Misunderstanding Islam by Gregory Borse
Misunderstanding Islam
Written by Gregory Borse
http://www.chronwatch.com/content/contentDisplay.asp?aid=23917
Monday, September 25, 2006
If writers like Lawrence Wright ( Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11) and Robert Spencer ( Islam Unveiled: Disturbing Questions About the World's Fastest Growing Religion), and scholars like Bernard Lewis ( "Islam and the West: A Conversation with Bernard Lewis") are to be believed, five years after 9/11 we remain woefully—and dangerously—ignorant of the enemy we face.
Nearly two years ago, I was given a copy of Robert Spencer's Islam Unveiled (and reviewed it ) and learned in it that the struggle we now face is hundreds of years old—and has been building since at least the 12th century, when, as Spencer pointed out (and I paraphrased in the article linked above), "Islamic science, poetry, art, culture, and philosophy came to something of a grinding halt . . . and was replaced then by a rejection of Western cultural values in favor of an extreme understanding of the law of Allah regarding the Muslim faithful."
I have since been reading Richard Hooker's review of the history of Islam ( go here) and have learned that the seeds for this rejection were sown almost immediately upon the death of Mohammed. In working out the form of succession following the death of the Prophet, there emerged within the first four Caliphates (the "Patriarchal Caliphs") different brands of Islam (do not understand, however, that there were necessarily four). To grossly oversimplify—predictably, following the death of Mohammed, sects formed with distinctly different interpretations of how Mohammed's successors should be selected and how Islam was to be lived. Perhaps as a result of the sheer force of Mohammed's personality, during his lifetime, the Islamic cult enjoyed a tenuous peace. As Hooker writes, however, "as soon as the Arabian tribes heard of the death of Muhammad, the Islamic peace and most of the [tribal] alliances broke down. Several tribes revolted—some of these tribes revolted under the leadership of rival prophets. This began the period the Muslims call al-Ridda, or "The Apostasy." All of Abu Bakr's [the first successor to Mohammed] energy in the first years would be focused on quelling these rebellions and tenuously re-establishing the Islamic peace." This description of Abu Bakr's tenure is typical of the next three Caliphs.
On the one side, there seem to have been Caliphs whose energies were spent organizing the Arab world under Islam in imitation of Byzantine and Greek administrative models—in addition to expanding the Islamic world through conquest and succeeding with what Hooker calls "mind-numbing" speed—and with little attention to the more spiritual and religious aspects of the faith. Under these Caliphs, the Umayyad, Islamic learning, culture, and civilization flourished. As Hooker rightly points out, if not for these Caliphs, neither Plato nor Aristotle may ever have been introduced to Europe—having been preserved in the Islamic world and later passed on to the West by such Islamic scholars as Avicenna and Averroes.
On the other side, however, there were followers of Mohammed who fundamentally rejected the Umayyad's rather worldly and irreligious administration of the growing Islamic Empire. The Umayyad's model was decidedly royal and un-tribesman-like and concentrated power among a few who administered Islamic law and power from afar. Perhaps more fundamentally, these purists rejected the legitimacy of the Caliphate of the Umayyad Dynasty as heretical. And, of course, among these followers of the teachings of the Prophet, there were splinter groups. Some became what is known today as the Shi'a (the Shiites) in Iraq and elsewhere. Others splintered into the Sunnis. Still, much later, come the Wahabists (Osama bin Laden belongs to this group), whose interpretation of the Koran is perhaps the most radical. Or not. To confuse the issue even further, even among the most radical, there seems—and here, reading Lawrence Wright would seem now to be indispensable to understanding our present situation (see his recent interview with Hugh Hewitt along with his articles, for the New Yorker, Web of Terror and The Master Plan)—to be fundamental disagreement about exactly how to achieve the goals of radical Islam.
According to Lawrence, Osama bin Laden's goal was parochial at first—the destruction of the corrupt and heretical governments within Islamic states, like Saudi Arabia, and their replacement with Taliban-style "true" Islamic regimes. In addition, however, bin Laden's anger toward Americans was centered upon their "occupation" of Islamic Holy Lands in the Arabian Peninsula following the first Gulf War. Still, amid great disagreement within radical Islamic circles following 9/11, there were those, like Musab al-Zarqawi and his mentor, Abu Mohammed al-Maqdisi (with whom al-Zarqawi later split for not being radical enough), who believed that Osama bin Laden's tactics had either backfired (Maqdisi) or had not gone far enough (Zarqawi). Despite these disagreements, however, as we know, Zarqawi (before his death) managed to warrant and accepted the title of chief architect of Al Qaeda in Iraq.
