Copyright © 2001, Islamic Political Ethics: Civil
Society, Pluralism, and Conflict. Used with permission.
[1] If their discourse on the Persian Gulf War is any indication,
Muslims are hopelessly divided on the Islamic ethics of war and
peace. One graphic indication of this division is found in the
deliberations of the People's Islamic Conference, a group of Muslim
activists and scholars from several countries originally convened
to find a resolution for the Iran-Iraq War. During January 1991, in
the weeks immediately before the Gulf War air campaign against
Iraq, the conference was meeting simultaneously in Baghdad and
Mecca, with the Baghdad group demonstrating sympathy with the Iraqi
position and the Meccans supporting the anti-Iraq coalition. In the
end, both groups issued communiqués declaring their side's
cause to be a "just" war, that is, jihad.
[2] Muslim writers of many intellectual persuasions have long
argued that Westerners hold an inaccurate, even deliberately
distorted, conception of jihad. In fact, however, the idea of jihad
(and the ethics of war and peace generally) has been the subject of
an intense and multifaceted debate among Muslims themselves. So
diffusely defined and inconsistently applied has the idea become in
Islamic discourse that a number of religious opposition groups have
felt compelled to differentiate their cause from competing "false"
causes by naming themselves, tautologically, "Islamic" jihad.
[3] Nevertheless, when the contemporary Islamic discourse on war
and peace is studied in the context of recent historical events,
including decolonization and the many conflicts in which Muslims
have been involved, one can discern an emerging consensus among
Muslim intellectuals on the current meaning of jihad. This
consensus is by no means universal, and given the diffuse nature of
religious authority in the Islamic tradition, debate on the ethics
of war and peace is likely to continue. But as I hope to
demonstrate, the concept of jihad in contemporary Islam is one that
is still adapting to the radical changes in international relations
that have occurred since th medieval theory was first elaborated.
We are witnessing a period of reinterpretation and redefinition,
one characterized by controversy and confusion about how the
concept should be applied to contemporary events, but also by
movement toward wider agreement on the essential points of an
Islamic ethics of war and peace.
[4] This chapter, in contrast to Bassam Tibi's presentation of
the "basic religious doctrine," seeks to place the traditional
legal discussion of war and peace within a broader ethical context.
I begin by considering the conceptions of war and peace outlined in
the two essential sources for any Islamic ethics, the Qur'an and
practice (sunna) of the prophet Muhammad. These sections
are necessarily to some extent exegetical, for my main contention
is that a comprehensive ethical framework for addressing the
question of violence in human society is present in the Qur'an and
elaborated by the traditions of the Prophet. In the remaining two
sections, I consider issues relating to the grounds for war and the
means of war as treated by the medieval Muslim jurists. But my main
purpose in these sections is to consider how these two categories
of moral evaluation of war are today being reinterpreted by Muslim
thinkers representing a wide spectrum of cultural and ideological
backgrounds. The proper conclusion, I believe, is that Islam has
more in common with Western ethical traditions than Tibi allows,
Regarding the issue of the relationship between the Islamic
tradition of jihad and the Western tradition of just war, I shall
suggest that there is a growing convergence in conceptions of jihad
and just war that permits a cross-cultural dialogue on the ethics
of war and peace.
[5] Much of the controversy surrounding the concept of Jihad
among Muslims today emerges from the tension between its legal and
ethical dimensions. This tension arises because it is the juristic,
and not the philosophical or ethical, literature that has
historically defined Muslim discourse on war and peace. With the
rise of the legalistic tradition, ethical inquiry became a narrow
and secondary concern of Islamic scholarship. What we find from the
medieval period are legal treatises propounding the rules of Jihad
and discussing related issues, but few ethical works outlining a
framework of principles derived from the Qur'an and sunna upon
which these rules could be based. With increasing political
instability in the central Islamic lands beginning in the twelfth
century, even legal development became moribund. The results have
been particularly deleterious in the political realm. As Fazlur
Rahman has observed, the stagnation of formal legal theory resulted
in the increasing "secularization" of Islamic administrative law.
As the dictates of the medieval Islamic law (shari'a)
became anachronistic according to the demands of various Muslim
states, jurists increasingly appealed to the notions of maslaha
mursala (general interest) and darura (necessity) as
justifications for various state practices.[1] The result has been the
continual erosion of the ability of Islamic law to address
contemporary political concerns and the reduction of Islamic ethics
to the ad hoc application of principles to specific situations in a
chaotic and unsatisfactory manner. One of the central dimensions of
the current controversy concerning the shari'a that is raging in
the Muslim world-although it is not often phrased in this manner-is
the need for a comprehensive Qur'anic ethics as a precursor to the
reform of law.
Conceptions of War and Peace in the Qur'an
[6] Ibn Khaldun observes in the Muqaddima, his
celebrated introduction to a history of the world composed at the
end of the fourteenth century, that "wars and different kinds of
fighting have always occurred in the world since God created it."
War is endemic to human existence, he writes, "something natural
among human beings. No nation, and no race is free from
it."[2] Ibn Khaldun's brief comment
summarizes rather well the traditional Islamic understanding of war
as a universal and inevitable aspect of human existence. It is a
feature of human society sanctioned, if not willed, by God Himself.
The issues of war and peace thus fall within the purview of divine
legislation for humanity. Islam, Muslims like to say, is a
complete code of life, given the centrality of war to human
existence, the moral evaluation of war holds a significant place in
Muslim ethical/legal discussion. The Islamic ethics of war and.
peace is therefore derived from the same general sources upon which
Islamic law is based.
[7] The first of, these sources, of course, is the Qur'an, which
is held by Muslims to be God's final and definitive revelation to
humanity. The Qur'anic text, like other revealed scriptures, is not
a systematic treatise on ethics or law. It is a discursive
commentary on the actions and experiences of the prophet Muhammad,
his followers, and his opponents over the course of twenty-three
years. But as the Qur'an itself argues in several verses, God's
message is not limited to the time and place of its revelation; it
is, rather, "a message to all the worlds" (81:27) propounding a
moral code with universal applicability. (39:41) From this
commentary emerge broadly defined ethical principles that have been
elaborated throughout Islamic history into what may be termed an
Islamic conception of divine creation and man's place in it. 1 In
other words, although the Qur'an does not present a systematic
ethical argument, it is possible to derive a consistent ethical
system from it.[3]
[8] Why is humanity prone to war? The Qur'anic answer unfolds in
the course of several verses revealed at various times, the
essential points of which may be summarized as follows:
[9] First, man's fundamental nature (fitra) is one of
moral innocence, that is, freedom from sin. In other words, there
is no Islamic equivalent to the notion of "original sin." Moreover,
each individual is born with a knowledge of God's commandments,
that is, with the essential aspects of righteous behavior. But this
moral awareness is eroded as each individual encounters the
corrupting influences of human society (30:30).
