In Their Own Words by Fair C. Christine;

Author:Fair, C. Christine;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Oxford University Press, Incorporated
Published: 2018-07-28T16:00:00+00:00

Key Sources for this Chapter

Many of LeT/JuD’s publications on this subject of appropriate jihad tend to reiterate similar messages. To detail JuD’s beliefs about how Muslims should interact with other Muslims, I draw upon three particularly important texts. The first is JuD’s minimum opus titled Hum Kyon Jihad Kar Rahe Hain, which translates as “Why We Are Waging Jihad.”16 (This pamphlet has been published many times. I cannot say for certain whether or not the version I have differs from that published in other years.) We know from the preface of this booklet that bin Muhammad drafted an essay by the same title in Majalla-ul-Dawah (one of JuD’s magazines); however, he does not provide the date of this earlier publication. At the insistence of friends, he tells his readers that he wanted to have this essay published independently of the magazine with important revisions and additions. Notably, he tells us that he appended a speech “Excuses for Waging Jihad” (“Rah-e-jihad-se faraar ke bahaane”) which he gave at Muridke on another unspecified occasion. Bin Muhammad wrote this pamphlet in a Socratic style in which a quester first poses a query, which the narrator answers through a combination of a selective recounting of events in the Quran, Sunnat, and hadees as well as historical and contemporary events that give salience to the textual references that he mobilized. At first blush, the pamphlet addresses the efforts of so-called pious Muslims who refute the necessity of waging jihad under various pretenses. However, in advancing these arguments, bin Muhammad makes a very specific case about waging jihad beyond Pakistan. In this pamphlet, he identifies specifically who should be the object of jihad, and why and—most importantly—who should not be the object of jihad and the reasons for their exemptions.

This pamphlet argues that no matter how questionable or even wrong a person’s practice of Islam may be, if the individual in question is kalima-go (one who has uttered the kalima or affirmation that there is no god but Allah and Muhammad is his prophet), he or she are should not be killed. The author argues that anyone who has said the kalima will never deny the supreme authority of Allah. Therefore, such persons should be rehabilitated through dawah rather than be murdered. This puts the organization in direct opposition to the Deobandi groups and Islamic State which practice takfir, and which believe that once one is declared a kafir, they are worthy objects of violence.17 (N.B: Deobandis are not doctrinally “takfiri,” although they behave as if they are through their frequent use of declaring persons to be kuffar and thus deserving violence or death.)

This raises the interesting question of whether or not Ahmadis are kalima-go. Ahmadis continue to endure a campaign of deadly violence against them, mostly perpetrated by Deobandi militant groups as well as individuals motivated by the belief that killing them will confer upon them spiritual rewards to the murderer owing to their “wajib ul qatal”18 status.19 Despite the widespread antagonism against Ahmadis and

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