Quran
and the Muslim Fanaticism
By
Mohammad Asghar
“The
debate has been shifting beyond the condemnation of 9/11 events and has
been addressing the pivotal question of how a bunch of fundamentalist
militants could distort the teachings of a noble religion to justify
their murderous designs”-Dr.
S. Amjad Hussain, Pakistan Link, July 16, 2004.
The
debate on a ‘bunch of fundamentalist militants,’ who are accused of
hijacking the peaceful teachings of Islam’ has fascinated many people
of almost all religious denominations. Many among us, who have never
bothered much to learn anything about Islam, are easily carried away by
statements, like the one quoted above, and nod their heads in dismay for
what they have been led to believe are the acts of a bunch of Islamic
fanatics. For those of us, who know what has been inspiring the
so-called Muslim fundamentalists to engage themselves in terrorism and
destruction, the stated argument falls flat on its face. We would need
to dig deeper to unearth the real truth, which have been eluding many of
us for a long time.
Islam
never received so much attention and scrutiny before as it does today
from people of almost all walks of life, not because its followers have
done something great for the good of mankind, but on account of the
attacks some of its adherents launched on the United States of America
on September 11 of 2001. It was the day that has changed the thinking of
the world; it was the day that has presented the world with a challenge
that humanity has never faced before in its long history. September 11
would continue to dominate our minds for a long, long time.
But
why, we need to ask ourselves, the 19 people mostly of Saudi Arabian
origin sacrificed their own lives for the purpose of killing thousands
of innocent people on that fateful day? Why Osama bin Laden conspired,
and had his followers carry out, among others, an attack on the USS Colt
that precipitated the American missile strike on his den in the hills of
Afghanistan
?
Osama’s
real brawl with the
United States
began with its attempt to liberate
Kuwait
from the clutches of now-deposed Saddam Hussain of
Iraq
. Driven by its own global interests, and also asked for help by most
Muslim countries of the Middle East, the United States massed some of
its forces on the soil of Saudi Arabia so that they could launch their
campaigns against the Iraqi forces, which were then in Kuwait.
Stationing its forces on the holy land of God was the gravest crime the
Americans have ever committed after their country came into being over
two hundred and twenty-five years ago. And for this crime, the American
needed to be punished in all possible atrocious manners.
Why
stationing American forces in
Saudi Arabia
, and that, too, for liberating a Muslim country from its occupying
forces should be a cause for Osama’s wrath? The answer to this
question lies in the teachings of the Quran, for it says:
“O
ye who believe! Truly the Pagans are unclean; so let them not after this
year of theirs approach the Sacred Mosque, and if ye fear poverty, soon
will Allah enrich you, if He wills, out of His bounty, for Allah is
All-Knowing, All-Wise
(9:28).
It
is clear from the above verse that the Prophet Muhammad had barred only
the Pagans from ‘approaching the Sacred Mosque’ of
Mecca
, as they, in his opinion, were unclean, but he left the Zoroastrians,
Buddhists, Jews and the Christians out of the prohibition. But the
rulers of Saudi Arabia took the Quranic stipulation a step further, with
the result that a visit to the Sacred Mosque of Mecca even by the
followers of Judaism and Christianity is a complete taboo today; this
despite the fact that, like the Muslims, they are also Ahlul Kitab—the
recipients of the Holy Books; whose foods are halal (permissible)
for the Muslims, and whose women Muslim men can marry without having to
convert them to their (men’s) own faith (Quran; verse 5:6).
Osama,
being a devout Muslim, and well versed with the contents of the Quran,
knew very well what it says about the Christians, yet he chose to follow
the footsteps of his country’s rulers. Accordingly, he, like many
other Muslims, concluded that the Christianity-dominated country of
America
has violated the sacredness of his country by stationing its forces on
its soil, and that if
America
did not remove its forces from his country immediately, it would mean
that the Americans intended to continue profaning its holy land by
continuously being present thereon.
His
conviction forced him to ask the Americans to leave
Saudi Arabia
forthwith.
America
ignored his call, as it had to have some of its forces stationed
somewhere in the
Middle East
in order to secure its own national interests. This infuriated Osama,
and he attacked the American warship and its other oversees interests
for the purpose of dragging
America
into a conflict with him and his followers. After
America
retaliated against him by launching missiles at his hideout in
Afghanistan
, he replied by killing thousands of its innocent people on September
11, 2001.
What
had made Osama to embark upon his course were the Quranic verses, like
the one quoted above. Had there been no commandment in the Quran to bar
the Pagans from approaching the Sacred Mosque of Mecca, Osama would have
had no other way to use the Islamic Scripture to further his own agenda,
thereby sparing the Americans the pains he has so grotesquely inflicted
on them to preserve his country’s perceived sanctity.
It
is true that all Muslims are not terrorists, and that the number of
terrorists among them is very small. But highlighting on this two facts
are not good enough for exonerating the Muslims from many of the
despicable acts their brethren have already committed, or are likely to
commit in future. An elucidation may be in order to drive my point home.
