Omar HH
23-04-2005, 05:19 PM
Every sin in Islam has it's atonement but even the earliest companions differed upon if taking a human life was atonable. The fact that there was a difference of opinion shows us how dangerous the matter is.
The nature of life on this earth is competition. The conflictual elements of good and evil are plain in many parts of life. Economic, intellectual, etc. Push and shove is in human beings in every aspect of life. It is most dangerous when these people begin to fight.
One of the other dangerous facts about this matter are that humans don't look at the circumstances and condition of other people so their judgement is related to their own experience of life which leads to misunderstanding.
For this reason the ugliest of human conflicts is beacuse of ethnic diversity. The reason why it is so evil is ebacuse people are looking at each other with no understanding of each other. People are divorced from the reality of otehr people.
The next most horrific are wars of expansion, exploitation or subjugation (i.e. Stalin) beacuse they are based on greed and human desire.
The next most terrible are those with some foundation to sound principles but as a means to selfish ends.
Wars going on today are not even in any of these realms. They are basically wars based entirely on human desire and avarice because they want something for themselves.
And this is where we arrive at Jihad. When the human being constrains and recognizes these principles himself.
The greatest Jihad is the human being overcoming his selfish desires and not commiting crimes against others. For this reason the Prophet (saw) said to speak the truth to tyranny. This is because what is most needed to call people back to the truth from the unjust is to permeate their hearts.
Jihad comes from a root from 2 different sources.
Juhd - total exertion to understand - to keep working.
Jahd - to completely exhaust one's self in effort - don't stop short.
Two aspects of Jihad - one is internal changing one's own resistence to the truth and the other is external confronting those forces in the world also resisting the truth.
At the root of true Jihad is not selfish desire but exhausting oneself for God and bringing out goodness to those around you. Exhaustion is taking place because of emptying self from selfish desire.
For that reason their not selfish but for the contentment for their Lord and service to the people on the earth.
Habib Ali is very troubled at media's talking about the pleasures of the Mujahid in the next world. It is actually belittling the meaning of why a Mujahid fights.
For this reason he was moved byresponse of people to the firefighters on 9/11. On the even on 9/11 when the firefighters were going with their noble goal of saving people without expecting anything from the material world.
You have this emtional feeling in your heart towards these people because they sacrificed the most valuable thing to them - this life - for no material gain or personal gain in this life.
Nobody feels for people who die dealing drugs - for 2 reasons: this person was not thinking in his moind of any higher principles of the advancement of good. Secondly, he was looking for material gain or material benefit.
Firefighters were almost certain they'd lose their life. They were not looking for material gain or benefit. And this is where we get to the understanding of the situation of Jihad of the Muslims.
Jihad for us is restraining falsehood and giving victory to what is right. With the correct methodology and with the correct reason. The correct
The proper intention or goal is that this should not be for the lower self - but rather only for seeking of the pleasure of God - a high lofty moral.
And you cannot combine seeking the pleasure of God - this high lofty moral - and personal benefit or personal gain. There is no way to combine between the two heights of understanding. It can only be for seeking the pleasure of God and his pleasure.
What is meant by personal gain is for this world - the things for this level of existence. And so for this reason you find that the Prophet (saw) said that whoever is harmed in the way of God and God knows best who is wounded or hurt in his way. So for this reason even if someone does not hold it as a principle in their own lives - if they see others who are hurt in attempt to save other people's lives - this sacrifice make's one feel within himself respect and honor for such a person because he realizes something profound about what he is doing.
So the Prophet (saw) was once asked by a man there are those who fight for booty or worldy gain, there are those who do so to be seen as brave or a warrior, and there are some who do so in desire for a position or as a way of showing off, and there are those who do it because they have some kind of false-patriotism believing they should fight for their people or their tribe whether they are right or wrong. The Prophet (saw) said the true mujahid was the one who was fighting in order that the Divine principle was paramount to all other principles.
In other words none of those were fighting Jihad. And so there are two conditions here - one of them are that the person that is struggling his goal has to be that he wants goodness to spread in the earth. This is absolutely essential for the person to have that condition. The second condition is it has to be within the constraints or guidelines that were given for a person to exert any force in the world. In order for it to be considered Jihad it must have these 2 conditions.
