The Concept of Jihad
in Islam

The word jihad is derived from the root jahada, which means ‘to strive’ or ‘to struggle’. It denotes the exertion of oneself to the utmost, to the limits of one’s capacity, in some activity or for some purpose. Thus, the Quran says ‘And strive for the cause of God as it behoves you to strive for it.’ (22:78)

In the Arabic language the word ‘jihad’ refers to making an all-out effort for something. (see, Ibn Manzoor, Lisan al Arab, vol 3, p. 135) Because fighting one’s enemies is also one form of such effort or striving, it is also referred to as a jihad, in an expanded sense. However, the actual Arabic word for this is qital, and not jihad.

Fighting with one’s enemies is something that might happen by chance, and only occasionally. However, jihad is a continuous process that animates every day and night of the life of the true believer. It never ceases. This continuous jihad is the ceaseless effort a believer makes at every moment to abide by God’s will in every aspect of his life. Such a person does not let any negative elements affect his life, such as the desires of the self, the allure of gain and personal aggrandisement, the promptings of opportunism, the problems of the ego, the lust for wealth, and so on. All such things, and even the pressure of traditions and customs, are hurdles in God’s path. Overcoming them all and abiding by the commandments of God is the real jihad, and this is what jihad’s essential meaning is.

There are many references to jihad in the sayings attributed to the Prophet. For instance, in the Musnad of Imam Ahmad, there are several traditions, such as:

1. A mujahid is he who engages in jihad against his own self (nafs) for God’s sake. (Musnad Ahmad, Hadith No. 23951)
2. A mujahid is he who engages in jihad against his own self in God’s path. (Musnad Ahmad, Hadith No. 23965)
3. A mujahid is he who engages in jihad against his own self for the sake of obedience to God. (Musnad Ahmad, Hadith No. 23958)

The world we live in is a testing ground. It has been fashioned in such a way that human beings are constantly in a state of being tested. In the course of this test, people have to face numerous hurdles. So, for instance, you might face a situation where you are faced with a truth, but you feel that acknowledging it would lower your status. You might have in your possession a thing that belongs to someone else and you feel that returning it to its rightful owner would cause you a loss. Or, you might feel that leading a modest life is tantamount to suppressing your desires. At times, you might think that not giving vent to feelings of anger and revenge is tantamount to negating yourself. You might hesitate to uphold justice for fear of losing your popularity. You might feel that if you act in a principled manner, instead of selfishly, you may lose certain facilities. And so on.

In this way, on different occasions one has to repeatedly suppress one’s desires. Sometimes, you might feel that you will have to sacrifice your ego totally, surmounting all hurdles and facing all sorts of difficulties and losses, but still remaining firmly established on the Truth. This is the real jihad. Those who remain steadfast in this jihad will be given the right to enter paradise in the Hereafter.

Jihad, in essence, is a form of peaceful struggle. One form of this peaceful struggle is dawah, inviting people to tread the path of God. Dawah is communicating to others the word of God (25:52). The jihad that this Quranic verse refers to is not military warfare. Rather, it connotes a wholly intellectual and ideological process. In short, it means refuting falsehood and affirming the Truth.

Jihad in the form of qital or war in its primary sense is also another name for peaceful struggle. That is to say, if an enemy challenges one militarily, even then, to begin with, one should still strive, to the utmost possible extent, to respond through peaceful means. Peaceful methods should be abandoned only when it is no longer possible to use them, when fighting remains the only possible option left to respond to the war initiated by others.