In
1971, over 75 millions of Bengalees (of
Bangladesh
) were afraid to oppose a government they knew was not their own. A
rational analysis of their situation would prove that the Bengalees were
not afraid of the government per se; they were afraid of the power it
wielded through 91,000 of its armed forces. And the armed forces struck
fear in the people’s minds, not so much due to their number, but
because of the deadly weapons with which they were equipped.
So,
it can be logically argued that a ‘bunch of people’ can become a
devastating force, if it is armed with deadly weapons. And when a bunch
of people become deadly, nothing can prevent it from playing the role of
the majority, unless the majority itself starts exerting its own
collective power over the small bands of people.
But
how a majority is supposed to prevail upon an armed bunch of terrorists?
In my opinion, it can be done in two ways: either the majority cajoles
the terrorists into laying down their weapons, or it takes up its own
arms and defeats them in a show of force.
Maintaining
silence by the majority over the perpetuation of a crime by an
individual or a group of individuals, or the lack of alacrity on its
part to prevent a crime from taking place should be a good ground to
believe that the majority not only accepts the legitimacy of the crime,
it also encourages its commission. Our modern societies should never
condone such conducts of the majority; rather, they must subject it,
along with the ‘bunches of people,’ to an exemplary punishment that
would not only prevent them from committing further crimes in future, it
would also discourage the would-be criminals from becoming their
followers.
This
is the only way that is likely to make our world safe; failing to do it
would expose our lives and properties to the wraths of the terrorists.
Given the chance, they would strike at us mercilessly. In our death and
destruction lies their happiness; and this is something that we should
never let them have at any cost.
The
deadly weapon that the Muslim terrorists carry is the Quran. It tells
them, and commands them, among others, to carry out the following
actions against the Pagans, the Jews and the Christians:
1.
“Let not the believers take for friends or helpers Unbelievers rather
than believers: if any do that, in nothing will there be help from
Allah.” (3:28).
2. “Then fight in Allah’s cause - Thou
art held responsible only for thyself - and rouse the believers. It may
be that Allah will restrain the fury of the Unbelievers; for Allah is
the strongest in might and in punishment” (4:84).
3. “And never will Allah grant to the
unbelievers a way (to triumphs) over the believers” (4:141).
4. “When in their
insolence they {Jews} transgressed (all) prohibitions, We said to them:
“Be ye apes, despised and rejected” (7:166).
5. “Against them make
ready your strength to the utmost of your power, including steeds of
war, to strike terror into (the hearts of) the enemies, of Allah
and your enemies, and others besides, whom ye may not know, but whom
Allah doth know. Whatever ye shall spend in the cause of Allah, shall be
repaid unto you, and ye shall not be treated unjustly (8:60).
6. “But when the forbidden months are
past, then fight and slay the Pagans wherever ye find them, and seize
them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem”
(9:5).
7. “Fight them, and Allah will punish
them by your hands, cover them with shame, help you (to victory) over
them, heal the breasts of Believers” (9:14).
8. “O ye who believe! Take not for
protectors your fathers and your brothers, if they love infidelity above
Faith: if any of you do so, they do wrong” (9:23).
9.
"Fight those who do not believe in God and the last day... and
fight People of the Book,
(Christian and Jews) who
do not accept the religion of truth (Islam) until they pay tribute (Ziziya
tax) by hand, being inferior” (9:29).
When
faced with the above Quranic verses, which clearly teach hatred and
violence to the followers of Islam, Muslim Apologists downplay their
implications by asserting that the verses “picked out of context,
historic or textual …” from the Quran do not represent the true
spirit of Islam, and that the exclusion of those passages, which espouse
the “themes of kindness, forgiveness, sanctity of human life, and
unconditional respect for other religions” should not be avoided in
order to understand the humane side of this religion. (Dr. S. Amjad
Hussain, ibid, top of this article).
It
is a fair statement and I subscribe to it. I also agree that many verses
of the Quran relate to those events, which had taken place in the life
of the Prophet Muhammad. He was upset with the Jews, so he accused them
of being the descendants of simian ancestors. The Pagans opposed him in
the propagation of his faith, so he cursed them, and when it failed to
have its desired effect, he asked his followers to beleaguer them, bind
them and to kill them, when and wherever they could lay their hands on
them.
These
are the historical facts. These, however, do not apply to the present
time, nor are they supposed to guide the Muslims in their relations with
Pagans, Jews and the Christians of the 21st
century.
The
matter being as such, one needs to ask the Muslims Apologists as to why
these apparently hateful verses should remain in the Quran, when they
are not supposed to be applicable in the lives of Muslims today. They
must also explain as to what lessons the readers of the Quran are
supposed to derive from many of its apparently violent passages. If the
instructions to murder, which are embedded in many verses of the Quran,
are not intended for the present-day Muslims, then why not remove these
verses from the Quran, so that it can really be a book from which
Muslims could learn nothing, but the lessons of love, kindness,
forgiveness and unconditional respects for other religions.
Are
Muslims willing, and prepared, to turn the Quran into a real “Holy
Book,” thereby ensuring the survival of mankind on earth in peace and
harmony?
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