Abstract: The organization known today simply as the “Islamic State,”
or by its Arabic acronym, Daesh (English, ISIL), has historical and ideological
roots that go beyond the territories it now controls. These deep roots give Daesh
confidence that it will succeed in dominating the world, but give others reasons
to believe that it will fail in controlling even a single nation. Mixing
puritan religious and political discourses, ISIL managed to dominate all other
armed opposition groups in conflict zones (Syria, Iraq, Yemen, and Libya) and
has inspired individuals in many other countries (Egypt, Pakistan, France, Kuwait,
Saudi Arabia, and Tunisia) to carry out brutal attacks in its name.
____________
With
time, this elite theological and legal position, which was backed by the office
of the caliph, grew stronger and became a tool for suppressing dissent.
Resistance was inevitable. Some religious scholars refused to go along and
produce the expected answer, choosing instead to say, “it was God’s words.”
These figures were known as Traditionists (Ahl al-hadith), as opposed to
Reasonists. While Reasonists held that reason and circumstance must play a role
in interpreting and applying religious principles and imperatives, Traditionists
believed that tradition cannot be superseded by reason or circumstance.
There
are many other points of contention that divided Muslim communities during the
formative period (first three centuries) of Islam along at least three sects
(Ibadism, Sunnism, and Shi`ism) and eight legal denominations (Malikism,
Ja`farism, Hanafism, Hanbalism, Shafi`ism, Zaydism, Isma`ilism, and Ibadism).
However, the point of contention that truly explains current crises in Islamic
societies is whether religious principles are tools to promote social justice
and address social problems, or whether they are sacred principles that must be
applied regardless of their effect on humans. Division over the primacy of
religious principles cuts across sectarian and legal currents, most pronouncedly
among the so-called Sunni communities.
Traditionism
in the context of Islamic societies is best expressed in Hanbalism, founded by
Ahmad Ibn Hanbal in the first half of the third Islamic Century. Traditionism, called
Salafism by its adherents, holds that the purity and authenticity of Islam is
ascertained through an organic chain of authorities and institutions that
connect today’s Muslim community to the original teachings and practices of
Islam through the opinions and practices of the ancestors (salaf). The
Salaf, thus understood, consists of the Companions of the Prophet Muhammad (Sahabah),
the Followers of (or those who came after) the Companions (Tabi`in), the
Followers of the Followers (Tabi`i al-tabi`in), and the masters of the
schools of jurisprudence (Ayimmah, Mujtahidun). Although, in
principle, Salafists contend that opinions of any of masters of the four Sunni
schools of jurisprudence (Malikism, Hanafism, Hanbalism, Shafi`ism) are equally
authoritative, in reality, Salafist scholars privilege Hanbalism over all other
schools of thought. To some extent, according to Salafism, the authentic
sayings and practices of ancestors are as authoritative as the texts of the
Qur’an itself. A true Salafist cannot rely on reason to override the opinion
and practice of a Companion of the Prophet or a Follower of a Companion of the
Prophet.
Ultimately,
Salafism is a specific stream of Traditionist interpretation of Islam that
relies on a selective chain of scholars that inform the broader base of
adherents. The chain of Salafi scholars is not continuous. It is bridged by
textual traditions that inform modern figures about opinions of their
predecessors who might have lived a century or two apart. For example, modern
Salafi figures like Usama
Bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri, Umar Mahmoud Uthman (Abu Qutada al-Filistini),
Isam al-Barqawi (Abu Mohammed al-Maqdisi), Abu Azzam al-Jazrawi, Abdullah
al-Muhaisini, Mustafa al-Jakiri al-Rifa`i (Abu Mus`ab al-Suri), Ibrahim Awwad
al-Samura’i (Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi), cite works of individuals whom they never
met like Mohammed Ibn Abd al-Wahhab, Ibn Taymiyya, Ibn Qayyim, and Ahmad Ibn
Hanbal. In the end, modern Salafism is ancient Traditionism reconstructed from
text-based historical events and sayings.
Today,
the struggle that is fueling civil wars and sectarian tension is about the function
and status of shari`a, one of the generic terms that refers to religious
legal principles and imperatives, which are believed to be derived from the
primary sources of Islamic traditions and practices. As it has been the case
throughout the history of Islamic societies, what distinguishes Reasonist
Muslims from Salafists is the answer to one general question: Is the shari`a
a tool for realizing social justice on earth or are humans mere agents that
must be sacrificed to impose the shari`a?
