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Jihad

JIHAD
Question:

What is jihad?

Answer:

Jihad consists of fighting for the cause of God.

Question:

What is the object and aim of jihad?

Answer:

The purpose of jihad is two-fold:

1.        Delivering people from superstitions in their beliefs and in what they do.

2.        Freeing the oppressed from the claws of the oppressors.

Question:

Does Islam ever justify starting a fight or a war with non-Muslims without provocation? 

Answer:

No, never.  On the contrary Islam fights in self-defence against:

1.        People of the Scriptures (Ahl al-Kitab), that is those who are possessors of a heavenly book, after they have been given an option between embracing Islam, or paying a tax (jizya), or fighting.

2.        People other than the People of the Scriptures when it has given them a choice between embracing Islam or fighting.

Question:

Who are the people of the Scriptures?

Answer:

People of the Scriptures consist of Jews, Christians and Zorastrians, all of whom possess heavenly books.

 

Question:

Who are those people not considered to be among the People of the Scriptures?

Answer:

They are other non-Muslims such as idol-worshippers and the like. 

Question:

What is the meaning of jizya?

Answer:

Jizya is an amount of money taken from the People of the Scriptures in return for the protection of the Muslims.

They are then free to practise their religious rites and they are excused from paying the zakat and the khums, which are taken from the Muslims.

Question:

Why make this difference?  Wouldn’t it be more just for the People of the Scriptures to be treated in the same way as Muslims?

Answer:

On the contrary, because the rights of the People of the Scriptures are fully safe-guarded under Islamic government whereas under other legal systems their rights have not been protected to such an extent, as is clear from the following principles:-

1.        In an Islamic country People of the Scriptures enjoy the same rights as their fellow Muslim citizens.

2.        Their life, property and honour is protected, just like that of the Muslims.

3.        The people of the Scripture are free to organize for themselves their own religious ceremonies just as Muslims are.

4.        With regard to legal problems, the People of the Scriptures can, if they wish, seek justice through the Muslim courts but if they prefer they can go to their own judges.

5.        The People of the Scriptures pay the jizya to the Muslim ruler while Muslims pay khums and zakat.  So can it justifiably be said that the People of the Scriptures are oppressed under Islamic rule?

Question:

So why did Muslims ever fight the People of the Scriptures?

Answer:

The conflict was always with their governments who were characterized by the ugliest forms of oppression and persecution.  We can see with what eagerness the inhabitants of those countries would welcome the Muslims, since they considered them to be their deliverers from the hands of their tyrannical rulers.  History is the best witness to that.  The same was the case with those non-Muslims who were not People of the Scriptures because the reason why the Muslims fought others was simply to exalt God’s law and to deliver other nations from exploiters and despots who were ruling their people through violence and terror.

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