In this regard, a statement recorded in the Sahih al-Bukhari, and attributed to Aisha, wife of the Prophet, serves as a guiding principle for us. According to this report, whenever the Prophet was faced with two possible courses of action, he would always opt for the easier one. (Sahih Al Bukhari, Hadith No. 3560; Sahih Muslim, Hadith No. 2327; Abu Dawud, Hadith No. 4785; Ibn Majah, Hadith No. 1984; Musnad Ahmad, Hadith No. 24549)

This practice, or sunnat, of the Prophet applies not only to the routine affairs of life but also to serious matters such as war, which by their very nature present difficult options. A study of the life of the Prophet reveals that he never initiated fighting himself. And, whenever his opponents sought to entangle him in fighting, he would always seek some way to avoid it and stave off war. He engaged in war only when there was no other way left at all. Thus, according to the Prophet’s sunnat, aggressive war is forbidden in Islam. Islam allows only for defensive war, and that, too, only when it becomes absolutely unavoidable.

In life, one is oftenfaced with the issue of having to choose between two paths to follow: the peaceful and the violent. The accounts of the Prophet’s life tell us that always, and in every matter, he adopted peaceful methods, totally shunning violence. His whole life was a successful expression of this principle. Here are some instances which illustrate this:

1. Immediately after being appointed as a prophet, he was faced with choosing between two methods—peaceful or violent. As a prophet, his mission was to end polytheism and to establish tawhid, faith in and surrender to the one God. The Kabah in Makkah had been established as a centre of tawhid, but by the time of the advent of the Prophet some 360 idols had been installed therein. Hence, one could think that in the Quran the Prophet should first have been instructed to purify the Kabah of idols and then remake it as a centre of tawhid, thus advancing themission he was engaged in. But had this been the case and he had started his work in this way, it would have been tantamount to warring with the Quraysh of Makkah, who enjoyed leadership among the Arabs, precisely because they had traditionally been the custodians of the Kabah. History tells us that at this stage, the Prophet completely avoided cleansing the Kabah of idols, and restricted himself purely to the mission of conveying the ideology of tawhid instead. This was an example of the Prophet choosing a peaceful method over a violent one.
2. Firmly upholding this peaceful principle, the Prophet carried on his preaching work for thirteen years in Makkah. Yet, despite this, the Quraysh fiercely opposed him, so much so that their elders, after consulting each other, plotted to act together to kill him. Accordingly, they armed themselves with swords and surrounded his house.

This, in effect, was a challenge to the Prophet and his Companions to do battle. However, based on God’s guidance, the Prophet decided to avoid armed confrontation. And so, in the silence of the night, he left Makkah and travelled in secret till he reached Madinah. This journey is known in Islamic history as the Hijrah. The Hijrah clearly exemplifies the choice of a peaceful method as opposed to a violent one.

3. The ‘Battle of the Trench’, also known as the Battle of Ahzab, is another illustration of this sunnat of the Prophet. On this occasion, a vast number of the Prophet’s opponents assembled and marched towards Madinah. This was an open challenge to war on their part. However, in order to avoid war, the Prophet arranged for a trench to be dug around the town. This served as a buffer against the attackers. And so, the Quraysh army, having spent just a few days on the other side of the trench, retreated. The trench, too, was, as it were, an example of the Prophet’s choosing a peaceful option as opposed to a violent one.
4. Likewise, the Treaty of Hudaybiya also exemplifies this sunnat of the Prophet. The Prophet and his Companions wanted to enter Makkah and perform the Umrah, but they were stopped by the chiefs of the Quraysh at a place called Hudaybiya and were told to go back to Madinah. The Quraysh said that they would not allow them to enter Makkah at any cost. On their part, this was, as it were, a challenge to do battle. If the Prophet had proceeded towards Makkah in accordance with his plan of performing the Umrah, it was certain that armed confrontation with the Quraysh would have broken out. However, the Prophet ended his journey at Hudaybiya. Accepting the one-sided conditions of the Quraysh, he entered into a peace treaty with them and returned to Madinah. This is yet another clear prophetic example of choosing a peaceful method over a violent one.
5. This sunnat of the Prophet was also exemplified by his victory over Makkah. On this occasion, he was accompanied by 10,000 devoted Companions. They could certainly have successfully fought the Quraysh. However, instead of using force, the Prophet chose rather to demonstrate force. He did not set out by making an announcement, with this army of 10,000 people, and then fight the Quraysh and capture Makkah. Instead, what he did was that in complete secrecy he made preparations for the journey and travelled along with his Companions to Makkah and then very silently entered the town. His entry into Makkah was so sudden that the Quraysh were unable to make any preparations against him, and Makkah was won without any bloody confrontation. This, too, is an example of the Prophet’s choice of a peaceful, over a violent, method.