And for this reason in our religion is it completely prohibited "the ends are justifying the means." This is a completely alein philosophy to the tradition of Islam. When anyone exerts their efforts it has to be noble means to exert noble goals.
And for this reason that we find within our own historical tradition that when people were struggling for the way of God in all of these ways which includes the most difficult form which is actual physical struggle in combat - there were many occasions in the history of Islam in which the goal which was intended could have been achieved had they been trecherous. But since they refused break trusts, nullify treaties, etc. they did not they could not reach their goal.
And this is why we believe that those earlier people when they fought and historians marvel at their victories - we believe at the root of their victories was that they did not use those means which Allah did not sanction. If one wants to use those means that are not allowed to shorten his journey in ways that Allah did not allow him to do - we believe that Allah will prevent him from reaching his goal even if his goal is a noble goal.
And this is why we have in our tradition Salah ud-Din when he was fighting Richard the Lionhearted there was a point when he was informed Salah ud-Din was sick. Salah ud-Din had mastered the medicine of his age. In danger to his own life he had went to Richard the Lionhearted to treat him as a physician. When he did that he was representing the tradition. Had he been wanting to use any means to reach his goal he would have used any means - but he actually went to help this person.
Salah ud-Din's story is not for us a myth - it's an actual methodology being implemented - the Prophetic methodology. Had Salah ud-Din wanted Richard the Lionhearted to die his state would have been vengence - which is prohibited. There is a reward in treating every human being - whether they are Muslim or non-Muslim, so he acted on that principle. This is actually representive of what that tradition is.
He was not fighting believing it was he who would be victorious. Nor was he fighting for the sake of his own victory. Rather he was fighting believing the outcome was for God. He was struggling not for the sake of himself, but for the sake of God and so what was refelected in his behavior was the highest principle.
He knew that had he been doing this for his own sake he would not be granted victory from God. For this reason we believe that the reason why he was given victory was that he was the embodiment of the highest moral principle.
For this reason when he was finally given victory and came into the city, had he been fighting for his own self he would have humiliated the people who he was given victory over. But instead not only did he not harm the people in the city, but he honored those people, treated them with the highest respect and prohibited his army from destroying any church or breaking any crosses! Even though the crusaders who had occupied that territory had done horrific things - he he had come in for vengence but for the sake of God and struggled within his own self against those natural human desire for vengence and kept the restraints in place. So after he did that outward Jihad, the innerward Jihad was in place and that is why he did not end up shaming his religion and tradition but rather exhaulting it.
The reality is in our religion that combative Jihad is not even 1/2 of Jihad, it's not even 1/3rd of a meaning of Jihad - it's only one part of a principle of Jihad. And for this reason in our tradition we do not seek combative Jihad as an end in and of itself and it is only seen as a means. A means to stop belligerence and prevent harm from occuring. And if there is a path without combat necessary to prevent belligerence - Muslims are desirous of this path if they are following their tradition. Therefore the idea of aggression being in any way associating with Islam is in error. It is actually the removal of aggression that is at the root of combative Jihad.
And for this reason anyone who goes into any kind of combative situation - if his goal is to kill that person rather than to prevent that person harm. If it is more desirable for that person to kill him than to rectify his state and prevent him from harming others - if he was desiring vengance for that person - then that person is not a Mujahid in the way of Allah.
And for this reason the Prophet (saw) after coming from 23 years of the people of Makkah harming him - as the head of a victorious army. And some of his followers felt that they were now going to "get back" at the people. Someone made the remark "today is going to be a day of slaughter" and the Prophet (saw) when he heard him say that he looked at him and said "Today is not a day of slaughter, today is a day of compassion and mercy."
The Prophet (saw) was entering into that city, and there were two people in that city. One of those had killed one of the beloved people to him which was his uncle - who had his ears and nose chopped off and the other had his body torn open, and his liver put in a mouth and spit out as an act of contempt.
And so for this reason when he had come into the city there had been people who had done horrific crimes to Muslims. He had put on a list these people who would recieve capital punishment. But he did not put on that list those 2 people who had mutilated the body of his uncle. He said "this is the day of mercy." When those two people saw the state of this man and the forgiveness he saw they embraced his religion. And after this the Prophet (saw) actually sat with these people and said they are now considered to be Sahabah of the Prophet (saw) and they are honored by all Muslims. The fact that the Prophet (saw) embraced these two people is proof for the amount of mercy that he showed.
