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Islam Hijacked
Rabbi Reuven Firestone, author of
"Jihad: The Origin of Holy War in Islam" and Professor
of Medieval Judaism and Islam at Hebrew Union College in Los Angeles, offers his
insights into the events of September 11.
The queries have come in steadily
since the great increase in suicide bombings by Muslim Palestinians during the
past year, but since Sept. 11, they have come virtually non-stop. "Does
Islam condone suicide? Does Islam condone killing noncombatants? Does Islam
teach that a martyr who enters heaven gets the pleasure of 70 virgins? Does
Islam really teach the universal doctrine of ‘Islam or the sword?’
Does Islam hate Jews and Judaism?" or, "Does Islam fundamentally hate
anyone and anything not Muslim or Islamic?"
Americans know almost nothing
about Islam beyond what they pick up from films and novels and news reports
(much of it erroneous). Israelis probably know even less, though many have the
bad habit of claiming (with some swagger) that they know Muslims because they
live with them. The truth of the matter is that Israelis don’t live with
Muslims, hardly see them beyond what they see on their own televisions, and tend
to have an extremely distorted view of Islam. We few who know something about
Islam are bombarded with questions and asked for interviews, but given the hurry
and the nature of media discourse, the short answers often confuse more than
clarify.
Simplistic clarifications by
so-called "Muslim scholars" often confuse the situation even more,
because virtually any Muslim can claim to be a scholar and speak on behalf of
Islam. From my own experience, many of them seem not to know what they are
talking about.
So how do we arrive at the truth
about Islam? Is it a fundamentally violent and hateful religion, as its
detractors have claimed? Or is it a religion of compassion and reason, as its
Muslim adherents insist? To answer this question, we must first look inward. How
have its champions and its enemies characterized Judaism? We have suffered the
abuse of religious character assassination by those who not only have hated us,
but also by those who have feared us. Anyone who can read is able to find
excerpts in translation from the Bible and from our Talmud and midrash that
would curdle the blood of any innocent reader who doesn’t know the context
of the citations. Our great King David arranged the murder of an innocent man
because he lusted over the poor man’s wife (2 Samuel 11). Rabbis
incinerate their opponents (Shabbat 34a, Sanhedrin 100a). The Torah even calls
for mass extermination, for genocide of the native Canaanite inhabitants of the
land (Deuteronomy 7). It is just as easy to find violent material in the Quran
and in the second most important source of Islamic religious teaching: the
Hadith literature (parallel to Oral Law in Judaism). It almost need not be said
that one can just as well find material urging compassion for the needy, the
poor, the homeless, the orphan and widow.
One of my criticisms of
self-proclaimed pundits of Islam is that they do not cite their sources. Take a
look at some of the key issues that lie at the core of the questions listed
above.
About a week before the suicide
massacres and destruction of the World Trade Center towers in New York, "60
Minutes" claimed to have interviewed a Palestinian working for and with
suicide bombers intending to kill Israelis. Interviewed in Arabic, the English
voice-over translation had the man claiming that a martyr who enters Paradise
will enjoy the sexual pleasures of 70 or 72 virgin women.
A number of self-proclaimed Muslim
scholars accused "60 Minutes" of distorting the transcript and
demanded an apology. They claimed to have heard the original Arabic in spite of
the loud English voice-over and emphatically stated that he said nothing of the
sort. They even went further, to claim that Islam would never teach such a
thing. This was clearly an attempt to avoid public embarrassment, but the truth
is that according to Islamic lore and tradition, a male who enters heaven enters
what we in the West would consider a hedonistic paradise full of physical and
sensual pleasures. This is simply a fact. The origin of this view most certainly
lies in the context of the extremely stark and difficult life of ancient Bedouin
Arabia. Something as simple as the constant flow of water in a stream was
considered miraculous, so it would be natural to imagine heaven as flowing with
streams of water under the shade of huge trees.
But there are other delights as
well, according to a Hadith in an authoritative collection called Sunan
al-Tirmidhi, which would be on the shelves of any Muslim scholar. In my edition,
published in Beirut, it can be found in a section called "The Book of
Description of the Garden," chapter 23, titled "The least reward for
the people of Heaven," Hadith number 2562. The Hadith reads literally as
follows: "Sawda (Tirmidhi’s grandfather) reported that he heard from
Abdullah, who received from Rishdin b. Sa’d, who in turn learned from Amr
b. al-Harith, from Darraj, from Abul-Haytham, from Abu Sa’id al-Khudri,
who received it from the Apostle of God [Muhammad]: The least [reward] for the
people of Heaven is 80,000 servants and 72 wives, over which stands a dome of
pearls, aquamarine and ruby, as [wide as the distance] between al-Jaabiyya and
San’a." That these 72 wives are virgin is confirmed by Quran (55:74)
and commentaries on that verse. Al-Jaabiyya was a suburb of Damascus, according
to the famous 14th century commentator, Isma’il Ibn Kathir, so one
personal jeweled dome would stretch the distance from Syria to Yemen, some 1,600
miles.
Was this tradition intended to be
believed literally? Do Muslims believe it literally? Are they required to? This
particular Hadith has technical weaknesses in its chain of transmitters and is
therefore not considered impeccable, though it is listed in an authoritative
collection. As a result, Muslims are not required to believe in it, though many
inevitably do (but an even more respectable Hadith with virtually the same
message can be found in Tirmidhi K. Fada’il al-Jihad 25:1663). I am sure
that many believe that they will experience incredible physical pleasures when
they enter heaven. I personally have no problem with that. Religions inevitably
expect their adherents to believe things that would seem absurd to believers of
other religions.
