Why it is wrong to see Islam as our enemy

The Scotsman/September 17, 2001

The vast majority of the world's 1,400 million adherents of the Islamic faith felt an instant revulsion at the atrocities committed last Tuesday in New York and Washington DC and, indeed, many made these feelings clear in public. Each faithful member of that creed is enjoined to pray five times in a day and we can be assured that many of those prayers contained a note of pity for those - of all beliefs and nationalities - who were massacred last week. Islam believes firmly in a Judgment Day when all will stand before their Creator to be weighed. If any of the fanatics who wasted their own lives and those of over 5,000 innocent people felt, in some twisted logic, that their "martyrdom" would gain them instant access to Paradise then they do not know their own faith. Islam says they will have to justify themselves personally before their God and few of their co-religionists would today think their chances of escaping Hell are very high.

Similarly, we in the West must instantly condemn and disown any bigoted attempt to associate last Tuesday's madness with ordinary members of the Islamic community or with their religion, most particularly those who are citizens or guests in this country. Anyone who desecrates a mosque or abuses someone who belongs to the Islamic community, supposedly out of anger for last week's events, is no better than - indeed, is of the same ignorant fanaticism as - the hijackers in America.

Perhaps, if there is one positive thing that can emerge out of Tuesday's events, it is that we all might gain a deeper understanding of the Islamic faith and its adherents - to our mutual benefit. Islam grew out of a great crusade in the seventh century to unite the Arab peoples against the domination of the invading foreign Persian and Byzantine empires. At its heart is a powerful vision of community and service to community, based on a balance of legal rights and responsibilities. This is quite the opposite of the Western tabloid notion of a religion of fanatics dealing a barbaric eye-for-an-eye justice. Moreover, Islam, like Christianity, is hardly a single body of ideas.

The dominant Sunni tradition, which represents 85-90 per cent of the Islamic world, is itself divided into four major "denominations" based on differing interpretations of the various sayings and recollections of the Prophet Mohammed and his immediate followers. Islam has major schisms, just like those between Catholics, Protestants and Orthodox Christians or between Reform and Orthodox Jews. The other great wing of Islam are the Shi'ites, who place more weight on specific writings of certain of the Prophet's immediate family. Within this tradition - at risk of over-simplifying - are found more fundamentalist strains of thinking. Fundamentalist in that the Shi'ite minority position in Islam has always underwritten a periodic tendency towards a purism that can fire political fanaticism. A purism that looks back to certain Caliphs (or "deputies" of the Prophet) as leaders - thwarted by the Sunnis - who combined religious and political direction that resulted in a Golden Age. This complex pattern within Islam should remind us that crudely identifying Tuesday's killers with everything Islamic is as blinkered as those who murder falsely in its name.

But there are minority, fanatical forces which usurp the name of Islam for their own ends. In particular, the Al-Qa'ida, or "base camp" (as in military) created by Osama bin Laden. This extensive religious-military sect is multi-national and heavily influenced by Shi'ite theology. Leaders in the organisation are also senior leaders in other terrorist organisations, including the Egyptian al-Gama'at al-Islamiyya, responsible for the massacre of 62 tourists at Luxor in 1997. Al-Qa'ida's goal is to unite all Islam under a new order of Caliphs, by force if necessary. Al-Qa'ida's goal, therefore, is to overthrow existing Arab governments, which are viewed as corrupt, to drive Western influence from those countries, and eventually to abolish state boundaries. Bin Laden is thus a religious and political minority within Islam and, indeed, at war with most of his co-religionists.

We need to remember these facts in the days ahead. If some cleric in Britain purporting to represent Islam calls for a holy war against the West, they are no more representative of their multi-dimensional faith than is some tiny American Christian fundamentalist sect of Christianity. And their impact will be just as small. We are not surrounded by 1,400 million potential bin Ladens. We share a planet with an Islamic religion of grace, law, compassion and justice. We should learn to make it our friend, not our enemy, and draw it into a coalition against all those who blaspheme by claiming to murder in the name of God.