Portal: Islamic Law: Difference between revisions

[checked revision][checked revision]
(→‎Non-Muslims: Fixed typo)
Tags: Mobile edit Mobile web edit Advanced mobile edit
Line 100: Line 100:
{{col-float-end}}
{{col-float-end}}
==Jihad==
==Jihad==
Jihad, which literally means ''struggle'', refers in Islamic law exclusively to military activity intended to spread and preserve the Islamic empire. Islamic literature does, however, often avoid this terminological use in order to use it in its literal sense. In this usage, the word Jihad is sometimes used to metaphorically allude to and describe the ''internal struggle'' one must at times engage in ''against oneself''. This alternative, metaphorical usage of the word Jihad does not, however, have any legal implications. The legal doctrines of Jihad are rather straightforward: the Muslim ''ummah'', or peoples, must, as the Quran states fight the unbelievers "until religion is all for Allah".<ref>{{Quran|8|39}}</ref> Although a military struggle is envisioned and described by these and similar statements in scripture, they have be employed rhetorically and metaphorically as encouragement for personal, spiritual struggles. There are also rules set out for how to conduct Jihad. On the one hand, wildlife, innocents, and enemies should not be needlessly maimed. On the other, all those who refuse to convert or submit to financial, social, legal, and various other forms of subjugation, be the innocents or combatants, must either be executed or enslaved (this includes sexually, in the case of women and girls).
Jihad, which literally means ''struggle'', refers in Islamic law exclusively to military activity intended to spread and preserve the Islamic empire. Islamic literature does, however, often avoid this terminological use in order to use it in its literal sense. In this usage, the word Jihad is sometimes interpreted in terms of the personal, spiritual ''internal struggle'' one must at times engage in ''against oneself''. This alternative, metaphorical usage of the word Jihad does not, however, have any legal implications. There are also rules set out for how to conduct Jihad. On the one hand, wildlife, innocents, and enemies should not be needlessly maimed. On the other, scholars of the expansionist-abrogationist paradigm held that aggressive warfare must be conducted to expand the abodes of Islam. Those who refuse to convert or submit to financial, social, legal, and various other forms of subjugation, be they innocents or combatants, must either be executed or enslaved (this includes sexually, in the case of women and girls). Historically, scholars outside of the imperial centres, as well as Islamic modernists and many academic scholars today see a much less aggressive picture in the Quran itself.  
<div class="articleSummaryColumnsWrapper">
<div class="articleSummaryColumnsWrapper">
<div class="articleSummaryColumn">
<div class="articleSummaryColumn">
{{PortalArticle|image=Jihadistsig.jpeg|summary=|title=Jihad in Islamic Law|description=Jihad has been a central imperative in Islamic law throughout history and remains one today. Although the doctrine of global religious and imperial conquest has proven controversial in recent times, particularly when groups have attempted to implement it, the basic contours of the doctrine have remained static since rise of first Islamic caliphates.}}{{PortalArticle|title=Invitation to Islam Prior to Jihad|summary=|image=Muhammad-Letter-To-Heraclius.jpg|description=The practice of inviting non-Muslim nations to join Islam or pay the Jizyah prior to engaging in offensive Jihad was first initiated by the Prophet Muhammad. His example was then followed by the Rightly-Guided Caliphs and the leaders of Islamic empires, codified within the Islamic Shari'ah. Where radical Islamists have today tried to emulate Muhammad and implement this well-established practice, they have generally been faced with widespread criticism.}}
{{PortalArticle|image=Jihadistsig.jpeg|summary=|title=Jihad in Islamic Law|description=Jihad has been a central imperative in Islamic law throughout history and remains one today. Although the medieval doctrine of global religious and imperial conquest has proven controversial in recent times, particularly when groups have attempted to implement it, the basic contours of the doctrine have remained static since the early Islamic caliphates. On the other hand, many academic and Islamic modernist scholars have questioned the medieval interpretations and their extensive use of the doctrine of abrogation, arguing that from a Quranic basis fighting and jihad are for defensive and pre-emptive purposes. Academic scholars also have much to say about the earliest expedition literature and the ideology at play in early interpretations.}}{{PortalArticle|title=Invitation to Islam Prior to Jihad|summary=|image=Muhammad-Letter-To-Heraclius.jpg|description=The practice of inviting non-Muslim nations to join Islam or pay the Jizyah prior to engaging in offensive Jihad was first initiated by the Prophet Muhammad according to tradition. His example was then followed by the Rightly-Guided Caliphs and the leaders of Islamic empires, codified within the Islamic Shari'ah. Where radical Islamists have today tried to emulate Muhammad and implement this well-established practice, they have generally been faced with widespread criticism.}}
</div><div class="articleSummaryColumn">
</div><div class="articleSummaryColumn">
