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Violence, Christianity and Islam
By:
Dr. Ahmad Shafaat
Christians have often presented their
religion as a religion of love and peace while presented Islam as a
religion of war and sword. In the modern media Muslims and Islam
have often been covered in a way which reinforces this old
perception. For Muslims who have time to think about such things the
Christian and Western perceptions appear as a complete disregard of
the most obvious facts. In what follows I discuss this issue from
the point of view of the teachings of the two religions as well as
the conduct of their adherents through history.
Christian conduct
For centuries now Christian nations have
been busy beating up one Muslim nation or another. In the Middle
Ages they came as crusaders. Then they colonized many Muslim
countries and tried to destroy their cultures and religion. During
their struggle for independence some Muslims had to suffer terrible
violence. The French killed about a million Muslims in Algeria
because they wanted independence. In a way this French war against
Islam and Muslims is still continuing through the support of the
military dictatorship in Algeria against the Muslim party that was
set to win elections and persecutions in France of Muslim men with
beards and Muslim women with hijab.Tag Heuer Aquaracer Ladies Replica The USA and Britain killed
hundreds of thousands of Iraqis (with the approval of about 90% of
their people) without letting the world see the blood, thus
practicing a lesson learned during the Vietnam war. Serbs have
killed hundreds of thousands of Muslims and raped thousands of women
in Bosnia and Kosovo. Although in these lands, a combination of rare
circumstances put the West (USA and Western Europe) on the side of
the Muslims, this did no good to them because the Western powers did
not want to loose any of their own soldiers. Had the West left the
Muslim Bosnians and ethnic Albanians to their fate without putting
an arms embargo on them, their suffering would not have been any
greater.
Israel has been for half a century
destroying the Palestinian people with the help of arms and
financial and moral support provided by the USA, the very sort of
crimes that have been committed by the Serbs against the people of
Kosovo and which have been condemned by the West, even though there
were no cameras to record the cries of the Palestinians and
photograph the pictures of the massacred people and burning homes.
In Lebanon when Christians were in the majority there was war, but
now that the Muslims are in the majority there is peace except in
the south of the country where Christians have been helping a
foreign enemy against their own countrymen. When an American
president needs to divert his people's attention away from his sex
scandal the easiest thing he finds is to bomb Muslim countries --
Afghanistan, Sudan and Iraq -- because he knows that this will be
approved by a vast majority of his people. And then there is the
media which is ever busy in maligning the Muslims while they do not
at this point in time possess the resources to speak up: for every
word spoken/written by a Muslim and heard/read by one person, a
thousand words from a Christian are received by a thousand persons
in the world. At the international level the voices of the Muslims
are all but drowned by the Christian voices and those Christian
voices are for the most part condemnatory. If a cartoonist was to
depict the situation between the Western and Muslim civilizations,
he or she will draw a weaker person not able or inclined to stand up
or to speak while another stronger person is standing over him with
a big stick, now and then beating him, and all the while shouting to
him in a loud voice: you are a violent man.
It is important for both Muslims and
Christians to ask: What will the Christian be if the tables were
turned and their lands were first colonized by Muslims and then
bombed or maligned or ethnically cleansed? If the past is any guide,
the answer is clear: There will be a vicious reaction and given the
chance an attempt at almost total destruction of the Muslims. For in
Spain Muslims lived for about 850 years as rulers. They lived with
Jews and Christians for the most part in a spirit of tolerance and
cooperation in promoting science and culture to the point that their
work prepared for the modern scientific revolution with all its
benefits for mankind. But the moment Muslims became weaker, the hate
in the Catholic heart came out with a vengeance. Muslims were either
killed, converted, or forced to leave Spain and their heritage was
as fully destroyed as was humanly possible. Before Palestine and
Kosovo, there was Spain.
Above, I have mentioned only what the
Christian nations have been doing or are doing to the Muslims. But
when we look at what they have done to each other or to other people
any validity in their claim of being people of love and peace
vanishes, at least as far as Western Protestant or Catholic
Christians are concerned. The horrible treatment of the heretics and
witches in the Middle Ages probably inspired the tyrants of later
centuries. The native peoples of the Americas, Australia, and New
Zealand bear a tragic witness to what Christian nations can do to
other nations and with the blessings and assistance of Christian
churches. In this century alone the Western nations have fought two
world wars with tens of millions dead and untold misery for the
living. For each victory in these two wars the church bells rang in
the victorious countries. The first nation to make a weapon of mass
destruction and the only one to use it is a Christian nation.
