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 Understanding Islam post-9/11
American attitudes about Islam were fundamentally shaped (or perhaps better,
misshapen) by the events of September 11, 2001. Both Islam's defenders and
critics have been driven to form much of their rhetoric about the religion
around efforts to demonstrate that those who carried out the attacks of that day
were either an aberration or representative of the true heart of the religion --
and particularly in the case of Islam's defenders it is possible to find those
who would argue on either side of the normativeness of al-Qaeda's interpretation
of Islam.
Precisely for that reason, it is essential to emphasize the broad range of
diversity within Islam itself. Mohammad may have been an Arab, but it is a major
misperception to equate Muslims in the 21st century with Middle Eastern Arabs
(only 10-15% of all Muslims today are of Arab descent -- less in overall numbers
than just the Muslim population of Indonesia). But the diversity extends far
beyond ethnicity and nationality, even though many of the attitudes that
non-Muslims consider essential to Islam are in fact only ethnic and cultural
manifestations of people who are Muslims. Women may not be able to drive cars in
Saudi Arabia (the religious heartland of Islam), but they not only drive but
have been elected president of some of largest Muslim nations in terms of
population (Indonesia and Pakistan). And just as every major
religion practiced in modern societies has a wide-range of ethical practices and
theological teachings along a "conservative" to "liberal" continuum, the same is
no less true of Islam.
  As an additional resource beyond the summaries on this web page, a PowerPoint®
presentation on Islam has been included on this site (the "on-line" viewing option
does not requires that you have PowerPoint installed on your computer.). It briefly relates the
emergence and central beliefs of Islam in order to explore its responses to
European cultural development and influence. You may view it on-line by
left-clicking the "on-line" title slide image at the right; depending
on your browser's security settings, you may have to give permission to allow
"Active X" controls for viewing the presentation (simply follow the
instructions in your browser window). You may also save a PowerPoint
version of the presentation for off-line use by right-clicking the "off-line" image and
selecting "Save Target As ..." from the pop-up menu to "copy"
the file either to a CD-R, CD-RW, or
a folder on your hard disk (you must have a licensed version of PowerPoint to
use this file ".ppt" file on your computer). Permission to use the
presentation for instruction in Scouting or other civic programs is granted with
the requirement that the title slide be shown and that all other slides be
presented without editorial revision.
History and Diversity
The origins of Islam lie in a series of "recitations" (the root idea of the
word Qur'an that designates the Muslim scriptures; see below)
revealed to Mohammad (c. 570-632 CE)
beginning in the year 610. According to the teachings of Islam, Mohammad
is the last of a series of "prophets" that the one God (Arabic, Allah)
has sent to reveal the divine will. Other important prophets included Abraham,
Moses, and Jesus. Mohammad was both a religious and political reformer, who
worked to both replace the multitheism of most his Arab contemporaries with a
thoroughgoing monotheism and to unite the fractious tribes into single community
(Arabic, ummah).
Following Mohammad's death, a question over succession to the leadership of the
movement quickly ensued. One group, that came to be known as the Sunni, backed a
man by the name of Abu Bakr. Others chose to follow Muhammad's cousin and
son-in-law, Ali, and became known as the Shi'a. Over time these groups began to
differ over matters of shari'a (principles and interpretations of Islamic
law) as well as over proper lines of succession. Another major division within
Islam is Sufism, a highly mystical practice of Islam.
Within only a few centuries of Muhammad's death Islam had spread throughout
much of the eastern hemisphere, extending from the straits of
Gibraltar in Spain and North Africa all the way to the islands of Indonesia. At
this height, Islam was also a major cultural and intellectual force as well. Not
only was it preserving many of the classics of the earlier Greco-Roman world
(such as the writings of Aristotle), it was also making major advances in such
sciences as astronomy, mathematics and optics.
Because of the way the notion of jihad ("struggle") has been employed
by some Islamist groups, many people believe that Islam was spread 'at the edge
of a sword.' In the Qu'ran, however, formal military jihad is a defensive
response to attack on the community of the faithful (the ummah); that
being said, "defense" could mean pressing the offensive on those who had begun
the attack. Since Islam traditionally did not distinguish between "secular" and
"sacred" (there is one world under the one God), Muslim lands were ruled by
Muslim faithful in accord with Islamic law (the will of the one God). The
Islamist political movement, then, can be cast as an effort to reestablish the
role of Islam in lands where those who oppose Islam (as understood by the
Islamists) have gained control.