{{PortalArticle|image=Vest.png|summary=|title=Suicide Bombing in Islam|description=There are many hadith narrations and Qur'anic verses forbidding suicide, however, there are also some hadith (and one Qur'anic verse related to one of them) which indicate that killing oneself is allowed under certain circumstances. Islamic law has generally been willing to amplify this variety of exception particularly in legal contexts, which has led numerous Islamic jurists to sanction suicide bombing in certain contexts (even where they have not supported the particular movements or groups implementing the practice).}}{{PortalArticle|summary=|image=Wolves.jpg|description="Fard" means Compulsory. Jihad is an Individual duty and is also a community responsibility, or sufficiency duty, for each and every Muslim. While modern voices differentiate between a personal or greater Jihad and a military or lesser Jihad, such a dichotomy is not found in classical and especially early Islamic literature, and finds no endorsement in Islamic scripture, which refers to Jihad overwhelmingly, and some argue exclusively, as a doctrine of military conquest, with the reference to internal struggle being a metaphorical usage.|title=Jihad as Obligation (Fard)}}
{{PortalArticle|image=Vest.png|summary=|title=Suicide Bombing in Islam|description=There are many hadith narrations and Qur'anic verses forbidding suicide. There are also a small number of hadiths which have been used in Islamic law to sanction attacks on the enemy when death at their hands is a near certainty. This has been taken further by numerous Islamic jurists in recent decades to sanction in certain contexts suicide bombing where death occurs at the attacker's own hands. These interpretations have, however, been heavily challenged in fatwas backed by thousands of scholars, and surveys show that increasing majorities of Muslim populations around the world disapprove of such attacks.}}{{PortalArticle|summary=|image=Wolves.jpg|description="Fard" means Compulsory. Jihad has generally been considered an individual duty at times of great need and otherwise a responsibility that can be fulfilled by a portion of the community. While modern voices differentiate between a personal or greater Jihad and a military or lesser Jihad, such a dichotomy is not found in classical and especially early Islamic literature, and finds no endorsement in Islamic scripture, which refers to Jihad overwhelmingly, and some argue exclusively, as a doctrine of military conquest, with the reference to internal struggle being a metaphorical usage.|title=Jihad as Obligation (Fard)}}
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
Line 117: Line 117:
{{Col-float-break|width=25em}}
{{Col-float-break|width=25em}}
*[[Dar al-Harb and Dar al-Islam (the Abodes of War and Peace)]]{{col-float-end}}
*[[Dar al-Harb and Dar al-Islam (the Abodes of War and Peace)]]{{col-float-end}}
==Ritual==
==Ritual==
A great part of the body of Islamic law regulates the particulars of ritual practices ranging everything from precisely how one should twiddle one's index finger during the daily prayers to how the the throats of cattle should be split and drained dry of blood during ritual sacrifice. Whereas scripture provides usually clear outlines on the basic workings of rituals, jurist differ endlessly in the details. The great majority of ritual law regards benign practices of the finger-twiddling variety which, despite being a potential and sometimes actual source of social discord, have generally become topics of lesser concern among the wider Muslim population. Ritual laws regarding the large-scale sacrifice of hundreds of millions of animals to Allah, on the other hand, have attracted growing international attention. Similarly troubling have been the pilgrimage rituals conducted at Mecca which, when practiced by millions of persons all at once, have repeatedly resulted in hundreds of deaths by stampede and contagion. While some of these challenges such as those with pilgrimage rituals, Islamic jurists contend, can be overcome through logistical and architectural innovation, other, often moral, challenges, such as those face by animal sacrifice in the face of growing concern for animal rights, have beeen cause for lesser optimism.
A great part of the body of Islamic law regulates the particulars of ritual practices ranging everything from precisely how one should twiddle one's index finger during the daily prayers to how the the throats of cattle should be split and drained dry of blood during ritual sacrifice. Whereas scripture provides usually clear outlines on the basic workings of rituals, jurist differ endlessly in the details. The great majority of ritual law regards benign practices of the finger-twiddling variety which, despite being a potential and sometimes actual source of social discord, have generally become topics of lesser concern among the wider Muslim population. Ritual laws regarding the large-scale sacrifice of hundreds of millions of animals to Allah, on the other hand, have attracted growing international attention. Similarly troubling have been the pilgrimage rituals conducted at Mecca which, when practiced by millions of persons all at once, have repeatedly resulted in hundreds of deaths by stampede and contagion. While some of these challenges such as those with pilgrimage rituals, Islamic jurists contend, can be overcome through logistical and architectural innovation, other, often moral, challenges, such as those face by animal sacrifice in the face of growing concern for animal rights, have beeen cause for lesser optimism.
Editors, em-bypass-2, Reviewers, rollback, Administrators
2,743

edits