19. GREATER JIHAD

19. Greater Jihad ~ 52 ~ According to the Hadith, a believer is one who wages jihad with himself in the path of obedience to God. That is, at moments when the self (nafs), lured by some temptation, desires to deviate from the path of God, he keeps control over it and remains unswervingly on the divine path. This is his jihad – a permanent feature of the life of a believer, continuing day and night, and ending only with death. The other form of jihad is that which is engaged in to propagate the constructive message of Islam. All those who embark upon such a course must first of all study the Qur’an and Sunnah in a dispassionate and objective manner. No kind of conditioning should be allowed to come in the way of such study. Only after passing through this intellectual jihad will the would be proponent of Islam be in a position to make a true representation of his religion. Two conditions have been laid down in the Qur’an for the communication of the teachings of Islam to others – naasih, well wishing and amin,