Make jihad only against the weak?

Inquiry and Analysis Series - No. 444

(MEMRI Logo from MEMRI)

Yesterday, I posted on "Jihad and Dr. Fadl's Inner Rebellion" and asked myself a central question about Dr. Fadl (aka Sayyid Imam al-Sharif), the jihadi intellectual and independent student of Islamic legal reasoning on jihad:

I wonder if his core beliefs about the centrality of jihad have changed . . . or if he has merely grown more realistic with age and defeat and is using his recent book, Rationalizing the jihadi action in Egypt and the world (Wathiqat Tarshid Al-'Aml Al-Jihadi fi Misr w'Al-'Alam, 2007), to repackage older ideas . . . . Fadl's view seems primarily to be that the terrorist jihad against America on 9/11 was wrong because it didn't succeed. (Gypsy Scholar, "Jihad and Dr. Fadl's Inner Rebellion," June 1, 2008)

I've now read a bit more on Dr. Fadl and see that my hunch was correct. He has not altered his view on jihad's centrality; he has merely argued that jihad is very unlikely to succeed.

For a technical explanation on this topic, see the text of a presentation by Daniel Lav, "The Party of Jurisprudence vs. The Party of Action: Sayyed Imam, Ayman Al-Zawahiri, and the Split in the Jihad Movement," Inquiry and Analysis Series, MEMRI, No. 444, May 29, 2008. Lav explains that Fadl has not retracted his view that the rulers of most nominally Muslim countries throughout the world are not true Muslims. That is, he still holds that these rulers are apostates -- a position that Lav identifies as "the doctrine of takfir of the rulers (declaring the rulers to be apostates)."

Jihad against such apostate rulers can therefore be legitimate, but Fadl has recently argued against such jihadi actions. Why? Lav asks the same question . . . but also provides the answer:

Why then does Sayyed Imam [i.e., Dr. Fadl] forbid jihad against these regimes? The main argument of the Document of Right Guidance for Jihad Activity is that the jihad groups today are in a state of weakness that precludes the waging of jihad. A number of Quranic verses and hadith are adduced to prove that inability allows or requires one to defer an obligation; for instance, Quran 2:286: "Allah only imposes obligation on someone according to his ability." This principle applies to all positive commandments, but it is noteworthy that in the Document of Right Guidance Sayyed Imam sets an even higher threshold for "ability" with regard to jihad. He writes that jihad "is like other matters in religion; ability to perform it is one of the conditions of its being incumbent. However, ability in jihad is not limited to the Muslim's person -- such as his physical or financial ability -- but rather it goes beyond this and [includes] the reality of the circumstances surrounding him…"

The concept that inability, or 'ajz, is a legitimate exemption from jihad is not an innovation in Sayyed Imam's thought. The theoretical principle was already mentioned in Imam's first book, The Essentials of Making Ready for Jihad, which was written in 1987 as a shari'a guide for jihad to be used in the training camps for mujahideen in Afghanistan. In 1992 he had already decided that this concept applied to the situation in Egypt, and Imam, as Emir of the reconstituted Jihad group in Pakistan, tried to forbid it from pursuing armed activities in its home country. The difference between the treatment of this issue in the Document of Right Guidance and in Imam's previous writings is thus more one of emphasis than of substance.

Thus, while Al-Gama'a Al-Islamiyya undermined the very legitimacy of jihad against the regime, Sayyed Imam and the Jihad group continue to maintain that it is a theoretical obligation, whose implementation they merely defer. (Lav, "The Party of Jurisprudence vs. The Party of Action," para. 20-22)

Another word must therefore be added to our vocabulary, 'ajz, or "inability," an important concept in Islam, for 'ajz exempts Muslims from duties that they are unable to fulfill -- e.g., the pilgrimage to Mecca for those too poor or too infirm to make the trip.

Consequently, Dr. Fadl has not retreated from his earlier position on takfir and jihad, which thus implies that he considers most current-day Muslim rulers apostates. What does this further imply?

This determination that the rulers are apostates has . . . . [the] consequence is that, in the absence of a legitimate Muslim ruler, his [i.e., the ruler's] duties and prerogatives -- including declaring and waging jihad -- devolve onto the Muslim community as a whole. This is what gives the jihad groups license to take matters into their own hands and, notably, stage operations in non-Muslim lands. (Lav, "The Party of Jurisprudence vs. The Party of Action," para. 11)

Dr. Fadl's view would seem to allow jihad groups to continue terrorist operations in non-Muslim lands . . . assuming, of course, that such operations can succeed. The doctrine of "inability" ('ajz) would also apply here and thus accounts for Fadl's view of 9/11, as reported by Lawrence Wright:

"People hate America, and the Islamist movements feel their hatred and their impotence. Ramming America has become the shortest road to fame and leadership among the Arabs and Muslims. But what good is it if you destroy one of your enemy's buildings, and he destroys one of your countries? What good is it if you kill one of his people, and he kills a thousand of yours? . . . That, in short, is my evaluation of 9/11." (Wright, "The Rebellion Within," page 10)

There we have it, Fadl's advice: Don't attack the strong; just attack the weak.