Had not the toll of death mounted too
high for the Americans there can be little doubt that the fate of
North Vietnam would have been like that of Iraq: it would have been
bombed to submission no matter how many Vietnamese lives would have
been lost. The lesson learned in North Vietnam was not that there
should be no more war but that never again the American casualties
would be allowed to mount so high and never again the cameras would
be allowed to get so near the horrors of war that a backlash against
the war would be created in the public. Often Christian countries
have some hand even in the violent conflicts in non-Christian
countries in Africa and Asia. The colonial policy of divide and rule
sowed seeds of conflicts that later resulted in violence between the
groups that the colonial powers turned against one another.
Palestinian-Jewish conflict and the Kashmir issue are among the
legacy of colonialism. After the colonial period interference by the
Western countries continued in the internal affairs of African and
Asian countries. More recently, Iran-Iraq war was encouraged by the
West so that the Islamic revolution in Iran may not spread to the
Arabian peninsula. The military government in Algeria which
cancelled the elections that Muslims were poised to win has the
support of France and this support is partly responsible for the
violence there, which, it seems, is mostly done by the military.
In Rwanda the tribe that perpetuated a
holocaust of another tribe follows the Catholic religion. The most
cruel tyrant in history came from a Christian country and there has
been no shortage of other somewhat less ruthless dictators in
Christian countries, especially in South America and Africa.
Even in terrorism, associated in the
media mostly with the Muslims, it is the Christians that hold the
record when it comes to the number of children and other innocent
people killed. The Oklahoma bombing, carried out by people
professing to be Christians, claimed more completely innocent
victims than any other single act of terrorism. Terrorism in
Northern Ireland which is a direct result of a sectarian conflict
between Catholics and Protestants and is often supported by the
religious leaders, has probably killed more children and innocent
people than Middle East terrorism. Moreover, Muslim terrorism is
mostly linked to the sort of unjust treatment suffered by the
Palestinians whereas the Oklahoma bombing and, to a lesser degree,
Irish terrorism is difficult to link in such a way.
Now and then there appear religious
sects whose beliefs lead them to violence. David Koreish armed his
followers to teeth and led them to their violent death. There seem
to exist several Millennium groups who are planning to engage in
violence around the year 2000. Several doctors have been murdered by
anti-abortionists and some Catholic leaders have not categorically
condemned these killings. In some cases the violent impulses in
Christian groups turn against the groups themselves. Jim Jones led
hundreds of his followers to commit suicide.
Then there is racial violence, by no
means dissociated from Christianity. Black churches have been burned
in America and recently some Americans tied a black man with a rope
and dragged him by their truck until he died. Such acts are often
carried out by members of groups who also carry crosses. And in
South Africa the inhuman system of apartheid was maintained by the
church-going white community with the blessing of the churches and
indeed the apartheid was practiced by the churches themselves.
At an individual level, too, most
horrible examples of violence are seen in the Western Christian
nations. In some American and British cities a car driver may take
out his gun and shoot senselessly whoever happens to be passing by.
There are many cases of church-going and Christmas-celebrating
serial killers who are privately busy sexually attacking young men
or women, killing them in the most horrible way, and then burying
them in their backyards. Also, prior to the media focus on churches
cases of gross sexual and other abuse of orphans by the Catholic
priests and brothers were not infrequent. And there are even larger
number of examples of church-going parents who torture their
children to death or to destroy them mentally by incestuous
relations. In one such case, an American father recently killed his
son by injecting him with the Aids virus.
One may object that we are concentrating
only on the negative, not providing any background analysis, and are
not making necessary distinctions between various brands of
Christianity and between secular and religious tendencies in the
Christian world. But this is precisely what the Christians do to
Muslims. They mostly talk and ask about acts of violence taking
place in the vast Muslim world without making any distinctions, or
analyzing them properly, or balancing them with the positive.
