Abstract
The Qāʿida muḫtaṣara fī qitāl al-kuffār: Hal sababuhu l-muqātala aw l-kufr? (QM), one of the less known epitomes of Ibn Taymiyya’s treatises, is notably important as a summarized gloss of his take on unbelief (kufr) as the mere ratio legis to fight or kill non-Muslims. Though its authenticity can be claimed, the disagreements are less about its attribution to Ibn Taymiyya and more about its content that sparked controversy about a crucial issue at the core of the jihad discourse. Examples of the challenging discrepancies of contested texts on the issue of offensive/initiatory jihad (ǧihād al-ṭalab/al-ibtidāʾ), spread over Ibn Taymiyya’s large corpus, may offer contradictive perspectives. The analysis and discussion of this treatise, compared to his extant legacy, shows how Ibn Taymiyya does not categorically refute initiating jihad against non-Muslims. He rather stresses a conceptualization of defensive jihad (ǧihād al-dafʿ) as the basic legitimate rule, even when initiating (ibtidāʾ) a fight is necessary as a preventive anticipatory measure.
Introduction
The name of Ibn Taymiyya (d. 1328), a polymath medieval scholar with a sheer scale of genuine authorship that covers variant disciplines and subjects, can hardly be missed in any discussion on jihad. His legacy and work on the subject are anchored in modern discussions, public debates, preaching, and publications including high level academic works, within and outside the Muslim world. His name frequently jumps into any discussion on jihadism, salafism, Wahhabism, fundamentalism, radicalism, Muslim political thought, militant activism, violence, and terrorism in general. His prolific writings still contain much of interest for further study, and they are not always easily understood and are often subject to much controversy. However, it is important to note that Ibn Taymiyya is more often cited than understood, constantly evoked and not sufficiently studied.1 In light of different fragments of his works, one may wonder whether he is a conspicuous foe of non-Muslims, especially Christians and Jews, or an uncompromising advocate for their rights, protection and freedoms in a Muslim context.
In this paper, I investigate a less known, yet very significant, treatise of Ibn Taymiyya on fighting the unbelievers titled Qāʿida muḫtaṣara fī qitāl al-kuffār: Hal sababuhu l-muqātala aw l-kufr? (A Summarized Principle Regarding Combating the Unbelievers: Is It Due to Their Hostility [fighting against Muslims] or Unbelief?).2 According to al-Qaraḍāwī (d. 2022), this treatise was deliberately neglected by some Saudi scholars and publishers of the collections of his fatwas, as it did not fit into their ideology on the obligation of fighting the whole [non-Muslim] world.3 This treatise offers significant material on his theory of jihad and seems to problematize the controversial notion of ǧihād al-ṭalab (offensive jihad).4 I will primarily focus on the controversy surrounding the originality of the Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, as a representative work of Ibn Taymiyya’s views on jihad, and whether this controversy reflects a scholarly debate or a crisis regarding the integrity of existing editions of his corpus. To do this, I firstly devote some attention to show how modern published editions of his corpus present salient examples of misrepresentation and misreading. This discussion would be of significant help to answer the question of why this treatise was left out of the published editions of the Taymiyyan corpus. I subsequently tackle his generic view of combatting enemies of the Muslim state, and the impact of his time on his theorization of jihad for the sake of Islam and its realm of power. I also discuss the main points in this treatise and show whether it endorses or contradicts his views in other works of his published corpus, especially on the issue of defensive and offensive jihad. My aim in this paper is to renegotiate the argument that a Taymiyyan theory of jihad justifiably exhorts fighting and/or killing unbelievers on account of their unbelief and promotes inter-faith intolerance. Both his agreement and dissociation with the general medieval jihad theory, and established juristic traditions,5 can contribute to our understanding of his thought and the posthumous reception and amalgamation of his views up to our modern times.
A Misquoted or Misrepresented Ibn Taymiyya?
Ibn Taymiyya is by far the most quoted medieval scholar in modern literature and discussions on jihad. In many cases his views on issues related to jihad are extensively employed by militant groups to theologically justify their modus operandi with violent attacks against “unbelievers”.6 He is a frequently quoted authority since ʿAbd Al-Salām Faraǧ’s (d. 1982) al-Farīḍa al-ġāʾiba (the Absent Duty), a creed of the assassins of the Egyptian president Sadat (d. 1981),7 through al-Qaeda according to the official 9/11 Commission Report,8 up to the recently published literature of ISIS in the web-issues of Dabiq. This made him the scapegoat blamed to be the spiritual father of modern violent Muslim groups. In many Muslim official and intelligentsia circles, his views are held to be responsible for mobilizing extremist-terrorist groups and promoting separatist ideas against modern nation-states.
Reading his works makes it no easier task to establish a conclusive approach which helps the critics of his alleged intolerant doctrines or even the apologists of a misquoted Ibn Taymiyya. The elusiveness of this endeavor lies partly in the fragmentation of his views, spread over a myriad of fatwas and treatises, and partly in the mixed nature of his style alternating between verbosity in some places and conciseness in others.9 The Qāʿida muḫtaṣara (QM), one of the lesser known epitomes of his treatises, is notably important as a summarized gloss of his take on unbelief (kufr) as the mere ratio legis to fight non-Muslims. Though this work may still need further testimonies to categorically establish its attribution to Ibn Taymiyya, and whether he wrote a larger treatise on the issue whereof this epitome serves as a succinct depiction,10 its authenticity as a summary of his views on fighting non-Muslims can be plausibly claimed.11 Nevertheless, another controversy is less about its attribution to Ibn Taymiyya and more about its content.
The work epitomizes the views of Ibn Taymiyya by giving scriptural and rational proofs for the legal legitimacy of two main claims. First, how Islamic rulings and ethics of war prohibit attacking, fighting or killing non-Muslims for the mere reason of disbelief, as long as they do not threaten Muslims or Muslim territories. Second, that the ǧizya (poll tax) ruling should be extended to apply for all non-Muslim groups, not only Christians and Jews.12 However, the first claim creates a controversy about a crucial issue at the core of the jihad discourse. In QM, Ibn Taymiyya seems to legitimize only defensive jihad (ǧihād al-dafʿ) and problematize the legitimacy of offensive jihad (ǧihād al-ṭalab). The Saudi editor of his pivotal voluminous collection of Mağmūʿ al-fatāwā, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Ibn Qāsim, states that he did not include this treatise in his edition as it is a “corrupted transmission to abandon initiating fight against the disbelievers”.13 The list of prominent Saudi scholars who deny the attribution of QM to Ibn Taymiyya includes sheikh Sulaymān bin Saḥmān (d. 1931) and the former grand muftis Muhammad Ibn Ibrāhīm Āl Šeiḫ (d. 1969) and ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz bin Bāz (d. 1999). Moreover, sheikh Sulaymān bin Ḥamdān (d. 1977) wrote a counter treatise titled “Dalālat al-nuṣūṣ wa-l-iğmāʿ ʿalā farḍ al-qitāl li-l-kufr wa-l-difāʿ” –(the textual evidences and consensus that the obligation of fighting is on account of both disbelief and defence)– where he affirms that “this treatise is fabricated and its attribution to him cannot be established in any way.”14 The Saudi scholar, Sulaymān al-Ḫarāšī, seems to be less interested in the authenticity of QM, but rather in what he calls a mistaken claim of the ‘modernists’ that this work can be seen as an evidence of Ibn Taymiyya’s refutation of ǧihād al-ṭalab. According to al-Ḫarāšī, this is the main reason for some scholars to disqualify the originality of the work as belonging to Ibn Taymiyya.15
These painstaking argumentations ought to pose fundamental questions on the credibility and integrity of the printed editions of the original manuscripts of the Taymiyyan corpus. One may extend these questions to other modern editions of classical Islamic works, which makes pursuing the study of textual manuscript tradition an urgent scholarly task.16 In the case of Ibn Taymiyya’s legacy, another evidence might diminish the credibility of exclusive reliance on crucial jihad-related excerpts of the published Mağmūʿ – especially in the ubiquitous edition of Ibn Qāsim, which constituted the canonized (muʿtamada) source for following printed editions such as that of al-Ğazzār & al-Bāz – and the editions of al-Fatāwā al-kubrā. I find it indispensable to detail this example to show its impact on modern militant ideology, and, eventually, to bring new evidence to the current discussions on how certain variations in the published editions are the result of an ex industria manipulation of the text.
In his famous Mardin fatwa, Ibn Taymiyya was asked about the legal status of Mardin (a town in today’s southern Turkey), then already under Mongol control since the end of the thirteenth century. The question was whether it should be considered a balad ḥarb (abode of war) – which may render hiğra (migration) obligatory for its Muslim residents – or balad silm (abode of peace/Islam), and how the Muslims abiding there should act and be treated. His brief response ends with a comprehensive text on the legal status of the city:
Whether its status is dār ḥarb or dār silm, it is combined [murakkaba], entailing both terms. It does not have neither the status of dār al-silm, where the rulings of Islam are applicable, for its soldiers being Muslims, nor that of dār ḥarb, whose people are unbelievers. It is rather a third category; where the Muslim should be treated [yuʿāmal] according to what he merits, and the dissenter from the law of Islam should be fought [yuqātal] according to what he merits
Citation: Studia Islamica 120, 2 (2025) ; 10.1163/19585705-12341513
The importance of the fatwa on Mardin lies in the central place it is claimed to occupy in the theorization of militant groups, together with Ibn Taymiyya’s three famous anti-Mongols fatwas and other authoritative legal texts, to justify violent combat against non-Muslims and Muslim authorities who are seen, in analogy with the Mongols and their partisans, to dissent from the divine law.18 For example, ʿAbd Al-Salām Farağ wrote his al-Farīḍa al-ġāʾiba (the Absent Duty) as an explication and adaptation of the Mardin fatwa, utilizing other jihad fatwas, to the modern context of a Muslim state whose rulers should be ‘fought’ as apostates and dissenters from Islamic sharia. Under the titles ‘the abode where we live’ (al-dār allatī naʿīš fīhā), and ‘a collection of fatwas of Ibn Taymiyya that are useful to this time’, he employs different legal opinions and refers to this fatwa to pave the way to the conclusion that the ruling authorities, in analogy with the Mongols, are apostates who should be combatted.19 The fatwa was translated into English (and earlier into French, 2004)20 by the Belgian scholar Yahya Michot (including the translation of the Arabic text of the Saudi printed editions of Ibn Taymiyya’s fatwas) as: “Rather, [Mardin] constitutes a third type [of domain], in which the Muslim shall be treated as he merits, and in which the one who departs from the Way/Law of Islam shall be combated as he merits.”21 Michot dedicated a long discussion in one of his publications to the internationally celebrated “New Mardin fatwa” conference that was held in Mardin-Turkey in 2010, convened by the Mauritanian scholar sheikh A. Bin Bayyah. The latter revealed a misreading error in the fatwa’s manuscript that resulted in the corrupt text quoted above; “should be fought [yuqātal]”, and finds a link between these editions and western translations of the Mardin fatwa and Islamist terrorism in Europe.22
A comparison with the only original manuscript in al-Ẓāhiriyya library in Damascus shows a mis-transcription and error in the transmission of the original text. The passive verb yuʿāmal (
MS. Damascus, Zahiriyya, 2757, f. 192r
Citation: Studia Islamica 120, 2 (2025) ; 10.1163/19585705-12341513
MS. Damascus, Zahiriyya, 2757, f. 192rNote: Excerpt of the original manuscript, with the discussed text, apud Michot, “Ibn Taymiyya’s “New Mardin Fatwa”, p. 146.
