What Can Be Done About Violence Inspired By Islam?
Why undermining belief in Islam is critical
In a recent article I showed that the carnage unleashed by HAMAS in their attack on Israeli civilians is directly linked to Islamic teaching on the Jewish people. Sadly, this is but one example of the violence inspired by the teachings contained in the Qur’an and hadiths (Islamic traditions). This leads to the inevitable question: What is to be done?
There are obviously answers that are in the realms of military action, geopolitics, and law enforcement. While these are necessary I believe that we will live with Islamically inspired violence for as long as the root cause remains unaddressed, namely that the Qur’an and hadiths explicitly teaches violence against unbelievers. The only logical long-term strategy must, therefore, be to undermine belief in Islam.
I realise that this statement may strike some people as slightly jarring, but as I show in my book ‘Nothing to do with Islam - Investigating the West’s Most Dangerous Blind Spot’, the core beliefs of Islam are part of the problem in understanding violence inspired by Islam.
Belief in Islam itself should, therefore, be questioned and undermined. Why do I say this? Simply because it should be clear by now that the tradition of violence against unbelievers can be found at the heart of authoritative Islamic teaching. How can it be otherwise? This tradition can be traced to chapter-and-verse of the Qur’an and hadiths. It is possible to argue on the basis of this that physical jihad for the sake of Allah is not a fringe concern in terms of the core beliefs of Islam, but that it is, in many ways, central to it.
This raises an important question: Is it possible to “salvage” an entirely peaceful Islam through the promotion of a rejection of the violent passages of the Qur’an and hadiths and the retention of more acceptable aspects? In other words, a kind of “Islam Lite” that is much more in line with what most people view as the mainstream religious values of peace, love and mutual understanding.
The problem with this approach should immediately be obvious. The core principles of Islamic theology and scriptural interpretation make it virtually impossible to envision any wholesale reinterpretation of Islamic teaching. This is because such a reinterpretation will necessarily involve the complete rejection of three foundational tools for interpreting the Qur’an. They are:
The “Law of Abrogation”. This ‘law’ is applied where an apparent contradiction occurs between two verses, and it states that the later text supersedes the earlier text. This “law” was supposedly commanded by Allah himself, but will have to be completely discarded if Islam is ever to be reformed. This is because the Law of Abrogation prioritizes later violent texts over earlier more peaceful ones. A rejection of the violent texts will, therefore, have to come down to a total rejection of a divinely inspired (so Muslims believe) way of interpreting the Qur’an by privileging texts that were formerly supposed to be abrogated (superseded) over the ones that Allah supposedly replaced them with.
The Normative Interpretive Tradition (Taqlid). It is hard to overstate the importance of the interpretive tradition known as taqlid in interpreting the Qur’an. Traditional interpretations carry immense weight within the Muslim theological landscape. The vast majority of Muslim theologians, therefore, believe that modern Muslims are in no way free to interpret the text in new ways. Modern Muslims should, rather, simply be content to comment on the authoritative, highly literal, interpretations of earlier generations. Thus, as far as mainstream Islam is concerned, the “Gates of Ijtihad” (Interpretation) are closed. This is the position, in principle or practice, of virtually every single Sunni Islamic theological institution of the world. The few exceptions are, for the most part, not found in the Muslim world itself, but in the West.
The example of Muhammad. A thoroughgoing repudiation of violence in the name of Islam will, by implication, also mean a repudiation of the conduct and teachings of Muhammad. Muhammad clearly taught and lived as one who was deeply committed to using physical force to extend the sway of his message. Stating that his example should not be followed anymore will fly directly in the face of the Qur’anic statement that Muhammad was an “excellent example” for those who hope to inherit eternal life (Qur’an 33:21).