The Bible
In the New Testament there are of course
teachings that stress love and mercy. Thus Jesus is reported to have
commanded Christians to love their enemies and to turn the other
cheek when stricken on one. Also, he is reported to reduce the whole
of the Law to loving God and to loving one's neighbor. He also
reduces in the fourth gospel his commandments to the single
commandment of loving one another. But all this was not able to save
the natives of the Americas, Australia or New Zealand, or the Iraqis
or Vietnamese or the Bosnians or Albanians, the millions massacred
in Rwanda and earlier killed in the world wars or the sad little
children who are tortured by their parents or the prisoners
suffering tortures at the hands of the dictators. Why? The talk of
love and peace in the New Testament, often repeated from the
pulpits, is ineffective partly because of human weaknesses and
partly because this is only one side of the Biblical message. The
other side is seen in Biblical passages such as the following:
When my angel goes
in front of you, and brings you to the Amorites ... you shall
not bow down to their gods ... but utterly demolish them and
break their pillars in pieces.
... Little by little
I will drive them out from before you, until you have increased
and possess the land (Ex 23:23-33; see also Ex 32:25-29, where
the sin of making the golden calf by the Israelites leads to the
command: "Each of you kill your brother, your friend, and your
neighbor").
But as for the towns
of these peoples that the Lord your God is giving you as an
inheritance, you must not let anything that breathes remain
alive. You shall annihilate them - the Hittites and the
Amorites, the Canaanites ... - just as the Lord your God has
commanded (Deut 20:16-17; see also Deut 7:2-16).
And at the seventh
time, when the priests had blown the trumpets, Joshua said to
the people, "Shout! For the Lord has given you the city
[Jericho]. The city and all that is in it shall be devoted to
the Lord for destruction. ... Then they devoted to
destruction by the edge of the sword all in the city, both men
and women, young and old, oxen, sheep, and donkeys (Joshua
6:16-21; cf. Heb 11:30-33, where a New Testament writer condones
such passages in the Old Testament).
Thus says the Lord
of hosts, "... Now go and attack Amalek, and utterly destroy all
that they have; do not spare them, but kill both man and woman,
child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey" (1 Sam
15:2-3). (Saul did not carry this command fully in that he
spared some cattle as booty. For this action God rejected Saul
as king of Israel (verses 8-9, 13-15, 26), and gave the kingdom
to David, although even David killed only men and women in the
conquered lands of other nations and spared the cattle, 1 Sam
27:8-9, cf. 2 Sam 8:2).
They did battle
against Midian, as the Lord had commanded Moses, and killed
every male (Num 31:7).
These passages relate to the situation
when the Israelites had power over some nations. But there are
passages which were written about nations against whom they had no
power. In these passages annihilation of other nations is of course
not commanded but hoped for:
O daughter Babylon,
you devastator!
Happy shall they be
who pay you back
what you have done
to us!
Happy shall they be who take your
little ones
and dash them
against the rock! (Psalms 137:8-9).
Such hopes can at times get associated
with the messianic times:
For the nation and
kingdom that will not serve you shall perish; those nations
shall be utterly laid waste (Isa 60:12). And in the days of
those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom [of Israel
which] ... shall crush all these kingdoms and bring them to an
end, and it shall stand forever (Dan 2:44). Ask of me, and I
will make the nations your inheritance, and the ends of the
earth your possession. You shall break them with a rod of iron,
and dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel (Psalm 2:8-9).
Arise and thresh, O daughter Zion, for I will make your horn
iron and your hoofs bronze; you shall beat in pieces many
nations ... (Micah 4:13). And among the nations the remnant of
Jacob [=Israel], surrounded by many peoples, shall be like a
lion among the animals of the forest, like the young lion among
the flocks of sheep, which, when it goes through, treads down
and tears to pieces, with no one to deliver (Micah 5:8).
Related with the above teachings of the
Bible is the well-known belief of the Israelites in their being
chosen children of God while the other nations are like dogs.
Another related belief is that the salvation and revelation almost
exclusively belong to the Israelites. All this creates certain
insensitivity to other peoples, the goyim.
The Old Testament is not devoid of any
reference to love and peace (see Ex 22:21, 34:6-7). But nationalism
and exclusivism dominates it and this cannot be conducive to love
and peace, as the passages quoted above show.