This misread corrupt text has been standardized and repeatedly replicated in the published editions of the Taymiyyan corpus. However, the correct text of the fatwa is to be found in a quotation by Ibn Taymiyya’s pupil Ibn Mufliḥ al-Maqdisī (d. 1362) in his al-Ãdāb al-šarʿiyya.24 Though Ibn Qāsim cites this work as one of the sources for his published supplementary appendix (Mustadrak) of the Mağmūʿ, affirms the veracity and scrupulousness of Ibn Mufliḥ in the eyes of Ibn Taymiyya and his prominent disciple Ibn al-Qayyim (d. 1350), and states that he quoted eighty one issues from al-Ãdāb,25 he does not revise, or refer to, the alternative text cited by Ibn Mufliḥ where the verb “yuʿāmal” (to be treated) falls in the two occurrences with both ‘Muslims’ and ‘dissenters from the law of Islam’. A corrective work titled ‘Preserving Mağmūʿ al-fatāwā from Negligence and Error’, which was meant to rectify Ibn Qāsim’s edition, does not refer to any of the controversial texts of the QM or the Mardin fatwa.26 More astonishingly, the correct text, with yuʿāmal in the second occurrence, is also cited in the voluminous authoritative work in Saudi Wahhabism; al-Durar al-saniyya fī l-ağwiba al-nağdiyya, which is compiled and edited by ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Ibn Qāsim himself.27 This leads to the conclusion that quoting and interpreting Ibn Taymiyya in light of the available editions is not always unequivocal, especially when textual elusiveness blurs the image for the critical eye. As Y. Michot observes, it illustrates “the uncritical nature of the current editions of his Majmūʿ al-fatāwā and is a welcome reminder that one needs to be more circumspect in using them”.28
The Mardin fatwa excerpt as published by Maṭbaʿat Kurdistān al-ʿIlmiyya in Cairo, 1911
Citation: Studia Islamica 120, 2 (2025) ; 10.1163/19585705-12341513
Presenting the Qāʿida muḫtaṣara: A Taymiyyan Dilemma?
The editor of the QM, al-Zīr,29 introduces his work with a front-page including three quotations from Ibn Taymiyya and his most prominent disciple Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya, which he labels as ‘luminous words’ (kalimāt muḍīʾa).30 The reader does not need to grapple with the quoted texts to conclude that fighting and killing non-Muslims is only legitimized as a reactive-defensive jihad if they initiate aggressions against Muslims. He quotes a text from Al-Nubuwwāt of Ibn Taymiyya and two texts from Aḥkām ahl al-ḏimma and Hidāyat al-ḥayārā of Ibn al-Qayyim:
Unbelievers are to be fought on condition of warfare, as the majority of scholars opine, as the Book and the Sunnah state, and as it is explicated elsewhere.31
And because killing is deemed obligatory in exchange for warfare not for unbelief. That is why women, children, disabled and blind people, and monks who do not fight, are not to be killed. We fight rather those who fights us.32
[The prophet] never coerced anyone to [accept] the religion. He rather fought those who fought and waged wars against him. As for those who were in terms of peace or truce with him, he did not fight them nor compel them to embrace his religion, in compliance with God’s (swt) injunction […]. Anyone who speculates on the biography of the Prophet (pbuh) will see how he never coerced anyone to accept his religion. He only fought those who fought him. As for those who had a truce with him, he did not fight them, as long as they keep their truce and do not break their pacts.33
Consequently, in the course of his long introduction to the short QM, he attempts to employ a plethora of texts from the QM and other works of Ibn Taymiyya to corroborate the authenticity of the treatise as a Taymiyyan work in consistency with, what he opines to be, the author’s view on fighting non-Muslims.34 Among other works of Ibn Taymiyya, he mainly quotes excerpts from al-Ğawāb al-ṣaḥīḥ, al-Ṣārim al-maslūl, al-Fatāwā, al-Nubuwwāt, Minhāğ al-Sunna and al-Ṣafadiyya, that allegedly reinforce the argument that unbelief is not the reason to fight non-Muslims. His endeavour is notoriously obscured by other texts that he uses to amend those who refute the authenticity of QM because it contradicts Ibn Taymiyya’s views in other works of his corpus on fighting non-Muslims for their unbelief. He argues that Ibn Taymiyya in the QM does not refute initiatory or expansionary jihad and that “he does not tackle this issue explicitly”.35 Nevertheless, employing extra-QM texts and personal interpretations, the editor comes to two clear conclusions on the ruling, introducing them to be intended by Ibn Taymiyya. The first is that “initiating fight against the unbelievers – when Muslims are in a position of power – whenever they hinder the spread and practice of Islam, or [as a second option] paying the ǧizya submissively with a willing hand, is a matter conclusively settled by the Quran and the Sunna, and the common practice of the Umma”36 The second conclusion is that it is justifiable to think that Ibn Taymiyya refutes initiatory fight against unbelievers because he quotes Quran, II, 190 and the supporting proofs from the prophetic legacy. Nevertheless, Al-Zīr resumes the conclusion by what he confirms to be Ibn Taymiyya’s purpose; that “if the unbelievers did not fight us and [my italics] accept to pay ǧizya submissively with a willing hand, there is no reason to kill or fight them.”37 To support his interpretation, the editor cites a text from Ibn al-Qayyim,38 which substantially puts his argument at stake. Ibn al-Qayyim’s quotation comes actually in continuity of the abovementioned text from Aḥkām ahl al-ḏimma:
And because killing is deemed obligatory in exchange for warfare not for unbelief. […] This was the way of the prophet peace be upon him with the people of the earth. He used to fight those who fight him until they enter his religion, or maintain a truce with him, or be subdued to his authority through (paying) ǧizya (poll tax).”39
Admittedly, Ibn al-Qayyim’s text states that the prophet used to fight those who fought him (kāna yuqātil man ḥārabahu). This can thus not stand as a clear corroborating evidence of Al-Zīr’s claim that abstinence from killing or fighting unbelievers is preconditioned by them not fighting us “and” accepting to pay ǧizya. Once emphasized that the prophet fought only reactive wars, Ibn al-Qayyim uses the optional particle ‘or’ (aww in Arabic), which differentiates between the three options: accepting Islam, or maintaining a truce pact, or paying ǧizya. It is thus precarious to claim that Ibn Taymiyya’s views on the legal reasons to combat unbelievers in the QM are in full consistency with those of his prominent disciple, or even his own views in other works of his corpus. Apart from the text of the QM, the introduction of the edition offers many discrepancies that put the reader vis-à-vis personal conclusions of the editor and textual proofs from other works of the author that contradict the original argument. While he repeatedly seems to argue that unbelief is not the reason to fight non-Muslims, he states:
That Jihad against the unbelievers, fighting them and initiating them with war – as reported in the Sunna – is legislated for [the case of] necessity. If the unbelievers do not accept this religion among them, so that religion belongs to God, His word becomes the uppermost, and Muslims are able to spread it among all people, or if the unbelievers do not pay the ǧizya submissively with a willing hand, the only choice is to fight [them].40
How can this “necessity” of initiating war against unbelievers match the argument that the QM stipulates that Muslims fight only those who fight them? The editor seems to struggle, on the one hand, with counterarguments against the originality and the content of the QM, and, on the other, with an ardent desire to rebut young militants who are eager to launch wars against non-Muslims and their own political regimes. Therefore, he justifies his plea by an alleged ‘conditional’ legal status of ‘utilitarian’ jihad which implies that when Muslims are in a position of power that enables them to initiate war against unbelievers, they should do this, and when they are not in such a position, they fight only those who fight them.41 A compromise between what the QM argues for and the dominant classical and modern streamlined pro-ǧihād al-ṭalab approach is a burdened onus. To interpolate this compact treatise within a pool of writings in favour of this jihad typology could result in contested conclusions. But what kind of unfamiliar views does the QM offer to generate these puzzled reactions?
The treatise begins with an exploration of the opinions of the major Sunni legal schools on fighting and killing unbelievers during warfare. Ibn Taymiyya gives an account of the majority view (Abu Ḥanīfa, Mālik and Aḥmad and others, opposed to the view of al-Šāfiʿī) that they are to be fought only if they begin hostilities against Muslims and that the rationale behind killing an unbeliever is being involved in a fight and not the peculiarity of unbelief.42 Afterwards, he sets forth a number of scriptural evidences to forbid fighting unbelievers if they don’t fight Muslims. The first evidence is verse 190 of al-Baqara (Fight in the cause of Allah those who fight you, but do not transgress limits; for Allah loves not transgressors.). He finds there an unequivocal proof that: a) fighting non-Muslims who do not fight Muslims is an act of transgression, b) the fitna (tumult) mentioned in Quran, II, 191, 193, as a reason to fight and kill unbelievers, is conditioned by their assault against Muslims to turn them away from what they believe (as the polytheists of Mecca used to do), c) the divine injunction to fight is limited to the elimination of this fitna and not to converting the unbelievers to Islam, d) “until religion is for Allah” (Quran, II, 193) implies that the final goal of this fight is to secure an eventual predominance of the word of Islam, which does not entail fighting all non-involved unbelievers, and finally that, e) the prophet’s tradition shows how he never fought those who were peaceful to him.43 To reinforce this view, Ibn Taymiyya delves into the discussion of scriptural sources and the prevailing counter-hermeneutic traditions during and before his time.
