Chapter Three

The Problem of Asking for Permission to Fight

Prologue

In Islam, official authority has two levels:

·        public authority, and

·        Special authority.

Public authority is assumed by the highest person of authority in the nation, whether he is a caliph, king, head of state, prince, sultan, etc.

Special authority is assumed by

·        officials who are authorized by the highest person of authority in the nation,

·        the parents in every family, and

·        One’s employer.

          Listening and obeying in a friendly manner is the normal legal relationship between individual Muslims, those who enjoy special authority, and the person with the highest public authority.  It is an obligation of the subordinate towards his superior.

Believers obey God and obey the Messenger and those with authority among you.  If you are in dispute over anything, refer it to God and the Messenger, if you believe in God and the Last Day. This is the best and the most suitable for final determination (Al-Nisaa IV: 59).

          Inferior authority can only be invalidated by a superior one, depending on specialization and legal jurisdiction, as defined by Islamic Law and in accordance with the Qur'an and sunna.

          Public authority that is entitled to be listened to and obeyed:

          A rational, just ruler, who has received a pledge of submission and a commission from the nation in accordance with relevant legal conditions.

·        A commissioned, strict and just ruler, even if he is dissipated.

·        An imposed but just ruler, whose authority is undisputed and under whose rule the security of the country and the people is guaranteed.

·        A tyrannical, unjust ruler, when the challenge of his authority will bring worse suffering to the country and the people.

          Authority that should be challenged and disobeyed:

·        Authority that, beyond any doubt, practices an explicit act of disbelief and violates the sacredness and divinity of God, the Most Sublime, and His Law.

·        The disbelief of one parent or both, with emphasis on keeping them good company and dealing with them in a pleasant manner.

·        A ruler that has invaded and occupied the homeland, crushed the will and identity of the people, and pillaged their wealth.

·        A ruler that has occupied any Islamic land, subdued its people, and undermined their sovereignty and identity.

          The ruling on fighting:

·        It is an exceptional obligation of jihad.  Fighting becomes obligatory as a result of aggression against and oppression of Muslims, violation of the sacredness of their homeland and sovereignty, or looting their property and wealth.

·        The obligation of fighting has the two levels of

1.     community obligation, and

2.     Individual obligation.

·        The normal thing in the case of fighting is that it is a community obligation, and when performed by some Muslims, it is waived for the others, like when a leader recruits some Muslims to guard fortified border towns and monitor the movements of aggressors, or for training and preparedness for any possible surprise attack against Muslims and their country.

·        It becomes an individual obligation when the leader mobilizes the nation to fight for a cause that serves the interests of the nation, defend the land, repulse any aggression against it, or fight an assailant attacking it.  It is an individual duty for

1.     those recruited by the leader to go out and fight,

2.     the inhabitants of the town or country being attacked, and

3.     The Muslims living the closest to a Muslim country attacked by an enemy.

Imam Ibn Taimiyah, may God have mercy upon him, says, “If an enemy gets into Islamic land, it is certain that pushing it back should be undertaken by the closest people, then the next closest, etc., because all lands of Muslims amount to one country.”[1]

Ibn Al-Qassas, may God have mercy upon him, says, “In the belief of all Muslims, it is clear that if the inhabitants of border towns fear the enemy and have no resistance force, and they are afraid for their lands, lives, and offspring, it is an obligation for the whole nation to send them those who can stop enemy aggression against Muslims.  This is a point on which there is no disagreement within the nation.”[2]

          The ruling on asking for permission to meet the obligation of fighting

In Al-Mughni, Ibn Qudamah, may God have mercy upon him, says:

When an enemy approaches, jihad becomes an individual duty, and no one has the right to stay behind.  When the news is confirmed, they can only go out by the ruler’s permission, because war is part of his responsibility.  He knows better the size of enemy forces, whether large or small; the hiding places of the enemy; and their intrigue.  Therefore, he must be consulted because that allows Muslims to be better prepared, unless taking his permission is impossible because the enemy’s attack is a surprise, the interests of Muslims are served by fighting enemy forces, and it is certain that corruption will occur by failing to meet the enemy.”[3]