9/11 was seen by some Islamists as a great victory of Islam over the West. Others, however, viewed it as a huge set-back, as it exposed the radicals as ones willing to go to any lengths to further their agendas, without regard for what some Muslims regard as fundamental to the Islamic faith—like safeguarding against killing fellow Muslims or women and children (even when they are themselves not "of the Book").
Consider, however, Bernard Lewis' comments regarding a certain turn in the rhetoric of radical Islam in the context of the political cartoon controversy last year in Europe and the War on Terror in general. He points out, early in a discussion sponsored by the Pew Research Center ( go here):
"You will surely be struck by a certain asymmetry in this formulation [of the title "Islam and the West"]. On the one side, a compass point; on the other, a religion. Now, of course, we use "the West" in a number of different senses, but primarily, they are political, strategic, cultural, even civilizational, but not normally religious. The one religious term I have heard used for the West is the post-Christian world. I needn't develop the implications of that term. Islam, on the other hand, is the name of a religion. And it is a part of human society identified by itself, and therefore also by others; not the other way around, in terms of religion."
So, Lewis first identifies an incongruity. "The West" refers to a primarily political, historical, and, as he says, a "civilizational" reality, while the term "Islam" identifies a religious reality (as multifaceted as that reality might be). This is important because in the West we generally identify ourselves in a bifurcated way—as belonging to a "civilization" and history and, if we are religious, as belonging also to a religion (usually, but not always, Christianity). Hence, Christians, being in this world, but not of it, are comfortable with a distinction between a worldly, historical, and political destiny as distinguished from a spiritual destiny. There is "Christianity" (to designate a religion) and "Christendom" (to designate a world-view, a civilization, an historical reality). But, for those of the Islamic faith, Lewis argues, the relationship between this world and the next is not quite the same. Islamists identify first with their spiritual destiny and only secondarily with their worldly one. Lewis continues:
"In the Islamic world, from the beginning, Islam was the primary basis of both identity and loyalty. We think of a nation subdivided into religions. They think, rather, of a religion subdivided into nations. It is the ultimate definition, the prime definition and the one that determines, as I said, not only identity, but also basic loyalty. And this is quite independent of religious belief. In Islam, there isn't — or rather, there wasn't until recently — any such thing as the church, in the Christian sense of that word. The mosque is a place of worship. It's a building, a place of worship and study. And in that sense, it is the equivalent of the church. But in the sense of an institution with a hierarchy and its own laws and usages, there was no such thing in Islam until very recently. And one of the achievements of the Islamic Revolution in Iran has been to endow an Islamic country for the first time with the equivalents of a pope, a college of cardinals, a bench of bishops and, above all, an inquisition. All these were previously unknown and nonexistent in the Islamic world."
In short, in the Islamic world, the primary identification and loyalty is with Islam. The secondary identification is with a nation, a country, or a political affiliation. This may account, for instance, for the paucity, within the context of the War on Terror in a post 9/11 world, of the public voice of the so-called "moderate" Muslim. Since the first identification and loyalty is with Islam, even moderate Muslims are hesitant to speak out regarding the activities of their brothers and sisters of faith whose interpretation of the Koran moves them to murderous acts against the West.
But how does this connect to the Danish Cartoon controversy? First, Lewis notes that the response in the Muslim world was delayed at least four months—lending credence to the view that it was seized by certain radicals as a cause célèbre that would advance a certain agenda. Second, and much more important, Lewis explains that the ginning up of resentment against the Danish Cartoons was a new interpretation of Islamic Law. Lewis elaborates:
"The first point made was that it is forbidden to portray the Prophet, that making images of the Prophet of any kind is against the Muslim religion. That is true, though not always strictly observed by Muslims. But the point is that they want to avoid any kind of deification of the Prophet. Muslims are shocked when they go into churches and they see pictures and statues being worshipped. This they see as idolatrous. And if you go into the interior of a mosque, it is very austere: no pictures, no statues, only inscriptions. The ban on the portrayal of a prophet is intended to prevent the development of idolatrous worship of the Prophet. I don't think there was any danger of that from the Danish cartoons."