Christians may say that this is the
attitude only of the Old Testament. There is, they will point
out, growth and evolution in revelation from the Pentateuch to the
psalms, then to the prophets, and finally to the gospels. With the
coming of the gospels earlier teachings were replaced by the law of
love. There is some truth to this view. Thus in the Pentateuch the
possibility is not admitted that people from other nations may
become worshippers of Yahweh. The division among people is strictly
on national or ethnic lines and Yahweh is a national god who expects
to be served by only his people. It is because of this that he
commands the annihilation of other peoples and the towns inhabited
by them are given only the choice of either submitting to forced
labor or annihilation. The third choice of submitting to the worship
of Yahweh is not even admitted. Later, in prophets like Isaiah there
is an improvement of this conception. Yahweh is seen as the
universal god and the possibility is admitted that other nations
such as Egyptians and Assyrians may join with Israel in the worship
of the God of Israel (Isa 19:18-25), although even then Israel is
expected to rule other nations (Isa 60:12). But this idea of
evolution does not justify the violence to other nations described
in the Pentateuch. For there can be no stage in the evolution of
divine revelation when killing "everything that breathes"
including infants can be justified. Moreover, the idea that the
nation of Israel is a chosen nation to which salvation and
revelation exclusively belongs and which is destined to destroy or
rule other nations with a rod of iron goes through the Bible, from
the Pentateuch to the New Testament, like a thread. The passages
quoted above from the Old Testament are from different parts of the
Jewish scriptures, including from prophets like Isaiah. The New
Testament also expresses similar sentiments.
Thus some stories in the gospels present
the Gentiles as dogs, as compared to the Jews who are the children
of God (Mark 7:24-30 and par). The exclusivism of the Jewish
religion is also inherited by the gospels. The fourth gospel says
that the salvation is of the Jews (4:22) and according to Paul the
church is formed by grafting Gentiles who are like a wild olive on
to the remnant of the Israelites who are like the root which
sustains the grafted branches (Rom 11:17-18). Indeed, throughout the
New Testament it is assumed that the savior had to come from the
Jews because salvation is of the Jews. From this it follows that
without this Jewish savior Jesus salvation is not possible. Hence
the fourth gospel makes Jesus say that no one goes to the Father but
through Jesus who is the way, the life and the truth (John 14:6).
According to Paul even a different type of Christianity is not to be
tolerated:
As we have said
before, so now I repeat, if anyone proclaims to you a gospel
contrary to what you received, let that one be cursed!
(Galatians 1:9).
If in the New Testament Jesus sometimes
appears like a lamb, this is so only during his first coming when he
had no power. During his second advent when he will come with power
and glory he will be like a lion (Rev 5:5, cf. Micah 5:8). The Old
Testament hope of the restored kingdom of Israel, destroying or
ruling other nations is transferred in the New Testament to
Christians and Christ:
when the Lord Jesus
is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels, in flaming fire,
inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and on those
who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus (2 Thess. 1:7-8).
[Christ will destroy] every ruler and every authority and power.
For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his
feet (1 Cor. 15:25).
But as for these
enemies of mine who did not want me to reign over them -- bring
them here and slaughter them in my presence (Luke 19:27, not a
saying of Jesus but of a character in a parable).
only hold fast to
what you have until I come. To everyone who conquers (temptation
to apostasy) and continues to do my works to the end, I will
give authority over the nations; to rule them with an iron rod,
as when clay pots are shattered -- even as I also received
authority from my Father (Rev 2:25-27, cf. Psalm 2:8-9). And she
gave birth to a son, a male child, who is to rule all the
nations with a rod of iron (Rev 12:5).
It is true that in Christianity the
nationalism of the Old Testament and the exclusivism and violence
connected with it is considerably toned down but because the New
Testament largely affirms the Jewish nationalism, exclusivism, and
the messianic hopes and because the Christians accept the Old
Testament as word of God and therefore as sacred they
are to some degree influenced by it. Indeed, it seems that the
Christian nations often subconsciously put themselves in the
position of the chosen Israelites while putting other nations in the
place of the Amelikes, Hittites, Canaanites etc and feel justified
in partially or totally destroying them with "a rod of iron" like a
potter's vessel. Thus what the Catholics and other Western nations
did to the natives in Americas, Australia and New Zealand etc or the
way they treated the colonized lands as markets to be exploited with
the accompanying attempt at the destruction of their cultures and
languages or what they in this century assisted the Jews to do to
the Palestinian people or what the Serbs almost did to people of
Kosovo or what the Catholics did to the Muslims of Spain is very
similar to what the Bible commands the Israelites to do to the
Amelikes etc or prophesies that they will do to the other nations in
messianic times. Even the Nazi holocaust is not too un-Biblical, for
in the holocaust probably the Nazis simply turned the tables around:
they put the Jews themselves in the position of the Amelikes while
they became the New Israel. Thus the seeds of hatred and intolerance
sown like weeds along with the wheat of divine revelation by the
editors of the Bible came to bear their poisonous fruit that the
Jews themselves were made to eat.
