Lessons to Be Learned
From Battling the Grass Roots of
Extremism in Islamic History
Bismillah, al-Hamdulillah, Wassalatu Wassalamu ^ala Rasulillah.
Muslims in the past, as is the case today, have encountered many
deviant factions that thrived on and advocated the dogma of extremism that
resulted in injustice and heinous crimes of terrorism of dire consequences.
The wise leaders of the past, when they enjoyed the threshold of
power and ability, battled the extreme factions and nipped their buds in their
early stages.
Their strategy was based on two essential elements: to destroy the
credibility of the extremists and to defeat them militarily, in the same order.
The credibility defeat entails gaining political ground by drawing
the masses away from such factions. Without first discrediting these factions,
military triumph, no matter how expansive, cannot bring about and secure a
lasting and permanent victory.
The credibility defeat requires Muslims who are soundly and highly
knowledgeable about the religion to spread the correct religious knowledge.
This knowledge reveals the religious proofs that enable the people to know, for
example, that committing suicide is an enormous sin punishable in Hellfire and
likewise, killing an innocent soul. Once this knowledge is instilled in the
minds and hearts of the people, they will be shielded against the dogmas of the
extremist factions and their invitations.
Ultimately, these factions will be unmasked and will lose their
credibility.
Unfortunately, today's so-called "War on Terror" lacks
every wisdom and insight in achieving a credibility defeat. On the contrary,
the orchestrators of this war have done everything in
the book to grant a credibility victory to the extremist scavengers. Most
likely, they are driven by their own biases, little knowledge of Islam, and
ambitious agendas to fulfill goals they mistakenly deem fruitful, just, and
fair. A thorough study of the problem would require a different article to
enumerate and critique the driving factors.
This negligence behooved me to shed light on lessons that could be
learned from the rich history of Islam.
However, before I engage in the body of the work, let me highlight that
the prime notion under which extremist groups operate is to pervert the meanings
of the religious texts and use them as grounds to declare heads of states,
their subjects, and everyone who opposes them as blasphemers, thereby
legitimizing their bloodshed and the usurpation and destruction of their
properties, a scene we have abundantly seen in Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon,
Palestine, Turkey and other countries.
It was during the Caliphate of ^Aliyy
bin Abi Talib, the fourth
rightly guided Caliph, that the dogma of bloodthirsty extremism, of the same
nature as we encounter today, emerged.
The faction known as the Kharijites
rebelled when Imam ^Aliyy accepted the contribution
of two arbitrators. Some of the people who had fought alongside Imam ^Aliyy splintered and saw the arbitration as misguidance and
blasphemy. They said, 'how could it be acceptable to seek the arbitration of a
creature when Allah said in surah Al-An^am, 57:
{ إِنِ الْحُكْمُ إِلاَّ لِلّهِ }
Which means: [The ruling is but for Allah to give.]'
They thought, as a result of their ill comprehension of the
Qur'an, that ^Aliyy had contradicted the text,
whereas in truth he did not. Imam ^Aliyy commented on
their statement: 'they took a word of truth [referring to the ayah of surah Al-An^am, 57] and meant by
it something ill.' That is, they did not use the ayah in the proper context.
The Kharijites were the first faction to
deviate from the correct belief of the companions. Imam ^Aliyy fought
them and eradicated them save a few.
Among their errors is that they judge the enormous sinner as a
blasphemer. Moreover, they attribute blasphemy and everlasting Hellfire to
everyone who opposes their belief. In fact, the blasphemy of the Kharijites themselves can be deduced from the saying of the
Messenger of Allah:
<< لئن ادركتهم لاقتلنهم قتل عاد و
فى لفظ ثمود>>
Which means: <<If I catch up with them, I shall kill them
the way the people of the tribe of ^Ad (Thamud in
another narration) were killed.>> From earlier
sources we know that the ancient tribes ^Ad and Thamud
had been divinely punished and eradicated for their blasphemy.
Also the blasphemy of the Kharijites can
be deduced from the saying about them by the Messenger of Allah:
<< هم شر الخلق و الخليقة>>
Which means: << They are the worst of the creations>>,
And from the saying of the Messenger of Allah:
<< انهم ابغض الخلق الى الله تعالى>>
Which means: << They are the most unaccepted creations to
Allah.>>
An army of twelve thousand people lifted the sword against Imam ^Aliyy. Although he was equipped with multitudes of soldiers
and a gigantic military capability, he chose to establish first a credibility
victory over the Kharijites. Through a structured
campaign of forums, debates and teachings, he managed to remind the people
about the true meanings of the religion and the texts. Indeed, he did
re-instill the proper knowledge in the chests and minds of the people. As a
result, eight thousand soldiers gave up their swords and retracted their
positions of enmity.