[10] Second, man's nature is to live on the earth in a state of
harmony, and peace with other living things. This is the ultimate
import of the responsibility assigned by God to man as His
vicegerent (khalifa) on this planet (2:30). True peace
(salam) is therefore not merely an absence of war; it is
the elimination of the grounds for strife or conflict, and the
resulting waste and corruption (fasad) they create. Peace,
not war or violence, is God's true purpose for humanity
(2:208).
[11] Third, given man's capacity for wrongdoing, there will
always be some who chooseto violate their nature and transgress
against God's commandments. Adam becomes fully human only when he
chooses to heed Iblis's (Satan's) temptation and disobeys God. As a
result of this initial act of disobedience, human beings are
expelled from the Garden to dwell on earth as "enemies to each
other" {2:36, 7:24). Thus, wars and the evils that stem from them,
the Qur'an suggests, are the inevitable consequences of the
uniquely human capacity for moral choice.
[12] The Qur'an does not present the fall of man as irrevocable,
however, for God quickly returns to Adam to support and guide him.
(2:37). This, according to Islamic belief, is the beginning of
continuous divine revelation "to humanity through a series of
prophets ending with Muhammad. God's reminders of the laws
imprinted upon each human consciousness through His prophets are a
manifestation of His endless mercy to His creation, because all
human beings are potential victims of Iblis's guile, that is,
potential evildoers, and most human beings are actually quite far
from God's laws (36:45-46). When people form social units, they
become all the more prone to disobey God's laws through the
obstinate persistence in wrongdoing caused by custom and social
pressures (2:1.3-1:4,37:69,43:22). In this way, the individual
drive for power, wealth, prestige, and all the other innumerable
human goals becomes amplified. Violence is the inevitable result of
the human desire for self-aggrandizement.
[13] Fourth, each prophet encounters opposition from those
(always a majority) who persist in their rebellion against God,
justifying their actions through various self-delusions. One of the
principal characteristics of rejection of God (kufr) is
the inclination toward violence and oppression, encapsulated by the
broad concept zulm. When individuals choose to reject
divine guidance, either by transgressing against specific divine
injunctions or by losing faith altogether, they violate (commit
zulm against) their own nature (fitra). When Adam and Eve, J
disobey the divine command in the Garden, the Qur'an relates that
they cry out in their despair not that they have sinned against
God, but that they have transgressed against their own souls
(7:23). When an entire society rejects God, oppression and violence
become the norm throughout the society and in relation with other
societies as well the moral anarchy that prevails when human beings
abandon the higher moral code derived from faith in a supreme and
just Creator, the Qur'an suggests, is fraught with potential and
actual violence (2:11-12,27, 2Q4-5; chapter 7,al-A'raf, deals with
this theme at length).
[14] Fifth, peace (salam) is attainable only when beings
surrender to God's will and live according to God's laws. This is
the condition of islam, the conscious decision to
acknowledge in faith and conduct the presence and power of God.
Because human nature is not sufficiently strong to resist the
temptation to evil, it is necessary for man to establish a human
agency, that is, a state, to mitigate the effects of anarchy and
enforce divine law.
[15] Sixth, because it is unlikely that individuals or societies
will ever conform fully to the precepts of Islam, Muslims must
always be prepared to fight to preserve the Muslim faith and Muslim
principles (8:60, 73). The use of force by the Muslim community is,
therefore, sanctioned by God as a necessary response to the
existence of evil in the world. As the Qur'an elaborates in an
early revelation, the believers are those "who, whenever tyranny
afflicts them, defend themselves" (42:39). This theme of the just,
God-ordained use of force for legitimate purposes is continued in
several other verses. In the first verse that explicitly permits
the Muslim community to use armed force against its enemies, the
Qur'an makes clear that fighting is a burden imposed upon all
believers (not only Muslims) as a result of the enmity harbored by
the unbelievers:
[16] Permission [to fight] is given to those against whom War is
being wrongfully waged, and verily, God has indeed the power to
succor them: those who have been driven from their homelands
against all right for no other reason than their saying: "Our
Sustainer is God!" For, if God had not enabled people to defend
themselves against one another, monasteries and churches and
synagogues and mosques-in all of which God's name is abundantly
extolled-would surely have been destroyed. (22:39-40)
[17] A subsequent verse converts this permission to fight into
an injunction: The rationale given for using armed force is quite
explicit "Tumult and oppression (fitna) is worse than
killing" (2:191). These two verses clearly undermine the
possibility of an Islamic pacifism. One verse in particular offers
an implicit challenge to an ethical position based on the
renunciation of all violence: "Fighting is prescribed for you, even
though it be hateful to you; but it may well be that you hate.
something that is in fact good for you, and that you love a thing
that is in fact bad for you: and God knows, whereas you do not"
(2:216). There is, thus, no equivalent in the Islamic tradition of
the continuing debate within Christianity of the possibility of
just war: There is no analogue in Islamic texts to Aquinas' s
Question 40: "Are some wars permissible?" The Islamic discourse on
war and peace begins from the a priori assumption that some types
of war are permissible-indeed, required by God-and that all other
forms of violence are, therefore, forbidden. In short, the
Qur'an's attitude toward war and peace may be described as an
idealistic realism. Human existence is characterized neither by
incessant warfare nor by real peace, but by a continuous tension
between the two; Societies exist forever in a precarious balance
between them. The unending human challenge jihad fi sabil
Allah (struggle in the way of God) to mitigate the possibility
of war to strengthen the grounds for peace. The resulting human
condition may bear out the truth of the angels' initial protest to
God that his decision to create man will only lead to corruption
and bloodshed in the world. But the Qur'anic message is, if
anything, continually optimistic about "the human capacity to
triumph over evil (5:56.; 58:19, 22): God silences the angels,
after all, not by denying their, prognostication, but by holding
out the possibility of unforeseen potential: "I know what you know
not" (2:30).
Conceptions of War and Peace in the Sunna
[18] The second source for the Islamic ethics of war and peace
is the practice (sunna) of the prophet Muhammad. It is impossible
to comprehend the Qur'an without understanding the life of the
Prophet and impossible to comprehend the life of the Prophet
without understanding the Qur'an. As the Prophet's wife, Aisha bint
Abi Bakr, is reported to have said: "His character
(khuluqhu) was the Qur'an.[4]
[19] Muhammad was born into a milieu characterized by
internecine skirmishes (ghazwa) among rival robes. These
were seldom more than raids undertaken for petty plunder of a
neighboring tribe's flocks. If the conflict had any "higher"
purpose, it was usually collective reprisal for an injury or
affront suffered by a single member of the tribe: according to the
prevailing lex talionis. Larger confrontations for higher
stakes, such as the actual conquest of territory, were rare,
although not unknown. The Qur'an itself alludes in the 105th
chapter to a full scale invasion of the Hijaz by an Abyssinian army
a few months prior to the birth of the Prophet in 570 C.E.