For Christians to act violently and
aggressively against other nations under the influence of the Bible
it is not required that they should have often read such passages as
talk about the killing of men, women and children of nations like
Amelikes. Such passages are simply a gross manifestation of
nationalism, exclusivism, and a very negative view of other nations
that is reflected everywhere in the Bible, which no one exposed to
the Bible, either by direct reading or through the sermons of the
priests and ministers, could possibly miss.
The best attitude that the Bible can
show to other nations is that it allows them the benefits of
revelation and salvation, of which they are otherwise deprived,
through the Jews or a Jewish Messiah, although even that concession
was fiercely opposed by some Jews and early Christians. In recent
times the church is more willing to recognize truth and salvation in
other traditions. But it is most revealing that many Christians
still believe that any truth and salvation found in other traditions
is the result of Christ acting anonymously in those traditions. This
shows how difficult it is for the readers of the Bible, whether
Jewish or Christian, to imagine that God might be loving, guiding
and saving remnants of other nations independently of Jews or a
Jewish Messiah.
Christians also point out that among
them there have always been people who have renounced and denounced
violence and spoken against the actions of their fellow Christians
when they engage in war and violence. This is true. But such voices
are almost always too few and too late. They have not been enough to
prevent some of the Christian nations and individuals from becoming
the most violent and aggressive in whole of human history. Also,
they gain strength only after the destruction of other nations
reaches a point of no return, that is, the interests of the
Christian nations have been completely served or can no longer be
served. Thus, far from opposing the colonial powers, an overwhelming
majority of churchmen used colonialism to try to convert the people
of the occupied countries. Some voices for the natives of North
America, Australia and New Zealand are now heard, but the
destruction of these natives is more or less complete now.
Palestinians are sometimes supported by the Christians but they have
already lost their country and are now in the process of loosing
their nationhood.
A positive recent development.
In the past thirty to fifty years there has been an unprecedented
movement in the Western nations in the direction of a genuine
tolerance, and even respect, for other groups and nations and hence
towards love and peace. This movement cannot be attributed to the
Bible or to Christianity, for it is inconceivable that the Bible and
Christianity have started to do now what they could not do for the
past two thousand years. The roots of this positive development lie
in the interest in science and philosophy kindled in Europe by the
Muslims through Spain and other areas of contact between the two
civilizations. This interest eventually led to the creation of the
institution of the University which provided a challenge and a check
to the Church. It needed several centuries for the University to
gain the sort of influence that could be compared to the influence
of the Church. And in recent decades the University has reached a
level of influence where it can make some fundamental changes in the
thinking of the Western nations. In particular, there is a
considerable rejection of exclusivism and nationalism, for the
rational thought moves man towards genuine universalism. The
terrible experience of the two world wars has also contributed to
reduce nationalism in the West. Finally, increasing global trade and
international business ties are helping to create a world culture
with universal values. These developments are even forcing the
Churches to revise their beliefs and practices. Very little credit,
if any, is due to the Bible or to Christianity for the apologies
that the popes have made in recent decades for the horrible acts of
violence that the Catholic Church has committed since the days of
Constantine when it gained power. For the Church is now bowing to
the new trends whose source is primarily the University.
Christian ideal
In the above observations we have used
the term "Christian" in a loose sense without making any distinction
between good or bad Christians. This is partly because of the
difficulty of deciding who is good or bad Christian and partly
because the fruits of a religion should be visible in the nations,
groups, and/or civilizations that it builds or influences despite
the fact that every group, nation or civilization is bound to
include both good or bad elements. We can do some justice to the
distinction between good and bad Christians by looking at not only
the conduct of the Christian nations generally but also what
Christians often present to be their ideal.