The more important question is,
who is privileged to enter heaven according to Islam? Does a suicide bomber who
kills innocent people merit entrance into heaven? The answer to this question
would appear to be quite clear. Because Islam is a religious civilization that
has been associated with political power for many centuries, its religious
scholars have had the responsibility to deal with issues of state and with
issues of war. Islam, therefore, has a lot to say on such issues. On the issue
of suicide and harming innocents, Islam is unambiguous.
The four schools of Islamic law
expressly forbid the harming of noncombatants. These include women, children,
monks and hermits, the aged, blind and insane. In the most authoritative
collection of Hadith, the Sahih al-Bukhari (The Book of Jihad, chapters 147-147,
Hadiths 257-258), Muhammad expressly disapproves and then forbids the slaying of
women and children. "A woman was found killed during one of the Apostle of
God’s battles, so the Apostle of God forbade the killing of women and
children." This message is found in a number of authoritative collections
and has been formalized in the legal literature. Islam also expressly forbids
suicide, the punishment for which is eternal reenactment of the act and
revisitation of the pain. Sahih al-Bukhari (K. Jana’iz 82:445-446) has the
following on the authority of the Prophet: "Whoever commits suicide with a
piece of iron will be punished with the same piece of iron in Hell. Whoever
commits suicide by throttling shall keep on throttling himself in Hell
[forever], and whoever commits suicide by stabbing shall keep on stabbing
himself in Hell [forever]."
On the other hand, martyrdom in
war for Islamic cause is praised extensively throughout the literature. The
Quran teaches (3:169): "Do not consider those killed [while engaging] in
God’s cause dead. Rather, they live with their Lord, who sustains
them!" The Quranic idiom, "killed while engaging in God’s
cause" is a reference to martyrdom for acting on being a Muslim, whether as
a persecuted and powerless individual or as a warrior fighting for the expansion
of the world of Islam. Perhaps the most compelling expression is composed of the
idioms found in the most authoritative sources and attributed to the Prophet,
"Paradise is [found] under the shade of swords," or "Paradise is
under the gleam of swords" (Sahih Bukhari, Jihad, 22:73). Muhammad’s
companion, Abu Hurayra, said that he heard the Prophet say: "By the One in
Whose hands is my soul [i.e., by God], I would love to be martyred [while
engaged] in God’s cause, then be resurrected, then martyred, then
resurrected, then martyred, then resurrected, and then martyred" (Sahih
Bukhari, Jihad 7:54). A Hadith in Sunan al-Tirmidhi states that in contrast to
the suicide, the martyr does not even feel the pain of his death (Fada’il
al-Jihad, 26:1663). He is also forgiven all his sins and has the right to
intercede on behalf of his own family to enter Heaven.
So suicide is forbidden, killing
of noncombatants is forbidden, but martyrdom is rewarded with entrance into
heaven and, therefore, with great material rewards in the world to come. We are
beginning to uncover the complexity of the problem. It rests to a great extent
on interpretation and the authority of those who make the interpretations. One
stable person’s definition of suicide may be interpreted as martyrdom by a
fanatic. All these categories may be easily manipulated by fanatical, desperate,
or evil people. A reasonable person’s obvious identification of innocent
noncombatants may be categorized as Satan’s hordes by someone who is
desperate and confused. Add to this the fact that most, though not all, suicide
bombers are in desperate economic straits.
We need to add one more ingredient
to an already complex soup, and this is the perception of the West (and the West
includes Israel) among many Muslims who live in the Middle East. The West prides
itself with having brought many gifts to the civilized world: tolerance,
democracy, pluralism, freedom. To the natives of many parts of the world that
were exploited by colonialism, imperialism and today’s "globalism,"
these noble contributions are meaningless. Many Muslims in the Middle East see
them as no more than slogans that attempt to hide the true intent of the West:
political and religious domination and economic exploitation.
To a poor peasant or middle-class
urban dweller who suffers the loss of children to disease, lacks opportunities
for improvement, and has a grim and downtrodden daily existence while watching
TV-movie portrayals of Western wealth and decadence, it is not a stretch to
conceive of the United States and Israel as the greater and lesser Satans.
Of course, local corrupt
leadership often takes advantage of such sentiment in order to prop up its own
crooked regimes. In fact, the secular leaders of Muslim countries have always
tried to manipulate Islamic symbols and images in order to manipulate their
populations. Add this also to our soup. Islam is a noble and compassionate
religion, but like all good things, Islam may be cynically used and manipulated.
Misguided people may also manipulate it in good faith.
The outrageously unstable
political situation in the Middle East, the terrible economic situation, the
lack of freedoms and lack of a tradition of open inquiry for the past six
centuries all contribute to an environment of suspicion and bitterness.
Whom can you trust, if not God?
But God has also been manipulated, and this is the saddest aspect of the complex
we call the Middle East. God has been hijacked by terrorists. Islam is not the
problem. Terrorism is the problem, and terrorists have hijacked both Islam and
God.
This article appeared originally
in The Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles, September 28, 2001
Information
on Reuven Firestone
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