All these examples prove that not only in ordinary conditions, but also in case of extreme emergency, the Prophet adopted the principle of peace as opposed to war. All his successes are practical examples of this very sunnat of peace.

As indicated above, in Islam peace is the general rule while war is a rare exception, to be resorted to only when it becomes an absolutely unavoidable compulsion. Keep this principle in mind and survey the world today. Today’s world is completely different from the world of ancient times. In the past, violence was a common or general practice. Choosing peaceful methods was, at that time, an extremely difficult thing to do. However, today the situation has changed completely. In today’s world, resorting to violence has become completely undesirable and unacceptable. In contrast, peaceful methods are now regarded as the only acceptable way. Moreover, today, peaceful methods not only have an intellectual base but are supported by practical requirements, which makes these methods extremely powerful in their own right.

These supports are very many—for instance, the right to express one’s views, the possibilities of widely disseminating one’s views using modern means of communications, and employing the power of the media in one’s favour. And so on. These modern transformations have made peaceful methods popular, and, at the same time, more effective.

As mentioned earlier, according to the Prophet’s sunnat, or practice, when peaceful methods are practically available, these methods alone must be used and violent struggle should be avoided. One can very well say, without fear of exaggeration, that today, violent methods have not only become difficult, but that they are also, in practical terms, completely counter-productive. In contrast, peaceful methods are easier to adopt and also much more likely to be successful. No longer is the use of peaceful methods a question of choosing between two possible options—peaceful versus violent. Rather, the peaceful method is now simply the only possible and viable existing option. And so, it is absolutely correct to say that violent methods must now be abandoned in practice, or what in the language of the shariah is called mansukh or ‘abrogated’. Now the followers of Islam are left with only one method to choose—and that, without any doubt whatsoever, is the peaceful method, unless and until such changes take place in the situation as once again change social imperatives.

It is true that in the past violent methods were used on some occasions, but these were only a choice based on the compulsions of the then prevailing causes and conditions. As a result of the changes in the conditions in our times, there is no longer such compulsion, so the choice of violent methods must now be considered to be unnecessary and not in consonance with the essential spirit of the Prophet’s sunnat. Now, with the new conditions, only peaceful methods should be chosen. As far as the issue of jihad is concerned, peace is the general rule or norm, while war as a necessity is a very rare exception.

An example from recent times of what we have been discussing here, and from which we can gain valuable lessons, is the life of Mahatma Gandhi. Because of the changes in the times that we have talked of, it was possible for Mahatma Gandhi to engage in a full-fledged political struggle and succeed. And all of this happened by adhering to non-violent methods and peaceful activism, from start to finish.

According to a well-known principle of fiqh or Islamic jurisprudence, certain rules can or should be modified to suit the change of time and place. (e.g., Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya, Ighathatu lahfaan, vol 1, p. 330) This generally accepted principle of fiqh demands that when the conditions have changed, then, if need be, one must seek the re-application of the relevant shariah commandments so that they may be brought into harmony with the prevailing conditions. Indeed, this principle of fiqh applies as much to issues of war as it does to many other matters. It, too, demands that violent methods should now be discarded and only peaceful methods should be considered to be in conformity with the shariah.

