Jihad and people power,

Jasdev Rai — Thu, 08 Sep 2005 16:52:07 +0000

Jihad has now become a household word in the world and conjures up associations with terrorism, suicide bombings and violent religious campaigns. It is fast becoming the evil that people want rooted out from the west. But jihad is not the problem it is being conjured up as. It is what jihad is for that should occupy our minds and our policies. Jihad is an action. It means a struggle. Muslims are at pains to explain that it could mean a struggle of the conscience, a struggle for a goal in life, a struggle of a family to deal with family crises, a struggle by a student to get through exams and so on. A jihad can be undertaken individually and peacefully by a person or it can be violent as a nation might engage in violently defending its territory. Jihad cannot be wiped away from the world any more than the action struggle can be wished away. The world is a struggle or jihad every minute of the day. It is therefore as ridiculous to say that jihad is the cause of problems as saying to struggle is the evil that needs to be expunged. One could be engaged in a jihad against suicide bombers! It is what the struggle is for and what inspires jihad that should concentrate attention. Conflicts and crises have a tendency to bring some words into common use. It should concern us that the young suicide bombers were brought up in UK but had stronger empathies with people in distant lands inspired by ideological perspectives of a different age. The liberals explain this dislocation with theories of insidious racism, lack of belonging etc. while the government resorts to the comforting and therapeutic citizenship programme. These analysis and solutions seem to be instinctive reactions formed from constructions of attitudes and values which are internal to British history. But religious affiliations do not subscribe to national boundaries. Religions and particularly Abrahamic religions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam, are essentially political theologies that compete for the nucleus of power. Christianitys refuge in the personal domain was forced on it by an increasingly secularised polity of the State in Europe. And ultra religious Jewish parties in Israel contest elections on the manifesto of a State with Jewish values although they remain in the minority. Islam however, is writ large as a political system in the Middle East. Historically the political aspects of these theologies evolved in response to the powers of the absolute monarch who ruled by terror at a time when wars often settled differences. The theologies armed the average person with divinely revealed doctrine to passively or actively resist the tyranny of the ruler. But these political theologies themselves became corrupted in the logic of power. In the west, secular democracy has addressed the maladjustment that was present in western polity between Christianity as a saviour of the poor and Christianity as a political power. But history does not always repeat in detail. Compared to its sister religions Islam has been egalitarian and tolerant in power but not yet been as liberal and compassionate in power as secular democracy in the west. Perhaps the road that Iran has taken may eventually lead to a Islam that will adjust to the logic of a pluralist non-monarchical statecraft or it may give way to secularism in time. But this is an internal battle of Islam which the west should avoid interfering in. One of the remarkable characteristics of Abrahamic theologies that have made them durable is their ability to adjust to different political and social circumstances by drawing from scriptures. All three have concepts of just war that have been interpreted at various times to engage in warfare or defence. Currently Islam is most active in the public domain of politics. The concept of just war is interpreted variably and contentiously from the word jihad in Islam. Whether it seems just to us is another matter, but the extrapolation from the scriptures for an insurgent to take up arms against an evil oppressor denying the enjoyment of Islam, is evidently meaningful and just to him however much other Islamic scholars condemn and refute such interpretation. But what does jihad mean in context of a democratic and pluralistic society? All three theologies also have concepts of fellowship through love of Gods creatures, coexistence with other religious theologies and peace. They all essentially strive to bring dignity to the common man. They all seek fair laws and a peaceful system of governance. In many Arab countries, such as Egypt and Syria, significant percentage of the populations are Christians. Historically Muslims have accepted their existence amidst them because the Holy Koran has conceptual directions for a pluralistic society. It is these values that need to be emphasised from the Koran now by Islamic theologians and brought into general public debate since the political paradigm has changed dramatically from the days of the despotic King. At least it has changed in the secular democratic world. The denial of concepts of just war simply drives the debate underground with its obvious appeal to the youth. But the realisation that the political dynamics of the egalitarian secular non-despotic democratic state necessitate a different functional interpretation of jihad promotes a different attitude. Concepts of Dar Al Islam and Dar al Harb must have different meanings in a democratic pluralistic society where the dynamics of conflict are battled in the ballot and the debate. Isnt debate and tolerance the hallmark of schisms within Islam through history? The interpretations need to emphasise that democratic politics gets rid of leaders who go against the popular grain through peaceful elections. Tony Blair and his fondness for wars will disappear from British politics. It may not bring back the dead of Iraq but neither will heinous bombings in London. Many of those who died and those who have been injured in the London bombings may have been as bitterly opposed to Blairs war in Iraq as the insurgents. But for them jihad the struggle of conscience is through the democratic process not the bomb. The Ummah, in principle the community in consensus, is most evident in a democracy even if the majority participants are not Muslims. The electorate share common values of decency respect and goodwill to fellow beings. But surely the onus is also on secular liberals to accept that religious scriptures have a permanence, power and durability that cannot be wished or reasoned away from the realm of social and political life. They have a way of re-emerging in the public domain. Both atheist liberals and the religionists need to reinterpret their positions in context of the tremendous opportunity that secular democracy has provided for coexistence. The need of the day is not more sanitised inter-faith dialogues between elites, or rejection of religious doctrines as the secularists want, but a realistic engagement and interpretation of these otherwise enduring political theologies in the light of a changed political paradigm. Todays paradigm is the realm of people power. Remarkably, almost all scriptures have concepts of coexistence, acceptance and pluralism that are important ingredients of a democratic society. We simply need to engage them to enable constructive and responsible participation of religious communities in secular democracies. After all, isnt the secular state a form of common Dar al Ahd, the state of treaty between individual and state and between communities for peaceful coexistence and change by consensus? Jasdev Singh Rai Director of the Sikh Human Rights Group The group has held several conferences on community cohesion, cultural diversity and anti discrimination. www.shrg.net

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Jihad and people power,