Most Muslims take seriously the dictum against the deification of the Prophet Mohammed. Images are discouraged precisely for the same reason that graven images are discouraged by the Jews—because they encourage a worship of a (necessarily false) idol. But, as Lewis points out, the Danish Cartoon controversy went further than to simply assert a prohibition against idol worship among the Islamic faithful. Lewis points out that until this episode the prohibition against the image was adjudicated within Islam against those of the Islamic faith. There was no understanding that the Islamic Law extended to non-Islamic peoples outside of Islamic states. That is, the Danish Cartoons represented a fundamental change in a kind of practice among some Muslims—and became an occasion for a change (among some) for the application not only of the substance of Islamic Law, but of its jurisdiction.
Here, the murder of Theo Van Gogh on November 2, 2004, in Amsterdam, is quite relevant. Van Gogh had directed a film, "Submission," which depicted the plight of women under the most austere interpretations of Islam. He was murdered by an Islamist in retribution for what was perceived to be his film's "offense" against Islam and as a warning to others, according to a note pinned to his body by the murderer.
Bernard Lewis, speaking of the Danish Cartoon episode, offers an explanation for why these two events constitute a fundamentally new turn in the understanding of Islam and the West, post 9/11. Under normal practice, offenses against Islam and the Prophet are adjudicated in Islamic Law according to a jurisdiction that extends first to Muslims themselves and only secondarily to non-Muslims who live (under Shar'ia Law) within Muslim territories. Under normal circumstances, the prosecution of offenses against Islam is reserved for offenses committed by Muslims themselves. Secondarily, and rarely—Lewis observes—offences against Islam by non-Muslims are prosecuted generally only under the most extreme circumstances and usually not at all. That is, non-Muslims within Islamic countries are generally not prosecuted for offenses because it is understood that, as non-believers, they cannot be held responsible for offending Islam.
But the murder of Theo Van Gogh—a non-Muslim in a non-Muslim country—and the outrage regarding the political cartoons depicting Mohammed (again, within a non-Muslim country) constitute, according to Lewis, a fundamental change in the application of Islamic law and practice (Lewis speaks of the Danish Cartoons only, but apply his words to the murder of Van Gogh as well):
"What is the range of jurisdiction of Muslim law? And here you have two opinions. According to the Shi'a and a minority among the Sunnis, Muslim law applies to Muslims wherever they may be in the world. A Muslim who commits an offense against Muslim law, wherever he may be in the world, is subject to Muslim law and must therefore be punished in accordance with Muslim law.
"The majority Sunni view is that Muslim law only applies in countries under Muslim government. What happens outside is no concern of the Muslim authorities. One distinguished jurist makes his point with an extreme example: A Muslim traveling in the lands of the unbelievers commits robbery and murder. He returns to the lands of Islam with his loot. No action can be taken against him or against his loot because the offense was committed outside the jurisdiction of Islam, and it is therefore up to the juridical and legal authorities of the infidels to take action, if they can and will.
"Here you have two different opinions relating to an offense committed by a Muslim. That is not the case for the Danish cartoons. This is an offense committed by a non-Muslim. And here the plot thickens. This is discussed by all of the juridical authorities only in the case of a non-Muslim subject of a Muslim state. If a non-Muslim subject of a Muslim state says or does something offensive to the Prophet, he is to be tried — accused, tried, and if necessary, punished. The jurists on the whole tend to take a rather mild view of this offense. They say, well, he is not a Muslim; he doesn't accept Mohammed as the Prophet; we know that. So saying that Mohammed is no prophet does not constitute this offense. It has to be more specifically insulting than that. And, as I say, there is an elaborate juridical literature and case law on this subject.