In general, opinions tend, on this question, to make asking for the ruler’s permission, as well as the permission of every person with authority, an obligation, which follows an orderly hierarchal order.  The obligation to a person with superior authority cancels the obligation to one with a lesser authority.  To illustrate this point, I give the example of a volunteer for fighting.  This volunteer should first ask for the permission of his parents, then his immediate superior, then the highest leader of the nation.  If permission is given to him in that order, he may go out and fight.  Otherwise, he has to follow the order of the one of these who objects to his fighting.  When, however, there is a conflict, one giving him permission and the other declines to do so, what is the ruling?  This needs some elaboration:

·        In the case of volunteering to go out and fight, the normal thing is to abide by the permission or prevention of the parents, Ibn Omar, may God be pleased with him and his father, says, “A man approached the Prophet, blessings and peace be upon him, and asked permission to participate in jihad.  The Prophet said, ‘Are your parents alive?’  The man said, “Yes.”  The Prophet said, ‘Let your jihad, then, be in serving them,’”[4]  In the book on Islamic Law in Sayyed Sabiq’s Fiqh Al-Sunna (Sunna jurisprudence), there is the statement: “No one should go out for Jihad unless he is free from family and children responsibility and from serving his parents, for that takes priority over Jihad.  It is even better than Jihad.”

·        If the conflict is between the parents and the highest leader of the nation, in both cases, voluntary fighting and individually obligatory fighting, the ruler’s opinion should be followed.  Parent authority becomes invalid when the leader gives orders to fight, for that order makes fighting an individual obligation, as in the case of general mobilization of the nation or the case of assigning special tasks to a particular person or group of persons, who have special competence or skills that make it difficult for others to carry out the task.  God says, “Believers, obey God and obey the Messenger and those with authority among you” (Al-Nisaa IV: 59).

When fighting is an individual obligation, the duty to get permission from parents and other people of authority is waived by the duty to obey the command of the highest leader of the nation.  Because the question of fighting and its ruling are to be decided by him, in order to preserve the religion and sovereignty of the nation, and its interests, security, and stability.

It is regrettable that the nation to day suffers from a devastating chaos due to the confusion of the concepts, controls, and mechanisms of the fighting doctrine.  Of course, the ultimate source of all such confusion of the concepts of the fighting doctrine is the claim that legal leadership of the nation is absent in its modern history, or the claim that the Islamic state does not exist in the lives of Muslims and that the existing governments in Islamic countries today have no legitimacy.  Muslims today, as the promoters of this claim say, have no leader.  Unfortunately, there are some Muslim scholars and students who examine this sedition among Muslims and rule that, to start with, the Islamic state does not exist today.  They argue that govern­ments that describe themselves as Islamic and claim to belong to the Islamic nation are only artificial entities aligned to, and created by, the enemies of God and the nation, who are the decision makers of all the affairs and policies of these governments.  Those scholars also claim that the make-believe heads of these governments, who assume Islamic titles, have nothing to do with governing and have no power or control at all over what is decided and applied under their names while they bow and submit.

On the basis of this sedition, and its subversive concepts and serious deviations, the phenomenon of the infidelity charge among members of the nation, which goes side by side with the phenomenon of nonentity leaders, who claim a right to lead the nation and run its affairs.  They demand allegiance and devotion to their approach and their leadership.  They contact adolescents and young men and women to entice and allure them into joining the secret, suspicious groups formed by those leaders.  These claimed, suspicious leaderships have been infiltrated by ferocious agents of the international conspiracy, who found in these leaders their long-sought tool, which they can utilize to start an uncontrollable sedition in the nation; a wide opening that allows them to tamper with the security of Muslim communities; and a spacious and fertile playground, where they can plant mines to blow the nation up from the inside, knock down its elements of stability, abort its attempts to resume the progress of its civilization, and revive the factors that deprive it of its will and leave it bewildered, so that it will be incapable of coping with the regional and international challenges that it faces.