In view of the teaching of love in the
Bible, especially the New Testament, this ideal seems to be a
renunciation of almost all use of force. This ideal has inspired
many individuals and some groups to devote their lives to helping
the needy and to denounce and renounce violence. Saint Francis of
Assisi, who was greatly influenced by the Muslim mystics (Sufis),
the order he founded in 1209 and Jehovah's Witnesses provide
examples. But such individuals and groups do not possess any
political power and when you are not in a position to use force, it
is easy to be non-violent, although violent men do not need much
power to show their violence. In one passage, the Qur'an says that
God has ordained love and compassion in the hearts of those who
follow Jesus but that "most of them are rebellious transgressors"
(57:27), a statement which takes into account both the existence of
individuals and groups practicing charity and non-violence and the
historical fact of the most horrible acts of violence committed by
the Christian nations, as also the Christians' holding on to some
doctrines in the face of clearest evidence that these doctrines
depart from the teaching of Jesus.
The Qur`an
Muslims believe that God has sent his
revelation to all nations and during all ages which men have
corrupted with their own desires and ignorance and the Qur`anic
revelation given through the Prophet Muhammad -- which is preserved
without any tampering in its original form -- corrects, perfects and
completes all earlier revelations. This is manifested in the balance
that characterizes the Qur`anic revelation. For men can come up with
all kinds of very good ideas but they cannot keep them in their
proper place.
Among the main causes of violence are
nationalism and exclusivism. We have seen above that the New
Testament tones down the nationalism and exclusivism of the Old
Testament but does not completely break free from it. The Qur`an
takes this crucial step of breaking free from nationalism and
exclusivism. It states clearly that there is no one nation through
which revelation and salvation has been made available. Revelation
took place among all nations:
And verily We have raised in
every nation a messenger, (proclaiming): Serve God and shun
at-taghut (evil, rebellious powers, false gods) (16:36; see
also, 10:47)
Salvation is based on some universal
principles. Anyone who follows those principles can be saved
regardless of national or religious affiliation:
And God does not forgive the
ascribing of a partner in His Godhead. He forgives other than
that (sin) to whom He will (4:48; 4:116).
Lo! those who believe (in
Muhammad), and those who are Jews, and Christians, and Sabeans -
whoever, believes in God and the last day and does good - they
have their reward with their Lord and there shall no fear come
unto them neither shall they grieve (2:62; 5:69).
The Qur`an rejects explicitly the Jewish
and Christian belief that the salvation is of the Jews and that
somehow, deliberately or "anonymously," man needs to go through
Judeo-Christian tradition to be saved:
And they (i.e., the Jews and
Christians) say, "None shall enter paradise unless he be a Jew
or a Christian. These are their vain desires. Say, "Produce your
proof (from reason or authentic revelation) if you are
truthful!" Nay, - whoever surrenders his whole self to God and
he is a doer of good, -he shall have his reward with his Lord;
they shall have no fear nor shall they grieve (2:112-113).
No nation or race has any superiority.
Only individuals can be superior and the criterion for individual
superiority is righteousness:
O humankind! We created you from
a single pair of a male and a female and made you into nations
and tribes that you may know each other. Verily, the most
honored among you in the sight of God is the most righteous
among you. Verily, God is knowing, well-acquainted (with who
each one of you really is) (49:13).
Like the Bible the Qur`an talks of love
and also sanctions some use of force but strikes, I believe, a
perfect balance between the two. The use of force proceeds from love
and takes place with the possibility of love and reconciliation left
open.
The Qur`an talks of "loving" one's enemy
as follows:
The good deed and the evil deed
are not alike. Repel (O man) the evil deed with one which is
best, then lo! he, between whom and you there was enmity,
becomes as though he was a bosom friend. But none is granted (to
practice such forgiveness) save those who are self-restrained
and patient, and none is granted it save those who are very
fortunate (41:34-35).
This verse differs from the New
Testament commandment to love one's enemy in three ways: First, it
does not command love. Love is not an act of will but a force in the
human heart. It cannot be commanded but inculcated. Second, love is
to be expressed in action. The evil deed of the enemy is to be
responded by a good deed. Third, the Qur`an recognizes that the
genuine ability of responding to evil with goodness comes after a
great deal of inner development and therefore should not be imposed
before that level of development is reached. For such an imposition
only creates pretentious or hypocritical professions and acts of
love or suppresses the aggressive and violent impulses into the
subconscious where they become more powerful, sustainable and
dangerous.
The Qur`an views the coming of the
Prophet and the revelation sent down to him as an expression of
divine love and grace (rahmah).
We [=God] have indeed brought them a
Book which We have expounded with knowledge as guidance and
mercy for those who believe (7:52).
O humankind! There has come unto
you (in the form of the Qur`an) an exhortation from your Lord
and Sustainer, a healing for the (diseases) in the hearts, a
guidance and mercy for believers (10:57).