"What is never discussed at all — it is never considered — is an offense committed by a non-Muslim in a non-Muslim country. That, according to the unanimous opinion of all of the doctors of the holy law is no concern of Islamic law, which brings us back to the case of Denmark. Does this mean that Denmark, along with the rest of Europe is now considered part of the Islamic lands, and that the Danes, like the rest, are therefore dhimmis, non-Muslim subjects of the Muslim state? I think this is an interesting question, which can lead to several possible lines of inquiry."
Add to this the recent remarks by Pope Benedict XVI in Germany just two weeks ago. According to the mainstream press, they have been nearly universally reviled in the Islamic world. Does this response—linked as it might be to what Lewis says is a fundamentally new interpretation of the jurisdiction of Islamic Law—constitute an understanding that now Christians, and specifically Catholics, are understood to be dhimmis (i.e. non-Muslim subjects of a Muslim state)?
At the very least, these episodes underscore a very real misunderstanding on the part of non-Muslim Westerners of the very mindset of Muslims, and especially the most radical among them, regarding exactly what is being fought for in the war currently being waged.
Perhaps the most astute comments came early in the Bush Administration by Condoleeza Rice: "We were at War, but not on a War footing."
Still, even if we are on a "War footing" now—what war do we wage? If we do not understand the enemy—his ideology, his worldview, his very paradigm for asking and answering fundamental questions—how can we fight him, let alone answer him?
From what I can tell, there are those Islamists who understand that Islamic Law (and the reach of its jurisdiction) now goes beyond the borders of any identifiable Islamic state. These Islamists literally live in an Islamic world "subdivided" into countries—and, the distinction between Muslim and non-Muslim "country" is immaterial. This means that offenses against Islam which are committed by non-Muslims in non-Muslim "territories" fall under the jurisdiction of Islamic Law and, by nature, are part and parcel of some Islamists' understanding of jihad.
In light of Benedict's remarks in Germany, Mehmet Ai Agca, the would-be assassin of John Paul the Great, warned Benedict not to travel in Turkey: "'I write as one who knows about these matters very well,' Agca said. 'Your life is in danger. Don't come to Turkey -- absolutely not!'" ( go here).
Agca's lawyer assured the public that his client's letter was a warning, not a threat.
Given what is becoming apparent about the most extreme of the interpreters of Islam, I'm not sure I fully understand the distinction.
Written by Gregory Borse
http://www.chronwatch.com/content/contentDisplay.asp?aid=23917
Monday, September 25, 2006
If writers like Lawrence Wright ( Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11) and Robert Spencer ( Islam Unveiled: Disturbing Questions About the World's Fastest Growing Religion), and scholars like Bernard Lewis ( "Islam and the West: A Conversation with Bernard Lewis") are to be believed, five years after 9/11 we remain woefully—and dangerously—ignorant of the enemy we face.
Nearly two years ago, I was given a copy of Robert Spencer's Islam Unveiled (and reviewed it ) and learned in it that the struggle we now face is hundreds of years old—and has been building since at least the 12th century, when, as Spencer pointed out (and I paraphrased in the article linked above), "Islamic science, poetry, art, culture, and philosophy came to something of a grinding halt . . . and was replaced then by a rejection of Western cultural values in favor of an extreme understanding of the law of Allah regarding the Muslim faithful."
I have since been reading Richard Hooker's review of the history of Islam ( go here) and have learned that the seeds for this rejection were sown almost immediately upon the death of Mohammed. In working out the form of succession following the death of the Prophet, there emerged within the first four Caliphates (the "Patriarchal Caliphs") different brands of Islam (do not understand, however, that there were necessarily four). To grossly oversimplify—predictably, following the death of Mohammed, sects formed with distinctly different interpretations of how Mohammed's successors should be selected and how Islam was to be lived. Perhaps as a result of the sheer force of Mohammed's personality, during his lifetime, the Islamic cult enjoyed a tenuous peace. As Hooker writes, however, "as soon as the Arabian tribes heard of the death of Muhammad, the Islamic peace and most of the [tribal] alliances broke down. Several tribes revolted—some of these tribes revolted under the leadership of rival prophets. This began the period the Muslims call al-Ridda, or "The Apostasy." All of Abu Bakr's [the first successor to Mohammed] energy in the first years would be focused on quelling these rebellions and tenuously re-establishing the Islamic peace." This description of Abu Bakr's tenure is typical of the next three Caliphs.