The second part is dedicated to discuss and rebut the nasḫ (abrogation) claim of the injunction of “no transgression” by other verses (Quran, II, 191; “And slay them wherever you find them”, and the so-called “sword-verse”, Quran, IX, 5; “But when the forbidden months are past, then fight and slay the Pagans wherever you find them, an seize them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem (of war)”), and the meaning of “transgression” (iʿtidāʾ). This is a crucial point in the QM which clarifies how Ibn Taymiyya conceptualizes initiating war against non-Muslims and what he defines as a transgression against them.44 He summarizes two major opinions of Ibn al-Ğawzī (d. 1201) on the nasḫ claim. The first legitimizes the killing of even those who do not fight, or the interpretation of “transgression” by initiating war against the polytheists. The second opines that Quran, II, 190 is not abrogable (muḥkama); that the order to fight is directed against those “who prepare themselves to fight” Muslims. Ibn Taymiyya, categorically supports the second opinion.45 He then moves to the analysis of the meaning of iʿtidāʾ (Quran, II, 190). He reviews four opinions also cited in Ibn al-Ğawzī’s tafsīr on the interpretation of “transgression”:46 1) killing women, 2) Muslims fighting those who do not fight them 3) committing what is unlawful, and 4) initiating war against them during the holy month. He mentions how some scholars claimed that 2 and 4 are abrogated by the “sword verse” and uses counterarguments to rebut this opinion as well.47
The following evidence of the impermissibility of fighting or killing those among unbelievers who do not fight Muslims includes two relevant prophetic traditions forbidding the killing of anyone not involved in the fight.48 The subsequent discussion is also very significant for the evaluation of Ibn Taymiyya’s view in this treatise. He discusses the famous Quranic segment on freedom of faith in Islam, Quran, II, 256 (“There is no compulsion in religion”). It takes him few words to argumentatively disprove any claims of specification (taḫṣīṣ) or abrogation of the verse.49 He concludes that:
The majority of the predecessors and the successors opine that it is neither specified nor abrogated. They rather say: We do not compel anyone to Islam, but we fight those who fight us. If he becomes a Muslim, his blood and property are inviolable. If he was not involved in fight we are not permitted to kill him, or compel him to convert to Islam.50
Afterwards, Ibn Taymiyya brings forth an uncommon opinion regarding the acceptance of ǧizya, not only from Christians and Jews, but also from polytheists, pagans, Magians, etc. who are fighting Muslims and choose to pay it. Later in the QM, he dedicates a long discussion to the legal diversity on the issue to consolidate his view that ǧizya is to be accepted from all kinds of unbelievers.51 Throughout the next part, he gives a polemic theological account of the tenets of belief of these groups to show how they all fall under polytheism (širk) and are to be dealt equally with regard to ǧizya.52 He continues his analysis of the legal requirements to denounce someone as kāfir, including the anathematization of Muslims who would abstain from ritual obligations. In a nutshell, he concludes “that mere unbelief is not the reason that entails [killing],53 it is rather the thicker (muġallaẓ) unbelief whose thickness is sometimes confirmed by warfare from the side of the involved person, and sometimes by his apostasy from Islam”54
The Taymiyyan Jihad of the (s)word
A legitimate question we need to ask is how to harmonize between Ibn Taymiyya’s views in the QM and his harsh intolerant polemic style, sometimes against non-Muslims and their creeds, and others against self-claimed Muslims and denominations seen by him as apostates and deviants, in several works of his extant corpus55? Asking this question about non-Muslims, one should be first reminded of his zeal targeting both Sunni and Shiite groups whose loyalty to the Muslim community against its enemies in times of war was at stake. In his time, the Muslim political entity was sieged and jeopardized by many external and internal dangers in a totally entangled religious context. On the one hand, the Mongols converted to Islam presumably to gain both religious rights in rule and support under Muslim groups, while they use the Yasaq and not the Sharia as a source of law.56 On the other hand, already since the Crusades, military conflicts and missionary antagonisms between European Christianity and Muslims had culminated. Both hostile parties, could gain loyalty among some Muslim groups whose orthodoxy was not in line with Ibn Taymiyya’s theological convictions. It is most likely for a meticulous uncompromising and intransigent scholar such as Ibn Taymiyya,57 in this critical historical moment, to invest the utmost of his theological career and expertise in the ‘jihad of the word’ against malpractices, concomitant misbeliefs,58 and overall those he considers enemies, traitors, hypocrites, apostates and defeatists.
It is not difficult to identify this genuine enterprise against non-Muslims and find telling examples in his legacy. The reason behind the authorship of Al-ğawāb al-ṣaḥīḥ li-man baddal dīn al-Masīḥ, as he mentions is the same work, was a reaction to the Letter to a Muslim Friend which he received from Cyprus including twelfth/thirteenth century anti-Islam apologetics of the Christian faith written by the Melkite bishop of Sidon Būlus al-Rāhib al-Anṭākī (Paul of Sidon, Paul of Antioch) with a Christianized reading of the Quran.59 It seems that this letter was famous in Muslim-Christian theological circles and provoked many Muslim stern responses.60 This was more than a counter missionary enterprise. Cyprus was at the core scenery of Muslim-Christian conflicts and the abode of many Muslim captives.61 Ibn Taymiyya wrote to the Sultan al-Nāṣir Ibn Qalawūn (d. 1341) a message where he describes military cooperation between Shiite groups of Ismailis and Nusayris and Cypriot Christians.62 The whole historical context of the period was loaded with military conflicts where some Muslims chose to support Christian troops against the Mamluk state and act as indoor enemies.63 Ibn Taymiyya described the deeds of the apostates of his time who were originally Muslims (among Arabs, Persians and others), and support the enemies of Islam, as more dangerous and worse than those of ‘original disbelievers’, with exception of Muslims who are coerced to fight on the enemy’s side.64 He even prefers support by local Christians and Jewish compatriots than Muslim heterodox sects.65 He wrote several other rebuttals against Muslim sects which he found culpable of alliance with enemies or not adequately positioned against them. Almost none of these groups survived the sting of his criticism. His ardent theological polemical take on these groups was sometimes followed by military campaigns against some of them, as it was the case when he joined a Mamluk expedition to the Lebanese mountains of Kasrawān in 1300 and set out on another one in 1305 targeting Ismaili and Nusayri groups for supporting the Mongols and the Christians.66 Beyond his ‘kalamistic’ antagonism, there lies a political enterprise to generate knowledge and sensitize Muslim main stream Sunni masses to make the jihad against these groups not desirable but necessary. This Taymiyyan enterprise of ǧihād al-kalima justifies the words of his follower Šams al-Dīn al-Ḏahabī (d.795 H.) about his teacher; he says “By him, [God] revived the Levant, but even Islam, before it was about to fade away.”67 It was Ibn Taymiyya’s convention that, in some cases, fighting with the tongue is a jihad, and might be greater than fighting with the hand. In a context of numerating some merits of the kalām-endeavor of Abū al-Ḥasan al-Ašʿarī (d. 936), where it agrees with the Quran and Sunna, against ‘heterodox’ groups, Ibn Taymiyya resembles such kalām struggle as belonging to the work of a “victorious muğāhid”. He further argues that “He who rebuts the people of [heterodox] innovations is a muğāhid”. He then quotes Yaḥyā Ibn Yaḥyā (d. 841) saying “defending the Sunnah is better than jihad” (al-ḏabb ʿan-l-Sunna afḍal min al-ğihād).68
Problematizing ǧihād al-ṭalab (Offensive Jihad)
Another important question arises on whether Ibn Taymiyya rebuts ǧihād al-ṭalab in the sense of initiating expansionary wars against non-Muslims for the mere reason of unbelief and to spread the realm of Islam. To give examples of the challenging discrepancies of contested texts on this issue, one can consult many relevant texts spread over Ibn Taymiyya’s large corpus that may allegedly offer contradictive perspectives. The arguments used by the Saudi scholars to reject the view that Ibn Taymiyya does refute ǧihād al-ṭalab in QM hinge on sporadic quotations from his other works which contradict this claimed refutation.69 The elusiveness of his style is a major challenge in any endeavor to establish a categorical conclusion on this issue. For example, as cited in al-Siyāsa al-šarʿiyya, he seems to define jihad as the origin of legitimate combat (aṣl al-qitāl al-mašrūʿ); its utmost goal is to render religion and worshipping wholly for Allah (yakūn al-dīn kulluhu li-Llāh) and that the Word of Allah becomes the uppermost (wa-an takūn kalimat Allah hiya al-ʿulyā). Anyone who hinders this (manaʿa hāḏā) should be combatted according to the consensus of all Muslims.70 Addressing the issue of fighting disbelievers, he begins his argumentation by referring to the punishments stipulated by the Sharia for those who “disobey God and His messenger.” By the second punishment he refers to the abstaining group (al-ṭāʾifa al-mumtaniʿa), which can only be subdued through military combat. He then comments: “and the origin of this is the jihad against the disbelievers, enemies of God and His messenger. Everyone whom the call of the messenger of God has reached, to God’s religion which he was sent with, but he did not accept it, should be fought ‘until there will be no more persecution (fitna) and religion will be wholly to Allah.”71 However, he then states his agreement with the opinion of the majority of scholars that those who do not fight should not be killed. His argument is that “Because fight is for those who fight us, in case we are eager to make God’s religion prevail; as Allah the Exalted said ‘Fight in the way of Allah against those who fight against you, but begin not hostilities. Verily! Allah does not love the aggressors.’”72
The quoted verse (II, 190), as al-Qaraḍāwī notes, is an explicit text about the impermissibility of beginning hostilities against unbelievers if they do not begin a fight against Muslims.73 Nonetheless, the context of “Because fight is for those who fight us” would not withstand as an explicit coherent proof of al-Qaraḍāwī’s claim; given that the text suggests that Ibn Taymiyya refers to ‘those who [already] fight us’ in the battlefield and should not be killed, because he later discusses the cases of groups who are not engaged in fight (women, elders, handicaps etc.).74 Moreover, Ibn Taymiyya adds that “as far as the people of the Book are concerned, they should be fought until they become Muslims, or pay the ǧizya submissively with a willing hand.”75 In the same context of the discussion of these fight rulings as part of the statecraft of sharia-oriented politics (siyāsa šarʿiyya),76 he states that “[the unbeliever] who does not hinder Muslims from establishing God’s religion, the harm of his unbelief lies only on himself. That’s why the jurists state that ‘he who propagates heterodox innovations (bidaʿ) should be punished while he who holds them privately should not be punished.”77 This might imply a contradiction in his views. Nevertheless, it seems that he interprets Quran, II, 190 in a way that makes it equally consistent, on the one hand, to fight for the establishment of the Islam if non-Muslims threaten the faith of Muslims or jeopardize a peaceful fulfilment of its duties (as in the case of Tabūk, which will be discussed later), and on the other, to abstain from aggressions if Muslims are not fought for this.78
But how could Ibn Taymiyya’s view of nasḫ match this approach and claim of the unequivocalness (iḥkām) of 2:190?. A telling example in al-Ṣārim al-maslūl may offer a controversial reading of Quran, II, 190, supporting the abrogation (nasḫ) vigour of the so called sword-verse (Quran, IX, 5) and other verses over all previous revelations that urge indulgence, forgiveness, patience and remission toward the unbelievers. In the context of his refutation of a counterargument that the Quran calls upon Muslims to show patience and remission against wrongdoings of non-Muslims,79 as in the case of insulting the prophet, he argues for the gradual abrogation of this ruling beginning with the battle of Badr, which granted Muslims the first triumph against the polytheists of Mecca. Thereafter, the revelation of sura 9 (al-Tawba), including verses 5, 29 and 36, abrogated all previous rulings. That would make fighting against non-Muslims the common rule until they accept Islam or pay the ǧizya. But in case Muslims are not powerful enough, indulgence would be the option.80 This seemingly utilitarian stance, to choose always for a preponderant good,81 would put the views expressed in the QM in full discredit. We should be reminded, though, that Ibn Taymiyya’s starting point in this discussion is the legal status of protected dhimmis, hypocrites or non-Muslims with whom Muslims are in terms of truce, if they commit wrongdoings such as insulting the prophet. In this context, he attempts to disprove all counterarguments that such a wrongdoing could be endured with indulgence. In his argumentation, he employs different opinions of the salaf including the nasḫ approach. Later in the discussion, he summarises his argument:
