MUSLIM WORLDVIEW
An Islamic Perspective
ISLAMIC jurisprudence, or fiqh, was framed mostly during the
Abbasid caliphate. Some of the terms coined by the jurists by way
of inference from the Quran and Hadith are Dar ul-Islam (Abode of
Islam) Dar ul-Kufr (Abode of disbelief) and Dar ul-Harb (Abode of War)
The jurists who devised these terms during the Abbasid period were
given the status of mujtahid (one who exercises Ijtihad or independent
reasoning in the light of the Quran and Hadith to understand religious
matters) in later times, and so these terms were never questioned over
the last one thousand years. However, upon perusing this matter, it
becomes clear that these terms created by the jurists were against the
spirit of Islam.
God sees and deals with all human beings in the
same light. The Quran refutes notions of God’s
'favoured people' in the strongest of terms.
The terms they devised did not exist in the Quran or Hadith. They
invented these terms on their own by exercising their right of ijtihad
There are many conditions that have to be met before making ijtihad,
and ijtihad is only considered valid if it fulfills all the required conditions.
Religious scholars have said that the ijtihad of a jurist can be right or
wrong, because a human being is liable to make errors in judgment,
and a mujtahid is no exception to this.
Ijtihad is a principle of Shariah (Islamic law). There is general acceptance
among the religious scholars, the ulema, that the source of this principle
of ijtihad in the Shariah is a Hadith narrated by Muaz ibn Jabal, a senior
companion of the Prophet and recorded by a number of traditionists,
like Abu Dawood, At-Tirmizi, An-Nasai, Ibn Majah and Imam Ahmad.
The Hadith is as follows:
Muaz ibn Jabal said that when the Prophet sent him to Yemen
as governor, he asked him how he would decide matters. Muaz
replied that he would decide in accordance with the Book of
God. Then the Prophet asked him what he would do in case he
did not find the required guidance in the Quran. Muaz replied
that he would seek guidance in the Hadith. The Prophet asked
him what he would do if he failed to find guidance regarding the matter in the Hadith as well. Muaz replied that in that situation
he would exercise his judgment to the best of his ability. The
Prophet then placed his hand on his chest and said, “May God
be praised, for granting this ability to Muaz".
This Hadith is regarded as the fundamental source of the principle of
Ijtihad. When we examine this Hadith, we learn exactly when a Muslim is
allowed to do ijtihad in Islam—he or she is permitted to do so only when
no guidance is available for that particular situation in the Quran and
Hadith. If guidance is available in the matter at hand in the Quran then
any ijtihad will be invalid. For example, it is established from the Quran
that fasting has been fixed for the month of Ramadan. It is, therefore,
not permissible for anyone to do ijtihad and fix some other time of the
year for fasting. The same applies to the number of obligatory prayers.
No one is allowed to do ijtihad to increase or decrease the number of
obligatory prayers, the number of obligatory fasting days or to change
the month of fasting, and so on.
Through this principle, we find clear guidance in the Quran and Hadith
regarding the use of such terms as Dar ul-Islam, Dar ul-Kufr and Dar ulHarb.
It is not proper for any scholar or jurist to devise new terms on
his own by means of ijtihad in the face of available guidance.
The sight of a human being should remind us of the
Creator who has created all human beings. It should
remind us of God’s miraculous powers to grant life.
Thus, it must bring us to God-realization.
To elaborate, the situations that the jurists use the term Dar ul-Kufr
for, were the same set of situations that the Prophet faced for the
period of thirteen years that he lived in Makkah after receiving
prophethood. So, according to the jurists, Makkah, from the beginning
of the Prophet’s prophethood to the Hijrah, had, in principle, the status
of Dar ul-Kufr. Yet, we do not find a single reference in the Quran and
Hadith to show that the term Dar ul-Kufr was ever applied to the town
of Makkah before the Prophet’s migration from there.
