by TALMIZ AHMAD
IMAGES / Amazon & Princeton University Press
Almost every day, there are reports of a jehadi organisation perpetrating some atrocity or the other in which several innocent victims are killed or badly injured. Images of widespread carnage at airports, shopping malls, concert auditoria, hotels, restaurants and busy streets fill our television screens while solemn reporters inform us that security agencies suspect this to be an attack by the Islamic State (or I.S., also known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS) or its local affiliate or even an individual, a “lone wolf”, who was indoctrinated to carry out a suicide attack by I.S. propaganda on social media. Over the past five years, these attacks have led to a beefing up of security organisations and an increase in intrusive security checks at public places and have generated a climate of fear and uncertainty among ordinary people across the world.
This jehadi violence has also inculcated a deep suspicion and distrust of Muslims, who are increasingly being seen as possible terrorists, so much so that they can be offloaded from domestic and international flights if even one of their co-passengers is uncomfortable about their presence. The problem of “Islam” has now become central to the contentious politics of Europe and the United States, with politicians seeking electoral office competing with each other in xenophobic anti-Muslim posturing and proclamations. Most people are just bewildered about how so much wanton destruction can be perpetrated in the name of a world religion, most of whose adherents claim is a faith that preaches moderation, peace and mutual understanding and accommodation. The two books reviewed here attempt to explain this apparent contradiction between Islam’s precept and its practice.
Salafism
Shiraz Maher’s work on Salafi-jehadism is a timely and substantial effort to explain the roots of the ideology of jehad. He traces its principal ideas to their origins in Islam’s first texts, the Quran and the Hadith (the “traditions” of the Prophet Muhammad, referring to his words and actions), and the commentaries of the early scholars, and then explains how jehadi ideologues have reinterpreted these ideas to analyse Muslims’ present-day predicament and provide justification for contemporary confrontations between Islam and its enemies. For, he points out at the outset, the ideology of jehad and its modern-day protagonist, the I.S., “sits within the mainstream tradition of Salafi-Jehadi thought”, but whose roots have been shaped “by the experiences of Sunni Islam over the last century and beyond”.
“Salafism” refers to the thought and conduct of the first three generations of Muslims, a period that roughly covers the first 200 years of Islam. On the basis of a hadith of the Prophet Muhammad, these first Muslims are said to reflect the characteristics of the best Muslims and hence are worthy of emulation by later generations in order to realise the perfect Islamic life. Thus, as Maher notes, Salafism provides “an idealised version of Islam that enshrines both authenticity and purity”. All through the 19th and 20th centuries, as Muslims experienced defeat and despair, it is to these “righteous ancestors” that their intellectuals turned, seeking to derive from their words and deeds the ability to cope with the present-day dilemmas of their community through a fresh interpretation of their early conduct and precepts.
Their understanding was of course largely influenced by the political context in which the academics or activists were placed. Thus, their first tracts were impacted on by the experience of colonial domination, while in the 20th century the intellectuals responded to Western control over their political order and, later, the installation of authoritarian rule in most Arab polities, with their rulers suborned by Western powers. The understanding that these intellectuals derived was extraordinarily varied, stretching from the extremely conservative and revivalist to very modern and liberal and accommodative of most of the ideas of Western Enlightenment, but it was rooted in the same concern: how to reconcile the beliefs and precepts of Islam to the needs of modern times.
In terms of their political orientation, these Salafi intellectuals have traditionally been divided into three groups: quietists, those who decry political activism by the citizenry and leave decision-making to the ruler, who is then expected to rule according to Islamic precepts; activists, those who advocate an active role for citizens in shaping their political order on Islamic lines; and jehadis, those who are willing to use violence to realise a society that is based on God’s law. The latter approach is clearly explained in a statement by Al Qaeda, the world’s first transnational jehadi movement: “We believe that the ruler who does not rule in accordance with God’s revelation, as well as his supporters are infidel apostates. Armed and violent rebellion against them is an individual duty on every Muslim.” This category of Salafism is referred to as “Salafi-jehadism”, which is the subject of Maher’s investigation in the book under review.
Salafi-jehadism has had numerous ideologues over the past 70 years who have described its various characteristics on the basis of their interpretation of Islam’s texts and the later commentaries on these texts. In so doing, they frequently stretch the limits of old texts and imbue them with meanings that support their present-day interests, even as they compete vigorously with each other to uphold the value of their own offering.
Five attributes
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