Islamic Scriptures
The Islamic scriptures are called the Qur'an, an Arabic word meaning
"recitations" (and sometimes romanized as "Koran"; transliterating Arabic is
notoriously difficult, and their is no agreed upon standard). The title
expresses the belief of Muslims that these words are the very words of God
recited by Muhammad. Because it is the record of the very words of God, the only
true Qur'an is the Arabic; all translations are at best "interpretations" of
these scriptures (recall that translators are often referred to as
"interpreters").
The prophet began the process of assembling these revelations, but the
collection was finally completed after his death. The Qur'an consists of a total
114 suras. As with the Christian and Jewish bibles, later scholars have
added verse divisions for ease of reference. Thus, Qur'an 1:1 would be a
reference to sura 1, verse 1 (suras may also be cited by their
respective titles and verse location: Al-Fātihah
["The Prologue"] 1). Apart from the first which stands as an introduction to
others, the suras are arranged not by topic or chronology, but rather
from longest to shortest. (If that seems unusual, it should be noted that the
letters in the Christian New Testament attributed to Paul are arranged basically
on the same pattern with letters to churches first and to individuals next, each
from longest to shortest respectively).
The ultimate authority in Muslim practice is the Qur'an, but there are also
different guides to understanding and applying this revelation of God's will to
life. First of these aids in importance is the sunna (the words, habits,
acts, and ritual gestures) of the prophet Muhammad himself, which are preserved
in the hadith. Additionally there is the shari'a which expresses
the "way" or principles of Islam and the fiqh which expresses the
"understanding" or laws of Islam as drawn from the Qur'an, sunna,
community consensus, and analogical reasoning (giving rise to the cultural
differences in Islamic practice). One point of distinction between Sunnis and
Shi'as is debate about whether shari'a and fiqh remain open to
further development or have been set.
Islamic Practices
Islam is an Arabic word meaning "submission," and the designation "Muslim" is
derived from the Arabic for "one who as submitted" to the will of God. Although
etymological definitions can be problematic, it is probably important to note
that islam is related to the same Semitic root as the word salam
(as is the Hebrew word shalom) which means "peace." Islam can then be
defined as "entering into a condition of peace and security with God through
allegiance or surrender to [the Divine]" ("Islam," Oxford Dictionary of World
Religions, 479).
The only requirement to becoming a Muslim is to affirm (in the sense of not
only saying but committing oneself to) ash-Shahada ("the witness"):
"There is no god but the God and Muhammad is the messenger of God" (in Arabic,
la ilaha illa Allah wa-Muhammad rasul Allah). This "witness" is the first of
the five so-called "pillars" of Islam, and is a key component of the call to
prayer and of formal Islamic prayers.
The remaining pillars of Islam are salat (formal, ritual prayers to be
recited at five prescribed times each day), zakat (a mandated "tax"
designated for assistance to the poor), sawm (fasting from all food and
drink between sunrise and sunset during the Islamic month of Ramadan), and
hajj (a prescribed pilgrimage to Mecca, the location of the Ka'ba -- Islam's
most sacred shrine). These pillars are in many ways interrelated in Islamic
practice. As already mentioned, the call to "prayer" includes the "witness" and
those who pray face toward the Ka'ba in Mecca no matter where they may be in the
world.
As with all religions, Muslims vary widely in the level of their personal
piety in following these practices. Having traveled extensively in Jordan (an
officially Islamic country whose rulers trace their ancestry to Muhammad
himself) both during the normal year and the holy month of Ramadan, I have heard
the calls to prayer and seen people stop everything (even their driving along
the highways) and face toward Mecca and carry out the rituals, and I have seen
others going about their routines even at the call to noon prayers on Friday
(the Islamic Sabbath). The point is not to be critical of Muslims personal
devotion, but precisely the opposite. Respect for the actual practice of Islam
(just as for any other religious tradition) calls for not criticizing adherents
of that faith who do not perfectly adhere to its "ideal" or "classical"
practices.
Beyond even the most radical Islamists, there are many other Muslims who are
critical of much in Western cultures. This criticism is in no way related to an
anti-intellectual or even inherently anti-technological reaction within Islam.
Again, for centuries the ummah was at the forefront of the preservation
and advancement philosophy and science, and even such extreme Islamists as those
who conduct terrorist operations use state-of-the art technology. The criticism
of Western culture instead is rooted in the idea that materialism and secularism
are denials of God's sovereignty. Consumerism drives people way from God's will
and toward their own desires and will. The industrial dominance of the developed
world has led to the exploitation and oppression of the developing world.
It is not a rejection, as some extreme critics of Islam have sometimes asserted,
of democratic values of freedom but rather of any view that exalts human freedom
as an absolute instead of the path to choosing to submit oneself to the will of
Allah.
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