The international conspiracy column has succeeded in achieving its aims, by using these reckless groups.  The crimes of influential world powers against the Islamic nation, as well as their political follies, uninhibited oppression, and arrogant tyranny in dealing with Islam and Muslim affairs, are exploited to arouse the sentiments of adolescents, and perhaps some adults, in order to attract, recruit, and encourage them to persist in their deviation.  Those agents have even made the errant groups feel important by giving them media promotion, facilitated their contacts with others and the means to announce themselves and their objectives, provided them with protection and cover-up, made available to them all what they need to go on, and supplied them with arms and all subversion and aggression tools, as well as the means to deliver these to their hiding places.  I suspect that the subtle and skillful manipulation that the international conspiracy column Has carried out, using these errant, stupid groups and their naïve conscripts as a camouflage to carry out the crime of crashing into the World Trade Center in New York on September 11, 2000.  The purpose of that crime was to create a deep and extensive wound in the psyche and feelings of American individuals in particular and Western people in general, by attributing the crime to Muslim Arab, or rather Saudi, men.  the purpose was to create a state of overwhelming anger, eternal hatred, deep-rooted animosity, and spiteful division between Muslims and the West.

It is interesting that although this great event and terrible catastrophe hit at the very heart of the political, military, and security pride of the United States, shook its status and power, and insulted its prestige and its cultural vanity among nations – no explanation, through legal or judiciary channels, has so far been offered concerning the truth of what happened on that day.  The file has been closed, and no step was taken beyond the revelation of clues consisting of a passport, audio recordings, and statements and televised tapes made by individuals and leaders of the alleged Qaeda organization,” in order to attribute this atrocious crime to Muslims and distort the image of Islam and its immortal divine message.  Of course those clues resulted from that great deception to which those fools responded and from their reckless and idiotic boastfulness that they have carried out an extraordinary victory over America and the West.  They called the event the “Manhattan Raid (Ghazwah),” and they claimed that they have avenged the Islamic nation against those who have been unjust and oppressive, and who greatly wronged it.

It is regrettable that American leaders have accepted this image that was given to the event as a reality, although they have discovered the truth about it and about those who stood behind it and who actually carried it out.  Those leaders were tempted by the political, military, economic, and cultural gains that could be reaped at the world level, through utilizing this false account of the event, as they were convinced or as they imagined.

There is no doubt that the event of September 11 has been utilized in a very serious manner by the people behind it, who skillfully managed the stages of its execution.  It has not been utilized against Arabs and Muslims alone, but also against the Americans themselves, and probably against Jews, who are the short-term beneficiaries of the event.  Here are the authors of this dangerous project developing and amplifying the complications and consequences of the notorious Manhattan play.  The performance of the play is still going on in various forms and at various levels to serve the political and economic ambitions and purposes of those authors through concocting a new, fictitious world war, which they have declared, on “terrorism.”  They have mobilized world powers and the world public opinion to support that war, and they entangled world communities in its intricate mazes.  Let world Zionism, then, be happy and the crafty receive their awards.

In any case, what I am interested in this particular chapter is a discussion of the serious aspect of this idiotic, reckless sedition.  That aspect is the process of enticement of youngsters under the pretext of answering the call for jihad in the service of God’s cause, which has become an individual obligation according to the claim of self-appointed, errant leaders, who ask all Muslims, particularly juveniles and young people, to hasten and fight under their leadership, without asking for the permission of their parents and any person of authority.  What is more serious is convincing these youngsters that it is legitimate to fight their own families, relatives, clan members, and people who share the same religion, and even to consider shedding the blood of their fellow citizens and destroying the property, wealth, and elements of the very existence of their countries as legitimate actions and as offerings to God and pure jihad that serves His cause!

