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was the essence of the mission of Prophet Muhammad? Was it dawah,
inviting, using peaceful means, people to the path of god? Or was it
jihad, in the sense of physical fighting against others? The Koran is very
clear on this point. It stresses that the prophet’s mission was
essentially that of peaceful dawah. Thus, addressing the prophet,
god says in the Koran: “O Messenger! Proclaim the [message] which has been
sent to you from your Lord” (5:67).
Accordingly, the Koran addresses the prophet as preacher (dai),
bearer of glad tidings (mubashir) and warner (nazir). It
explains: “We have sent among you a messenger of your own, rehearsing to
you Our signs, and purifying you, and instructing you in scripture and
wisdom and in new knowledge” (2:151). In this regard, the prophet said, “I
have been sent as a teacher to the people (ini boistu mualiman).”
He also said, “I have been sent to establish the pinnacle of morality.” In
other words, Prophet Muhammad was a messenger of knowledge and morality
and his aim was to provide knowledge to people so that they could walk on
the straight path. Nowhere in the Koran is it mentioned that the prophet
was sent to the world in order to engage in jihad, in the sense of
physical warfare (qital).
Despite this, in the early Islamic period, not long after
the prophet’s demise, in the books that came to be written about his life,
the prophet was presented as a warrior (mujahid or ghazi) rather than as a
teacher of morals. In fact, these biographies of the prophet were also
known as maghazi, that is accounts of the battles (ghazwat)
of the prophet, despite the fact that in the course of his 23-year span of
prophethood, warfare was only an exception and certainly not the rule.
With regard to fighting, the prophet clearly declared “O people! Do not
desire to confront your enemies. You should seek protection of God from
this.” Had war been a permanent feature of the mission of Islam, obviously
the prophet would not have exhorted his followers thus.
The reason why after his demise, the prophet’s biographies
presented his life as essentially that of a mujahid, in the sense of one
being engaged in physical battle with non-Muslims, is to be located not in
the teachings of the Koran but rather in the then prevalent cultural,
literary and intellectual contexts. From earliest times all victorious
communities saw their battles and conquests as the essence of their
history and that was how it was recorded by them. Their exploits on the
battlefield were converted into epics in which they took great pride. This
explains why the literary heritage of powerful communities in the past
consisted almost wholly of such romanticised stories of their military
exploits, and the pagan Arabs were no exception to this, as is evidenced
from the poetry produced in the pre-Islamic period. It was thus not
surprising that after the demise of the prophet, and as Islam began to
spread out of the Arabian peninsula and the Arabs established a vast and
mighty empire, the biographies of the prophet that began to be written
projected him as a warrior and his life in terms of the wars he
participated in. Consequently, his basic mission, that of peaceful
dawah, or inviting people to the path of god, was almost wholly
eclipsed in the writings about him that were penned at this time.
The prophets who were sent by god prior to Prophet
Muhammad were provided with certain miracles through divine help. The
miracles of numerous prophets such as Abraham, Moses, Jesus and David are
mentioned in the Koran. The main miracle bestowed by god to Prophet
Muhammad was none other than the Koran itself and the prophet was asked to
engage in jihad with his enemies using the Koran. This the Koran termed as
the exalted form of jihad (jihadan kabiran). As the Koran lays
down: “Therefore listen not to the unbelievers but strive against them
with the utmost strenuousness, with the [Koran]” (25:52). This clearly
indicates that the prophet’s mission was one of appealing to the people to
adopt god’s path, using proofs and evidence to convince them, and not one
of slaughtering people who disagreed with him.
The prophet preached in Mecca for 13 years during which he
and his companions were brutally persecuted by their opponents. Yet he
tolerated this oppression steadfastly and exhorted his disciples not to
waver but yet to stay away from revenge. Some critics argue that this was
because the prophet and his companions were a small and relatively
powerless group at this time and so in any case were in no position to
take on their foes through arms even if they had wanted to. This however
is not true.
Admittedly, compared to the situation of the prophet and
his followers in Medina, where he later migrated, the situation of the
Muslims in Mecca, that is before the prophet’s migration, was certainly
weak. But at the same time, even in Mecca, the prophet had numerous brave
disciples who were willing to lay down their lives for him. Had he wanted
to, he could easily have secretly instructed them to strike at his
aggressors. But this he did not do. This was because not only had he not
received permission from god for this but also because in fact god had
prevented him from taking to arms at this time against his oppressors.