We have sent down to you (O
Muhammad) the Book as an exposition of all things and as
guidance, mercy and good tidings for those who surrender to God
(16:89).
Lo! this Qur`an narrates unto the
children of Israel most of that concerning which they differ.
And lo! it is guidance and mercy for those who believe
(27:76-77).
These are revelations of the Book
with wisdom, guidance and mercy for those who do good, those who
establish regular prayers and practice regular charity and have
firm faith in the hereafter (31:2-4).
Unlike the Messiah or Christ of the
Bible who comes with destruction for the nations, the Prophet is
said in the Qur`an to come as a mercy and love for all the nations:
And We have not sent you (O
Muhammad) except as love and mercy to all the nations (lit.
worlds) (21:107).
Consequently, nowhere the Arabs are
presented as a chosen people who will rule other nations. The
essential division between humankind is between those who have faith
in God and do good and those who do not believe in God and do not do
good, in contrast to the Bible where along with this division
another very important and essential division is between the
children of Israel and the other nations, a very racial and
nationalistic division.
As is well known, the Prophet Muhammad
engaged in warfare, often defensive, but sometimes also offensive.
This use of force, however, proceeds from love. Before the Prophet,
Arabia was inhabited by tribes who were not under any system of law
enforced by a legitimate authority. There was no mechanism to settle
disputes which often led to feuds that continued for many
generations. The Prophet Muhammad united these tribes into a single
brotherhood so that there may not be any violence. The Qur`an itself
refers to this:
And remember the favor of God on
you: how you were enemies and He reconciled your hearts so that
you became as brothers by the grace of God; and how you were at
the brink of an abyss of fire and He saved you from it (3:103).
This unification, however, could not
have taken place without resistance which made some warfare
necessary.
During all the battles that the Prophet
fought only a few hundred people were killed. And after victory all
those who for years fought the Prophet were forgiven. There was
nothing like the treatment of the subjugated people that we see in
the Bible. When the city of Makkah was conquered, the Qur`an did not
tell the Prophet to kill everything that breathes but rather said
the following:
When the help of God came along
with victory, you (O Prophet) saw the people enter the religion
of God in large groups. So glorify God and seek His forgiveness
(110).
Warfare requires some consolidation of
one's troops and in Surah 60 the Qur`an brings its followers on a
war footing. But in the middle of preparing the Muslims for war, the
possibility of love and reconciliation with the enemies is held
out:
It may be that God will generate
love between you and those of them with whom you are now at
enmity. God is capable (of all things); God is forgiving and
merciful (60:7).
No religious tradition can exist for
long without some love just as no tradition can exist without some
use of force in disciplining its own adherents and dealing with
external enemies. What differentiates various traditions is the way
the two are mixed. When the Bible talks of love it forgets the very
real need for the use of force in human societies and when it talks
of the use of force it forgets about love. The Prophet Muhammad
shows how to combine the two.
Some Christians, not too informed about
either Islam or Christianity, often contrast Jesus and Muhammad by
saying that Jesus was a man of love and peace while Muhammad was a
man of war. But Jesus' career was cut short by his departure. Had he
succeeded in his first coming to complete his mission there can be
no doubt that his career would have involved some use of force. As
we have seen, the New Testament says that during his second coming
when his mission will be completed he will come with a rod of iron.
And there is evidence that even during his first coming, in a lowly
and weak position, he was not totally against the use of force. Some
gospel traditions suggest that his disciples carried arms which one
of them used (Mark 14:47) and he himself initiated the arming of the
disciples (Luke 22:35-38), although the gospel writers in various
contradictory ways try to minimize the implications of these
traditions. He reportedly said that he did not come with peace but
with sword (Matt 10:34-39 = Luke 12:51-53, 14:26-27. He turned the
tables of traders in the Jerusalem temple (Mark 11:15-19 = Matt
21:12-17 = Luke 19:45-48 = John 2:13-22), an act of physical force.
(Some scholars even suggest that Jesus and his disciples were
well-armed and they came to Jerusalem to free Palestine from the
Romans, but this is highly improbable.)
Had Jesus' mission come to some type of
completion during his ministry he would have looked very similar to
the Prophet Muhammad. On the other hand, had the Prophet Muhammad
been killed during his flight from Makkah, he would have appeared
like Jesus. The prophets and messengers of God are all essentially
of the same spirit. Any differences among them are due to the scope
of their work and the circumstances in which they operate.