Naturally, tribal loyalty was the cornerstone of this society's
ethos, and virtue was often equated with. martial valor. It would,
however, be incorrect to view pre-Islamic' Arab culture as
glorifying war. Imru'l-Qays, the renowned poet of the pre-Islamic
period known as the jahiliyya, compares war before it is
started to a young and alluring girl. But once a war begins, it
quickly becomes like an old woman, hideous in appearance, unable to
find any young suitor to embrace her.[5]
Moreover, as Fred Donner points out, the ghazw'a was often
viewed by its participants as a sort of ongoing game, a struggle to
outwit the opponent with a minimum of bloodshed. The aim was not to
vanquish the foe but to demonstrate the qualities of courage,
loyalty, and magnanimity-all components of masculine nobility
included in the term muruwwa. Implicit in the Arab martial code
were "rules of the game" that prohibited, among other things,
fighting during certain months, the killing of noncombatants, and
unnecessary spoliation.[6]
[20] The conceptions of warfare existing in the jahiliyya
undoubtedly influenced the Prophet's approach to the subject. In
particular, many of the qualities of muruwwa were incorporated into
Islam within a new ethical context, and the Prophet became the new
exemplar of Arab chivalry. [7]But it
would be false to suggest, as have some Western writers, that the
Prophet's approach to war was largely an "extension of the
pre-Islamic Arab approach to the ghazwa.[8] Such a contention is not
borne out by either the prophet's practice or his (and the
Qur'an's) self-image as a reformer of pagan Arab values. We can
construct an outline of the Prophet's approach to the ethics. of
war and peace not only by referring to the Qur'an, but also by
making use of the large body of literature comprising the Prophet's
sayings and actions (hadith) and biography (sira)
compiled between the second and fourth Islamic centuries. It is
clear from these records that from an early age, Muhammad was
averse to many aspects of the tribal culture in which he was born.
In particular, there is no indication that he ever showed any
interest in affairs of tribal honor, particularly in the ghazwa.
throughout the Meccan period of his prophetic mission (610-22
C.E,), he showed no inclination toward the use of force in any
form, even for self-defense--on the contrary, his policy can only
be described as nonviolent resistance. This policy was maintained
in spite of escalating physical attacks directed at his followers
and at him personally. And it was maintained in spite of growing
pressure from within the Muslim ranks to respond in kind,
particularly after the conversion of two men widely considered to
embody traditional Arab virtues, the Prophet's uncle Hamza and
'Umar ibn al-Khattab. Some Qur'anic verses reflect the growing
tension among the Meccan Muslims over the use of force (16:125-28,
46:35). Nevertheless, the Prophet insisted throughout this period
on the virtues of patience and steadfastness in the face of their
opponents' attacks. When the persecution of the most vulnerable
Muslims (former slaves and members of Mecca's poorer families)
became intense, he directed them to seek refuge in the realm of a
Christian king, Abyssinia. The Prophet's rejection of armed
struggle during the Meccan period was more' than mere prudence
based on the Muslims' military weakness. It was, rather, derived
from the Qur'an's still unfolding conception that the use of force
should be avoided unless it is, in just war parlance, a "last
resort." This ethical perspective is clearly outlined in the
continuation of a verse (42:39) cited earlier, which defines the
believers as those who defend themselves when oppressed:
[21] The requital of evil is an evil similar to it hence,
whoever pardons [his enemy] and makes peace, his reward rests with
God-for, verily; He does not love evildoers. Yet indeed, as for any
who defend themselves after having been wronged--no blame whatever
attaches to them: blame attaches but to those who oppress [other]
people and behave outrageously on earth, offending against all
right: for them is grievous suffering in store! But if one is
patient in adversity and forgives, this is indeed the best
resolution of affairs. (42:40-43).
[22] The main result of these early verses is not to reaffirm
the pre-Islamic custom of lex talionis but the exact opposite: to
establish the moral superiority of forgiveness over revenge. The
permission of self-defense is not a call to arms; military force is
not mentioned, although neither is it proscribed. Instead, it
should be seen as a rejection of quietism, of abnegation of moral
responsibility in the face of oppression. Active nonviolent
resistance and open defiance of pagan persecution is the proper
Muslim response, according to these verses, and was, in fact, the
Prophet's own practice during this period. Because the Meccan
period of the Prophet's mission lasted almost fourteen years, three
years longer than the Medinan period, it is absolutely fundamental
in the construction of an Islamic ethical system. Clearly, jihad in
this extended period of the Prophet's life meant non-violent
resistance. For potential Muslim nonviolent activists, there are
many lessons to be learned from the Prophet's decisions during
these years. But, regrettably, the Meccan period has received scant
attention, either from Muslim activists or from jurists,
historians, and moralists.[9]
[23] The period that has been the traditional focus of Muslim
and non-Muslim concern in discussing the Islamic approach to war
and peace is the decade during which the prophet lived in Medina
(622-32 C.E.). It was in Medina that the Muslims became a coherent
community, and it was here that jihad acquired its military
component. According to the early Muslim historians, the Prophet
enacted a new policy toward the Quraysh, the ruling tripe of Mecca,
within a year of settling Medina aimed at redressing Muslim
grievances. He authorized small raids against specific pagan
targets, in particular caravans proceeding along the trade route to
Syria. These raids, according to many orientalist accounts, were
intended specifically to be a means of collecting booty in order to
alleviate the financial distress of the immigrants, to Medina as
well as to provide an added incentive for potential converts. The
raids, it is suggested, signaled a fundamental shift in the
Prophet's approach to an emphasis upon violent struggle, a shift
sanctioned by increasingly belligerent Qur'anic verses of the
Medinan period. Both the early historians' accounts and the
subsequent orientalist speculations have been challenged by
contemporary Muslim biographers of the Prophet. Muhammad Haykal,
for example, argues that the early forays were not military
expeditions. but only small raids intended to harass the Meccans,
impress upon them the new power of the Muslims, and' demonstrate
the necessity for a peace accommodation with the
Muslims.[10]
[24] Both positions in the debate are obviously speculative. The
uncertainty regarding any shift m the Prophet's attitude toward the
employment of violence is compounded by the uncertainty regarding
the actual date of the Qur'anic revelation permitting fighting
(22:3.9). Haykal himself implies that the Qur'anic permission to
fight had already been revealed before these expeditions: "This
peaceful show of strength by Islam does not at all mean that Islam,
at that time, forbade fighting in defense of personal life and
religion, or to put a stop to persecution. What it did really mean
at that time, as it does today or will ever do, was to condemn any
war of aggression."[11]
[25] Thus the Prophet's first year in Medina may rightly be
characterized as a transition period in the evolution of his new
policy toward the Meccans. The event that signals a clear break
with pre-Islamic custom was the outcome of the third expedition,
led by Abdallah ibn Jahsh during the prohibited month of Rajab in
the second year A.B. (after hijra, the Prophet's flight to
Medina in 622 C.E.). According to the Prophet's instructions to
Abdallah, he and his companions were simply to reconnoiter Qurayshi
positions outside Mecca. But when they came upon a Meccan caravan,
the temptation to attack it overcame them. In the process they
killed one man, took two others captive, and returned to Medina
with the booty. Realizing that 'Abdallah had violated instructions
as well as the prohibition against fighting in that month, the
Prophet rebuked 'Abdallah and refused to take any share of the
booty. The incident also touched off an anti-Muslim propaganda
campaign led by the Quraysh, making Abdallah and his compatriots
even more unpopular with their fellow Muslims.