After he shifted to Medina, he was granted permission to take to arms only
after he had arranged for the Muslims of the town to become a strong,
consolidated force which provoked the jealousy of his opponents. It is
crucial to note here that the fighting that god now permitted Muslims to
engage in was simply in defence.
As the Koran explained: “To those against whom war is
made, permission is given to [fight] because they are wronged […] They are
those who have been expelled from their homes in defiance of right – [for
no cause] except that they say, ‘Our Lord is God’” (22:39-40).
It cannot be denied that many mistakes, indeed tragic
blunders, in understanding and presenting before the world the true
essence of the mission of Prophet Muhammad have been made by both Muslims
as well as non-Muslims. The battles in which the prophet fought were all
directly or indirectly defensive in nature but, despite this, Islamic
scholars and writers developed the completely untenable theory of
offensive jihad which has been elaborated upon in considerable detail in
the books of medieval fiqh. In fact, the spurious theory of
offensive jihad seems to pervade this corpus of literature which wrongly
seeks to argue that many of the battles of the prophet were offensive
wars. This literature gives the mistaken impression that the prophet
sought to exterminate all non-Muslims, or to force them to accept Islam at
the point of the sword, which was not the case at all. Obviously, and
needless to add, this completely wrong conception, which is so prominently
present in the corpus of traditional Muslim writings, has given non-Muslim
critics all the ammunition they need to criticise and even condemn Islam.
It must also be added here that the wholly un-Islamic
notion of ‘offensive jihad’ is a fundamental contradiction of the Koranic
dictum: “There is no compulsion in religion (la ikraha fi ad-din).”
The cause of revelation (shan-e nuzul) of this verse is also
pertinent to our discussion here. The prophet forbade his companion Abul
Husain from compelling his young son, whom he had earlier given to a Jew
to look after, to convert to Islam. This was the cause of this particular
verse being revealed.
Once a needy non-Muslim woman approached the Caliph Umar
with a request. Thereupon Umar invited her to accept Islam but she
declined. Later, Umar felt that perhaps his invitation might be construed
as compulsion – he was the caliph, after all – and so was very upset about
what he had done and repented of it. If this was how careful a close
companion of the prophet like Umar was in not compelling anyone to accept
Islam, how can it be expected that the prophet would ever use force to
make others believe in Islam?
But despite this, some Islamic scholars, including the
putative founder of the Shafi school, Imam Shafi, went to the extent of
arguing that the reason (illat) for fighting the ‘infidels’
(non-Muslims other than the ‘People of the Book’) was their infidelity.
That is why these scholars granted such people only two choices: Islam or
death. Obviously, this stance is a gross affront to Islamic teachings and
also a clear contradiction of the practice of Prophet Muhammad, who is
described in the Koran as the ‘Mercy unto the Worlds’ (rahmat al il
alamin) and who said about himself that he was a ‘gift of mercy’ sent
by god. How could the prophet, who clearly forbade his followers from
killing in the course of war non-Muslim women, children, the aged and
worshippers who had abandoned the world, ever have permitted killing
non-Muslims simply because of their infidelity?
Prophet Muhammad was a peace-loving man. That is why he
agreed to enter into a peace treaty with the pagan Meccans at Hudaibiyah
despite the fact that the terms of the treaty were heavily weighed against
him and the Muslims, which caused considerable resentment among his
companions. The Koran referred to the treaty of Hudaibiyah as ‘the clear
victory’ (fateh mubin). Further clearly indicating his love of
peace, the prophet instructed his disciple Muaz thus: “Do not engage in
war with your enemies till you have invited them to Islam. Then, if they
refuse this invitation, do not fight them till they start fighting. Then,
if they start fighting, do not fight back till they kill one of your
people. Then, if they do this, show them the dead person and say to them,
‘Is there no better path than this?’ This is because if through you
someone receives true guidance from God, it is better than the whole
world.”
Every sensible and impartial person will thus readily
admit that the prophet was a lover of peace and that the jihad, the sense
of qital, that is in certain cases allowed for in Islam is
definitely a blessing and not a curse.