Jihad Emails: A Prequisite

Some time ago I had one of my readers (and friend)  suggest that I use this blog as an outlet to help curb mainstream perceptions about Islam. As time goes on, I find myself working to that end. Sometime this week, I'm going to be presenting to a classroom in my old high school about misconceptions of Islam and being Muslim American (When it happens I'll post about it). I'm also starting a Muslim Awareness initiative on my university campus that will roll out in the next month or two. It only seems natural to use this blog as another outlet to get out the message.

Admittedly, as you all know, I am no expert on Islam. I am no scholar, no Sheikh, and no historian. I am a practicing Muslim who looks at the world and my own religion critically when I see something wrong. This post was inspired by an email conversation I had with one of my readers about my Facebook status. My status said "Oh the misconceptions of Jihad..." When questioned about it, I sent him an email that began the emails titled "Jihad."

I want to present those emails in a series titled "Jihad Emails" because they address a lot of issues that some people tend to have with Islam. These emails have been stripped of any personally identifiable content as well as an personal messages that we sent (as friends). I've also made edits to grammar and sentence structure; as well as paraphrasing in some areas to save space. What is left is the lengthy and in depth discussion at its best. 

When asked what I meant by my status I began: 

One thing I’ve constantly recognized from this debate about Jihad (or any religious discussion) is that both non believers (and/or atheists) and extremists interpret the religion the same way. Atheists do so to denounce the “extremists” as evil and extremists do it to find justification for their attacks against Atheists (among others).

When he mentioned that many Muslims believed that Islam was a peaceful religion I continued: 

Muslims never shy away from the aggressive texts of the Quran, because they don’t have to. No Muslim that I’ve ever known has ignored the aggressive side of Islam and only dealt with the peaceful one, because without the two the religion isn’t what it is. Islam does condone violence in very particular instances. Otherwise peace and mercy are supreme. My status on Facebook was sparked by an article I read about how Jihad has been misconstrued today to justify the killings BETWEEN Muslims and between Non Muslims and Muslims, instead of being used for what it is meant to be used for: defense. This is the article:  http://islamopediaonline.com/editorials-and-analysis/debating-jihad-yoginder-sikand It was posted on Islamopedia, a website that my sister is a part of but it was extracted from another news source.

 (I would recommend reading the link from Islamopedia). I said this in reply to his statement that believers tend to have a biased view of their religion because they have been raised that way (which I generally agree with):

I don’t have a protective stance for my religion. I have to deal with Walter (an atheist friend) all the time and he’s constantly challenging my belief and all that. If I found something unreasonable in my religion I just don’t accept it because it is so. I like to think that I’m a reasonable follower, not a blind one.

I continued to talk about the structure of the Islamic Institutions:

 

 Islam, Islamic documents, edicts, and Sharia law are not stagnant. This is A HUGE misconception with most of the people in the world. They are constantly changing, being debated, and implemented based on different interpretations. Just keep that in mind as time goes by. :)
Furthermore, an important tenet in Islam is ijtihad, the duty of everyone to learn analyze and understand the texts on their own. In Islam interpretations and knowledge (even in the sciences) is promoted and not restricted.

As for a central tenet of Islam, prophetic messages are not restricted to the prophets mentioned in the Quran and some of the other texts. In fact, Muslims believe there have been thousands of prophets within their communities, but those in the holy books were either the most influential or powerful. -- this is what I was talking about when I mentioned learning about Islam from a Muslim than from Google or even a christian or a person of any faith. On this point, I can't defend any of the other Abrahamic faiths, as they can't defend mine and I wouldn't expect them to. Belief in faith and then defending it is more convincing and powerful than not.

Many people aren't recognizing that a religion isn't a solid block. It has nooks and crannies. It is beautiful in some parts and fucked up in others, they need to realize the complexity of the belief system. People think there are rules 1, 2, and 3. Anything that is slightly different isn't Islamic, and only those rules lead to "true" Islam. There are thousands of interpretations, teachings, edicts, and philosophies studied by hundreds of thousands of leaders, and billions of Muslims over its history. People are oversimplifying the people, belief system, and structure. Where you see a wooden plank, I see the Golden Gate Bridge.

As I've posted several times on this blog, I recommended a woman who gave a TED Talk some time ago, here she is:

What she learned was that most ideas of Islam are wrong (including many things you've said to me in the past), but she also said something extremely important: she was an outsider. With all her knowledge on it's history, reading 4 translations and even the 7th century Arabic Qur'an, she could not truly grasp it's power, passion and beauty on her own. She was limited in her knowledge of the belief system because she lacked it.

Then I talk about the nature of Islamic interpretation:

Given all that I’ve said, there are important implications: first, if every Muslim has a duty to interpret the Quran and Islamic teachings we establish that, to the ability and subjectivity of those interpretations, all are correct. In fact, Muslims believe that the only one who knows the “true” meaning of the Quran and Islam is Allah (I would say God, but the two aren’t linguistically equal, but they speak of the same being). Now, from an interpretation to interpretation basis, one holds their belief believing that the interpretations of others are wrong and so humans should try their best to interpret and apply Islam as they can best understand it (with good intentions).  So the extremist positions aren’t necessarily wrong from the Godly objective standard as they are from the subjective standard.

Likewise, the progressive interpretations aren’t necessarily right or wrong based on those same standards. We can only do our best to understand it, I  along with most others, have come to the conclusion that people like Osama bin Laden is wrong in his interpretation and we strongly believe that we are correct in our belief and will work on that, but that is only to our human ability to reason.  

 As you can tell, the issue of Jihad still hasn't been directly addressed. As the title implies, this is all you need to know before entering this discussion. I hadn't realized how long and in-depth these emails actually are. This post alone is just half of my first email to begin the conversation. There will be plenty more to come! Feel free to throw any of your comments about what's been said in the comments.

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