[26] It was upon this occasion that the following Qur'anic'
verse was revealed:
They ask you concerning
fighting in the prohibited months. Answer them: "To fight therein
is a grave misdeed. But to impede men from following the cause of
God, to deny God, to violate the sanctity of the holy mosque, to
expel its people from its precincts is with God a greater wrong
than fighting in the prohibited month. Tumult and oppression are
worse than slaughter." (2:217)
[27] This verse is indicative of the continuing Qur'anic
exposition of the Islamic ethics of war and its "appropriation" of
certain pre-Islamic Arab values, now in the context of the Medinan
city-state, placed within an altered, more coherent moral
framework. Fighting continues to be viewed as undesirable, and in
some months is to be , avoided altogether. In extremis; however, it
is a legitimate response to injury and aggression already received
at the hands of oppressors of re1igion. Even at, this point it
remains the less desirable choice and is to be exercised, the
Qur'an repeatedly urges, with restraint and brevity (2:190, 193,
194; 8:61). Subsequent verses subject other pre-Islamic customs,
including the ban on fighting near the Kasba, to the same moral
evaluation (2:191). Open warfare between the Muslims and the
Quraysh was begun with the battle of Hadr, fought in the month of
Ramadan in 2 A.H. In the eight years following, the Prophet
personally led or authorized over seventy military encounters
ranging in intensity from pitched battles in defense of Medina, to
sieges, raids, and skirmishes against enemy targets. Such an
astounding number of military engagements could, only have had
profound implications for the Prophet personally as well as for the
nascent Muslim community. The preaching of Islam and the conducting
of the community's day-to-day activities had to occur within a
milieu characterized by outright warfare against a range of
enemies: Quraysh, bedouin tribes, the Jewish tribes of Medina, and
the Byzantine Empire. The Muslims of this period, according to one
report, "did not sleep or wake except withtheir
weapons."[12] Qur'anic verses of the
period exhorting the Prophet and his followers to fight suggest the
strain that the constant threat of war must have imposed upon the
community (8:24, 65).
[28] The battle of Badr was fought when the Prophet was
fifty-four years old. And although it is clear that he personally
conducted several key campaigns afterward, the combined evidence of
the sources indicates that he remained a reluctant warrior. On
several occasions he urged the use of nonviolent means or sought an
early termination of hostilities, often in the face of stiff
opposition from his companions. At the same time, consonant with
Qur'anic revelation, he seems to have accepted as unavoidable
fighting in defense of what he perceived to be Muslim interests.
The essence of his approach to war is crystallized in the following
words ascribed to him: "0 people! Do not wish to meet the enemy,
and ask God for safety, but when you face the enemy, be patient,
and remember that Paradise is under the shade of
swords."[13]
The Grounds for War
[29] Ibn Khaldun continues his discussion of war in the
Muqaddima by distinguishing four types of war: One arises
from petty squabbles among rival foes or neighboring tribes,
another from the desire for plunder found among "savage peoples."
These two types he labels "illegitimate wars." Then, reflecting the
prevailing medieval approach, he divides legitimate wars into two
types: jihad and wars to suppress internal
rebellion.[14] This latter division of
legitimate wars is the logical outgrowth of the medieval juristic
bifurcation of the world into two spheres, dar al-Islam
(the realm where Islamic law applied), and dar al-harb
(the realm of war). According to the Sunni legal schools, jihad
properly speaking was war waged against unbelievers. Because all
Muslims were understood to constitute a single community of
believers, wars between Muslim parties were usually classed in a
separate category, fitna (literally, a "trial" or "test").
Like Plato, who has Socrates declare that Greeks do not make war on
one another,[15] the Muslim jurists viewed
intra-Muslim disputes as internal strife that should be resolved
quickly by the ruling authorities. This approach to war among
Muslims, important in medieval theory, has assumed greater
significance in modern controversies about the definition of
jihad.
[30] The descriptions of jihad in the medieval texts reflect the
historical context in which legal theory was elaborated. Because
the medieval juristic conception of jihad provided legal
justification for the rapid expansion of the Islamic empire that
occurred in the decades following the Prophet's death, its
connotations are offensive rather than defensive. Relatively little
consideration was given to jihad defined as "defensive struggle,"
that is, war undertaken strictly to safeguard Muslim lives and
property from external aggression. It was considered obvious that
Muslims may wage war in self-defense, according to the Qur'anic
verses cited earlier. This defensive war was fard 'ayn, a
moral duty of each able-bodied Muslim, male or female.
[31] More detailed discussion of jihad comes in the context of
offensive struggles aimed at expansion of Islamic hegemony, an
expansion aimed ultimately at the universal propagation of Islam.
In the twelfth century, Ibn Rushd (Averroes) wrote a legal treatise
that deals at some length with the conditions of jihad.
[16]His treatise is
representative of the medieval theory for two reasons. First, as
one of the later medieval writers, he incorporates into his work
the views of earlier scholars. Second, his treatise is typical of
the methodology applied by earlier jurists in reconciling
apparently conflicting verses of the Qur'an or actions of the
Prophet.