After the migration of the Prophet, the Makkans openly opposed him.
Following the Hijrah, the Muslims and the Makkans were at war, and
this was a situation similar to the one for which the jurists devised the
term Dar ul-Harb. Yet, we know that no such term has been used in the Quran and Hadith for this specific situation.
Following the Hijrah, a state was established in Madinah under the
leadership of the Prophet. To describe a situation such as this, later
jurists devised the term Dar ul-Islam. But neither the Quran nor the
Hadith uses the term Dar ul-Islam for the Madinah of the Prophet’s
time. In fact, the Quran uses Dar us-Salaam for Paradise ( 10:25 ). There
is no bit of land on this earth for which the terms Dar ul-Islam or Dar
ul- Iman (Abode of faith) are used in the Quran. Islam does not allow
the use of terms such as Dar ul-Islam, Dar ul-Kufr, and Dar ul-Harb, etc.
for such situations. Devising such terms by the Abbasid period jurists
amounted to transgressing their bounds. They exercised ijtihad in a
matter where they were not authorized by the Shariah.
The coining of such terms by the jurists was an error in judgment. A
student of Islam should reject this ijtihad. In the terminology of the
Shariah, it is an invention (bid‘a) and must be rejected. It is clearly
mentioned in the Hadith that regardless of who does so, introducing
anything new into Islam is not permissible.
Muslims find great appeal in the 'community-oriented
approach', but such things are short-sighted, narrowminded
and closeted representations of reality that
have no appeal for anyone else.
The coining of such terms as Dar ul-Islam, Dar ul-Kufr and Dar ul-Harb is
an extremely serious matter. It relates to the Muslim world-view. It is
responsible for inculcating the mentality of 'the chosen people' among
Muslims. It is the sign of the decline of a nation.
We learn from the Quran that God does not divide human society
on the basis of such demarcations as Dar ul-Islam, Dar ul-Kufr and
Dar ul-Harb. God sees and deals with all human beings in the same
light. The Quran refutes notions of God’s 'favoured people' in the
strongest of terms.,/p>
The Quran tells us that in the eyes of God, everyone’s worth is
determined by their personal actions or character, rather than by
their belonging to a particular race or community (THE QURAN 53:39).
One verse of the Quran in this regard will suffice for this purpose:
The believers, the Jews, the Christians and the Sabeans all
those who believe in God and the Last day and do good deeds
will be rewarded by their Lord; they shall have no fear,
nor shall they grieve.
THE QURAN 2: 62
Muslims, Christians, Jews and all others are equal in the eyes of God.
God will judge people based upon their deeds, rather than upon their
belonging to a particular community.
Determining the status of other groups in relation to Muslims is a
sectarian viewpoint, which is contrary to the universal approach of
Islam. It goes against the creation plan of God. God has made this
world for all human beings, and not just for Muslims.
Some Hadith reports have been similarly misread (in order to promote
a wrong sense of Muslim supremacy). Once, when the Prophet of Islam
was in Madinah, a funeral procession passed by. On seeing it, the
Prophet stood up. His Companions said to him that it was the funeral
of a Jew, indicating that, therefore, there was no need to stand up. The
Prophet replied by asking them if the person was not a human being.
This incident has been recorded by Al-Bukhari.
This act of the Prophet of Islam clearly shows that every human
being is worthy of respect and honour, regardless of his religion. This
Hadith clearly shows that the way of Islam is to regard everyone as
one regards oneself. The sight of a human being should remind us of
the Creator who has created all human beings. It should remind us of
God’s miraculous powers to grant life. Thus, it must bring us to Godrealization.
This tradition clearly tells us of the practice of the Prophet of Islam
regarding respect for all people. It is strange that none of the
commentators of the Hadith have taken the main lesson from this.