In a nutshell, there is no dispute that it was prescribed for the prophet peace be upon him, when he became powerful, to shift from the attitude of forgiveness and remission in dealing with the People of the Book, the polytheists and the outright hypocrites, to fighting them, establishing the legal punishments against them, whether this is called nasḫ or not.82
If both texts, in the QM and here in al-Ṣārim, are read in a sequence of their contexts, one could conclude that in the QM Ibn Taymiyya sets the generic rules for combatting or killing non-believers, while in al-Ṣārim he tackles a specific legal problem of dealing with verbal assaults against Muslim faith and whether it should be tolerated or punished because it implies a renunciation of the truce with Muslims. In this view, an act that implies breaking the truce pact with Muslims is perceived as a declaration of war and could justify initiatory attack. In the QM, Ibn Taymiyya discusses and disproves the nasḫ claims of Quran, II, 190, because there is nothing in the Quran to contradict this verse and “transgression is wrongdoing and Allah never permits wrongdoing.”83 Furthermore, when he discusses the legal implications of sura 9, al-Tawba – which offers the basic argument for the nasḫ claim of dealing peacefully with unbelievers by the so-called sword-verse (Quran, IX, 5)84 – he stresses the necessity of keeping the truces with those who did not break them or form a threaten to the Muslim community.85 His reasoning of the command in Quran, IX, 5 is because “they are polytheists who belong to the combatant group (ahl al-qitāl) and if they are able to corrupt the religion [Islam] and its followers, they would do.”86
Ibn Taymiyya’s plea for the protection of Muslims within non-Muslim abode is coupled with a sincere advocacy of equal treatment of non-Muslims within the abode of Islam. He wrote a letter, known as al-Risāla al-Qubruṣiyya,87 or The Cypriot Letter, sometime between early 1303 and mid-1304, to a crusader baron in Cyprus (whom he addresses as Sirjwān; probably Johan II of Giblet (d. 1315)), requesting that the Muslim captives under his power be well-treated while awaiting ransom. Ibn Taymiyya appends to his appeal a long exposition on religious history in order to convince Sirjwān of Islam’s supremacy over the other Religions of the Book.88 He reminds this Christian leader of the ethical norms Muslims follow toward ahl al-ḏimma (non-Muslims under Muslim rule; mainly Christians and Jews). Ibn Taymiyya refers enthusiastically to his refusal of Ģāzān’s, the Mongol leader, suggestion to free only the Muslim prisoners captured in Jerusalem but not the Christians (and Jews). He wrote:
The Christians know already that when I negotiated with the Tatars to free the captives […], he [the leader] said to me: “But we have Christians whom we captured in Jerusalem. These will not be freed.” I said to him: “Nay! But all the Jews and the Christians in your disposition, who are the people of our ḏimma. We set them free and we never leave a single captive, neither from ahl al-milla [the people of our religion; Muslims] nor from ahl al-ḏimma. And we set free from among the Christians whom God willed. This is our deed and benevolence and from God comes the reward. Likewise, everyone knows our benevolence, mercy and lenience toward the Christian hostages in our hands.89
However, a paragraph in the same letter may suggest that he is in favor of ǧihād al-ṭalab. He distinguished between the Crusade’s unlawful assault on Muslim territories and a Muslim proselytizing-jihad legitimized to guide the misguided and make Allah’s Word and His true religion the uppermost. He states:
If someone says ‘they fought us first’, it should be said ‘this is not true concerning those whom you treated treacherously and initiated fight against them.’ As for those who initiated [fight] against you, they are excused; because both Allah (swt) and His messenger ordered them to do it. Even Jesus and his disciples gave covenants to do this. He who acts upon obedience to Allah and his messengers – calls to his worship and religion, recognizes all Books and messengers, and fights so that God’s word become the uppermost and religion become wholly to Allah – is not equal to him who fight for a whim in his soul and out of obedience to the Satan in contradiction with the ordinance of Allah and His messenger.90
Again here, the text could offer an argument that Ibn Taymiyya legitimizes initiating wars against non-Muslims. But one needs only to conjecture this conclusion in absence of other relevant texts of Ibn Taymiyya’s theory of jihad. In his rebuttal of the analogy made by the Hanbali scholar al-Qāḍī Abū Yaʿlā (d. 1066) concerning the necessary preparation for jihad and Hajj, he states that the obligation of jihad could be a priority “to repel the enemy’s damage” (dafʿ ḍarar al-ʿadūw) and classify this under qitāl al-ṭalab.91 This alludes to a certain category of ǧihād al-ṭalab as a preemptive jihad; as he initially refers to combatant act of repelling aggression. In the same text he refers to qitāl al-dafʿ as the utmost degree of fight against an aggressor enemy (ʿadūw ṣāʾil) and underlines the importance to differentiate between the repel of such a wrongdoer disbeliever aggressor and attacking him in his own land (yağib al-tafrīq bayna dafʿ al-ṣāʾil al-ẓālim al-kāfir wa bayna ṭalabih fi bilādih).92
In a more explicit corroborating text in his al-Siyāsa al-šarʿiyya he mentions two kinds of ǧihād wāğib (obligatory) against unbelievers (kuffār) and abstainers (mumtaniʿīn) from some religious injunctions. He classifies the obligation of jihad into ibtidāʾ (initiatory) and dafʿ (defensive):
The obligatory jihad against unbelievers and abstainers from some injunctions, such as those who don’t pay the zakāt, the Khawārij and their likes, is prescribed ibtidāʾan (initiatively) and dafʿan (defensively). If it is ibtidāʾan, it is a collective duty (farḍ ʿala al-kifāya). If it is carried out by a sufficient number, the obligation does not apply then for the rest. […] But if the enemy wants to attack the Muslims, then the repel of the enemy becomes obligatory for all those involved, and for those non-involved to help them.93
Contemplation on the context of these texts is required, not in quest of a preponderant reading, but to construe Ibn Taymiyya’s generic view of initiatory jihad. At the epilogue of his Cypriot Letter, he categorically ensures the pacifist reaction of Muslims as the legal quid pro quo of an eventual gesture of goodwill:
What I would advise him [the king] is that everyone who showed benevolence and tendency to the Muslims will see a good consequence with them according to his good deeds, as God says: “whoever does an atom’s weight of good, shall see it, and whoever does an atom’s weight of evil, shall see it” [Quran, IC, 7-8]. I end my letter by recommending good treatment of sheikh Abu al-ʿAbbās and the other captives, helping them and showing lenience to the people of the Quran among them, to abstain from converting any of them. The king will see the consequence of all this, and we reward him the doubles of what he may think. God knows how I seek the good of the king because He ordered us to do so and gave us the injunction to seek the good for everyone, to show compassion to His creatures, call them for Him, for His religion, and save them from the devils of men and jinn.94
This approach proposes that peaceful attitudes of non-Muslims even at times of hostile encounters and wars should reciprocally be recompensed with equal attitudes. Initiating fight, in this context of the letter, presupposes a declaration of hostile intentions and actions against territories under Muslim rule, jeopardizing the lives, faith and sanctities of Muslims. This puts the argument of Ibn Taymiyya again in consistency with Quran, II, 217 and LX, 8-9.95
The second text where he discusses the two categories of ibtidāʾ (initiatory) and dafʿ (defensive) jihad deserves equal speculation. There, he develops his argument employing scriptural justifications from the Quran and the Sunnah. The example he gives for ǧihād al-dafʿ from the Quran is XXXIII, 13 with reference to the confederates (aḥzāb) assault headed by the pagans of Mecca on the newly established Muslim state of Medina. He describes this as a defense of faith, sanctity and life (dafʿ ʿan al-dīn wa ’l-ḥurma wa ’l-nafs) which makes it a case of compulsory fight (qitāl iḍṭirār). Coming to ǧihād al-ibtidāʾ, he discerns another motivation which is to show the loftiness of Islam and overawe the enemy:
That is rather an optional fight to boost religion and exalt it to overawe the enemy, such as the battle of Tabūk and its likes. This kind of punishment is [prescribed] for the abstaining groups [ṭawāʾif mumtaniʿa]96
To understand the analogy, we need to consult the circumstances surrounding the battle of Tabūk (9/630) during the lifetime of the prophet. Islamic historical sources report that the prophet did ‘initiate’ the expedition, but for defensive and preemptive reasons. He received the news that the Byzantines, supported by Arab tribes north of Hijaz, are gathering in considerable numbers in the Levantine,97 endangering the outnumbered Muslim army in Medina. It was thus initiated and launched in defensive terms, as a reactive preemptive fight to anticipate a prospective attack. The only difference from pure defensive fight is that Muslim troops wage wars initiatively outside the abode of Islam against a prospective enemy for reasons of an existing menace against the integrity of the state or to avoid the affliction of an expected first attack. In the QM, Ibn Taymiyya asserts this defensive-preemptive nature of jihad when he argues for the principle of freedom of religion based on Quran, II, 256.98 He explicitly vouches the pacifist attitude of the prophet with those who do not act unjustly and menace Islam and Muslims:
But there is a difference if he [the prophet] or anyone has ever compelled them [the unbelievers] to convert to Islam and fighting them to repel their wrongdoing and assault against religion [Islam]. […] He did not fight whomever he knew that he does not do wrong to the religion or its people, whether from the people of the Book or not.99
He [the prophet] never initiated fight against any of the unbelievers. Had God commanded him to kill every unbeliever, he would have initiated killing and fighting them.100
He realizes the urgency of justifying the supposedly initiative war against the Byzantines during the lifetime of the prophet in the battle of Mu’ta (629) by the fact that they killed some converts to Islam. He states that “the Christians initiated the fight against Muslims and killed those who embraced Islam wrongly and unjustly.”101
Conclusion
The analysis and discussion of the QM, compared to the extant jihad-legacy of Ibn Taymiyya, show how he does not categorically refute initiating fight against non-Muslims. His statements in this treatise rather resonates with a Taymiyyan notion of jihad which stresses a conceptualization of ǧihād al-dafʿ as the basic legitimate rule, even when initiating (ibtidāʾ) a fight is necessary as a preventive anticipatory measure. It reveals his zealous apologia of qitāl (fighting) as an exceptional proactive jihad to protect both Muslim belief and believers and secure an unscathed spread of God’s word. Persistently, Ibn Taymiyya underlines the danger of fitna, the fear of turning Muslims away from their faith, as a main reason to defend Islam and launch proactive wars. A contextual reading of the relevant texts in Ibn Taymiyya’s corpus on jihad suggests a subtle distinction between expansionary-initiatory and preemptive jihad and that his categorization of ǧihād al-ṭalab or al-ibtidāʾ gives credence to a preventive anticipatory jihad. This view of jihad fits with his claim that non-Muslims are to be fought, and eventually killed, on account of their hostility and not on account of their unbelief. A crucial thread in his discussions of the tensions with non-Muslims and deviant groups is to repel aggression, suspend hostilities,102 and ensure the integrity and loftiness of Islam and an inviolable supremacy of its word. Accordingly, the amalgamation of his views in the QM within his jihad corpus can be plausibly justified.
