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Religious Tradition and Terror
by Dan Cere, Newman Institute of Catholic Studies, McGill University (Montreal, Canada)

The strong clear insistence on a fundamental chasm between Islam and the terrorism has been a remarkable feature of American political discourse since the horrific events of September 11th. This message is a mark of political maturity. First, this unequivocal affirmation of Islam strives to throw a mantle of protection over American Muslims. From day one American political leadership cast a very jaundiced eye at any discriminatory action against Muslims. Secondly, it lays the ideological groundwork for the kind of close diplomatic cooperation with Muslim states that will be critical to effective international action against terrorism.

This view continues to be echoed in diverse public contexts. In the aftermath of the catastrophe, there have been numerous interfaith prayer services. These events have followed a familiar pattern: general denunciations of terrorism, and readings and prayers for the victims, for justice, and for peace. The services are typically marked by strong affirmations of the deep commitment of Islam to peace and justice, together with firm and oft-repeated denials of any linkage between Islam and terrorist extremists.

As director of the Catholic Newman Center at McGill University, I was involved with such an interfaith service on the day of prayer, Friday September 14th. After it was over, I was still left with a nagging sense that, despite the good will and the good words, something important was left unsaid. Religious traditions such as Christianity, Judaism and Islam, proclaim the saving grace of confession. However, they often have some difficulty with candid self-examination and confession. When the dust settles, some hard questions will need to be addressed.

Despite the prudent caution of current political and religious rhetoric, in the final analysis the vicious terrorists acts of September 11th cannot be dismissed as the product of some form of "pure terrorism" devoid of any religious content. They were, at least in part, the product of beliefs which have, in recent years, been disseminated or tolerated within certain sectors of the Middle Eastern society and beyond. A cluster of pernicious perspectives has emerged in the second half of the 20th century that has allowed particular forms of terrorism to gain footholds within various segments of the Muslim community. It is arguable that these beliefs constitute reprehensible "innovations" (the Islamic concept of bid'a), that have no basis in Islam. However, they do carry some persuasive force for far too many Muslims. There are at least two basic developments that are troubling.

Terrorism and Jihad

First, there has been a tendency to justify terrorist activity as compatible with Islamic jihad. Many fatwas (formal religious rulings by religious scholars) by religious authorities in recent years have adopted a "pro-jihad" interpretation of acts of aggression such as "suicide bombing". Such rulings are incompatible with Islamic teaching on jihad as well as Christian teaching on "just war."

One would expect that fatwas vigorously denouncing terrorism could have littered the Islamic community. But they haven't. The West is familiar with Khomeini's notorious fatwa targeting the novelist Salmon Rushdie, and with bin Ladin's fatwa against the United States. But where are the fatwas from prominent Islamic scholars aimed directly at terrorist organizations and their teachings?

In fact, the history of recent fatwas pointed in a different direction. The Shariah Court of the United Kingdom took great exception to the British Terrorism Act 2000. A fatwa was issued by Sheikh Omar Bakri Muhammad, Judge of the Shari'ah Court of the UK, severely criticizing the Terrorism Act. It explained to British Muslims that they need to keep this legislation at arms length. The fatwa offered a number of key claims:

• that God, not man, must be obeyed. This suggests that Muslim faith in God may put them at odds with British law.
• that so-called terrorists may well be Mujahiddeen (freedom fighters).
• that Muslims cannot allow legislation like the Terrorism Act to run interference with true "Muslim brotherhood"; Muslims are not permitted to "boycott" their fellow freedom fighters. Support for Muslim organizations may be a religious obligation even if those organization are tainted with the brush of terrorism by secular authorities.

In an interview in April 2000 the grand mufti of Saudi Arabia, Shaykh Abd al-Aziz bin Abdallah Aal al-Shaykh, did try to suggest that the teaching of Islam forbids suicide terrorist attacks. His remarks came as a surprise, since previous Saudi religious authorities such as Shaykh Bin Baz and Shaykh Muhammad Bin 'Uthaimin had given their tacit blessing to suicide missions.

Even though Shaykh Abd al-Aziz's critical remarks about suicide missions were not issued as a formal fatwa; nevertheless, they sparked a storm of protest amongst Muslim religious authorities. Shaykh Sayyid Wafa, the secretary-general of the Islamic research center of al-Azhar in Egypt, strongly endorsed the religious and moral legitimacy of suicide missions. Shaykh al-Azhar Muhammad Sayyid Tantawi, appointed by the government as the highest Islamic authority in Egypt, gave his firm support to suicide operations and even deemed them to be something of an Islamic duty.

Islamic terrorist organizations such as Al-Qa'ida clearly do stir religion into their confection of fervor, cynicism, and murder. Given this fact, it is curious, and more than a little distressing, that the determined and obviously partly successful efforts of these people to wed Islam to terrorism have not been countered by equally determined efforts by leading Muslims clerics to break up such a marriage.

