Jihad
 Jihad  (ummah, warfare)   | |
|---|---|
Jihad is an Arabic word that means "exerting", "striving", or "struggling", particularly with a praiseworthy aim. In an Islamic context, it encompasses almost any effort to make personal and social life conform with God's guidance, such as an internal struggle against evil in oneself, efforts to build a good Muslim community (ummah), and struggle to defend Islam.
Ummah
Jihad is often used without any religious connotation, with a meaning more or less equivalent to the English word crusade (as in “a crusade against drugs”).
Warfare
If used in a religious context, the adjective Islamic or "holy" is added. Jihad is the only legal warfare in Islam, and it is carefully controlled in Islamic law. It must be called by a duly constituted state authority, it must be preceded by a call to Islam or treaty, noncombatants must not be attacked, and so on.
To justify the struggle against their coreligionists, extremists branded them unbelievers for their neglect in adhering to and enforcing a particular interpretation of Islam. Contemporary thinking about jihad offers a wide spectrum of views, including conservative jihadists who look to classical Islamic law on the subject and radicals who promote a violent jihad against Muslim and non-Muslim rulers.[1]
Related Quotations
| Page | Quote | Author | Date |
|---|---|---|---|
| "War on Terror" | “Western governments and the financial sponsors of jihad... [W]e remain allies with those who have sponsored this terrorism for the last 30 years.” | Alain Chouet | |
| Joe Biden | “Our allies in the region were our largest problem in Syria. The Turks were great friends, and I have a great relationship with Erdogan, [who] I just spent a lot of time with, [and] the Saudis, the Emirates, etcetera.
What were they doing? They were so determined to take down Assad, and essentially have a proxy Sunni-Shia war, what did they do? They poured hundreds of millions of dollars and tens of tons of weapons into anyone who would fight against Assad – except that the people who were being supplied, [they] were al-Nusra, and al-Qaeda, and the extremist elements of jihadis who were coming from other parts of the world. Now, you think I'm exaggerating? Take a look. Where did all of this go? So now that's happening, all of a sudden, everybody is awakened because this outfit called ISIL, which was al-Qaeda in Iraq, when they were essentially thrown out of Iraq, found open space and territory in [eastern] Syria, [and they] work with al-Nusra, who we declared a terrorist group early on. And we could not convince our colleagues to stop supplying them.So what happened? Now, all of a sudden – I don't want to be too facetious – but they have seen the lord. Now we have ... been able to put together a coalition of our Sunni neighbors, because America can't once again go into a Muslim nation and be the aggressor. It has to be led by Sunnis. To go and attack a Sunni organization. And so what do we have for the first time? President Erdoğan told me, he is an old friend, said you were right, we let too many people through, now we are trying to seal the border.” | Joe Biden The Washington Post | 2014 |
| Escape From Evil | “If there is one thing that the tragic wars of our time have taught us, it is that the enemy has a ritual role to play, by means of which evil is redeemed. All "wars are conducted as 'holy' wars" in a double sense then-as a revelation of fate, a testing of divine favor, and as a means of purging evil from the world at the same time. This explains why we are dedicated to war precisely in its most horrifying aspects : it is a passion of human purgation.” | Ernest Becker | 1976 |
| Escape From Evil | “The striving for perfection reflects man's effort to get some human grip on his eligibility for immortality. And he can only know if he is good if the authorities tell him so; this is why it is so vital for him emotionally to know whether he is liked or disliked, why he will do anything the group wants in order to meet its standards of "good" : his eternal life depends on it.” | Ernest Becker | 1976 |
Related Document
| Title | Type | Publication date | Author(s) | Description |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Document:The day the media decided militant jihadism was respectable | blog post | 10 December 2024 | Jonathan Cook | Suddenly, after years of misrepresenting Hamas, western politicians and media are desperate to clarify – if only in Syria – the difference between jihadists and Islamic nationalists |