So for this reason at the root of all of these events is that Jihad is in our understanding to remove harm and those things which harm us in our society - and this is not in order to punish others. If that is the intention then it is not Jihad. The point is to remove aggression from somebody. If people are not harming us we have no problem in living in peace with such people. One of the types of Jihad is to repel that harm and repel that aggression.
So for that reason I will return to my first presence in that we are in dire need for Jihad in the world. Economic Jihad - we need to remove the elements of economics that are harming human beings because economics is now for the selfish desires of human beings - the rich get richer while the poor get poorer. We need a Jihad in our politics. The point of politics is for social justice - when theere is harm coming from the political system themselves then these harms need to be taken out from the political system themselves. Our goal should never be to achieve power - if our goal is "I want to be the ruler, in my Jihad is to remove the present ruler" then there is a misunderstanding. The goal should be to rectify those who are in power. To see them to be brought back to the truth and help people and benefit human beings.
This is why Imam ash-Sha'rawi used to say "anyone who tells you I want to rule in the name of Islam" he is a liar! The point is not to rule in the name of Islam but to actually be ruled by the princples of justice and truth and goodness. That is what we should want, not to rule others, but for the self to be ruled by those principles.
We need a Jihad in knowledge because knowledge is not being used for the benefit of human beings. We have scientists out there whos point is not to help people - such as during the Vietnam war was that scientists made a chemical weapon called Napalm. Since the Vietnamese built pools of water so that the women and children could be put in those lakes if they were hit by napalm. So some scientists made a kind of napalm not affective by water. This is the type of knowledges that have been given to help people have been now used to harm people. The Jihad of knowledge is to remove this harm from knowledge.
We need a Jihad in our houses so our families are protected - so that women are not harmed in their homes. So our children are protected from the harmful principles in society.
What we really need at the root of all of this is the Jihad against our individual souls - that we must struggle against the individual impulses within ourselves.
So the point is that we do not live for pleasure. Our lives should not be pleasure principle which motivates us. Instead of pleasure being a goal in and of itself, it is a means to give us the ability to sustain our struggle in this world for the highest principles to help human beings.
http://www.alhabibali.org/english/
The nature of life on this earth is competition. The conflictual elements of good and evil are plain in many parts of life. Economic, intellectual, etc. Push and shove is in human beings in every aspect of life. It is most dangerous when these people begin to fight.
One of the other dangerous facts about this matter are that humans don't look at the circumstances and condition of other people so their judgement is related to their own experience of life which leads to misunderstanding.
For this reason the ugliest of human conflicts is beacuse of ethnic diversity. The reason why it is so evil is ebacuse people are looking at each other with no understanding of each other. People are divorced from the reality of otehr people.
The next most horrific are wars of expansion, exploitation or subjugation (i.e. Stalin) beacuse they are based on greed and human desire.
The next most terrible are those with some foundation to sound principles but as a means to selfish ends.
Wars going on today are not even in any of these realms. They are basically wars based entirely on human desire and avarice because they want something for themselves.
And this is where we arrive at Jihad. When the human being constrains and recognizes these principles himself.
The greatest Jihad is the human being overcoming his selfish desires and not commiting crimes against others. For this reason the Prophet (saw) said to speak the truth to tyranny. This is because what is most needed to call people back to the truth from the unjust is to permeate their hearts.
Jihad comes from a root from 2 different sources.
Juhd - total exertion to understand - to keep working.
Jahd - to completely exhaust one's self in effort - don't stop short.
Two aspects of Jihad - one is internal changing one's own resistence to the truth and the other is external confronting those forces in the world also resisting the truth.
At the root of true Jihad is not selfish desire but exhausting oneself for God and bringing out goodness to those around you. Exhaustion is taking place because of emptying self from selfish desire.
For that reason their not selfish but for the contentment for their Lord and service to the people on the earth.
Habib Ali is very troubled at media's talking about the pleasures of the Mujahid in the next world. It is actually belittling the meaning of why a Mujahid fights.
For this reason he was moved byresponse of people to the firefighters on 9/11. On the even on 9/11 when the firefighters were going with their noble goal of saving people without expecting anything from the material world.