The first sedition, then, is waiving the duty to get parent permission for the sake of joining jihad under the banner of fictitious leaders, under the pretext that those leaders have declared that fighting has become an individual obligation for Muslims and that the leaders, authorities, governments, and any kind of authority have no legitimate standing, because they are, as the claim goes, illegitimate leaderships and entities, which, under Islamic Law, must not be supported or obeyed.

In response to this sedition, I say:

·       If Islamic leaderships and governments in charge of Muslim affairs in their various countries have lost their legitimacy, which is then the legitimate leadership?

·       Does the Law and religion allow a person to appoint himself as a substitute for a leadership that he claims to be illegitimate?

·       What is the legal standing of a person who declares his self-appointment as a legitimate leader of the nation without its knowledge, permission, or pledge of allegiance?

·       Does the Law and religion allow pledging allegiance to a non-entity in a land without an official status and for purposes that are not officially recognized?

·       Does the Law and religion allow a Muslim to fight under the banner of a fictitious, unknown leadership, whose true identity he knows nothing about other than what it claims about itself?

·       Does the Law and religion allow the whole nation to be led to the unknown under a claimed, unknown leadership?

·       Can parent authority, which is stipulated by Law and religion, be invalidated by a fictitious, claimed leadership that has no religious or legal justification of its existence, and enjoys no other thing than its rebellion against its religion and the followers of that religion, disobeying God, His Messenger, and the consensus of Muslims?

Indeed, parent authority and claim for obedience can only be invalidated, according to the Law and religion, by the highest leader of the nation, who is in charge of its affairs and responsible for its security and stability.

The second sedition concerns the absence of the nation’s leadership and ruler, and of the Islamic state, and also concerns the claim that the nation lives without any system, government, or state.  It is as if it is a nation on the loose, waiting for any passer-by to lead and guide it.  All this will be responded to in detail in the following chapter, “The Problem of the Claim that the Islamic State is Absent.”  I conclude here with a statement that I address to young Muslims, who are zealous for, faithful to, and jealous of their religion and the interests, prestige, and power of their nation.  I urge you, young people, to be most sincere in obeying God, His Messenger, and the people of authority over the nation.  Do not renounce your allegiance and cause Muslims to divide, disagree, and weaken.  To be most zealous, young people, is to be on the side of the nation’s majority, to support its unity, back and strengthen it, and enhance its prestige and might before its enemies and in the eyes of those who are waiting to attack it and hoping to humiliate it, loot its resources, lower the banner that says “There is no deity but God and Muhammad is the Messenger of God,” and suspend the nation’s equitable Law and immortal divine system.

Young people who are jealous of your religion, loyal to your Lord, the glory of His law, and the prestige of His nation, beware, again and again, of falling into the trap of those who have gone astray and lead others astray.  Beware, again and again, of replacing what is good and right and is a blessing with what is an evil, sedition, and venom.

·        Follow God’s immortal command and recommendation:

Hold fast, all of you, to the bond with God and do not be disunited (Aal ‘Imran III: 103).

·        Follow the wise instructions of the Glorious Qur'an:

If something related to security or fear comes to their knowledge, they make it known to all and sundry; whereas, if they would only refer it to the Messenger and to those from among them entrusted with authority, those of them who are engaged in obtaining intelligence would know it. Were it not for God’s bounty to you and His grace, all but a few of you would have followed the Devil (Al-Nisaa IV: 83).

·        Follow the instructions of the Messenger who brought guidance and mercy:

If someone approaches you who wants to divide you while you are united, cut his head off.

Each of you is positioned at one of Islam’s front stations.  Oh God, if Islam were to be attacked from his side.

Prof. Dr. Hamid bin Ahmad Al-Rifaie

President, International Islamic Forum For Dialogue

    Assistant Secretary General, Muslim World League

From His Book (Partners ... not Guardians)  Part Four / Chapter Three

All Rights Reserved For The Author Prof. Dr. Hamid Al-Rifaie