On the one side, there seem to have been Caliphs whose energies were spent organizing the Arab world under Islam in imitation of Byzantine and Greek administrative models—in addition to expanding the Islamic world through conquest and succeeding with what Hooker calls "mind-numbing" speed—and with little attention to the more spiritual and religious aspects of the faith. Under these Caliphs, the Umayyad, Islamic learning, culture, and civilization flourished. As Hooker rightly points out, if not for these Caliphs, neither Plato nor Aristotle may ever have been introduced to Europe—having been preserved in the Islamic world and later passed on to the West by such Islamic scholars as Avicenna and Averroes.
On the other side, however, there were followers of Mohammed who fundamentally rejected the Umayyad's rather worldly and irreligious administration of the growing Islamic Empire. The Umayyad's model was decidedly royal and un-tribesman-like and concentrated power among a few who administered Islamic law and power from afar. Perhaps more fundamentally, these purists rejected the legitimacy of the Caliphate of the Umayyad Dynasty as heretical. And, of course, among these followers of the teachings of the Prophet, there were splinter groups. Some became what is known today as the Shi'a (the Shiites) in Iraq and elsewhere. Others splintered into the Sunnis. Still, much later, come the Wahabists (Osama bin Laden belongs to this group), whose interpretation of the Koran is perhaps the most radical. Or not. To confuse the issue even further, even among the most radical, there seems—and here, reading Lawrence Wright would seem now to be indispensable to understanding our present situation (see his recent interview with Hugh Hewitt along with his articles, for the New Yorker, Web of Terror and The Master Plan)—to be fundamental disagreement about exactly how to achieve the goals of radical Islam.
According to Lawrence, Osama bin Laden's goal was parochial at first—the destruction of the corrupt and heretical governments within Islamic states, like Saudi Arabia, and their replacement with Taliban-style "true" Islamic regimes. In addition, however, bin Laden's anger toward Americans was centered upon their "occupation" of Islamic Holy Lands in the Arabian Peninsula following the first Gulf War. Still, amid great disagreement within radical Islamic circles following 9/11, there were those, like Musab al-Zarqawi and his mentor, Abu Mohammed al-Maqdisi (with whom al-Zarqawi later split for not being radical enough), who believed that Osama bin Laden's tactics had either backfired (Maqdisi) or had not gone far enough (Zarqawi). Despite these disagreements, however, as we know, Zarqawi (before his death) managed to warrant and accepted the title of chief architect of Al Qaeda in Iraq.
9/11 was seen by some Islamists as a great victory of Islam over the West. Others, however, viewed it as a huge set-back, as it exposed the radicals as ones willing to go to any lengths to further their agendas, without regard for what some Muslims regard as fundamental to the Islamic faith—like safeguarding against killing fellow Muslims or women and children (even when they are themselves not "of the Book").
Consider, however, Bernard Lewis' comments regarding a certain turn in the rhetoric of radical Islam in the context of the political cartoon controversy last year in Europe and the War on Terror in general. He points out, early in a discussion sponsored by the Pew Research Center ( go here):
"You will surely be struck by a certain asymmetry in this formulation [of the title "Islam and the West"]. On the one side, a compass point; on the other, a religion. Now, of course, we use "the West" in a number of different senses, but primarily, they are political, strategic, cultural, even civilizational, but not normally religious. The one religious term I have heard used for the West is the post-Christian world. I needn't develop the implications of that term. Islam, on the other hand, is the name of a religion. And it is a part of human society identified by itself, and therefore also by others; not the other way around, in terms of religion."