You have this emtional feeling in your heart towards these people because they sacrificed the most valuable thing to them - this life - for no material gain or personal gain in this life.
Nobody feels for people who die dealing drugs - for 2 reasons: this person was not thinking in his moind of any higher principles of the advancement of good. Secondly, he was looking for material gain or material benefit.
Firefighters were almost certain they'd lose their life. They were not looking for material gain or benefit. And this is where we get to the understanding of the situation of Jihad of the Muslims.
Jihad for us is restraining falsehood and giving victory to what is right. With the correct methodology and with the correct reason. The correct
The proper intention or goal is that this should not be for the lower self - but rather only for seeking of the pleasure of God - a high lofty moral.
And you cannot combine seeking the pleasure of God - this high lofty moral - and personal benefit or personal gain. There is no way to combine between the two heights of understanding. It can only be for seeking the pleasure of God and his pleasure.
What is meant by personal gain is for this world - the things for this level of existence. And so for this reason you find that the Prophet (saw) said that whoever is harmed in the way of God and God knows best who is wounded or hurt in his way. So for this reason even if someone does not hold it as a principle in their own lives - if they see others who are hurt in attempt to save other people's lives - this sacrifice make's one feel within himself respect and honor for such a person because he realizes something profound about what he is doing.
So the Prophet (saw) was once asked by a man there are those who fight for booty or worldy gain, there are those who do so to be seen as brave or a warrior, and there are some who do so in desire for a position or as a way of showing off, and there are those who do it because they have some kind of false-patriotism believing they should fight for their people or their tribe whether they are right or wrong. The Prophet (saw) said the true mujahid was the one who was fighting in order that the Divine principle was paramount to all other principles.
In other words none of those were fighting Jihad. And so there are two conditions here - one of them are that the person that is struggling his goal has to be that he wants goodness to spread in the earth. This is absolutely essential for the person to have that condition. The second condition is it has to be within the constraints or guidelines that were given for a person to exert any force in the world. In order for it to be considered Jihad it must have these 2 conditions.
And for this reason in our religion is it completely prohibited "the ends are justifying the means." This is a completely alein philosophy to the tradition of Islam. When anyone exerts their efforts it has to be noble means to exert noble goals.
And for this reason that we find within our own historical tradition that when people were struggling for the way of God in all of these ways which includes the most difficult form which is actual physical struggle in combat - there were many occasions in the history of Islam in which the goal which was intended could have been achieved had they been trecherous. But since they refused break trusts, nullify treaties, etc. they did not they could not reach their goal.
And this is why we believe that those earlier people when they fought and historians marvel at their victories - we believe at the root of their victories was that they did not use those means which Allah did not sanction. If one wants to use those means that are not allowed to shorten his journey in ways that Allah did not allow him to do - we believe that Allah will prevent him from reaching his goal even if his goal is a noble goal.
And this is why we have in our tradition Salah ud-Din when he was fighting Richard the Lionhearted there was a point when he was informed Salah ud-Din was sick. Salah ud-Din had mastered the medicine of his age. In danger to his own life he had went to Richard the Lionhearted to treat him as a physician. When he did that he was representing the tradition. Had he been wanting to use any means to reach his goal he would have used any means - but he actually went to help this person.
Salah ud-Din's story is not for us a myth - it's an actual methodology being implemented - the Prophetic methodology. Had Salah ud-Din wanted Richard the Lionhearted to die his state would have been vengence - which is prohibited. There is a reward in treating every human being - whether they are Muslim or non-Muslim, so he acted on that principle. This is actually representive of what that tradition is.
He was not fighting believing it was he who would be victorious. Nor was he fighting for the sake of his own victory. Rather he was fighting believing the outcome was for God. He was struggling not for the sake of himself, but for the sake of God and so what was refelected in his behavior was the highest principle.
He knew that had he been doing this for his own sake he would not be granted victory from God. For this reason we believe that the reason why he was given victory was that he was the embodiment of the highest moral principle.
For this reason when he was finally given victory and came into the city, had he been fighting for his own self he would have humiliated the people who he was given victory over. But instead not only did he not harm the people in the city, but he honored those people, treated them with the highest respect and prohibited his army from destroying any church or breaking any crosses! Even though the crusaders who had occupied that territory had done horrific things - he he had come in for vengence but for the sake of God and struggled within his own self against those natural human desire for vengence and kept the restraints in place. So after he did that outward Jihad, the innerward Jihad was in place and that is why he did not end up shaming his religion and tradition but rather exhaulting it.