The state of affairs described above should be deeply discouraging to anyone contemplating the need for fresh reinterpretations of Islam. Any such project is bound to come up against the harsh reality that literalism in interpreting the Qur’an reigns supreme in the Muslim world. Any deviation from this norm will be regarded as bi’dah (innovation). Those who consistently engage in this kind of innovation run the risk of being branded as heretics. This is, for obvious reasons, a very dangerous position in which to be in the Muslim world – especially since some forms of heresy are viewed as little better than apostasy. Questioning traditional interpretations could, quite literally, be viewed as a capital offense since Muhammad prescribed the death penalty for apostasy (Sahih Bukhari Volume 9, Book 84, Number 57).
The understandable fear of being branded apostates means that many Muslim scholars take great care not to stray from traditional interpretations of their faith and its key texts, the Qur’an and hadiths. The result is that the creation of an Islam shorn of the emphasis that Muslims should strive to expand the sway of Islam, even through the use of physical violence, will be well-nigh impossible to achieve.
It is, furthermore, not only the fear of negative consequences that undergirds traditional interpretations. In the eyes of true believers, an Islam that does not seek to dominate will no longer be Islam at all. Survey after survey show how deeply entrenched belligerent interpretations of the Qur’an are across the Muslim world.
Even if novel reinterpretations of key texts can be successfully established in the minds of the majority of Muslim believers, this will not automatically delete the problematic verses from the Qur’an. They will still be there, ready to be rediscovered by those wishing to ask how the Muslim community interpreted these verses in the past.
Considering the above, it is of the utmost importance that Islam itself be critiqued, questioned, and undermined. No matter what kinds of beauty and truth some people may claim to find in the teachings of Islam, it still harbors a deeply dangerous underlying ideology. It is, in my view, simply not possible to salvage its positive aspects and somehow quarantining its incitements to violence. This is simply too dangerous to even contemplate. “Pure Islam” will continue to be there to tempt those who hold the Qur’an to be the word of God away from tamer versions of the religion.
On the other hand, if someone ceases to be a believing Muslim, the temptation to wage violent jihad against non-Muslims will also automatically cease at that very moment. To state it in the plainest way possible: The best way to counter jihad ideology is to help Muslims leave Islam.
Fortunately, on an intellectual level, this is not a difficult task to undertake. The Qur’an is riddled with errors, inconsistencies, and contradictions. Aspects of the biography of Muhammad are also, as we have seen, deeply unappealing. Islam simply cannot withstand critical scrutiny. Devout Muslims will obviously vigorously protest this. One has to wonder, however, why many of them react so strongly to any attempt to critically question Islam, not by engaging in debate, but by attempting to shut down the discussion. This can be seen in the almost inevitable accusations of “hatred”, “racism” or “bigotry” from many in the Islamic community whenever the truth of Islam is questioned. This tendency is also part of the subtext of the spate of violent attacks on satirists, cartoonists, and other critics of Islam over the past few decades.
The shaky theological and historical foundation of Islam forms the Achilles heel of any movement seeking to expand the sway of Islam through violence. Critical questions are what such people fear more than anything else. Some of them probably believe that they can win a physical struggle and would, therefore, welcome attempts to shut them down with force. At least then they have a fight on what they view as “home turf” on their hands. They have, however, no hope whatsoever of winning in an ideological struggle where the truth claims of Islam are critically evaluated. Attempts at censorship, threats, and even acts of violence should, therefore, not deter us from picking away at the shaky foundations of orthodox Islam.
Critics pointing out the link between Islam and violence are often accused of trying to “start a war”. Those who make this claim completely misunderstand the nature of this conflict. No one is trying to start a war. We are already in a war (formally declared by several Muslim groups) whether we like it or not. The best possible response to this stark fact is seemingly counterintuitive. The primary response is not to go out with all guns blazing (although sometimes military action is justified and required). On this basis, we will be looking at a never-ending conflict. Islamist groups welcome violent responses as it validates their worldview (“See! The whole world is battling the righteous soldiers of Allah”) and acts as a very powerful recruiting sergeant. “War talk” will, therefore, be highly counterproductive as it will only embolden our enemies.