So, Lewis first identifies an incongruity. "The West" refers to a primarily political, historical, and, as he says, a "civilizational" reality, while the term "Islam" identifies a religious reality (as multifaceted as that reality might be). This is important because in the West we generally identify ourselves in a bifurcated way—as belonging to a "civilization" and history and, if we are religious, as belonging also to a religion (usually, but not always, Christianity). Hence, Christians, being in this world, but not of it, are comfortable with a distinction between a worldly, historical, and political destiny as distinguished from a spiritual destiny. There is "Christianity" (to designate a religion) and "Christendom" (to designate a world-view, a civilization, an historical reality). But, for those of the Islamic faith, Lewis argues, the relationship between this world and the next is not quite the same. Islamists identify first with their spiritual destiny and only secondarily with their worldly one. Lewis continues:
"In the Islamic world, from the beginning, Islam was the primary basis of both identity and loyalty. We think of a nation subdivided into religions. They think, rather, of a religion subdivided into nations. It is the ultimate definition, the prime definition and the one that determines, as I said, not only identity, but also basic loyalty. And this is quite independent of religious belief. In Islam, there isn't — or rather, there wasn't until recently — any such thing as the church, in the Christian sense of that word. The mosque is a place of worship. It's a building, a place of worship and study. And in that sense, it is the equivalent of the church. But in the sense of an institution with a hierarchy and its own laws and usages, there was no such thing in Islam until very recently. And one of the achievements of the Islamic Revolution in Iran has been to endow an Islamic country for the first time with the equivalents of a pope, a college of cardinals, a bench of bishops and, above all, an inquisition. All these were previously unknown and nonexistent in the Islamic world."
In short, in the Islamic world, the primary identification and loyalty is with Islam. The secondary identification is with a nation, a country, or a political affiliation. This may account, for instance, for the paucity, within the context of the War on Terror in a post 9/11 world, of the public voice of the so-called "moderate" Muslim. Since the first identification and loyalty is with Islam, even moderate Muslims are hesitant to speak out regarding the activities of their brothers and sisters of faith whose interpretation of the Koran moves them to murderous acts against the West.
But how does this connect to the Danish Cartoon controversy? First, Lewis notes that the response in the Muslim world was delayed at least four months—lending credence to the view that it was seized by certain radicals as a cause célèbre that would advance a certain agenda. Second, and much more important, Lewis explains that the ginning up of resentment against the Danish Cartoons was a new interpretation of Islamic Law. Lewis elaborates:
"The first point made was that it is forbidden to portray the Prophet, that making images of the Prophet of any kind is against the Muslim religion. That is true, though not always strictly observed by Muslims. But the point is that they want to avoid any kind of deification of the Prophet. Muslims are shocked when they go into churches and they see pictures and statues being worshipped. This they see as idolatrous. And if you go into the interior of a mosque, it is very austere: no pictures, no statues, only inscriptions. The ban on the portrayal of a prophet is intended to prevent the development of idolatrous worship of the Prophet. I don't think there was any danger of that from the Danish cartoons."
Most Muslims take seriously the dictum against the deification of the Prophet Mohammed. Images are discouraged precisely for the same reason that graven images are discouraged by the Jews—because they encourage a worship of a (necessarily false) idol. But, as Lewis points out, the Danish Cartoon controversy went further than to simply assert a prohibition against idol worship among the Islamic faithful. Lewis points out that until this episode the prohibition against the image was adjudicated within Islam against those of the Islamic faith. There was no understanding that the Islamic Law extended to non-Islamic peoples outside of Islamic states. That is, the Danish Cartoons represented a fundamental change in a kind of practice among some Muslims—and became an occasion for a change (among some) for the application not only of the substance of Islamic Law, but of its jurisdiction.
Here, the murder of Theo Van Gogh on November 2, 2004, in Amsterdam, is quite relevant. Van Gogh had directed a film, "Submission," which depicted the plight of women under the most austere interpretations of Islam. He was murdered by an Islamist in retribution for what was perceived to be his film's "offense" against Islam and as a warning to others, according to a note pinned to his body by the murderer.
Bernard Lewis, speaking of the Danish Cartoon episode, offers an explanation for why these two events constitute a fundamentally new turn in the understanding of Islam and the West, post 9/11. Under normal practice, offenses against Islam and the Prophet are adjudicated in Islamic Law according to a jurisdiction that extends first to Muslims themselves and only secondarily to non-Muslims who live (under Shar'ia Law) within Muslim territories. Under normal circumstances, the prosecution of offenses against Islam is reserved for offenses committed by Muslims themselves. Secondarily, and rarely—Lewis observes—offences against Islam by non-Muslims are prosecuted generally only under the most extreme circumstances and usually not at all. That is, non-Muslims within Islamic countries are generally not prosecuted for offenses because it is understood that, as non-believers, they cannot be held responsible for offending Islam.