[32] Because the ultimate end of jihad is the propagation of the
Islamic faith, not material gain or territorial conquest, Ibn
Rushd; like other medieval writers, implicitly, if not always
explicitly, separates the grounds for jihad from the grounds for
war (harb or qitai). Because Islam is viewed as a universal mission
to all humanity, jihad is the perpetual condition that prevails
between dar al-Islam and dar, al-harb. Participation in the jihad
to overcome dar al-harb was, a fard kifaya, a moral
obligation only for those capable of assuming it, namely
able-bodied and financially secure adult males. Actual war arose
only as the final step in a "ladder of escalation." The first step
in any contact between the Muslim state and a foreign power was an
invitation to allow the peaceful preaching of Islam. This was
consonant with the practice of the Prophet, who allegedly had sent
letters to the rulers of Byzantium, Iran, and Egypt for precisely
this purpose. If a foreign ruler refused this invitation, he was to
be offered the incorporation of his people into the Islamic realm
as a protected non-Muslim community governed by its own religious
laws, but obliged to pay a tax, the jizya, in lieu of
performing military service. Only if the non-Muslims refused these
conditions were there grounds for active hostilities. At this
point, the Muslim ruler was not only permitted but required to wage
war against them.
[33] According to Ibn Rushd, the medieval jurists disagreed most
on the question of when it was permissible to suspend jihad. The
basis of the controversy was the apparent discrepancy between the
Qur'an's "verses of peace" and "verses of the sword." In the eighth
chapter, for example, is the following verse: "If they incline
toward peace, incline you toward it, and trust in God: verily, He
alone is all-hearing, all-knowing" (8:61). In the ninth chapter,
however, we encounter the following commands: "And so, when the
sacred months are over, slay the polytheists wherever you find
them, and take them captive, and besiege them and lie in wait for
them at every conceivable place" (9:5); and fight against those
who-despite having been given revelation before-do not believe in
God nor in the last day, and do not consider forbidden that which
God and His Messenger have forbidden, and do not follow the
religion of truth, until they pay the jizya with
willing-hand, having been subdued. (9:29)
[34] As Ibn Rushd observes, some jurists held the opinion that
the sword verses must be read in context with the peace verses,
arid that the ruler (imam) was therefore entitled to suspend jihad
whenever he deemed it appropriate. Others read the sword verses as
requiring continual warfare against unbelievers (both polytheists
and the recognized people of the book," that is, Jews, Christians,
Sabaeans, and, by assimilation, Zoroastrians and others) until they
had been incorporated within dar al-Islam. They invoked the
interpretive principle of abrogation (naskh) to support
their conclusion. Because the sword verses had been revealed after
the peace verses, the command to wage jihad against non-Muslims
supersedes the permission to engage in peaceful
relations.[17]
[35] Thus, as Ibn Rushd's discussion makes apparent, the
medieval juristic literature is characterized by fundamental
disagreements on the grounds for war. But most of the legal
scholars agree that the object of jihad is not the forcible
conversion of unbelievers to the Islamic faith. This object would
contradict several clear Qur'anic statements enjoining freedom of
worship, including "Let there be no compulsion in religion; the
truth stands out clearly from error (2:256), and "If your Lord had
so willed, all those who are on earth would have believed: you then
compel mankind, against their will, to believe?" (10:99). With
regard to verse 9:5 (quoted above), which seems to sanction a war
of mass conversion of all polytheists to Islam, most acknowledge
that the full context in which the verse occurs limits its
application to the pagan Arabs who were so implacably opposed to
the earliest Muslim community at Medina, The object of jihad is
generally held by these writers to be the subjugation of hostile
powers who refuse to permit the preaching of Islam, not forcible
conversion. Once under Muslim rule, they reason, non-Muslims will
be free to consider the merits of Islam. The medieval theory of an
ongoing jihad, and the bifurcation of the world into dar al-Islam
and dar al-harb upon which it was predicated, became a fiction soon
after it was elaborated by medieval writers. The "house of Islam"
disintegrated into a number of rival states, some of whom found
themselves allied with states belonging to the "house of war" in
fighting their co-religionists. Nevertheless, the idea that "Islam"
and the "West" represented monolithic and mutually antagonistic
civilizations underlay much Muslim and European writing,
particularly during the heyday of European imperialism in the
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Shades of this viewpoint are
very much apparent in our own day.
[36] In his discussion of recent Muslim thinking on the grounds
for jihad, Bassam ubi outlines two contending approaches, the
"conformist" and the "fundamentalist." He suggests that the
reinterpretation of the medieval theory of jihad 'by modernists (as
the conformists are more commonly known) is half-hearted and that,
in the end, it is the fundamentalists' resurrection of the medieval
dar al-harb / dar al-Islam distinction that best characterizes the
current Muslim view of international relations generally and issues
of war and peace in particular. His presentation, I think, does not
adequately acknowledge the significance of modernist challenges to
the medieval theory or real differences in how fundamentalists
employ medieval terms like dar al-harb. It is important to
recognize that modernists as well as fundamentalists believe that
Islamic thought must be revived by returning to the "true sources,"
that is, the Qur'an and sunna. This approach leads the modernists
to challenge many aspects of medieval legal doctrine regarding war
and peace, beginning with the division of the world into separate
spheres. As they point out; this rigid bifurcation is nowhere to be
found in the Qur'an or the traditions of the Prophet. Although the
Qur'an's division of mankind into believers and unbelievers lends
support for such a view, modernist writers argue that the Qur'anic
verses cannot be interpreted to suggest a perpetual state of war
between the two, nor any territoriality to the "house of Islam,"
when these verses are taken in the full context of the Qur'anic
message. In one of the leading modernist expositions of Islam
international law, Mohammad Talaat al-Ghunaimi, dismisses the dir
al-Islam/ dar al-harb distinction as an idea introduced by certain
medieval legal thinkers in response to their own historical
circumstances, but having no basis in Islamic
ethics.[18]
[37] Having undermined the medieval dichotomy, the modernists
proceed to challenge the medieval conception of "aggressive jihad."
Again, their method is to return to the "sources." When the
Qur'anic verses and the Prophet's traditions on warfare are studied
their full context, they argue, jihad can only be a war of
self-defense. As the influential Egyptian scholar Muhammad Abu
Zahra writes, "War is not justified to impose Islam as a religion
on unbelievers or to support a particular social regime. The
Prophet Muhammad fought only to repulse aggression."[19] Turning to the
fundamentalists, we do find a much more assertive, militant,
violent interpretation of jihad. 'This is not surprising, given
that most of the writers labeled "fundamentalist" are involved in
revolutionary movements seeking to overthrow militarily superior
nationalist regimes. Yet if we probe even superficially beneath the
rhetoric of the fundamentalists' polemics, we find real differences
between their ideas and those of medieval legal theory, and real
similarities uniting them with the modernists. It is true that
there remains a large gap between the modernists and the most
militant fundamentalist groups operating in the Muslim world today
but these groups, despite the media attention they receive,
represent only the fringes of Islamic activism.
