My (earnest, irate) thoughts

Something has troubled me since I first began to learn about Islam. It niggled at my conscience. It irked me. It made me feel as if Islam, promoted by Muslims as a ‘complete way of life’, was destined forever to be misunderstood by non-Muslims because of it.

Though I could read with my own eyes the Qur’anic position on warfare — which forbids aggression but permits killing in self-defense — it still seemed like Islam would always fall short against other religions whose theologies appear more pacifist. Though medieval Europe had Christian armies, modern Christians largely dismiss them as antithetical to the message of Jesus, blessings upon him, and avoid judgment for secular armies because they are unrelated to Christianity. On the other hand, eastern traditions like Buddhism now seem very distant from the warrior-monks of feudal Japan, and today is associated with peace and inclusiveness. Then there’s Islam, which is linked to warfare and vigilantism in every sound byte.

A partial list of hadiths (sayings of the Prophet Muhammad, may God bless him) about gentleness and kindness:

Truly, God is mild and is fond of mildness, and he gives to the mild what he does not to the harsh.
God is gentle and loves gentleness.
To gladden the heart of the weary, to remove the suffering of the afflicted has its own reward. In the day of trouble, the memory of the action comes like a rush of the torrent, and takes our burden away.
He who helps his fellow creature in the hour of need, and he who helps the oppressed, him will God help on the Day of Travail.
All God’s creatures are His family; and he is the most beloved of God who does the most good to God’s creatures.
Whoever is kind to His creatures, God is kind to him; therefore be kind to man on earth, whether good or bad; and being kind to the bad is to withhold from him badness, thus in heaven you will be treated kindly.
Kindness is a mark of faith: and whoever has not kindness has not faith.

In some very pacifist part of my own being, warfare and religion were forever at odds. When learning about the history of the Arab and Turkic Islamic empires, some central part of me rebelled at the idea of a ‘Muslim’ army. How could an army be Muslim, I thought. Islam, coming from the root word slm, means peace and submission. This is the vision of Islam that I had fallen in love with — a Sufi bowing to his Beloved, grinning at children and animals as tiny examples of Divine Beauty. I began to be troubled. How could a soldier and his sword fit into this picture?

It’s important to note that I have always had an overdeveloped sense of justice. As a child, after being punished for back-talking or door-slamming with time-out in my room, I would come out and say, ‘I’m sorry.’ Then I would wait for my mother’s apology, since it takes two people to have an argument and clearly I wasn’t alone in my wrongness. My mother didn’t agree. And yet, anyone else’s ‘wrongdoing’ continued to bother me deeply, and I would wish that other people cared, like they ought to, about objective justice.

Though I liked reading about Sultan Mehmet the Conqueror, who spoke seven languages and at the age of 21 fulfilled the prophetic prediction that one day Constantinople would be conquered by a Muslim army, I was vaguely horrified by various Turkic and Arab invasions throughout Asia, Africa and Europe under the banner of Islam. Though it’s never really fair to judge the past by present sensitivities, it hurt me that they did it for Islam, not in spite of Islam.

Interestingly, since the Crusades, anti-Turkish sayings abound in European languages, like the Italian saying for any imminent danger (’Oh my, the Turks are coming!’) and the French saying for a person who is harsh and pitiless (’He’s a real Turk’) and the Austrian way to call children in from play (’It’s already dark, the Turks are coming, the Turks are coming!’). It makes my husband laugh — Yusuf is fond of saying Europeans still wouldn’t know how to relieve themselves or take showers if it weren’t for the ‘bloodthirsty Turks’.

But a part of me couldn’t help but think, ‘How could it be ‘religious’ to take up arms?’ See, I had this idea that true religion means always turning the other cheek, always peacefully resisting violence, always striving to return evil with good. (I picture Gandhi in his loincloth, refusing to eat.) Which is true, according to all the major religious traditions, including Islam. But is it the whole truth? Is it the truth in every situation?

If a people are ruled by violent, unjust or dishonest leaders, do they have a right to rebel against their society, or ask for help from foreign leaders? If a leader has knowledge, justice and love for God — and it shows in his nur — does he have an obligation to take control over foreign lands in order to rule them more justly, to prevent those people from starving or being stolen from or executed?

And if a country is peaceful, tolerant and inclusive, is there any guarantee that other countries will respect its freedom to continue that way? Look at Tibet.

Was my pacifism a cop-out, a way of dodging responsibility for my fellow humans? Does it make it easier for me to hide behind theories to explain why our world is full of injustice? Didn’t I have a part — don’t we all — in making it so?

The Prophet Muhammad, upon him be peace, said that the greatest jihad is to speak the truth before an oppressive ruler. (Due to the oppressive nature of many Muslim countries, it’s not oft-quoted in their history classes.) The Prophet also said that if we see an injustice, we must change it with our hands; if we cannot, we must speak out against it; if we cannot, we must feel bad about it in our hearts — though the last is the weakest form of faith. Faith, then, is not linked to what we believe, it is linked to what we do.

The Qur’an gives limited permission to fight, and only against persecution, which it says is worse than killing. When I think of ethnic cleansing, no matter who orders it; or torture, no matter who’s wearing the ski mask; or mass starvations, government corruption, or religious persecution, no matter who’s behind it — we do have an obligation to do, say or (at the very, very least) feel something.

Though I could never harm an innocent person, I also know that I should not be able to live with myself if I did nothing as a horrible indecency unfolded before my eyes.

I give credit to my husband for taking the time to explain to me his theory of why the Ottomans worked to spread the boundaries of their 600-year empire. At the least, it is a fresh perspective to consider historic empire-building from. At the best, it is a weight off my mind, as Islam now returns to its rightful place as a fundamentally honest religion that offers a ‘correct’ action for every human situation.