But the murder of Theo Van Gogh—a non-Muslim in a non-Muslim country—and the outrage regarding the political cartoons depicting Mohammed (again, within a non-Muslim country) constitute, according to Lewis, a fundamental change in the application of Islamic law and practice (Lewis speaks of the Danish Cartoons only, but apply his words to the murder of Van Gogh as well):
"What is the range of jurisdiction of Muslim law? And here you have two opinions. According to the Shi'a and a minority among the Sunnis, Muslim law applies to Muslims wherever they may be in the world. A Muslim who commits an offense against Muslim law, wherever he may be in the world, is subject to Muslim law and must therefore be punished in accordance with Muslim law.
"The majority Sunni view is that Muslim law only applies in countries under Muslim government. What happens outside is no concern of the Muslim authorities. One distinguished jurist makes his point with an extreme example: A Muslim traveling in the lands of the unbelievers commits robbery and murder. He returns to the lands of Islam with his loot. No action can be taken against him or against his loot because the offense was committed outside the jurisdiction of Islam, and it is therefore up to the juridical and legal authorities of the infidels to take action, if they can and will.
"Here you have two different opinions relating to an offense committed by a Muslim. That is not the case for the Danish cartoons. This is an offense committed by a non-Muslim. And here the plot thickens. This is discussed by all of the juridical authorities only in the case of a non-Muslim subject of a Muslim state. If a non-Muslim subject of a Muslim state says or does something offensive to the Prophet, he is to be tried — accused, tried, and if necessary, punished. The jurists on the whole tend to take a rather mild view of this offense. They say, well, he is not a Muslim; he doesn't accept Mohammed as the Prophet; we know that. So saying that Mohammed is no prophet does not constitute this offense. It has to be more specifically insulting than that. And, as I say, there is an elaborate juridical literature and case law on this subject.
"What is never discussed at all — it is never considered — is an offense committed by a non-Muslim in a non-Muslim country. That, according to the unanimous opinion of all of the doctors of the holy law is no concern of Islamic law, which brings us back to the case of Denmark. Does this mean that Denmark, along with the rest of Europe is now considered part of the Islamic lands, and that the Danes, like the rest, are therefore dhimmis, non-Muslim subjects of the Muslim state? I think this is an interesting question, which can lead to several possible lines of inquiry."
Add to this the recent remarks by Pope Benedict XVI in Germany just two weeks ago. According to the mainstream press, they have been nearly universally reviled in the Islamic world. Does this response—linked as it might be to what Lewis says is a fundamentally new interpretation of the jurisdiction of Islamic Law—constitute an understanding that now Christians, and specifically Catholics, are understood to be dhimmis (i.e. non-Muslim subjects of a Muslim state)?
At the very least, these episodes underscore a very real misunderstanding on the part of non-Muslim Westerners of the very mindset of Muslims, and especially the most radical among them, regarding exactly what is being fought for in the war currently being waged.
Perhaps the most astute comments came early in the Bush Administration by Condoleeza Rice: "We were at War, but not on a War footing."
Still, even if we are on a "War footing" now—what war do we wage? If we do not understand the enemy—his ideology, his worldview, his very paradigm for asking and answering fundamental questions—how can we fight him, let alone answer him?
From what I can tell, there are those Islamists who understand that Islamic Law (and the reach of its jurisdiction) now goes beyond the borders of any identifiable Islamic state. These Islamists literally live in an Islamic world "subdivided" into countries—and, the distinction between Muslim and non-Muslim "country" is immaterial. This means that offenses against Islam which are committed by non-Muslims in non-Muslim "territories" fall under the jurisdiction of Islamic Law and, by nature, are part and parcel of some Islamists' understanding of jihad.
In light of Benedict's remarks in Germany, Mehmet Ai Agca, the would-be assassin of John Paul the Great, warned Benedict not to travel in Turkey: "'I write as one who knows about these matters very well,' Agca said. 'Your life is in danger. Don't come to Turkey -- absolutely not!'" ( go here).
Agca's lawyer assured the public that his client's letter was a warning, not a threat.
Given what is becoming apparent about the most extreme of the interpreters of Islam, I'm not sure I fully understand the distinction.
posted by JDS at 7:12 PM
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