[38] First, with respect to the fundamentalists' use of the
expressions dar al-Islam and dar al-harb, there
is a substantial difference between the use of these terms and
others, such as jahiliyya, by writers like Hasan al-Banna
and Sayyid Qutb, and their medieval connotations. Jahiliyya is used
by the fundamentalists as a sweeping condemnation of cultural norms
and political corruption that has only the vaguest connection with
medieval ideas. Fundamentalist writers do argue that the origin of
this anti-Islamic culture is Western, but their polemics are'
equally, if not mainly, focused on allegedly hypocritical Muslim
rulers and other "Westernized" elites who actively propagate
jahili Culture in their own societies. Thus, the
fundamentalist attack on Western values is not a resurrection of
the medieval dichotomy between Islam and the rest of humanity. It
is, I believe, the Muslim version of the attack on "neoimperialism"
that characterizes many ThirdWorld polemics against the current
international order. The dar al-Islam/ dar al-harb dichotomy
developed by medieval jurists was predicated on the moral arid
military superiority of Islamic civilization. When
twentieth-century writers such as al-Banna, Qutb; Mawdudi, and
Khomeini depict international politics as a. struggle between Islam
and the West, they are governed more by their understanding of the
history of European colonialism and American policies in the Muslim
world than by medieval notions of dar al-harb. They are motivated
by faith in the moral superiority of Islam, but also by a painful
awareness of the technological and military weakness of the Muslim
world compared to the West.
[39] Second, regarding the use of jihad by fundamentalist
writers, there is again, a substantial difference between recent
and medieval works. The thrust of the medieval jihad is outward
more than dar al-harb. Central to medieval theory is the issue of
right authority. A war is jihad, that is, lawful, only when it is
declared by a legitimate. ruler, the imam, who bears responsibility
for assessing the war's right intent and right conduct. Sunni
writers discuss at considerable length the characteristics of a
legitimate ruler, but devote almost no attention to illegitimate
rulers. The medieval political theory favors acquiescing to any
ruler who can maintain order and enforce the law, regardless of the
means he has used to assume power. Thus, on the topic of political
rebellion, medieval theorists are generally quite conservative.
Rebellion threatened the established order of dar al-Islam and the
resulting anarchy undermined the religious life of the community.
As a result, there is a strong bias against any right of rebellion
and an emphasis on the need to speedily reincorporate rebels into
the body politic. With the emergence of postcolonial Muslim states,
political legitimacy and the rights of the people in the face of
oppressive regimes have emerged as central issues in Islamic
discourse. These issues figure prominently, of course, in all
fundamentalist literature. Fundamentalists view themselves as a
vanguard of the righteous, preparing the way for the elimination of
jahili values from their societies and the establishment of a just
"Islamic" order. The details of this order remain vague in the
fundamentalist tracts. What is clear from these works is the view,
supported by experience, that the secular, nationalist regimes
ruling most Muslim countries today, backed by their Western
supporters, will not willingly cede power, even if the majority of
the population does not support them. They will maintain power by
any means, including the violent repression of dissent. In other
words, it is argued that these regimes have declared war on Islam
within their countries, and that it 'is incumbent upon all true
believers to respond by whatever means are necessary, including
violence, to overthrow them. The fundamentalist writings are
therefore focused on combating the social and international
oppression that they 'believe face the Muslim community (umma)
everywhere. Jihad is for the fundamentalists an instrument for the
realization of political and social justice in their own societies,
a powerful tool for internal reform and one required by the
Qur'an's command that Muslims "enjoin the right and forbid the
wrong" (3:104). The thrust of the modern jihad is thus very much
inward. Warfare on the international level is considered only to
the extent that Western governments are viewed as archenemies who
impose corrupt and authoritarian regimes upon Muslims. Jihad as an
instrument for the imposition of Islamic rule in non-Muslim states
today hardly figures in fundamentalist works. That goal has been
postponed indefinitely, given the fundamentalist position, which
they share with many other Muslim writers, that most of the Muslim
countries themselves do not at present have Islamic
governments.
[40] One area in which modernists and fundamentalists are
tending to converge is upon the argument that jihad is an
instrument for enforcing human rights. For example, the Iranian
revolutionary leader Ayatollah Murtaza Mutahhari argues that "the
most sacred form of jihad and war is that which is fought in
defense of humanity and of human rights."[20] Similarly, the
Indian/Pakistani scholar Maulana Abu al-A'la Mawdudi writes that
jihad is obligatory for Muslims when hostile forces threaten their
human rights, which in his analysis includes forcibly evicting them
from their homes, tampering with their social order, and
obstructing religious life.[21] To
some extent these arguments are a response to Western writings on
the international protection of human rights. But it is interesting
to note that whereas there is continuing debate in the West on the
legality of humanitarian intervention against sovereign states,
continuing ambivalence toward the territorial state in Islamic
thought lends weight to the argument in favor of such intervention
among a broad range of Muslim writers.[22]
The Conduct of War
[41] Because the goal of jihad is the call to Islam; not
territorial conquest or plunder, the right conduct of Muslim armies
has traditionally been an important concern within Islam. The
Qur'an provides the basis for ius in bello considerations:
"And fight in God's cause against those who wage war against you,
but do not transgress limits, for God loves not the transgressors"
(2:190). The "limits" are enumerated in the practice of the Prophet
and the first four caliphs. According to authoritative traditions,
whenever the Prophet sent out a military force, he would instruct
its commander to adhere to certain restraints. The Prophet's
immediate successors continued this practice, as is indicated by
the "ten commands" of the first caliph, Abu Bakr:
[42] Do not act treacherously; do not act disloyally; do not act
neglectfully. Do not mutilate; do not kill little children or old
men, or women; do not cut off the heads of the palm-trees or bum
them; do not cut down the fruit trees; do not slaughter a sheep or
a cow or a camel, except for food. You will pass i by people who
devote their lives in cloisters; leave them and their devotions
alone. You will come upon people who bring you platters in 'which
are various sorts of food; if you eat any of it, mention the nameof
God over it.[23]
[43] Thus, the Qur'an and the actions of the Prophet and his
successors established the principles of discrimination and
proportionality of means. But as Ibn Rushd's treatise makes clear,
the elaboration of these broad principles created serious divisions
among medieval jurists. The legal treatises generally focus on a
number of issues raised by the Qur'an itself: the treatment of
prisoners, both combatants and noncombatants (47:4, 8:67); the
granting of quarter or safe passage (aman) to residents of dar
al-harb (9:6); and the division of booty (8:41). In addition, the
jurists also dealt with the traditional concerns of ius in bello:
the definition and protection of noncombatants and restrictions on
certain types of weapon. The legal discussions address three
issues: Who is subject to damage in war? What types of damage may
be inflicted upon persons? What types of damage may be inflicted
upon their property? Underlying the differing opinions on these
issues once again are the apparent contradictions between the peace
verses and the sword verses. The jurists who contend that the sword
verses provide a general rule superseding earlier revelation argue
that belief is the decisive factor in establishing immunity from
attack. Since verse 9:5, in their view, commands Muslims to fight
all polytheists, only women and children (who were specifically
designated by the Prophet as immune) are prohibited targets. All
able-bodied polytheist males, whether actually fighting or not, may
be killed.