On the contrary, in their commentaries, they have interpreted it, for
example, by saying that standing for the funeral of a non-Muslim is not
obligatory, or that the Prophet stood only because he was reminded
of death, or that the Prophet stood out of respect for the angels who
accompanied the dead body, or that the Prophet did not want the
funeral passing above his head, or even that the Prophet did stand
before the funeral of a Jew but that this command has been abrogated
and that Muslims are no longer required to do so.
There is no doubt at all that such interpretations are invalid. But
explanations and commentaries of this nature continue even today.
Books, magazines, journals, radio, television and the internet—all
these resources have, directly or indirectly, been used to perpetuate
this mindset. Muslims find great appeal in the 'community-oriented
approach', but such things are short-sighted, narrow-minded and
closeted representations of reality that have no appeal for anyone else.
For example, a TV channel called QTV (Quran TV) has become very
popular among the Muslim masses. Although this channel carries the
name of the Quran, it only serves to placate the Muslim community.
Khushwant Singh, the famous journalist, wrote a column called
‘Spreading Islamophobia’ in the Hindustan Times a decade ago.
Here is an excerpt from what he wrote:
About the most disturbing phenomenon of the past decade is
the widening divide between the Islamic and non-Islamic world
[…] I looked forward to the Pakistani Channel, QTV (Quran TV), to
take the lead in this direction. I made it a point to tune in every
afternoon to see and hear how it was going about its mission. I
was sorely disappointed. I expected that it would address itself
to non-Muslim audiences among which wrong notions about
Islam persist. I found it focused entirely on Muslims, to assure
them that their faith was better than any other and that anyone
who disagrees is an ignoramus […]
What Khushwant Singh says here applies to almost every Muslim writer
and speaker. This mindset is responsible for Muslims having completely
forgotten their goal of dawah.
Fiqh or Muslim jurisprudence consists of the details of commands
and laws, and hundreds of books about fiqh have been written over
the years by Muslim scholars; yet, none of them contain chapters on
dawah. The books of all other Muslim writers, including al-Ghazali, Ibn
Taiymiya, Shah Waliullah, Jamaluddin Afghani, Mohammad Iqbal, etc.
are similarly bereft of chapters on dawah.
Due to this unnatural way of thinking, the Muslim ummah, once
intellectually stagnant, is now in regress. The responsibility for this
intellectual tragedy falls especially on the sectarian juristic concept
of Dar ul-Kufr.
Another one of these dangerous concepts is that Muslims are God’s
vicegerents on earth, and that it is their binding duty to impose upon
the world the laws of the Shariah on behalf of God.
This concept has come to dominate Muslim thought. Many other things
are explained and interpreted in the light of this concept. For instance,
there is a Hadith of the Prophet which says that the word of God would
enter every home in the world. This was interpreted as a concept of
Caliphate in the sense that the rule of Islam would be established all
over the world. This is illogical and baseless. The Hadith refers to the
'word of Islam’, not the ‘rule of Islam’. It is obvious that, according to
this Hadith, the word of Islam, or its message, will reach all homes, but
this is far from Muslim rule being established all over the world!
This (mis)interpretation is not an explanation, but, rather, a politicization
of this Hadith report. Muslims have begun to take great pride in
saying that Islam is a complete system. This may seem like a beautiful
definition of Islam, but it is a later addition (bid‘a), and has nothing to
do with the original Islam. Nowhere in the Quran and Hadith do we find
anything to suggest that Islam is a total system.
This concept of ‘total Islam’, if perpetuated, will leave present-day
Muslims with two dangerous, futile and evil choices. In order to adhere
to their version of ‘total Islam’, they must declare war against the entire
world, because until they conquer all of it, they cannot uphold their
supposed version of Islam. Or, they can continue to regard Islam as
a ‘total system’ but compromise with the world, because they are too
hypocritically enamoured with material benefits to commit themselves
sincerely to their own professed ideals.
Isolated Living
Individual or isolated living deprives one
of interactive learning, greater experience and the
opportunity to learn lessons. It is like living in a cocoon.