Yossef Rapoport and Shahab Ahmed (eds.), Ibn Taymiyya and His Times, New York, OUP, 2010, p. 4. Cf. Yahya Michot, Muslims under Non-Muslim Rule: Ibn Taymiyya on fleeing from sin, kinds of emigration, the status of Mardin (domain of peace/war, domain composite), the conditions for challenging power. Texts translated, annotated and presented in relation to six modern readings of the Mardin fatwa, Oxford-London, Interface Publications, 2006, p. ix, pp. 46-48.
The editor of the work, ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz Al-Zīr , uses a modified title: “A Summarized Principle Regarding Combating the Unbelievers, Making Truce with them and the Impermissibility of Killing them Due to Mere Unbelief”; Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara fĪ qitāl al-kuffār wa muhādanatihim wa taḥrīm qatlihim li-mujarrad kufrihim, ed. ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz al-Zīr, Riyadh, published by the editor, 1424/2003. The variation of ‘killing them” (qatlihim) in the title is significant as it involves only the impermissibility of killing, for example, those who do not fight in the battlefield, but not fighting unbelievers for their unbelief. See the summary he gives of the objectives behind this treatise, pp. 61-62, and the reason he opted for this title, p. 70. The title above is extracted from the cover page on the manuscript as projected by the editor, p. 77. See also Yūsuf Al-Qaraḍāwī, Fiqh al-ğihād: Dirāsa muqārana li-aḥkāmih wa falsafatih fī ḍawʾ al-Qurʾān wa-l-Sunna, Cairo, Maktabat Wahba, 2009, vol. I., p. 377 n. 1.
Al-Qaraḍāwī, Fiqh, vol. I., pp. 376-377.
Ǧihād al-ṭalab (or al-ibtidāʾ) refers to the case when a Muslim state takes the initiative (ibtidāʾ) of pursuing (ṭalab) and fighting non-Muslim enemies in their own territories. I use the common term “offensive” in modern jihad discourses as opposed to “defensive” jihad (ǧihād al-dafʿ; repulse).
Within the four Sunni canonical legal schools, the distinction between the per capita (farḍ ʿayn) and the communal-sufficiency (farḍ kifāya) obligation of jihad revolves around: a) a defensive reactionary fight necessary to repel hostilities against Muslims and their territories (as a reason for the first), and b) an offensive initiatory jihad to ensure and expand the freedom of preaching God’s word, suppress unbelief and establish a just social and political order (as a reason for the second). For the latter, the enemy (constituting Dār al-ḥarb, the Abode of War, especially from among the People of the Book and the Magians-Zoroastrians, with different opinions concerning the mušrikīn (associators-polytheists)) is to be given the choice between three options: Islam, ǧizya (poll tax) or fighting, as supported by scriptural proofs from the Quran and Sunnah. For the discussion of the wider spectrum of legal perspectives within the Sunni canonical schools see Ibn Rushd, Bidāyat al-muǧtahid wa nihāyat al-muqtaṣid, ed. Mājid Al-Ḥamawī, Beirut, Dār Ibn Ḥazm, 1995, vol. II, p. 736-751. Cf. Ibn Khaldūn, The Muqaddimah, tr. Franz Rosental, Princeton, PUP, 2015, p. 291; Wahba al-Zuḥaylī, Ãthār al-ḥarb fī al-fikr al-islāmī, Damascus, Dār al-Fikr, 3rd ed., 1998, p. 84-93, p. 151, p. 169-176; Rudolph Peters (tr. and ed.), Jihad in the Medieval and Modern Islam: The Chapter on Jihad from Averroes’ Legal Handbook “Bidāyat al-Mudjtahid” and the Treatise “Koran and Fighting” by the Late Sheikh al-Azhar Maḥmūd Shaltūt, Leiden, Brill, 1977, p. 19-25; Idem, “Jihad”, in The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Modern Islamic World, ed. J. Esposito, Oxford, OUP, 1995, p. 370-372. The Hanbali position before Ibn Taymiyya is explicated in Ibn Qudāma, al-Muġnī, eds ʿAbdullah al-Turkī & ʿAbd al-Fattāḥ Al-Ḥilw, Riyadh, Dār ʿĀlam al-Kutub, 3rd ed., 1997, vol. XIII, p. 5-201 (on ǧizya, p. 31-33, p. 201-255). He states (p. 10) that it is obligatory for the ruler to carry out jihad at least once a year except otherwise stipulated for exceptional reasons. Although it is not entirely clear in his explication whether offensive jihad is legitimized against unbelievers only on account of their unbelief and to expand the rule of Islam, it seems that he recognizes a probable danger from the side of non-Muslim territories as a reason to, proactively, neutralize their eventual hostilities. For example, when he discusses the issue of the obligation of each group to fight those enemies bordered with them (p. 15-16), according to Kor 9, 123, het states “because the nearest is the most harmful; fighting him implies repelling his harm against the opposite part and those beyond. Being engaged [only] with the distant [enemy] would enable him to take the opportunity against the Muslims, who are not vigilant [to his danger]”
Emmanuel Sivan, Radical Islam: Medieval Theology and Modern Politics, New Haven-London, YUP, 1990, p. 84.
See Johannes Jansen, The Neglected Duty: The Creed of Sadat’s Assassins and Islamic Resurgence in the Middle East, Macmillan, New York, 1986; Idem, “Ibn Taymiyyah and the Thirteenth Century: A Formative Period of Modern Muslim Radicalism”, Quaderni di Studi Arabi 5/6 (1987-1988), p. 391; Caterina Bori, Ibn Taymiyya: Una Vita Esemplare. Analisi delle Fonti Classiche della sua Biografia, Supplemento n. 1 alla Rivista di Studi Orientali, LXXVI, [Pisa-Roma], (2003), p. 11-12. Jon Hoover, “Reconciling Ibn Taymiyya’s Legitimisation of Violence with His Vision of Universal Salvation’, in Violence in Islamic Thought from the Mongols to European Imperialism, eds Robert Gleave & István Kristó-Nagy, Edinburgh, EUP, 2018, p. 107. Peters, “Jihad”, p. 372, states how Faraǧ legitimized jihad against the Sadat regime by making analogy to the fatwa’s of Ibn Taymiyya regarding the Mongols rule in the Middle East who applied their own law instead of the Sharia. Sivan, Radical Islam, p. 103.
Yahya Michot, Mamluks, Qalandars, Rafidis and the ‘other’ Ibn Taymiyya, The Thirteenth Annual Victor Danner Memorial Lecture, Bloomington, Indiana University, 2015, p. 3, quoting Thomas Kean, The 9/11 Commission Report: Final Report of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United State, New York-London, W. W. Norton & Company, 2004, p. 362.
Recent research has underlined this characteristic in Ibn Taymiyya’s writings as ‘occasional and circumstantial’ and his views as ‘not easily systematised’; Jon Hoover, “Foundations of Ibn Taymiyya’s Religious Utilitarianism” in Philosophy and Jurisprudence in the Islamic World, eds. Peter Adamson et. al., Berlin, De Gruyter, vol I., 2019, p. 168, with reference to Sophia Vasalou, Ibn Taymiyya’s Theological Ethics, Oxford, OUP, 2016, p. 16, p. 19.
His pupil Ibn ʿAbd al-Hādī refers in his hagiography of Ibn Taymiyya to a work on “Questions and answers on fighting the Mongols who accompanied Ghazān and others, and on fighting the people of churches-the Christians, the Christians of Malatya, and fighting the confederates and the combatants, in almost one volume”; Ibn ʿAbd al-Hādī, Al-ʿUqūd al-durriyya fī ḏikr baʿḍ manāqib šayḫ al-Islām Ibn Taymiyya, ed. ʿAlī al-ʿImrān, Riyadh-Beirut, Dār ʿAṭāʾāt al-ʿIlm-Dār Ibn Ḥazm, p. 99. The editor, however, notes that volume 28 of Maǧmūʿ al-fatāwā contains many fatwa’s on combatting the Mongols.
Al-Zīr (Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 46-59) makes a good effort to confirm the authenticity of the work as belonging to the Taymiyyan corpus. He cites many analogies with other works and statements of Ibn Taymiyya, and the references of some of his pupils, such as Ibn ʿAbd al-Hādī, to the work. For a discussion of the strategy followed by al-Zīr and the doubts of other scholars about its authenticity, see Jabir Maihula, “Analysis of Qāʿida Mukhtaṣara fī Qitāl Al-Kuffār wa Mudāhanatihim wa Taḥrīm Qatlihim bi Mujarrad Kufrihim”, Saudi Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences 3/9 (2018), p. 1103-1104. Cf. Mehdi Berriah, “Ibn Taymiyya’s Conception of Jihad: Corpus, General Aspects, and Research Perspectives”, Teosofi: Jurnal Tasawuf dan Pemikiran Islam (12/1), 2022, p. 62-64. In p. 63, the editor of the work is mistakenly referred to twice as Ashraf ʿAbd al-Maqṣūd. Al-Qaraḍāwī, Fiqh, p. 376-377. In his seminal book on Ibn Taymiyya, Abū Zahra dedicates a short discussion to the Qāʿida muḫtaṣara as a genuine work of Ibn Taymiyya; Muhammad Abū Zahra, Ibn Taymiyya: Ḥayātuhu w-ʿaṣruhu, ãrāʾuhu wa-fiqhuhu, Cairo, Dār al-Fikr al-ʿArabī, 1974, p. 318-322.
Maihula, “Analysis”, p. 1103. The article presents a summary of the QM, with quotes arguing very shortly for those two points without a deep critical analysis of al-Zīr’s argumentation or the controversial counterviews from Ibn Taymiyya’s corpus on jihad and the broader classical and modern relevant literature.