Political
Origins: Umayyad Caliphate System
Salafism
is about religious tradition and the preservation of that tradition in its literalist
form. According to Salafi dogma, any deviation from established understanding
of religious norms and practices is an innovation, and any innovation is
strictly prohibited. The preservation of established tradition goes beyond
religious texts. It is also about accepting the political order as is. For
Traditionists, the caliphs were guardians of religious traditions. To raise
doubt about any given caliph’s ethical and legal standing would amount to
raising doubt about the authenticity and transcendence of religious truths.
Therefore, Salafism does not dwell on the causes of the civil wars during the reign
of the third and fourth caliphs, does not dwell on the transgressions and
crimes of the Umayyads, and does not challenge the reign of the Saud clan over
Arabia as long as the Saudi rulers act as protectors of pure Sunni Islam and
guardians of holy places.
It
is worth noting that Traditionism was most successful when it was allied with
political rulers. Traditionists were strong when al-Mutawakkil adopted their teachings
as Sunni orthodoxy. Salafists are strong now because of their alliance with the
wealthy rulers of Saudi Arabia. State-enabled theology was their best path to
project influence. Their disdain for reason limited their ability to influence
public opinion through the deliberative processes, and because of that they have
preferred a top-down process of imposing what they see as religious principles.
The
most advantageous path to power and influence for Salafism is through the brute
force of the sword or gun and strong alliances with powerful governments. By
declaring the re-establishment of the caliphate, ISIL essentially declared
Salafi independence from the Saudi patronage that sustained Salafism for nearly
a century. Salafism is now enabled by the “Islamic State,” formerly known as
the ISIL, which was formerly a branch of al-Qaeda.
ISIL’s
Connections: U.S.-Saudi-Wahhabi Tripartite
In
modern times, and in order to keep Salafists in check, the sponsors of the
Traditionist creed created two streams of Salafism, each built on a distinct
strategy:
1.
Religious purity/authenticity is ascertained through separation of religion from
politics. This path created a form of secularism that recognized two parallel
authorities—one religious and one political. These Traditionists formed al-Da`wa
wa-‘l-tabligh, who went on proselytizing without engaging political issues.
In return they were allowed to preach publicly and enjoy some governmental and
private support. These groups, generally, belonged to what became known as Learned
Traditionism (al-Salafiyya al-`ilmiyya).
2.
To meet some international challenges and to help project influence globally, the
sponsors and sustainers of Traditionists also encouraged some Salafists to combat
ungodly ideologies, like communism and atheism. They were taught that stopping
the spread of communism and atheism, ideologies strictly prohibited in Islam
because they deny the existence of God—according to Saudi religious scholars,
was a religious obligation. These adherents subscribed to Combatant
Traditionism (al-Salafiyya al-jihadiyyah).
Eventually,
the two groups complemented one another. Learned Traditionists provided religious
context for ideological wars. They helped produced the body of literature,
institutions, and networks that sustained Traditionism in general. When
necessary, these ideologically trained adherents joined Militant Traditionists in
defense of the community (ummah) from ungodly ideologies such as
communism in Afghanistan—justifying the war against the Soviet Union, and
secularism (`ilmaniyyah) in Algeria, Tunisia, and almost all other
Muslim majority countries. They worked to impose religious order on corrupted Muslim
societies from Morocco to Malaysia.
What
we ought to remember, however, is that the US-Saudi alliance that empowered
Militant Traditionists in Afghanistan produced Bin Laden and al-Qaeda. The
invasion of Iraq and the US-Saudi alliance against Assad in Syria produced
ISIL. These are not abstract speculations. Even the architects of the Iraq war
admit as much. Tony Blair, Bush’s ally
and strong supporter of the illegal invasion of Iraq recently declared:
Of
course you can't say that those of us who removed Saddam in 2003 bear no
responsibility for the situation [in Iraq] in 2015... There are elements of
truth in the fact that the invasion is responsible for the rise of ISIS. –Tony
Blair, CNN, October 25, 2015).
The
Future of ISIL and its Derivatives:
ISIL
is the expression of a Traditionist position that is present in all Semitic
traditions, if not all religions. As the data shows, Traditionists who do not
believe in broad, free public participation in defining and applying religious traditions
are strongest when enabled by the state or when relying on brute force to
impose their will from the top down. This model cannot survive the test of
time.