In short, there is a problem here. Fatwas against the United States and fatwas supporting suicide missions have been endorsed by a number of Muslim organizations and religious leaders. There has been little in the way of vigorous denunciation. Immediately after September 11th one Islamic academic living and working in the West did take an important stand. Ziauddin Sardar warned that, "The terrorists are among us, the Muslim communities of the world. They are part of our body politic. And it is our duty to stand up against them."

Sardar went on to issue a fatwa: "So, let me take the first step. To Muslims everywhere I issue this fatwa: any Muslim involved in the planning, financing, training, recruiting, support or harbouring of those who commit acts of indiscriminate violence against persons or the apparatus or infrastructure of states is guilty of terror and no part of the Ummah. It is the duty of every Muslim to spare no effort in hunting down, apprehending and bringing such criminals to justice."

Sardar's action is decisive and right. However, his introductory comments about taking "the first step" suggest that, to date, Muslim religious authorities have been slow to reject terrorism. In fact, for a generation, some Islamic religious authorities have been courting the possibility that various forms of terrorist activity could be safely harbored within jihad teaching. It is time for a serious reconsideration of this innovation.

The Demonization of the West

Second, in some sectors of Muslim society there has been a demonization of the West. The recent attack on the United States is predicated on an ideology that "the modern calamities that are leading to the deformation and decline of humanity" are the product of the West. (see Ali Shariati, The Idea of Western Decadence; also Sayyid Abul A'la Maududi, Self-Destructiveness of Western Civilization). In its more extreme expression, the United States is depicted as the "great Satan". Such vicious denunciations of the West and the United States clearly violate the principles of mutual justice and respect that should inform both Islamic and Christian cultures.

In this view the "West" is regularly portrayed as the source of all major ills and problems for Islamic countries (see Jalal Al-I Ahman, "Westoxification" in Plagued by the West). The very serious and "problematic" dimensions of modernity (commericialism, materialism, de-stablization of family life, erosion of communitarian and traditional values, the anti-religious forms of secularism) are placed squarely at the feet of the West. To treat these troubling features of modernity and postmodernity as merely "Western" misrepresents the global nature of modernization. Such views can also work to deflect or absolve Muslim political, intellectual, and religious leaders from their own responsibility to engage in a serious collaborative effort to confront and grapple with these problems.

The "West" is wrongfully portrayed as a fairly monolithic reality. Within Western countries there has been an important and ongoing debate--a very serious culture war "jihad"--over the problems and developments that many Muslim fundamentalists condemn and dismiss as inherently Western. One-dimensional views of the West profoundly misread and confuse the nature of the struggles which all cultures and faiths face in postmodern societies. Those concerned with the vital contribution of our moral and religious traditions to these debates must vigorously denounce such narrow and distorted presentations as perverse and dangerous

America is full of remarkable risks and possibilities for religious faith. It has proved to be a unique site for the creative interaction between religious traditions and modernity. Destructive voices, whether in the name of a carping illiberal secularism or a angry fundamentalism, strive to deny religious traditions any role in the ongoing debates about postmodern culture and society. Constructive voices have brought the traditions of Catholicism, Protestantism, and Judaism into a critical dialogue which has been transformative both for faith and culture.

For terrorist movements such as Al Qa'ida, September 11th symbolized the inescapable destructive clash between Islamic faith and American secularism. However, given the strange twists and turns of American history, this tragic event may trigger a different outcome. It may prove to be a spur to American Muslims to move forward in bold and new ways. American Muslims can be courageous pioneers as they take Islam in this passage through the frontiers of the West. Just as an authentic Catholicism found its voice in modernity in part through the medium of American Catholics such as John Courtney Murray, so too the time has come for American Muslims take courage and to find their own voice.

Conclusion

Modernity is a complex human reality with both positive and negative features. This underscores the vital significance of an ongoing debate on the impact of modernity and postmodernity upon our religious, moral, and cultural traditions.  We need to honor the valiant efforts of diverse faith communities across the world to sustain human, religious, moral, and familial traditions in the face of some of the corrosive features of modernity and postmodernity.

These efforts are utterly violated and undermined by the violent, destructive, polarized views of reality that contributed to the events of September 11th.  Members of faith and moral traditions who are deeply committed to struggle against the problematic aspects of modernity must mount a fierce and fearless moral denunciation of the beliefs as well as the acts which directly contributed to the catastrophe of September 11th. These terrorist acts, and the views that support them, are blatant and horrific examples of some of the most radical perversities and deep diseases that can exist within modernity. 

It does not serve us to be too loud in proclaiming the purity of our religious or secular traditions. Contemporary Christians, Jews, and Muslims are not squeaky clean. Religious and secular traditions are in need of a hard-nosed American realism in these troubling times. Uncritical ideologues can violate the deepest truths of their faiths in small and great ways. In Islam it is said that the truly honorable struggle is the internal jihad, the struggle against evil within, not the external jihad, the struggle with enemies. September 11th signals once again the call to steel ourselves against viciously simplistic solutions and to deepen the complex internal jihad between religion, tradition, and modernity that has always been the hallmark of American culture.

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