Ibn Taymiyya, Maǧmūʿ fatāwā šayḫ al-Islām Ibn Taymiyya, ed. ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Ibn Qāsim, Medina, Muğammaʿ al-Malik Fahd, 1425 AH/2004 AD, vol. 8, p. 5. The collection was first published in 1386 AH/1966 AD under the auspices of king Saʿūd bin ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz Āl Saʿūd, while this edition was published as recommended by king Fahd bin ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz Āl Saʿūd (see p. 14).
Sulaymān bin Ḥamdān, Dalālat al-nuṣūṣ wa-l-iğmāʿ ʿalā farḍ al-qitāl li-l-kufr wa-l-difāʿ, Amman, Dār al-Ṭibāʿa wa-l-Našr, n.d., p. 2-3. See also al-Ḫarāšī, 1424 AH/2003, p. 11-13.
Sulaymān Al-Ḫarāšī, Aqwāl al-ʿulamāʾ fi l-risāla al-mansūba li-šayḫ al-Islām Ibn Taymiyya -raḥimahu Allāh- fī l-ğihād, n.p., 1424 AH/2003 AD, p. 2. He tends to accept the testimonies of its attribution to Ibn Taymiyya as it reflects his stylistic vigour (p. 3, n. 3). A corrective bibliographical work on the corpus of Ibn Taymiyya and the edition of the Mağmūʿ, published eight years after the publication of the QM by Al-Zīr, ignores the QM; Hišām al-ʾUbaylī, Ṯabt al-kutub wa-l-rasāʾil fī mağmūʿ fatāwā šayḫ al-Islām Ibn Taymiyya, Riyadh, Dār al-Maymān, 2014.
The issue deserves further investigation based on available manuscripts, which is beyond the scope of this paper and will be conducted in a future research project. Caterina Bori, “One or Two Versions of Al-Siyāsa al-Sharʿiyya of Ibn Taymiyya? And what do they tell us?”, ASK working paper 26, Bonn, Annemarie Schimmel Kolleg, 2016, p. 1. In this work (p. 1-2, p. 4), she presents whole missing passages from Ibn Taymiyya’s treatise on Al-Siyāsa al-šarʿiyya fī Iṣlāḥ al-rāʿī wa-l-raʿiyya, examining two different edited versions of the work to argue that “the common view that the book is about the coercive power of the state as in punishment, jihad and public order is to be partially revisited” and how “that has gone unnoticed by those scholars who have recently published either specifically on this text or on Ibn Taymiyya’s political project as a whole”. A recent revised and expanded version of this paper has been published in Caterina Bori, ‘Istanbul, Süleymaniye Kütüphanesi MS Şehid Ali Paşa 1553: A Neglected Version of Ibn Taymīya’s al-Siyāsa al-Sharʿīya and Its Manuscript’, in History and Society during the Mamluk Period (1250-1517): Studies of the Annemarie Schimmel Institute for Advanced Study III, eds. Bethany Walker & Abdelkader Al Ghouz, Bonn, BUP, 2021, p. 9-60. A recent survey of the print tradition and rehabilitation of Ibn Taymiyya’s erudition under postclassical scholars is given in Ahmed El Shamsy, Rediscovering the Islamic Classics: How Editors and Print Culture Transformed an Intellectual Tradition, Princeton-Oxford, PUP, ch. 7. In ch. 8, under the title “Pseudophilology” (p. 208 ff.), he explores printed editions whose authenticity and/or credibility is debated under postclassical scholars and editors; he quotes (p. 217) Zāhid al-Kawtharī (d. 1952) criticizing the use of a certain edition of the Fatāwā of Ibn Taymiyya (by al-Kurdī, see n. 24 below): “It is enough for him to have the fatwas of Ibn Taymiyya printed by Faraj Allāh al-Kurdī and to cite a couple of pages on the issue of divorce, for example, and to publish this in journals and newspapers, without feeling the need to ascertain the reliability of the publisher, or to make sure he did not add or delete anything, correcting and corrupting according to his whim, or to verify that the work corresponds to reality and that the author is truthful, reliable, and not deviant”.
Ibn Taymiyya, Mağmūʿ fatāwā, (ed. Ibn Qāsim), vol. 28, p. 241; Ibn Taymiyya, Mağmūʿ al-fatāwā, eds. ʿĀmir al-Ğazzār & Anwar al-Bāz, Al-Mansura, Dar al-Wafāʾ, 3rd ed., 2005, vol. 28, p.135; Ibn Taymiyya, Al-Fatāwā al-kubrā, eds Muḥammad ʿAtā & Mustafa ʿAtā, Beirut, Dār al-Kutub al-ʿIlmiyya, 1987, vol. III, p. 533.
See Yahya Michot, “Ibn Taymiyya’s “New Mardin Fatwa”. Is genetically modified Islam (GMI) carcinogenic?”, The Muslim World 101 (2011), p. 130.
Abd al-Salām Farağ, Al-Ğihād: Al-farīḍa al-ġāʾiba, Cairo, n.p., 1981, p. 4-8; An edited version of the text is to be consulted in Muḥammad ʿImāra, Al-farīḍa al-ġāʾiba: Ğuḏūr wa ḥiwārāt, dirāsāt wa nuṣūṣ, Cairo, Nahḍat Misr, 2009, p. 16. ʿImāra (p. 15) states that he used a copy of the original work of Farağ which he could obtain through the latter’s lawyer. It is noteworthy that both the available edition on internet and that of ʿImāra use the verb yuʿāmal in both cases (Farağ, p. 4, p. 8; ʿImāra, p. 86, p. 94). Cf. Jon Hoover, “Ibn Taymiyya between Moderation and Radicalism” in Reclaiming Islamic Tradtion: Modern Interpretations of the Classical Heritage, eds. Elisabeth Kendall & Ahmad Khan, Edinburgh, EUP, 2016, p. 202, n. 70, who notes that “Faraj transcribes the relevant text from the Mardin fatwa in al-Farīḍa al-ghāʾiba in one place yuʿāmal and in a second place yuqātal”. For the link between the Mardin fatwa and the assassination of Sadat, see Abdullah Bin Bayyah, Mardin: Ibn Taymiyya wa qatl al-Sādāt, Cairo, Cairo Center for Strategic Studies (CCSS), 2020. Michot undermines the role of the Mardin Fatwa in violent militancy views of terrorist groups, “Ibn Taymiyya’s “New Mardin Fatwa”, p. 147-150; Cf. Yahya Michot, “Mamlūks, Qalandars, Rāfidīs and the ‘other’ Ibn Taymiyya”, The Thirteenth Annual Victor Danner Memorial Lecture, Bloomington, Indiana University, 2015, p. 6-8, and especially Idem, Ibn Taymiyya: Against Extremisms, Paris, Editions Albouraq, 1433 AH/2012 AD. He might be right as for the frequency of quoting this fatwa in their literature. However, its misrepresented content offers a solid argument for their anathematization of political authorities in Muslim states and societies and legitimizes the use of violence against them. For his analysis of the historical context and modern contextualization of the fatwa, see the introduction of Yahya Michot, Muslims under Non-Muslim Rule: Ibn Taymiyya on fleeing from sin, kinds of emigration, the status of Mardin (domain of peace/war, domain composite), the conditions for challenging power. Texts translated, annotated and presented in relation to six modern readings of the Mardin fatwa, Oxford-London, Interface Publications, 2006. For the impact of the anti-Mongol fatwas and the Mardin fatwa on Farağ and an analytic discussion of Michot’s approach see Hoover, “Ibn Taymiyya between Moderation”, p. 177-178, p. 182-193.
Yahya Michot, Ibn Taymiyya. Mardin: Hégire, fuite du péché et “demeure de l’Islam”, Paris, Editions Albouraq, 1425 AH/2004 AD.
Michot Muslims under Non-Muslim Rule, p. 65.
Michot, “Ibn Taymiyya’s “New Mardin Fatwa”, p. 146. He recognizes the misreading error in the printed editions of the fatwa.
Ibn Taymiyya, Mağmūʿ fatāwā, (ed. Ibn Qāsim), vol. I, p. k. He underlines the difficulty in dealing with al-Zāhiriyya manuscripts. See also Muhammad Shams and ʿAlī al-ʿImrān, Al-ğāmiʿ li-sīrat šayḫ al-Islām Ibn Taymiyya ḫilāl sabʿat qurūn, Mecca, Dār ʿĀlam al-Fawāʾid, 1422 AH/2001 AD, p. 23.
Ibn Mufliḥ, al-Ãdāb, vol. I, p. 212.
ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Ibn Qāsim, al-Mustadrak ʿala mağmūʿ fatāwā šayḫ al-Islām Aḥmad Ibn Taymiyya, n.p., 1418 AH/1998 AD, p. 8-9. He quotes Ibn al-Qayyim’s testimony on the merit of Ibn Mufliḥ as a reliable source of Ibn Taymiyya who copied a lot of his legacy.
Nāṣir al-Fahd, Ṣiyānat Mağmūʿ al-Fatāwā min al-saqṭ wa-l-taṣḥīf, Riyadh, Aḍwāʾ al-Salaf, 2003, p. 8-13, p. 214-221.
Group authors, al-Durar al-saniyya fī l-ağwiba l-nağdiyya, ed. ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Ibn Qāsim, rev. 6th ed., n.p., 1995, vol. 9, p. 248. Cf. the first edition, al-Durar al-saniyya fī l-ağwiba l-nağdiyya, ed. ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Ibn Qāsim, Mecca, Umm al-Qura, 1356 AH/1937 AD, vol. III/7, p. 354 where the verb “yuʿāmal”/“to be treated” falls in the two occurrences as well.
Michot, “Ibn Taymiyya’s “New Mardin Fatwa”, p. 146.
The editor transliterates his surname in the email address cited on the front matter of the publication as al-Zeer; Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 4.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 5.
Ibn Taymiyya, al-Nubuwwāt, ed. ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz al-Ṭawiyān, Riyadh, Aḍwāʾ al-Salaf, 2000, p. 570.
Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya, Aḥkām ahl al-ḏimma, eds. Yusuf Al-Bakrī & Shākir Al-ʿĀrūrī, Al-Dammam, Ramādī li-l-Nashr, vol. I, p. 110.
Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya, Hidāyat al-ḥayārā fī ağwibat al-yahūd wa-l-naṣārā, ed. ʿUthmān Ḍumayriyya, Mecca, Dār ʿAlam al-Fawāʾid, p. 29-30.