ISIL’s
teachings and practices might be enough to sustain a culture. But it is not
capable of sustaining a worldview or civilization. Combatant Traditionism in
Islamic societies is a backward-looking ideology with no place for diversity,
plurality, reason, art, or any other human invention that has no roots in the
formative period of Islam. An ideology that aspires to establishing a
monolithic community is in conflict with its own sources of authority and with
human nature. Even the literal interpretation of some Islamic texts suggest
that God does not wish to coarse all humans into accepting one faith: “Had your
Lord wished it, He could have made all of the earth’s inhabitants, all of them,
believers. Is it up to you, then, to force people to believe?” [Qur’an: Yunis,
99]; see also [Qur’an: Hud, 118-9].
To
aim for an earth inhabited by people who follow a single creed and live by one
law is to be delusional in aspiration and genocidal in practice. Neither
religious tradition nor historical records support the Traditionists’ position
and aims.
The
world in which we live has always been full of people with diverse ideas,
diverse racial backgrounds, and diverse social orders. Throughout the history
of Islamic societies, there has never been a caliphate that imposed one law and
one orthodoxy and lasted beyond the reign of one caliph or one dynasty. Even
the most idealized caliphal period, known as the Righteously Guided Caliphate,
was full of dissent, tension, rebellion, revolution, and bloodshed.
During
the righteously guided caliphate, the most prominent leaders of that era held
that the principles derived from religious texts were intended to establish
social justice, not to be blindly imposed. In other words, they understood that
the shari`a is supposed to be in service of human beings, not that human
beings can be sacrificed to impose the shari`a. The second caliph, Umar
Ibn al-Khattab, nicknamed al-Faruq for his commitment to fairness, invented an inheritance
law principle that contradicted the explicit Qur’anic dictates. The principle
of proportional distribution of legacy, `awl, diminished all the
Qur’anic share otherwise due to Qur’anic heirs to accommodate grandparents in
the presence of first and second generation heirs. Moreover, Umar reportedly
suspended hudud rules during harsh economic times.
Today,
the conflict between theory and practice is evident even in Traditionism
formulated and implemented by the same generation of adherents. In theory,
Salafism united scholars and adherents from all over the world. Salafist
ideologues prophesized that once a pure “Islamic state” is established, it will
self-sustain (Baqiyah) and it will self-perpetuate (Mutamaddidah)
until the end of time. Such self-assuredness enticed Traditionists from all
over the world to make the journey to the lands under the control of ISIL in
Syria and Iraq. However, months later, that influx of supporters decreased, the
number of Syrian and Iraqi citizens who lived in or near the towns and cities
under ISIL’s control left it all behind and sought refuge in European
countries, far away from ISIL’s control and influence, prompting the latter to
issue a religious edict prohibiting relocation to the land of unbelievers (Kuffar).
In
2014, ISIL and other Salafi affiliated armed groups in Syria went to war
against one another prompting Salafi religious figures to call for a truce. A
document entitled, Mubadarat al-ummah, drafter and signed by a number of
Salafi figures instructed all parties to stop the infighting and put the matter
in the hands of a shari`a court. When ISIL rejected the plan, even the
most committed authorities of Combatant Traditionism issued opinions
invalidating the procedure and substance of ISIL’s project to re-establish the
Islamic caliphate.
Ayman
al-Zawahiri, the most militant Salafi combatant and successor of Usama Bin
Laden rebuked ISIL’s leaders and declared their state null and void. The
Jordanian Salafist, Abu Muhammad al-Maqdisi (Isam al-Barqawi), who spent many
years in prison for his support of Combatant Traditionism, also rebuked ISIL
leaders and their state, arguing that they have poor understanding of Islamic
tradition and he argued that “ISIL does not have a single scholar who trusted
and supported them.” Many other Salafist scholars who previously supported
al-Qaeda and its derivatives rejected ISIL’s caliphate, including, Abu Qatada
al Filistini, Sami al-Uraydi, Sadiq al-Hashimi, Muslih al-Alyani, Abu Sulayman
al-Ustrali, Abu Azzam al-Jazrawi, al-Mu`tasim Billah al-Madani, and Abdullah
al-Muhaysini.
The
Mufti of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the Saudi establishment’s authority of
Salafism, also determined that ISIL, like al-Qaeda, is a deviant trend (fi’ah
baghiyah) and that it must be fought and defeated. Many other scholars of
Salafism held similar opinions on ISIL’s ideology and practices. If ISIL cannot
enjoy any degree of consensus about its interpretation of Islam and its
political theory, how could it secure the support and consent of other Sunni
Muslims, especially those who are Reasonists, let alone adherents to other
sects, religions, and seculars?
