One year after the Novemner 26-29, 2008 terrorist attacks, the leaders of different faiths met in Mumbai on Tuesday, 17th November 2009 at an anti-terror solidarity meeting co-sponsored by the Simon Wiesenthal Center and the Art of Living. The following is an excerpt from Maulana Wahiduddin Khan's statement:
One year after the Novemner 26-29, 2008 terrorist attacks, the leaders of different faiths met in Mumbai on Tuesday, 17th November 2009 at an anti-terror solidarity meeting co-sponsored by the Simon Wiesenthal Center and the Art of Living. The following is an excerpt from Maulana Wahiduddin Khan's statement:
One year after the Novemner 26-29, 2008 terrorist attacks, the leaders of different faiths met in Mumbai on Tuesday, 17th November 2009 at an anti-terror solidarity meeting co-sponsored by the Simon Wiesenthal Center and the Art of Living. The following is an excerpt from Maulana Wahiduddin Khan's statement:
One year after the Novemner 26-29, 2008 terrorist attacks, the leaders of different faiths met in Mumbai on Tuesday, 17th November 2009 at an anti-terror solidarity meeting co-sponsored by the Simon Wiesenthal Center and the Art of Living. The following is an excerpt from Maulana Wahiduddin Khan's statement:
One year after the Novemner 26-29, 2008 terrorist attacks, the leaders of different faiths met in Mumbai on Tuesday, 17th November 2009 at an anti-terror solidarity meeting co-sponsored by the Simon Wiesenthal Center and the Art of Living. The following is an excerpt from Maulana Wahiduddin Khan's statement:
What happened on November twenty-six, 2008 at some prominent buildings in Bombay was a sheer act of Terrorism. According to the International Law as well as Islamic Law it was a heinous crime. In every aspect it is highly condemnable, nothing can justify it.
What is Terrorism? According to the Islamic definition, terrorism is an act of violence by any agency or organization other than state. Islam allows only an established state to use arms only in a situation when there is a clear attack from outside. According to the Islamic Sharia only one kind of war is permissible, that is, defensive war. According to this definition guerrilla war, proxy war, and undeclared war are unislamic.
Islam gives great respect to all human beings. There is a verse in the Quran:
Whoever killed a human being – except as a punishment for murder or for spreading corruption in the land – shall be regarded as having killed all mankind. (5:32)
It means, according to Islam, killing of an innocent person is so bad that it is like killing all mankind.
According to Islam violence is not only a moral crime, it also does not yield any positive result. According to the law of nature, one cannot achieve anything through the violent method. The prophet of Islam has said: “God grants to non-violence what He does not grant to violence.”
Islam tries to root out all kinds of violence. According to the Islamic teaching, negative reaction is completely prohibited.
One person came to the Prophet and asked: “O Prophet, give me a master advice by which I may be able to manage all the affairs of my life.”
The Prophet replied: “Don’t be angry.”
What is anger? Anger is a negative reaction to a situation. Anger is the source of all kinds of evil. Anger leads to hate, hate leads to enmity, and enmity leads to revenge and violence, and lastly to war.
Terrorism is a world-wide phenomenon, several states are involved in trying to eradicate terrorism, but as far as the result is concerned they have completely failed. We have to reassess the matter and find out an effective solution. We have to re-plan our strategy.
According to the dictum of UNESCO: “Violence begins from the mind.” So, we have to kill violence in human mind. If it is alive in the human mind, no effort can eradicate terrorism except the re-engineering of minds of individuals by taking them away from the culture of violence and bringing them closer to the culture of peace.
Those who are engaged in eradicating violence or terrorism, have taken it as a gun versus gun issue, so they are trying to eliminate violence with counter violence. But this method is not going to work. Present violence or terrorism is based on an ideology so we have to find out a counter ideology, otherwise all kinds of methods based on this theory adopted to eradicate violence will fail.
The ideology behind present day terrorism is that Islam is a political system and that it is the duty of all Muslims to establish the political rule of Islam in the world. This kind of thinking was not prevalent during the time of the Prophet Muhammad or his early companions. It is a later innovation. This was developed over the last few centuries by a handful of people and has become widespread in the Muslim world today. This has led to the present-day violence.
A large number of Muslims, and especially many easily influenced youth, have become obsessed with this ideology and are trying to establish the political rule of Islam, thinking it to be their ticket to paradise. Having failed to achieve this objective of establishing Islamic rule by the peaceful method, they have started resorting to suicide bombing, the idea being that if we cannot eliminate non-Islamic rule, then let us at least de-stabilize it and pave the way for Islamic rule.
I have studied Islam by making reference to its original sources—the Quran and Hadith—and I can say with certainty that the political interpretation of Islam is an innovation and the real Islam, as followed by Prophet Muhammad and his early followers, is based upon peace, compassion and tolerance.
People consider peace as the greatest good in the world. However, peace does not prevail in the world today. In my view, this is because people the world over are acting intolerantly and indulging in acts of violence, saying, “Give us justice and peace will ensue”. But when people, ostensibly seeking justice, stoop to violence, peace can never prevail. Peace is always desirable for its own sake, and every other desirable state comes after peace, not along with it. So, the maxim I follow, when peace is the desired state, is:
“Ignore the problems, and avail of the opportunities.”
Once people become tolerant and obtain peace for its own sake, what that actually does is open up opportunities—it creates favourable conditions, which enable people to strive for their ideals, eventually attaining justice and other constructive ends.
This happens due to the law of nature. When the individual refrains from making a controversial matter into one of prestige, this gives rise to serious thinking. This non-emotional thinking helps him to understand that if he were to walk out of the point of controversy he would find all other paths open to him.
To me, this ideology of peace can counter the ideology of violence and it is based on the original sources of Islam. The Prophet Muhammad provides a very clear historical example of this in his method of negotiating the Hudaybiyya peace treaty.
All religions condemn violence; all religions preach love, compassion, and tolerance. So, is the case of Islam. Islam gives us the formula of enmity management rather than fighting with the enemies. There is a verse in the Quran: “Good deeds and bad deeds are not equal. Do good deeds in return for enemy’s bad deeds. And you will see that your enemy has become your dearest friend.” (41:34)
According to this Quranic teaching, one’s enemy is his potential friend, so, turn this potential into actual.
Everyone wants to live in peace. In terms of result, peace is the summon bonum, it is a fact that violence or terrorism is not going to give a positive result to anyone. Violence can only lead to destruction rather than construction, so we have no option other than to choose peace at any cost. Violence is not an option, neither for an individual nor for a nation.
On the eve of the first anniversary of the 26/11, I join my voice with others against religion-based terrorism and express my solidarity with all victims, may they be Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, Christians, or Jews. May God give peace to all.
Maulana Wahiduddin Khan