Islam and Terrorism (15 page)
Q
UTB
’
S
K
EY
B
ELIEFS
Sayyid Qutb, the founding father of modern jihad, authored more than seven books. However, the book that earned him a death sentence from the Egyptian government at the age of fifty-nine can only be found on the black market. The name of that book is
Signs Along the Road (Ma’alim fi el-Tareek)
. The Egyptian government arrested Qutb and sentenced him to death in 1965 during the presidency of Gamal Abdel Nasser. The Egyptian government thought that by killing Qutb they could stop the mind-polluting philosophy he taught.
The Egyptian government ordered the police to take into custody and burn any copies of his book; however, copies survived. I read this book in Egypt before I left. The book’s contents continue to be distributed through the radical Muslims in Egypt and throughout the Islamic world.
2
Sayyid Qutb and
Signs Along the Road
have become the heartbeat of the radical Islamic movements of today. Some of the better known groups in Egypt that follow his teaching are
al-Jihad
,
al-Takfir wal-Hijra
(Repentance and Holy Flight),
El Najune Min El-Narr
(Rescued from Hell), and many other terrorist groups. Qutb is the philosopher and spiritual leader of today’s Islamic terrorist groups.
Let’s take a closer look at Qutb’s beliefs.
Qutb felt that the world had regressed to the way it was before Muhammad’s teachings—pagan and idolatrous.
(Courtesy of Shorouk International, Cairo, Egypt)
Signs Along the Road
, the book that earned Qutb the death sentence but continues to guide jihad movements today.
Today we are living like heathens—just like the days before Islam in the way people act, the world’s culture and what they believe and think. It is all heathenism. Even in the Islamic world, Muslims’ education, their philosophies, their culture, their thinking and their laws are all far from the true Islam.
3
Qutb believed that Allah is the only ruler over earth and that no human should rule or govern the earth. Therefore, he rejected all man-made systems of government, including democracy, socialism, dictatorships, and communism. He wrote:
The way that life is lived today is an insult to Allah and his authority on earth. It contradicts godly principles. This idolatrous world gives the authority of Allah to humans as if they were God. We have become our own gods. These heathens are not like the ones before Islam, but far worse. Today’s heathens reverence and honor man-made constitutions, laws, principles, systems and humanistic methods. They disregard Allah’s law and his constitution for life.
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Qutb believed Muslims should rebel and resist any human power on earth until they overturn all man-made governments. This is the ultimate calling for a Muslim, and it is not to be compromised, deviated from, or stopped.
We should immediately eliminate this pagan influence and the heathen pressure on our world. We must overturn this current society with its culture and leadership of infidels. This is our first priority: to shake and change the foundations of heathens. We must destroy whatever conflicts with true Islam. We should get out from under the bondage of what keeps us from living in the ways that Allah wants us to live.
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His logic was as follows: good and evil cannot live together, truth and false are not the same, and people cannot live under the authority of both man and God. And to please God, people should destroy the ways of man. He wrote:
Demolish all governments and organizations that are established by man. Eliminate human racism that exalts one over the other. The return of God’s kingdom can only be established by a movement of power and the sword.
Qutb, following the teaching of Ibn Taymiyah, went as far as declaring some Islamic leaders to be apostate infidels. He felt that this declaration gave him support from other Muslims and from Allah.
Qutb not only applied these methods within his country, but he also called the movement to enforce his beliefs all over the world.
P
ROFILE OF A
J
IHAD
G
ROUP
In his book Qutb brought the reader to an important question: How can this revolution be accomplished? He did not specify exactly what should be done to accomplish this. Perhaps he feared the Egyptian government would see this book as a plan for a new Islamic revolution to overturn their government.
Or perhaps he feared the government would be angry with him because his thinking was so similar to Sheikh Mawlana Abul Ala Mawdudi, the leader of the Islamic movement in Pakistan. (This is the author whose words I used earlier to define jihad.)
However, an average reader who can read between the lines would conclude that Qutb envisioned the following type of group to carry out the call of Islam:
• This group would be purified from any and all inclination to lean toward the pagan world. They would eliminate all sources of spiritual beliefs that would compete with Allah and the Quran. This includes destroying books and man-made Islamic commentaries.
• They would accept no authority but Allah for beliefs, worship, systems, laws, and constitution.