I am, of course, not arguing that policing of radicals and attempts to thwart their attacks through military responses should cease. These efforts are, however, essentially only dealing with the symptoms without addressing the fundamental root cause of the problem with violence in the name of Islam. The root cause is Islam itself.
The history of the 20th-century Cold War may be instructive in this regard. Thankfully, the West did not attack the Soviet Union head-on in a military attack. U.S. strikes against Moscow or some other Communist capital would, inevitably, have led to what has been termed Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD). I, therefore, think it would have been fair to say that the Soviets were unbeatable in the military arena. Yet, it was deeply vulnerable in another area. What brought down the so-called Red Empire was not military defeat but, rather, what may be described as an “ideological implosion”. For a variety of reasons, millions of “true believers” behind the Iron Curtain stopped believing in the truth of Marxism-Leninism. Once this happened, no nuclear warhead or cutting-edge submarine could save the Soviet Union or its satellite states.
My consistent answer whenever someone asks me “What can be done?” is simply: Question Islam. By doing so, you will be hitting at the very heart of the ideology that motivates the jihadists. Equipping non-Muslims to engage in the kind of critical questioning that will be required to undermine orthodox Islam was one of the main reasons behind the writing of my book Questioning Islam – Tough Questions and Honest Answers about the Muslim Religion. I wrote the book because levels of knowledge about Islam among Westerners are shockingly low, even though many people are deeply concerned about the place of Islam in the modern world. Sadly, when it comes to the ability to challenge the truth claims of Islam, the situation is even direr.
Political correctness and cultural relativism have brought us to the point where it is almost regarded as an article of faith that it is the height of rudeness and insensitivity to probe too deeply into the beliefs of others – especially if those beliefs have something exotic about them. The resulting reluctance to question Islam is, of course, significantly strengthened by the spate of attempts at censorship and acts of violence aimed at critics emanating from certain segments of the Muslim community. We must, however, be willing to stick our necks out and strive for the values that we hold dear and against teachings that can only result in perpetual conflict between believers and unbelievers.
To summarize, if we believe that the world will be a better place if people did not believe in the literal truth of the Qur’an or follow the example of Muhammad – and it is hard to see how any unbeliever can come to any other conclusion – then we must do everything in our power to influence people away from these beliefs. Here are some ways in which this can be done:
Educate yourself to be able to clearly articulate the main arguments against the truth claims of Islam and to convincingly counter the standard reasons Muslims give for their beliefs (e.g., “The Qur’an is a perfect book that has been perfectly preserved”).
Discuss what you have been learning about the main arguments against the truth of Islam with Muslims you are in contact with. Do this in a respectful but firm manner that will make it clear that you do not believe that Islam should somehow receive a free pass from the critical scrutiny to which we routinely subject beliefs in Western society.
If you are active on social media, seek to engage Muslim believers (especially those who are seeking to convert others to Islam) with some of the key arguments against their faith. Once again, do this in a respectful but firm manner.
Seek to actively support the efforts of ex-Muslims to help their former co-religionists leave Islam.
Call out attempts at censorship whenever they occur. One of the main reasons why Islam is able to escape critical scrutiny is the culture of fear associated with saying anything negative about it. Free speech is worthless if people are too scared to exercise it. We must, therefore, vigorously oppose all efforts to get non-Muslims to keep silent about Islam. This is one of those areas where strength in numbers definitely applies. The more people are willing to speak their minds about Islam, the more difficult it will be to freeze out free speech in this area. I, therefore, urge you to be bold and forthright in voicing your criticisms of Islam.
Again, I am not saying that questioning Islam is the only thing to be done. However, if we neglect to do it, all our other efforts will be useless. You can start equipping yourself for the task of undermining belief in Islam by reading (or giving away copies of) my book ‘Questioning Islam - Tough Questions and Honest Answers About the Muslim Religion’.
Kind regards,
Peter
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