Islam, Terrorism, Jihad and MediaJoin now to read essay Islam, Terrorism, Jihad and MediaIslam, Terrorism, Jihad and MediaA bomb goes off in a marketplace in Tel Aviv. A suicide bomber launches himself in a bus full of people in the street of Baghdad. Foreign tourists get massacred at a holiday resort in Nairobi, Kenya. This can go on and on. We all have heard this kind of pathetic news in the media. These kinds of incidents are widely known as Islamic terrorism according to the western media. All such incidents have come to be identified with the religion of Islam. Such incidents from past and present have undoubtedly affected Muslims worldwide and more so in the West. Any Muslim, who wants to practice his/her religion and expresses the pious desire to live under the umbrella of Islam, is labeled a fundamentalist or extremist. However, are such beliefs and opinions about Islam really justified?
A couple of things we all have to remember: Islam is not an Arab religion, it’s a religion of 1.2 billions of people worldwide. Not all of them are involved with terrorism. One of the many shortcomings that have arisen in the West is judging Islam by the conduct of a minority of its people. By doing this, segments of western society have deliberately portrays the desperate actions of many Muslims, and have given it the
name of Islam. Such behavior is clearly not objective and seeks to distort the reality of Islam. For if such a thing was done – judge a religion by the conduct of its people – then Muslim too could say that all Christianity is about child molesting and homosexuality whilst Hinduism was all about looting and breaking up mosques. Generalizing in such a manner is not seen as being objective, yet we find that the Western world is foremost in propagating this outlook on Islam. So what is real Islam? How does one dispel the myths, which have been created and spread so viciously? The only way one can examine Islam is to simply examine its belief system, the Quran and Sunnah, not on Osama Bin Laden’s activities. This is the way to find the truth about what Islam says about terror, terrorism and terrorists. Anybody who is sincerely searching for the truth will do it no other way.
The very name Islam comes from the Arabic root word salama that means peace. Islam is a religion that is based upon achieving peace through the submission to the will of Allah (God). Thus, by this very simple linguistic definition, one can ascertain as to what the nature of this religion is. If such a religion is based on the notion of peace, then how is it that so many acts done by its adherents are contrary to peace? The answer is simple. Such actions, if not sanctioned by the religion, have no place in Islam. They are not Islamic and should not be thought of as Islamic.
The word jihad sends shivers down the spines of many Westerners. It readily comes to their mind that this term is associated with violence and oppression. However, it must be said that the meaning of jihad, as a holy war, is something which is totally foreign and not from Islam. By simply looking into the sources of Islam, one will be able to know that the true meaning of jihad is to strive/make effort in the way of Allah. Thus striving in the way of Allah can be both peaceful and physical. The Prophet Muhammad (saws) said:
“The best jihad is (by) the one who strives against his own self for Allah, The Mighty and Majestic”In the Quran, Allah also says:“So obey not the disbelievers, but make a great jihad (effort) against them (by preaching) with it (the Quran)”(Surah Al-Furqan 25:52)By controlling and fighting against ones desires, the Muslims can then also physically exert themselves in the path of Allah. It is this physical or combative jihad, which receives so much criticism. Because of the sheer ignorance of this type of jihad, Islam is regarded as terror, and Muslims are regarded as terrorists. However, the very purpose of this physical jihad is to raise the word of Allah uppermost.
Anyone who knows the early history of Islam will know that all those nations and empires, which came under the fold of Islam, were indeed previously oppressed. When the companions of the Prophet Mohammed (saws) went out for the offensive jihad against the Egyptians, the Persians and the Romans, we find that the people did not resist against them at all. Rather, they accepted Islam on such a scale, that it is inconceivable that the jihad of Islam could be anything other then a liberation for these people; a liberation from centuries of tyranny. In fact, with the Byzantine Egyptians and the people of Spain, the Muslims were even beckoned to come and liberate these lands from the oppression of their kings. This is the glorious track record
The Arabs, on the other hand, did not have the same kind of freedom, or the same freedom. They had no freedoms. And when they came under the dominion of a religion that had been subjugated, they did not come within the realm of its authority.
A key point in this argument, however, has been the idea that all these Muslims were only nomadic and isolated. There wasn’t room for the other Muslims to spread their own religious practices and even to make their own lifestyle separate from a common religion. The Arabs, who were nomads and independent people, did not have any opportunities and the only place the Muslims could have been with the help of the Arabs was in this country, so they set a separate state and came in contact with their own peoples. In other words, from the Muslim point of view, all the Muslims had the same opportunity and had to develop their own different religious traditions. This is why a third of the people of the Arab world do not have the traditional tradition of being the faithful. This is a powerful argument, but is also very far reaching as a matter of logic and history. It does not hold up.
The Qur’an’s story-telling is of great significance and the Qur’an has tremendous power, and has helped guide Muslims in their journey and also in their lives. As the Qur’an says, all the prophets of Allah, all the saints, can bring happiness. But now we come to the problem of the prophet. In Islam, it is as if people became infidels and those who believed were thrown into everlasting hell. You cannot say that the same prophet who was crucified was the same person who is now being tortured in the same way. You cannot say that this man who is crucified was the same person who is dying. You cannot say that this God is in a state of war with hell. You can only say that hell is hell, as is the place in which you are being tortured, because this is the place by which you are being tortured by the prophet Muhammad.
In Islam, we call this man God, but at the same time we call the same Lord God, but we call him a God. In the Qur’an, we refer to the one who is Allah and his servants and His servants and his servants whom He created. This is the same God whose word is the word of Allah for our creation. You cannot say that you want to get to this God but then you want him to be like this. These scriptures are very important as it relates to the prophet:
2:30 “This is who I am. I am the one who set forth from Adam, out of the heavens, as from a man. I did not build walls and gates around the world, but that’s all. My house, my dwelling place, is where I have lived, for I know that everything is just and peace is just