Another
problem with the ideology espoused by ISIL and its derivatives is that it is an
elitist, top-down vision of Islam because it is derived from textual evidence.
Writing is not an activity that preserves the values and practices of ordinary
people or the consensus of the community. Writing has been, for most of
history, a mode of communication dominated by the elite, the wealthy, and the
powerful. Writing and publishing is an expensive and complex mode of producing
narratives and recording historical events. Historical written texts are not
inclusive or diverse. To reconstruct Islam through the interpretation of a
select group of ancient texts is to presume that those texts represented a
broad consensus or authoritative preservation of Islam. They do not. Islam was once
said to be the religion of an illiterate for the illiterate. Then it was co-opted
by the elite aristocrats, like the Umayyads, in the second half of 7th
century, and the Saud Clan, in the 20th century.
Salafism
exists today because it aligned itself, directly and indirectly, with two of
the most powerful political orders in the world: a regional power, Saudi
Arabia, and a global power, the United States. Salafism’s reach and influence
are deep because they are enabled by state agencies and the generosity of wealthy
individuals from Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, and Qatar.
Today,
the Saudi rulers’ belligerent arrogance is stunning. While their air force
bombarded the impoverished Yemeni people for months killing scores of civilians
and destroying schools and hospitals, they continue to argue their bizarre
logic of equating the brutality of Assad’s government to the horror Daesh and
its derivatives inflict on civilians around the world.
The
Arab Spring put in motion a movement whose effects cannot be fully contained,
reversed, or redirected. The Arab countries must adapt to a new reality where
the people no longer fear the rulers. This problem is more complex for the
rulers of Saudi Arabia. For nearly a century, they presided over a society with
no civil institutions like opposition political parties, a free press, or
non-governmental organizations—a society dominated by the corrupt clan
government or by exclusionary Salafi religious institutions. Should the Saudi
government fall, the only group that would be prepared to take power is the
Salafist, a religious order that aspire to dominate all others who do not share
its views and beliefs.
The
Saudi rulers’ refusal to eradicate Combatant Traditionism is, in many ways,
another form of preserving and prolonging their own hold on power. The
existence of Combatant Traditionism makes the Saudi regime appear “moderate,” the
same way the rise of Daesh made other al-Qaeda derivatives, like al-Nusra and
Ahrar al-Sham, seem “moderate.” However, Muslims, and the world community at
large, must realize that they do not have to choose between Combatant
Traditionism and the Saudi regime. Given the evident historical and ideological
connections between the Saud clan and Combatant Traditionism, confronting both,
the Saudi regime and Combatant Traditionism, at the same time, might be the only
path to ending this petrodollar-empowered genocidal alliance.
The
Saudi rulers could save themselves and their country from total destruction.
They could stop blaming their neighbors, abandon their sectarian rhetoric, and
allow scholars from other Sunni schools of thought to engage Salafism, which has
enjoyed a virtual monopoly over educational and religious institutions since
the Kingdom was founded.
The
rise of Combatant Traditionism might also be an opportunity for Muslim
thinkers, scholars, and educators to revive Reasonism, the discourse that
guided the development of Islamic thought and practices during the formative
period (first two centuries of Islam). While Combatant Traditionism is
attempting to transcend geographical border to impose a particular narrow understanding
of Islam with blind zeal, those who believe in the universality of human
dignity need to articulate their commitment to social justice in a way that
transcends sectarian, ethnic, religious, national, and ideological fault lines.
The Saudi rulers’ sponsored culture puts religious dogma above human dignity. Confronting
that culture will launch a social justice driven movement within Islamic
societies and lay a strong foundation for dignity-centered movement that
transcends all other boundaries.
______________
* Prof. SOUAIAIA teaches at the University of Iowa. His most recent book, Anatomy of Dissent in Islamic Societies, provides a historical and theoretical treatment of rebellious movements and ideas since the rise of Islam. Opinions are the author’s, speaking on matters of public interest; not speaking for the university or any other organization with which he is affiliated.
* Prof. SOUAIAIA teaches at the University of Iowa. His most recent book, Anatomy of Dissent in Islamic Societies, provides a historical and theoretical treatment of rebellious movements and ideas since the rise of Islam. Opinions are the author’s, speaking on matters of public interest; not speaking for the university or any other organization with which he is affiliated.
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