The reality is in our religion that combative Jihad is not even 1/2 of Jihad, it's not even 1/3rd of a meaning of Jihad - it's only one part of a principle of Jihad. And for this reason in our tradition we do not seek combative Jihad as an end in and of itself and it is only seen as a means. A means to stop belligerence and prevent harm from occuring. And if there is a path without combat necessary to prevent belligerence - Muslims are desirous of this path if they are following their tradition. Therefore the idea of aggression being in any way associating with Islam is in error. It is actually the removal of aggression that is at the root of combative Jihad.
And for this reason anyone who goes into any kind of combative situation - if his goal is to kill that person rather than to prevent that person harm. If it is more desirable for that person to kill him than to rectify his state and prevent him from harming others - if he was desiring vengance for that person - then that person is not a Mujahid in the way of Allah.
And for this reason the Prophet (saw) after coming from 23 years of the people of Makkah harming him - as the head of a victorious army. And some of his followers felt that they were now going to "get back" at the people. Someone made the remark "today is going to be a day of slaughter" and the Prophet (saw) when he heard him say that he looked at him and said "Today is not a day of slaughter, today is a day of compassion and mercy."
The Prophet (saw) was entering into that city, and there were two people in that city. One of those had killed one of the beloved people to him which was his uncle - who had his ears and nose chopped off and the other had his body torn open, and his liver put in a mouth and spit out as an act of contempt.
And so for this reason when he had come into the city there had been people who had done horrific crimes to Muslims. He had put on a list these people who would recieve capital punishment. But he did not put on that list those 2 people who had mutilated the body of his uncle. He said "this is the day of mercy." When those two people saw the state of this man and the forgiveness he saw they embraced his religion. And after this the Prophet (saw) actually sat with these people and said they are now considered to be Sahabah of the Prophet (saw) and they are honored by all Muslims. The fact that the Prophet (saw) embraced these two people is proof for the amount of mercy that he showed.
So for this reason at the root of all of these events is that Jihad is in our understanding to remove harm and those things which harm us in our society - and this is not in order to punish others. If that is the intention then it is not Jihad. The point is to remove aggression from somebody. If people are not harming us we have no problem in living in peace with such people. One of the types of Jihad is to repel that harm and repel that aggression.
So for that reason I will return to my first presence in that we are in dire need for Jihad in the world. Economic Jihad - we need to remove the elements of economics that are harming human beings because economics is now for the selfish desires of human beings - the rich get richer while the poor get poorer. We need a Jihad in our politics. The point of politics is for social justice - when theere is harm coming from the political system themselves then these harms need to be taken out from the political system themselves. Our goal should never be to achieve power - if our goal is "I want to be the ruler, in my Jihad is to remove the present ruler" then there is a misunderstanding. The goal should be to rectify those who are in power. To see them to be brought back to the truth and help people and benefit human beings.
This is why Imam ash-Sha'rawi used to say "anyone who tells you I want to rule in the name of Islam" he is a liar! The point is not to rule in the name of Islam but to actually be ruled by the princples of justice and truth and goodness. That is what we should want, not to rule others, but for the self to be ruled by those principles.
We need a Jihad in knowledge because knowledge is not being used for the benefit of human beings. We have scientists out there whos point is not to help people - such as during the Vietnam war was that scientists made a chemical weapon called Napalm. Since the Vietnamese built pools of water so that the women and children could be put in those lakes if they were hit by napalm. So some scientists made a kind of napalm not affective by water. This is the type of knowledges that have been given to help people have been now used to harm people. The Jihad of knowledge is to remove this harm from knowledge.
We need a Jihad in our houses so our families are protected - so that women are not harmed in their homes. So our children are protected from the harmful principles in society.
What we really need at the root of all of this is the Jihad against our individual souls - that we must struggle against the individual impulses within ourselves.
So the point is that we do not live for pleasure. Our lives should not be pleasure principle which motivates us. Instead of pleasure being a goal in and of itself, it is a means to give us the ability to sustain our struggle in this world for the highest principles to help human beings.
http://www.alhabibali.org/english/