War.
Jihad prohibited as a war
LAW
Jihad Prohibited As A War
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.
The Arabic root ج ه د carries in it the concept of striving, overpowering a resistance with greater will power or struggling for good cause. Ordinary meanings of the words from this root do not involve any militancy or extremism like attacking, killing, slaughtering, slaying or committing murder or mayhem. Instead, the original meanings imply communicating, talking and settling disagreements by peaceful dialogue and conversation.
The noun from this root ‘Je-haad’ (incorrectly spelled as Jihad) means the aforesaid type of striving hard by exerting strong will. The derivative word ‘Jaa-hid’ (009:073) means the ‘doer of the acts of Je-haad’. It has been used to extrapolate that the Holy Prophet s.a.w (See our Commentary Islam, Qor-aan, Mohammad, Relationship) was ordered to ‘fight’ the disbelievers and hypocrites.
Any reasonable person can pin-point the fallacy of such assertion by looking at the reference to the context and the contents of the two verses before it and the three verses after it reproduced below:
These passages make clear that the good fate of Believers is the incentives for others to join them. They urge non-believers to enter the fold by warning of God’s punishment (as all Scriptures, including Torah and Bible, do).
Nowhere is a Moslems ordered to invade the country or homes of non-Moslems to establish his faith. To the contrary, verse 009:074 is explicit: the punishment for non-believers will come from Allah, not from Believers mistakenly wielding a false mandate that God never gave.
In fact, the true meaning of these verses upholds the principles on which United Nations was founded. It prohibits spreading communism, socialism, capitalism or democracy by conquering other sovereign nations to really plunder their natural resources like the South African diamonds, Indian food and spices or middle eastern oil.
To be fair, the verse 002:191 of the Holy Qor-aan clearly confers upon a victim the right of private defense by retaliating against his transgressor. But even that exercise of self-defense is limited (a) to the situation when self-defense advances the cause of Allah, and (b) to the extent it is proportionate to the initial aggression committed against the victim.
This verse (or for that matter, any other verse of the Holy Qor-aan) does not allow, justify, permit or warrant a cart blanch killing of other human beings for any reason whatever — leave alone doing so on the basis of any real or perceived difference in the religion, views, cast, creed or color like Man the animal has always done wanting to ‘conquer the world’ or ‘impose his version of religious, political or economic’ suitability for the whole mankind.
This verse really is an absolute prohibition against initiating, continuing or perpetuating war of any kind. How sad it is that the very prohibition against war has been twisted around by some as a justification to spread their dogmas by crusades, holy wars, Jehad or Jihad, while by others to criticize Islam, which is essentially a message for love, peace and humanism.
This verse merits to be studied along with other verses mentioned in the Law of War.
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