Contemporary Jihadi Movements

In present times, in many countries Muslims are engaged in armed conflicts in the name of ‘Islamic jihad’. But the fact is that no movement can turn into a jihad simply because its flag-bearers give it that label. An action can be considered an Islamic jihad only if and when it is fully in accordance with the conditions that Islam has laid down in this regard. Without fully meeting these conditions, it will not be a real jihad, but, rather, fasad, or strife. Those who are engaged in such actions will not earn the rewards they would have had for participating in a true jihad. Rather, they will deserve only God’s punishment.

I have discussed in considerable detail in several of my books the various conditions necessary for jihad in the sense of qital or physical war. Here I wish to clarify just one point. And that is, that the status of jihad in the sense of qital is not the same as that of actions performed by individuals such as prayer and fasting. Rather, it is such an action as has wholly to do with the government.

This status of jihad in the sense of qital is clearly evident in the Quran and Hadith. For instance, the Quran (4:83) tells us that if a state of fear is created by an enemy, one should not initiate action against it on one’s own. Rather, one should turn to those who are in authority—that is, those who have governmental powers. The latter should accurately gauge the situation and take proper and necessary steps. This verse tells us that in the event of fear (a situation of war), it is not legitimate for members of the general public to take steps on their own. The only thing they can do is to leave the matter with the rulers and assist the latter in whatever actions they may take.

Likewise, according to a hadith in the Sahih al-Bukhari, the Prophet is said to have declared that the leader is a shield. War is undertaken under his leadership, and protection is secured through him. (Sahih al Bukhari, Hadith no. 2957) This indicates that military defense must always be conducted under the ruler’s leadership. The only duty of the general Muslim public in this regard is that they should obey their rulers, and, giving them their support, should help them succeed in their efforts.

This fiqh issue is one on which there is unanimity among the fuqaha, or scholars of Muslim jurisprudence. Almost no Islamic jurisprudent of note has any differences with it. According to the unanimous agreement of the fuqaha, only an established government can declare war. Or, as it is said in Arabic, ar-raheelu lil imam, meaning that the declaration of war is the sole prerogative of the ruler. Non-governmental actors do not have the right to make such a declaration.

War is something that needs considerable organization. Only a sovereign government is capable of dealing with its complexities. It is because of this that it is legitimate only for a government to declare war, and not the general public.

In present times, Muslims have launched violent confrontations with governments in various countries. But almost wholly without exception, these are not Islamic jihads, but, rather fasad, or conflict. This is because none of these so-called jihads has been launched by an established government.

All of these movements have been launched, and are being carried out, by what in today’s parlance are called non-governmental organizations. If some of their so-called jihadi activities enjoy the support of some Muslim government, this support is being provided in a clandestine and undeclared manner. However, according to the shariah, a Muslim government has the right to engage in jihad (Ibn Qudamah, Al Mughni: vol 9, p. 202) only when it openly declares this. It is impermissible, according to Islam, for a Muslim government to engage in qital, or war, without such a declaration.

The violent activities presently engaged in by Muslims in various parts of the world in the name of jihad are, to use modern-day terms, of two types: guerilla war and proxy war. And both of these types of war are, without any doubt, illegitimate in Islam. Guerilla war is illegitimate in Islam because it is conducted by non-state actors, and not an established government. And proxy war is illegitimate because it is engaged in by a government without its having made an open declaration of hostilities.

Islamic jihad is thus a positive and continuous action or process. It continues uninterrupted in the life of a believer and has three large spheres:

1. Jihad an-Nafs: This is the struggle to control one’s negative emotions and desires, and under all conditions, remain always firm in the way of life that is pleasing to God.
2. Jihad-e Dawah: This is the struggle to convey the message of God to all of humankind, and for this purpose to make every effort, inspired by compassion and concern for the welfare of all. This is an exalted task, and so the Quran calls it jihad-e-kabir, or ‘great jihad’.
3. Jihad-e A‘ada: This is the effort to preserve the True Religion under all circumstances. In the past, this jihad was basically a peaceful action, and it remains so now as well.

Accordingly, then, jihad is a peaceful struggle, and not a violent one.