• They would experience tremendous resistance from the rest of the world. Existing governments and authorities would cause them financial difficulties. Their families and society would reject them.
• They would claim that the new Islamic world could exist only if their group obtained a great deal of power and force to gain the respect and submission of the pagan world. They would use armed forces to overthrow governments, just as Muhammad did.
• There would be no mercy or compromise in this war.
• This Muslim group may have a difficult start, but as soon as true believers hear the call, the numbers will multiply to hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands, and then throughout the world.
“D
EFEATED
” M
USLIMS
Qutb was very frustrated with Muslims who questioned the call to jihad as a command to be followed by all Muslims of all time. Qutb asserted:
The order in which Allah gave Islam to Muhammad was gradual and progressive to maximize positive results toward Islam. Many Muslims take the early verses of this progression of teaching out of context as if they are Allah’s final and complete instructions. These Muslims strip Islam of its power and build their own theory on these verses.
The results of this type of interpretation of Islam are Muslims who are living a defeated life spiritually and mentally. They are under the pressure of the hopelessness that they cannot spread Islam any longer.
These people are only Muslims by name. They only have the title of Islam but not the power. They only fight to defend their beliefs.
These are the same Muslims who like to carry the title of Islam without the responsibility of overturning the entire earth with all of its politics and earthly governments. These Muslims choose to compromise the message of Islam by not forcing high taxes on people who refuse the message of Islam.
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Qutb expressed deep frustration about the people whom he described as “defeated Muslims, spiritually and mentally.” He complained about them distorting the meaning of jihad. “These Muslims write about jihad in Islam as just a spiritual jihad against evil.” He said that the truth is:
Islam is nothing but Allah declaring his liberation to the human race on earth from slavery. Allah declares his lordship over the entire earth. This means that Allah greatly protests all man-made government and authorities. Absolute rebellion is a must against anything on earth that conflicts with Islam. We should eliminate and destroy with great power anything that stops Allah’s revolution.
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W
ORDS
B
ACKED BY
A
CTION
Following Qutb’s philosophy, the Muslim Brotherhood attempted to kill Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser twice—once in 1954 and once in 1965. These terrorists planted bombs in many different places of gathering. Bombs were planted in the Cairo Bab El-Kalk Court and many police stations. They murdered many Egyptian policemen.
To defend itself, the Egyptian government placed many of the leaders of these groups in prison. Many of them left the prison in their coffins without a trial. President Nasser ordered the guards just to shoot them.
Sayyid Qutb’s execution by the Egyptian government elevated his writings to a level of great authority in the Islamic world. He is respected and known by radical Muslims all over the world. He is held in esteem by Muslims the same way John Calvin or Martin Luther is held in esteem by Christians. There were long-term effects not only in Egypt, but also in the entire world.
THE PHILOSOPHERS OF JIHAD
More Books That Guide Today’s Terrorists
T
HERE IS A
pattern among the philosophers of jihad. An author will write a book outlining his ideas of jihad and how it should be carried out. He will gather a following. Then that author is put to death by the government of his own country. The dead author is a hero, and his books gain more power.
Then the next author comes along and builds on the same ideas, only making them more radical. After three or four of these cycles we have the philosophy of jihad today that resulted in al Qaeda and the attack on the United States on September 11, 2001.
D
R
. S
ALAH
S
EREA
: T
HE
E
GYPTIAN
I
SLAMIC
L
IBERATION
M
OVEMENT
Qutb’s teaching and philosophy captured a large number of Muslims, though many of his followers were imprisoned at the time of his hanging. Following this period of time a man named Dr. Salah Serea led a new radical movement called the Islamic Liberation Movement (
Hezb al-Tarir
). He based his movement on the mind-set of Qutb’s teaching. His goal was to overturn the Egyptian government and declare a new Islamic nation. Let’s look at what Dr. Serea had to say:
• Muslims are nothing but talk. They make commitments but do not follow through. Throughout the last few centuries, Islam changed from a religion of action to a religion of just talk.
• The priority of the Islamic nations should be to carry on the message of Islam and apply it internally and externally in all ways.
• Jihad should be enforced. It is the way of paying a price for what you stand for and keeping the message alive. It should be practiced inside the nation and carried out to the world.