Ibn al-Qayyim brings more evidence from the prophet’s tradition; that he never fought Quraish unless they began hostilities against the Muslims in Medina and how he respected the truce pact of al-Ḥudaybiyya and never initiated a war against the pagans of Mecca. He states that “If they have turned away from him, he would have not fought them” (
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 46-59. Al-Zīr dedicates a separate chapter (p. 43-45) to count the aims of this edition and study of the QM. One of the main goals is to defend a Wahhabi ‘moderate’ jihad perspective by interpreting the QM in light of other works of Ibn Taymiyya, to show its consistency with this particular perspective and the deviation of those who are not in line with the policies of the Saudi state; see. p. 11-12, p. 17, p. 39-40).
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 64.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 64; cf. p.23 where he concludes that among the reasons jihad is legislated in Islam is to “fight those who stand against the call for Islam, to oppose the supremacy of God’s word and the spread of the religion he accepted [for humankind]”
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 65. See below how Ibn al-Qayyim uses the optional particle “or” (aww) instead of “and” as cited by Al-Zīr.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 66.
Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya, Aḥkām, p. 110.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 28; cf. p. 66.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 33.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 87-90.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 91-96. Al-Qaraḍāwī, Fiqh, vol. I., p. 377-378.
I will come back later to his view on nasḫ in other works of his corpus.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 100-114. Here, Ibn Taymiyya opposes the opinion of prominent exegetes and jurists before and after him. See Maihula, “Analysis”, p. 1106-1107. Cf. Yaser Ellethy, Islam, Context, Pluralism and Democracy: Classical and Modern Interpretations, London-New York, Routledge, 2017, p. 117-122.
Ibn al-Ğawzī, Zād al-masīr fī ʿilm al-tafsīr, Beirut, al-Maktab al-Islāmī & Dār Ibn Ḥazm, 2002, vol. I, p. 110-112.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 115-118.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 119-120; Al-Qaraḍāwī, Fiqh, vol. I., p. 378.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 121-124, p. 128-133; Al-Qaraḍāwī, Fiqh, vol. I., p. 379.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 123-124.
جمهور السلف والخلف على أنها ليست مخصوصة ولا منسوخة، بل يقولون: إنا لا نُكره أحدًا على الإسلام، وإنما نُقاتل من حاربنا، فإن أسلم عُصِمَ دمه وماله، ولو لم يكن مَن فَعَلَ القتال لم نقتله ولم نُكرهه على الإسلام
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 125, p. 148-159, p. 178-183.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 164-183.
Editor’s brackets replacing a lacuna in the manuscript.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 211.
See David Waines, “Ibn Taymiyya”, in The Islamic World, ed. Andrew Rippin, Abingdon, Routledge, 2008, p. 378. Cf. Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 164-176.
Though Ibn Taymiyya does recognize them being seemingly ‘Muslims’ by virtue of speaking out the declaration of faith and practicing rituals, he still wonders whether this suffices for someone to be a “Muslim”, if he fails to keep/apply the Sharia and its injunctions. See Ibn Taymiyya, al-Siyāsa al-šarʿiyya fī iṣlāḥ al-rāʿī wa-l-raʿiyya, ed. ʿAlī Al-ʿImrān, Mecca, Dār ʿĀlam al-Fawāʾid, 1429 AH/2008 AD, p. 96, p. 162-163. His pupil, the prominent exegete Ibn Kathir (d. 974) supports this view in his commentary on Quran, V, 50; Ibn Kathīr, Tafsīr al-Qurʾān al-ʿAẓīm, Dar al-Ḥadīth, Cairo, vol. II, p. 87, quoted in Sivan, Radical Islam, p. 97-98, “Do they then seek after a judgment of the Jāhiliyya (pre-Islamic period), “[…] the Mongols who follow the Yasa code set down by Genghis Khan, which is a conglomeration of laws, some taken from Jewish, Christian, Muslim, and other legal traditions, and many others decided upon by the whim of the Mongol rulers; the whole amalgam being given priority over the laws of Allah laid down in the Koran and the Sunna. Those who follow such (man-made) laws are infidels and should be combated until they comply with the laws of God”. See also Hoover, “Ibn Taymiyya between Moderation and Radicalism”, p. 178-182.
On the “intransigence” of Ibn Taymiyya, see Alina Kokoschka & Birgit Krawietz, “Appropriation of Ibn Taymiyya and Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya: Challenging Expectations of Ingenuity”, in Islamic Theology, Philosophy and Law: Debating Ibn Taymiyya and Ibn Qayyim Al-Jawziyya, eds. Birgit Krawietz & Georges Tamer, in collaboration with Alina Kokoschka, Berlin-Boson, De Gruyter, 2013, p. 11-14. El Shamsy, Rediscovering the Islamic Classics, p. 167, characterizes him as “the iconoclastic bugbear of postclassical Islamic thought”.
See Shahab Ahmed, What is Islam: The Importance of Being Islamic, Princeton-Oxford, PUP, 2016, p. 93.
The letter itself draws on earlier works of Elias of Nisibis (Nestorian metropolitan of Nisibis; Elias Bar Šīnāyā, d. 1046). It uses Quranic verses to establish the veracity of the Christian faith. For detailed information on the letter and its author see Paul Khoury, Paul d’Antioche, évêque melkite de Sidon (XIIe S.), Beirut, Recherches de l’Institut de Lettres Orientales de Beyrouth, tome XXIV, 1964, p. 58-83 (Arabic), p. 169-87 (French). Ibn Taymiyya, Réponse raisonnable aux chrétiens? extrait de: La réponse valide à ceux qui ont altéré la religion du Messie (alǦawāb al-ṣaḥīḥ li-man baddala dīn al-Masīḥ) Ed., trad. et comm. par Laurent Basanese, s.j., Beyrouth, Istitut Français du Proche-Orient, 2012, p. 47-50. See also Diego Cucarella, “Carta a un amigo musulmán de Sidón de Pablo de Antioquía”, Collectanea Christiana Orientalia 4 (2007), p. 190, p. 195.
Thomas, 2001, p. 203-223. For example, another Damascene scholar, Ibn Abī Ṭālib al-Dimashqī, wrote Risāla li-ahl jazīrat Qubruṣ (Utrecht, MS 1449, apud Thomas, 214, n.20). See Rifaat Ebied and David Thomas (eds.), Muslim-Christian Polemic during the Crusades. The Letter from the People of Cyprus and Ibn Abī Ṭālib al-Dimashqī’s Response, Leiden, Brill, 2005. The famous Egyptian scholar Šihāb al-Dīn al-Qarāfī (d. 1285) wrote a long treatise to rebut this letter; see Al- Qarāfī, al-Ağwiba al-fāḫira. See also Cucarella, 2007, p. 189; who characterizes the impact of the Letter as follows: “La obra que aquí se presenta […] dio origen a uno de los episodios más ricos y complejos de la historia del debate islamocristiano”.
See Mehdi Berriah, “Mobility and Versatility of the ʿUlamāʾ in the Mamluk Period: The Case of Ibn Taymiyya”, in Professional Mobility in Islamic Societies (700-1750), eds. Mehdi Berriah & Mohamad ElMerheb, Leiden, Brill, 2021, p. 107.
Ibn Taymiyya, Mağmūʿ fatāwā, vol. 28, p. 399-403, cf. 478; Ibn ʿAbd al-Hādī, al-ʿUqūd al-durriyya, p. 153.
He saw in those Shiite sects, Ismāʿīliyya and Nuṣayriyya, an indoor enemy more dangerous than the Mongols and the Crusades and that the obligation of fighting them is prior to fighting those external enemies; see his Mağmūʿ fatāwā, vol. 28, p. 405, p. 435; Minhāğ al-Sunna al-nabawiyya, Muhammad Salem (ed.), Riyadh, Jāmiʿat al-Imām Muhammad Ibn Saʾūd, vol. I, p. 11, p. 20-21; vol. II, p. 486; Abū Zahra, Ibn Taymiyya, p. 9.
Ibn Taymiyya, Mağmūʿ fatāwā, vol. 28, p. 413-414, p. 474-479.
Ibn Qāsim, al-Mustadrak, p. 219. Cf. Ibn Mufliḥ, al-Ãdāb, vol. I, p. 275.
Waines, 2008, p. 375. For the exploitation of his of anti-Nusayris fatwa by modern Syrian militant groups against the Alawite regime of Hafiz al-Asad, see Sivan, 1990, p. 106-107. For his propagandist role in this expedition and other activities see Berriah, 2021, p. 101-102.
Quoted in Ibn Rajab, Al-Ḏayl, vol. 4, p. 497; cf. Ibn Taymiyya, Mağmūʿ fatāwā, vol. 28, p. 466.
Ibn Taymiyya, Mağmūʿ fatāwā, vol. 4, p. 13. See also Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida mukhtaṣara, p. 192-193. The last quotation is attributed to Yaḥyā ibn Maʿīn (d. 847) in al-Ḏahabī, Siyar aʿlām al-nubalāʾ, eds. Shuʿayb al-Arnaʾūṭ & Muhammad al-ʿIrqsūsī (eds), Beirut, Muʾassassat al-Risāla, 1996, vol. X, p. 518, in his biography of Yaḥyā Ibn Yaḥyā al-Nisāburī, which might denote another possible misreading of Ibn Taymiyya’s manuscript.
A detailed account of these quoted works is to be consulted in the abovementioned work of Bin Ḥamdān, Dalālat al-nuṣūṣ. One of the ardent opponents of the theory of ğihād al-ṭalab for the mere reason of kufr is the contemporary scholar Yūsuf al-Qaraḍāwī (1926-2022). In his discussion of QM, Fiqh, vol. I, p. 377-383, he establishes the originality of the QM as belonging to Ibn Taymiyya. He vehemently employs a plethora of arguments to establish the view that Ibn Taymiyya does not support ğihād al-ṭalab. His strategy is mainly based on scriptural and legal texts quoted in the QM. Nevertheless, a more nuanced comparison with contradicting views in other works of Ibn Taymiyya leaves this approach disputed, as it will be shown later. Al-Qaraḍāwī’s view could be linked to his generic jihad-approach from, what is called, a “wasaṭī” (centrist-moderationist) perspective which strives to present a more moderate view of jihad and to find a middle way between Salafi-jihadists, proponents of offensive jihad, and “westernized-secularists” who want to “kill jihad”. An analysis of this approach is presented by Sagi Polka, Shaykh Yūsuf al-Qarad˙āwī: Spiritual Mentor of Wasat˙ī Salafism, Syracuse, SUP, 2019 (esp. Ch. 5 on “The Conception of Jihad”). Polka, p. 210, states that “al-Qaraḍāwī maps the approaches of various ʿulamāʾ to jihad and locates the wasaṭī approach between two extremes, between “deficiency” (tafrīṭ) and “excess” (ifrāṭ), between those who want to “kill jihad” and those who want to “wage war against the whole world.” He also, p. 212-213, argues that “al-Qaraḍāwī wants to present wasaṭī Islam as an alternative to jihadi Salafism and to the Islamist groups that have adopted that approach, especially al-Qaʿida and the IS. Between these two extremes – westernizing secularists on one hand and jihadi Salafīs on the other – al-Qaraḍāwī locates his own wasaṭiyya as a “balanced middle approach,” an approach he explains thoroughly in his very extensive book on jihad published in 2009 under the title The Jurisprudence of Jihad: A Comparative Study of Its Laws and Philosophy in Light of the Qurʾān and the Sunna. The wasaṭī view of jihad, as clarified in this book, is based on the tools of wasaṭī jurisprudence and on the interpretation of Qurʾān and Sunna texts, which are presented as proof that the laws of Islam in no way promote violence or terrorism.”