[44] Other jurists, who do not consider the peace verses to have
been abrogated, maintain that capacity to fight is the only
appropriate consideration, and therefore include old men; women,
children, peasants, slaves, and. hermits among prohibited
targets.24 The prohibition against direct attack, however, does not
establish the absolute immunity of noncombatants, because,
according to most jurists, all of these persons (except for
hermits) are subject to the laws pertaining to prisoners of war.
They may be enslaved or ransomed by the Muslim forces. During the
fighting, Muslims are permitted to inflict damage on the property
of their enemies to the extent necessary to overcome them. Most
jurists do not permit the unnecessary slaughter of animals, the
destruction of homes, the cutting down of fruit trees, or the use
of fire. [24]However, the
eighth-century jurist Shaybani reports that Abu Hanifa, the founder
of one of the four Sunni legal schools allowed these tactics as
well as the use of catapults and flooding to defeat the enemy.
These methods may be employed against an enemy target even when
women, children, and old men will, be killed. If the enemy uses
Muslims as shields, even then the Muslim forces may attack them.
The reason given by Abu Hanifa is that if Muslims stopped attacking
their enemies' for fear of killing noncombatants, they would not be
able to fight at all, "for there is no city in the territory of war
in which there is no one at all of these . . .
mentioned."[25]
[45] Abu Hanifa's justification summarizes the medieval approach
to noncombatant immunity. Muslim forces should exercise
discrimination in war, but if "collateral damage'; is inflicted,
then the blame lies with the enemy, who made protection of
noncombatants impossible. In general, the medieval theory views
damage to the enemy as self-incurred harm. If Muslim forces violate
the normal restrictions on conduct, it is because of provocation by
the enemy. Yet strict reciprocity has never been established as a
principle of the Islamic ethics of war: wanton disregard for humane
treatment of combatants arid noncombatants by the enemy does not
permit Muslim armies to respond in kind.
[46] In current Muslim discourse on war and peace, ius in bello
issues receive very little attention. This is true despite the vast
changes that have occurred in both the international law and the
technology of warfare. The discussion that does occur is usually
undertaken by modernists seeking to reinterpret the Qur'an and
sunna so that Islamic injunctions correspond to current
international practice. [26]Invariably these works
concentrate on demonstrating the obsolescence of various aspects of
medieval theory, such as the killing or enslavement of prisoners or
the distribution of enemy property. More contemporary issues, such
as the definition of noncombatant immunity and the use of terrorist
methods by some Islamic groups have yet to be treated
systematically.
[47] Far more relevant arid interesting discussion or right
conduct in war occurs in the context of specific conflicts. During
the "war of the cities" toward the end of the Iran-Iraq War, for
example, Mehdi Bazargan and the Liberation Movement of Iran (LMI)
repeatedly protested that Khomeini was violating Islamic
prohibitions against targeting civilians when he authorized missile
strikes against Baghdad in retaliation for Iraq's Scud missile
attacks against Teheran. In one "open letter" to Khomeini, the IMI
wrote:
[48] According to Islam, it is justifiable retribution only if
we, with our own missiles, hit the commanders or senders of the
Iraqi missiles rather than hitting civilian areas and killing
innocent people and turning their homes and communities into ghost
towns and hills of rubble, all in the name of striking military
targets.[27]
[49] But the LMI never developed its argument. Issues raised by
its criticism, such as "double effect," "reciprocity," and
"proportionality of means," were never fully addressed. More
systematic discussion of just means occurred during the Persian
Gulf War. In fact, ius in bello rather than ius ad bellum concerns
dominated Muslim debates on the ethics of the conflict. Among the
points raised by opponents of the anti-Iraq coalition's policies
was that the conflict should be treated as fitna, that is, a
dispute among Muslims. The rules concerning fitna developed by
medieval jurists do not permit Muslims to ally themselves with
non-Muslims, particularly when military decision-making is in
non-Muslim hands. The prohibition was based on the belief that
unbelievers would not apply the stricter code of conduct incumbent
upon Muslims when fighting other Muslims. Critics of the Gulf War
have: argued that the conduct of the war by the coalition validates
the medieval jurists' concerns. The massive air bombardment of
Iraq's governmental and industrial facilities, they charge, was
disproportionate to the Iraqi provocation and insufficiently
discriminated between military and civilian targets. Moreover, the
slaughter of Iraqi troops fleeing Kuwait City on the "highway of
death" directly contravened one of the central points of Islamic
law, namely that the goal of all military campaigns against other
Muslims should be to rehabilitate and not to annihilate the
transgressing party.
[50] The most glaring area of neglect in contemporary Islamic
analyses of ius in bello concerns weapons of mass destruction. So
far, no systematic work has been done by Muslim scholars on how
nuclear chemical, and biological weapons relate to the Islamic
ethics of war. This is an astonishing fact in: light of the
development of nuclear technology by several Muslim countries and
the repeated use of chemical weapons by Iraq. In discussing the
issue with several leading Muslim specialists in international law,
I have found a great deal. of ambivalence on the subject. Most
scholars cite the Qur'anic verse "Hence, make ready against them
whatever force and war mounts you are able to muster, so that you
might deter thereby the enemies of God" (8:60) as justification for
developing nuclear weaponry. Muslims must acquire nuclear weapons,
I have been repeatedly told, because their enemies have introduced
such weapons into their arsenals. There is unanimous agreement that
Muslims should think of nuclear weapons only as a deterrent arid
that they should be used only as a second strike weapon. But
Islamic discussion of this topic remains at a very superficial
level, There is little appreciation of the logistics of nuclear
deterrence and of the moral difficulties to which a deterrence
strategy gives rise.
Conclusion
[50] Is the Islamic jihad the same as the Western just war? The
answer, of course, depends upon who is defining the concepts. But
after this brief survey of the debates that have historically
surrounded the Islamic approach to war and peace and the
controversies that are continuing to this day, I think it is safe
to conclude that even though jihad may not be identical to the just
war as it has evolved in the West, the similarities between Western
and Islamic thinking on war and peace are far more numerous than
the differences.