Muslim Conduct
In every religious group individuals
have to grow to achieve the level of development that the religion
requires. One would therefore find individuals in each religious
group at different level of development and behaving accordingly.
Some will doubtless perform some reprehensible acts. Thanks to the
Western media I need not rehearse acts of violence done by the
Muslims. But put all the acts of individual and group violence done
by Christians and Muslims on the two sides of a balance and no one
with the necessary factual information can doubt that the Christian
acts of violence far outweigh those by Muslims in their scope, in
their senselessness and in their cold-bloodedness and evil. When
Muslims were in a dominating position their treatment of non-Muslim
minorities and nations under their control, especially Christians
and Jews, have been far more kinder than the other way around. In
recent decades there have been deplorably some acts of violence
against Christian minorities in such Muslim countries as Egypt,
Pakistan and Indonesia. This is probably partly due to a reaction of
the news of American, British and Serbian violence against Muslim
peoples combined with some very local reasons. Even so, they are
nothing compared to what Muslims have suffered and are suffering at
the hands of Christians.
Muslim Ideal
The Muslim ideal is not to renounce all
use of force and retire to a monastic life or to stay away from
politics and thus leave the running of the world to those who do not
fear God. Rather the Muslim ideal is the proper use of force, a use
which is exercised with fear of God and love of fellow human beings
and even other creatures. One of the heroes of Muslim history is 'Umar,
the second Khalifah. At one point he ruled a great part of the then
known world. But he sew his own garments. It is reported that at
night he used to roam around in disguise to see if someone is
suffering from hunger or injustice because he believed that he will
be asked about it on the day of judgment. When he conquered
Jerusalem he is said to ride his camel with a servant. For half the
journey he was on the camel and for the other half his servant was
on the camel. Another hero is the fourth Khalifah, 'Ali. It is said
that he overpowered a combatant in a battle and was about to kill
him when the combatant spit on him. 'Ali withdrew his sword. The
combatant asked why he let him go. 'Ali replied, I was fighting in
the way of God, but when you spit at me I was no longer sure that my
killing you would have been purely in the way of God.
In Islam, one does not give to God what
is God's and to Caesar what is Caesar's. In Islam what is Caesar's
must be what is God's. Islam aims to have Caesars like 'Umar and
'Ali who fear God and are moved by compassion, wisdom and justice.
Proper use of force can usually take
place within a system of law which is enforced by a legitimate
authority. Wars and violence are often the result of a lack of
existence of such a system of law and a legitimate authority to
enforce it. This was the case in the Arabian Peninsula where
different tribes lived without any well-defined system of law and
without any recognized authority to enforce it. The world as a whole
has also been in a similar situation so far. There are often wars
because there is no well-established system of law and no legitimate
authority to enforce it. After the world war II such a system is
slowly evolving. But this process will not succeed without the
principles of faith in God and the hereafter and of the
brotherhood/sisterhood of all human beings. It is one of the
missions of Islam to establish these principles in the world and to
thereby lead it to peace and stability. That is, what the Prophet
achieved during his life in Arabia in terms of reconciling the
hearts of the various Arab tribes, Islam wants to achieve in the
world as a whole by reconciling different nations and groups and to
bring them under a single brotherhood/sisterhood serving the one
true transcendent God.
Conclusion
In comparing any two great civilizations
one should not focus on one land or one decade or century, but
rather glance over many centuries and over many lands. If we do
that, then it becomes clear that whether one looks at the teachings
of the two religions or the conduct of their followers there is no
basis in fact in the claim that Christianity is more of a religion
of love and peace than Islam. Christians have no doubt talked
about love and peace more, but Muslims have practiced these
values more.
As a final word, I would say that before
preaching love and peace to other nations, Christians will do well
to pay heed to the following well-attested words of Jesus:
Or, how can you say
to your brother, "Friend, let me take the speck in your eye,"
when you yourself do not see the log in your own eye? You
hypocrite, first take the log in your own eye, and then you will
see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye (Luke
6:42 = Matt 7:4-5 = Thomas, saying 26)
To myself and other Muslims I would say
that forever keep reflecting the meaning of the following words of
God:
We have not sent you
(O Muhammad) except as a mercy and love to all the nations (lit.
all the worlds).
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