Ibn Taymiyya, al-Siyāsa, p. 158.
Cf. Ibn Taymiyya, Mağmūʿ fatāwā, vol. 28, p. 354 , where the text cites the indirect transitive verb “imtanaʿa min hāḏā” (abstains from this) instead of “manaʿa hāḏā” (hinders this):
On the differences between two versions of al-Siyāsa, see Bori, “One or Two Versions”, esp. p. 15; Bori, “Istanbul, Süleymaniye Kütüphanesi MS”, esp. p. 28-47. Al-Kabbī, 1992, p. 71-74.
Ibn Taymiyya, al-Siyāsa, p. 153; Zuhayr al-Kabbī, Fiqh al-ğihād li-šayḫ al-Islām al-imām Ibn Taymiyya, Beirut, Dār al-Fikr al-ʿArabī, 1992, p. 71.
Ibn Taymiyya, al-Siyāsa, p. 158-159; Al-Kabbī, Fiqh al-ğihād, p. 74-75.
Al-Qaraḍāwī, Fiqh, vol. I, p. 377-378.
See indicatively Al-Kasānī, Badāʾiʿ al-ṣanāʾiʿ fī tartīb al-šarāʾiʿ, eds. ʿAlī Muʿwwaḍ & ʿĀdil ʿAbd al-Mawğūd, Beirut, Dār al-Kutub al-ʿIlmiyya, 2nd ed., 2003, vol. 9, p. 398. He differentiates between two groups among the unbelievers who could be (il-)legitimately killed: during fight or thereafter (hostages, etc.). As for those encountered ‘during fight’, he underlines the impermissibility of killing non-fighting and non-involved (in hostilities) individuals such as women, boys, elders, handicaps etc. For a discussion of the different legal opinions Cf. Ibn Rushd, Bidāyat al-muğtahid, vol. II, p. 740-744. Cf. n. 70 above.
Ibn Taymiyya, al-Siyāsa, p. 160.
For a brief discussion of his relevant treatise see Ellethy, Islam, p. 220-221.
Ibn Taymiyya, al-Siyāsa, p. 159-1602.
Jon Hoover, Ibn Taymiyya, London, Oneworld, 2019, p. 104-105. In this original publication, Hoover argued that, in al-Siyāsa al-šarʿiyya, “Ibn Taymiyya also cites the harsher juristic view that all unbelievers should be fought simply by virtue of their unbelief, with the women and children taken as war booty”. He rejects this latter view, stating that ‘Fighting is only against those who fight us’ (Siyasa 156).” In a later published web-clarification (https://sites.google.com/site/jhoover363/taymiyyan-studies/jihad-against-the-mongols?pli=1, accessed 21.6.2022), Hoover revises, deletes sentences and corrects his view in the book on whether “Ibn Taymiyya uphold[s] the common medieval Muslim juristic view that offensive jihad should be waged against unbelievers, or does he maintain that unbelievers should only be fought if they initiate hostilities?” He then concludes: “My discussion of Ibn Taymiyya’s doctrine of jihad from his well-known Law-Guided Public Policy (al-Siyāsa al-sharʿiyya) found in my book Ibn Taymiyya (London: Oneworld, 2019), p. 103-105, is unnecessarily ambiguous on this question. He does in fact affirm the common medieval view on offensive jihad in Siyāsa.” He deletes the sentence “Unbelievers are to be left alone as long as they make no effort to spread innovation and unbelief. However, those who do attempt to spread their errant beliefs and practices must be fought.”
Sophia Vasalou notes how in cases of conflicts, Ibn Taymiyya “emphasizes on the importance of establishing the overall balance of benefits and costs”; she gives as example: “Killing is an evil, but so is unbelief, and scripture has clarified that the latter evil outweighs the former so that it is acceptable to kill when the faith comes under threat (Quran, II, 217)”; Vasalou, Ibn Taymiyya’s Theological Ethics, p. 207-208. On this balance of benefits and costs and its modern appropriations as utilitarianism see Hoover, “Ibn Taymiyya between Moderation”, p. 193-196; Idem, “Foundations”, p. 145-168; Idem, Ibn Taymiyya, p. 104.
Examples are Kor 3, 186, “Assuredly you will be tried in your property and in your persons, and you will hear much wrong from those who were given the Scripture before you, and from the idolaters. But if you persevere and ward off (evil), then that is of the steadfast heart of things.”, and Kor 2, 109, “Many of the people of the Scripture long to make you disbelievers after your belief, through envy on their own account, after the truth has become manifest to them. Forgive and be indulgent (toward them) until Allah gives command. Lo! Allah is Able to do all things.”
Ibn Taymiyya, al-Ṣārim, vol. II, p. 405-413; see also Abū Zahra, Ibn Taymiyya, p. 319.
See Hoover, “Ibn Taymiyya between Moderation”, p. 194. In this particular situation Ibn Taymiyya (al-Ṣārim, vol. II, p. 413, p. 444) refers to the ‘land’ where a Muslim faces this challenge; whether he is in a weak or powerful status, and that the reaction could be respectively considered.
Ibn Taymiyya, al-Ṣārim, vol. II, p. 444.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 98-101, p. 113-114.
For a detailed discussion of this claim, see Ellethy, Islam, p. 117-122.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 139-146.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 147; cf. p. 145.
Ibn Taymiyya, Mağmūʿ fatāwā, vol. 28, p. 601-630.
Diego Cucarella, « Corresponding across Religious Borders. The Letter of Ibn Taymiyya to a Crusader in Cyprus », Islamochristiana, 36 (2010), p. 187.
Ibn Taymiyya, Mağmūʿ fatāwā, vol. 28, p. 617-618; Ellethy, Islam, p. 126.
Ibn Taymiyya, Mağmūʿ fatāwā, vol. 28, p. 626.
Ibn Qāsim, al-Mustadrak, p. 215.
Ibn Qāsim, al-Mustadrak, p. 215.
Ibn Taymiyya, al-Siyāsa, p. 163-164.
At the end of his letter to the Sultan al-Nāṣir Ibn Qalawūn concerning jihad against the Mongols, Ibn Taymiyya stipulates the urgency of this initiative-taking jihad against enemies whose prospective threat to Muslim territories is clear. Ibn Taymiyya, Jāmiʿ al-rasāʾil li-šayḫ al-Islām Aḥmad Ibn ʿAbd al-Ḥalīm Ibn ʿAbd al-Salām Ibn Taymiyya, ed. Muhammad Shams, Riyadh-Beirut, Dār ʿAṭṭāʾāt al-ʿIlm-Dār Ibn Ḥazm, 2019, vol. 5, p. 306: “It is not part of the Sharia of Islam that Muslims wait for their enemy to come to/attack them. This was not commanded by God, nor His Messenger, nor the Muslims. But Muslims must go to them for [carrying out] jihad for the sake of God. And if they begin to move, it is not permissible to enable them to cross the lands of the Muslims. Rather, it is necessary for the Islamic armies to advance to the Muslim borders.”
وليس من شريعة الإسلام أن المسلمين ينتظرون عدوهم حتى يقدم عليهم، هذا لم يأمر اللّٰه به ولا رسوله ولا المسلمون، ولكن يجب على المسلمين أن يقصدوهم للجهاد في سبيل اللّٰه، وإن بدأوا هم بالحركة فلا يجوز تمكينهم حتى يعبروا ديار المسلمين، بل الواجب تقدم العساكر الإسلامية إلى ثغور المسلمين.
For an annotated French translation with detailed analysis of the letter see Emmanuel Fons, « À propos des Mongols. Une lettre d’Ibn Taymiyya au sultan al-Malik al-Nāṣir Muḥammad b. Qalāwūn ». Annales Islamologiques, vol. 43, 2009, p. 31-73, texte arabe, p. 73-69.
Ibn Taymiyya, Majmūʿ fatāwa, vol. 28, p. 629-630.
Kor II, 217 “They ask you [Mohammad] concerning fighting in the Prohibited Month. Say: ‘Fighting therein is a grave (offence); but graver is it in the sight of Allah to prevent [men from] access to the way of Allah, to disbelieve in Him, to prevent access to the Sacred Mosque, and drive out its members.’ Tumult and oppression are worse than slaughter. Nor will they cease fighting you until they turn you back from your faith if they can. And if any of you turn back from their faith and die in unbelief, their works will bear no fruit in this life and in the Hereafter; they will be companions of the Fire and will abide therein”; and LX, 8-9 “Allah forbids you not with regard to those who fight you not for (your) Faith nor drive you out of your homes, from dealing kindly and justly with them: for Allah loves those who are just. Allah only forbids you, with regard to those who fight you for (your) faith, and drive you out of your homes, and support (others) in driving you out, from turning to them (for friendship and protection). It is such as turn to them (in these circumstances), that do wrong.”
Ibn Taymiyya, al-Siyāsa, p. 164.
Ibn Saʿd, Kitāb al-ṭabaqāt al-kabīr, ed. ʿAlī ʿUmar, Cairo, Maktabat al-Khānjī, 2001, vol. II, p. 150-151.
He comments on several traditions among which a famous one where the prophet condemned the deed of Usama Ibn Zayd who killed a non-believer in the battlefield while he pronounced the šahāda (testimony of faith) believing that it was a fake conversion to save his own life. AL-Bukhari, The Translation of the Meanings of Sahîh Al-Bukhâri. Arabic-English, tr. Muhammad Muhsen Khan, Riyadh, Darussalam, 1997, vol. 5, k. al-maġāzī, hadith 4296; Muslim, English Translation of Sahîh Muslim, tr. Nasiruddin al-Khattab, Riyadh, Darussalam, 2007, vol. I, b. al-imān, hadith 96.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 133.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida muḫtaṣara, p. 134.
Ibn Taymiyya, Qāʿida mukhtaṣara, p. 136.
Abū Zahra, Ibn Taymiyya, p. 318; he comments on ‘the opinion of the majority’ which Ibn Taymiyya accepts, “No fight except for in the case of [repel of] aggression, fight is [then] for defense, even if it is in the form of attack”. Maihula, “Analysis”, p. 1104. Cf. Al-Zuḥaylī, Ãthār al-ḥarb, p. 86-94; Hoover, “Reconciling Ibn Taymiyya’s Legitimisation”, p. 115.