[51] Jihad, the just war, was conceived by its early theorists
basically as a means to circumscribe the legitimate reasons for war
to so few that peace is inevitably enhanced. Jihad, like just war,
is grounded in the belief that intersocietal relations should be
peaceful, not marred by constant and destructive warfare. The
surest way for human beings to realize this peace is for them to
obey the divine law that is imprinted on the human conscience and
therefore accessible to everyone, believers and unbelievers.
"According to the medieval law, Muslims are obliged to propagate
this divine law, through peaceful means if possible, through
violent means if necessary. No war was jihad Unless it was
undertaken with right .intent and as a last resort, and declared by
right authority. Most Muslims today disavow the duty to propagate
Islam by force and limit jihad to self-defense. And finally, jihad,
like just war, places strict limitations on legitimate targets
during war and demands that belligerents use the least amount of
force necessary to achieve the swift cessation of hostilities. Both
jihad and just war are dynamic concepts, still evolving and
adapting to changing international realities. As Muslims continue
to interpret the Islamic ethics of war and peace, their debates on
jihad will, I believe, increasingly parallel the Western debates on
just war. And as Muslims and non-Muslims continue their recently
begun dialogue on the just international order, they may well find
a level of agreement on the ethics of war and peace that will
ultimately be reflected in a revised and more universal law of war
and peace.
© February 2003
Journal of Lutheran Ethics (JLE)
Volume 3, Issue 2
[1] Fazlur Rahman, "Law and Ethics in
Islam,&=javascript:goNote(39~ in Richard G. Hovannisian, ed.,
Ethics in Islam: Ninth Giorgio Levi Della Vida Biennial Conference
(Malibu, Cal.:.Undeila Publications, 1985), 9.
[2] Ibn Khaldun, The Muqaddimah: An
Introduction to History, trans. Franz Rosenthal (Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1967}, 2:73.
[3] The Qur&=javascript:goNote(39an
argues in. several places for the inner consistency of the moral
code elaborated within it. .See 4:82, 25:32 and 39:23. These verses
are part of an extended debate contained in the Qur'an against the
Meccan polytheists as well as Christians and Jews who argued that
the Qur'an was Muhammed's own agglomeration of disparate scriptures
and moral codes.
[4] Ahmad b. 'Abdallah Abu Nu'aim
al-Isfahani, Dala'il al-nubuwwa (Hyderabad:
Da&=javascript:goNote(39irat al-Ma'arif al-Uthmaniyya, 1977),
139.
[5] Cited in M. Abu Laylah, In Pursuit
of Virtue: The Moral Theology and Psychology of Ibn Hazm
al-Andalusi (London: Ta-Ha Publishers, 1990), 51.
[6] Fred Donner, "Sources of Islamic
Conceptions of War," in John Kelsay and James Turner Johnson, eds.,
Just. War and Jihad: Historical and Theoretical Perspectives on War
and Peace in Western and Islamic Traditions (New York: Greenwood
Press, 1991), 34.
[7] See the valuable study by Toshihiko
Izutsu, Ethico-Religious Concepts in the Qur'an (Montreal: McGill
University Press, 1966),74-104.
[8] Montgomery Watt, for example,
writes: "It was essentially from the light-hearted razzia [the
corrupted form of ghazwa] that the Islamic ideal and practice of
the jihad or holy war developed." W. Montgomery Watt, "Islamic
Conceptions of the Holy War," in Thomas Murphy, ed., The Holy. War
(Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1976), 142.
[9] There are, however, some
significant modern examples of Muslim advocacy and practice of
nonviolent resistance. See Ralph E. Crow, Philip Grant, and Saad E.
Ibrahim, eds., Arab Nonviolent Political Struggle in the Middle
East, (Boulder, Colo.: Lynne Rienner Publishers~ 1990).
[10] Muhammad Husayn Haykal, The Life
of Muhammad, trans. Isma&=javascript:goNote(39il Ragi al-Faruqi
(Indianapolis: North American Trust, 1976), 204.
[11] Haykal, Life of Muhammad,
208.
[12] Jalal al-Din al-Suyuti Asab
al-nuzul (Cairo: Dar al-Tahrir li'l-Tab' wa'l-Nashr, 1963),
128.
[13] Imam "Bukhari, Sahih al-Bukhari,
trans. Muhammad Muhsin Khan (Beirut Dar al-Arabia, 1985), 4:
165.
[14] Ibn Khaldun, Muqaddimah, 224.
[15] Plato, The Republic, trans. Allan
Bloom (New York: Basic Books, 1968), 150.
[16] HASHMI
[17] Ibn Rushd, Bidayat al-mujtahid,
22-23.
[18] Mohammad Talaat al-Ghunaimi, The
Muslim Conception of International
[19] Muhammad Abu Zahra, Concept of
War in Islam, trans. Muhammad al-Hady and Taha Omar (Cairo:
Ministry of Waqf, 1961), 18.
[20] Ayatollah Murtaza Mutahhari,
"Defense: The Essence of Jihad," in Mehdi Abedi and Gary
Legenhausen, eds., Jihad and Shahadat: Struggle and Martyrdom in
Islam (Houston: Institute for Research and Islamic Studies, 1986),
105.
[21] Abu al-A'la Mawdudi, Al-Jihad
fi&=javascript:goNote(39l-Islam (Lahore: Idara Tarjuman
al-
Qur'an, 1988), 55-56.
[22] For a more detailed discussion of
this issue, see Sohail H. Hashmi, "Is There an Islamic Ethic of
Humanitarian Intervention?" Ethics and International Affairs 7
(1993), 55-73.
[23] Quoted .in John Alden Williams,
ed., Themes of Islamic Civilization (Berkeley and Los Angeles:
University of California Press, 1972), 262.
[24] The prohibition against
using fire in warfare was based on a tradition .of the Prophet: "No
one is free to punish by means of fire, save the Lord of the
Fire"-that is, God.
[25] Muhammad ibn al-Hasan
al-Shaybani, Kitab al-siyar al-kabir, trans. Majid Khadduri, The
Islamic Law of Nations (Baltimore: The ]ohns Hopkins University
Press, 1966), 101-2.
[26] Two important modernist
discussions of the means of war are Abu Zahra, Concept of War in
Islam; 44-68, and Muhammad Hamidullah, The Muslim Conduct of State,
7th ed. (Lahore: Sh. Muhammad Ashraf, 1977), 202-54.
[27] Liberation Movement of Iran, "A
Warning Concerning the Continuation of the Destructive War"
(Houston, Tex.: Maktab, 1988), 14.