Imam ^Aliyy and Ibn
^Abbas fought the remaining four thousand soldiers and
eradicated them, save a handful of about nine people. These nine fled and
spread in different parts of the land. Two fled to Sagistan,
two to
Over the years, one of
their descendents, Abu Bayhas Hasim
bin ^Amir, led a faction known as al-Bayhasiyyah, which was named after him. In the same way
that the Kharijites had treated Imam ^Aliyy, this faction fabricated and spread the false notion
that if the Head of State makes a ruling
contradictory to the Qur'an, even though he retains the belief that the
ruling of the Qur'an is the proper one, he blasphemes and should be ousted.
Moreover, they deemed that if his subjects do not rebel against him or if they
remain working under him in the institutions of the state, they also blaspheme
and their properties and bloodshed become lawful. They judged themselves as the
true believers following the Qur'an and the Prophet, sallallahu
^alayhi wa
sallam, and whoever opposed them as blasphemers.
Again this ill school of thought was eradicated at the hands of
the conscientious and just Muslim rulers.
About seven hundred years ago, Ibn Taymiyyah (died 728 AH), revived the thought of the Bayhasiyyah movement. Some two hundred years ago, Muhammad
bin ^Abdilwahhab—the forefather of the Wahhabi movement—embraced Ibn Taymiyyah's thought and brought about much of the menace
and mischief that all of us are witnessing today. A similar thought was
embraced and advocated by Sayyid Qutb,
a man who derailed the movement of Al-Ikhwan Al-Muslimin, which was once soundly managed and led by the
late Imam Hasan Al-Banna.
Today, there are several branches of these movements engaging in
the same ill school of thought, which is foreign to the teachings of Islam.
Ibn
Taymiyyah, Ibin ^Abdilwahhab, Sayyid Qutb, and their likes are notorious for contradicting
numerous cases in the religion. The reputable scholars of Islam have authored
many works refuting them and warning the Muslims against their straying. They
have done that out of religious obligation and out of conviction that unmasking
such factions, through spreading the correct knowledge of the religion, shields
the people and drives them away from their ill methodologies. This also
establishes the credibility victory for the People of Truth over the factions
of extremism.
Detailed religious refutations and the many examples of dispute
even among these factions might be of little interest to the Western World, but
this body of knowledge remains the grounds for drawing the people away from
extreme dogmas.
Contrary to what is required in terms of securing the credibility
victory, we find that the orchestrators of the
"War on Terror" actually call for perverting the religion of Islam by
demanding changes to the texts with which they disagree, canceling Islamic
Schools, and advocating a so-called "modernization of Islam." They
think it is feasible to convince the Muslims to alter and give up certain Qur'anic and religious texts. It could be said this is a
prime recipe to grant an ultimate credibility victory to the factions of
extremism.
To top that, they allow the extremist factions to take the lead,
masquerading as peacemakers, in defending issues of strategic importance and
concern to all Muslims. Such issues include defending the religion from
perversion, addressing the Palestinian cause, liberating
The moderate Muslims around the world are a massive majority,
whereas the sympathizers with the principles of the extremist factions do not
exceed two million people. Yet, the orchestrators
have elected, through their short-sighted strategy, to delve in the mud and
step into the home of every Muslim, tracking dirt and arousing massive
aggravation and alienation.
It would have been much wiser for the orchestrators
of the war, prior to entertaining military action, to win the political
war by establishing the credibility victory and unmasking the religious
ignorance of the factions of extremism.
This matter requires engaging the mainstream Muslims who are soundly
knowledgeable about the religion in taking a leading role in structured and
massive educational programs and institutions.
Ironically enough, the orchestrators
have stretched their hands to every Tom and Jerry capable of speaking either in
an undisciplined way about Islam or in a way that crosses the acceptable bounds
of the religion. They did not yet deal constructively with the true moderate
Muslims who stand mid way between laxity and exceeding the acceptable religious
bounds. They have ignored the moderate Muslim groups, perhaps because they do
not know how to deal with the fact that there are points of disagreement
between the teachings of Islam and their own schools of thought. Thus, they
prefer to label the truly moderate Muslims as dangerously questionable with
long term agendas, rather than submitting to the very teachings of the Democratic
society that allows and acknowledges the different points of view of its
people.
Rather than speculating and theorizing, what is really needed is a
genuine effort to understand the differences between Islam and other schools of
thought, and to reveal the vast common grounds that truly exist, upon which
coexistence and mutual building of sound societies can stand tall.
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