The Command of War in Islam

companions of the Prophet held himself aloof from the battle. People approached him and, quoting the verse of qital-al-fitna, asked him why he was not joining in the battle. Abdullah ibn Umar replied that ‘fitna’ as mentioned in the Quran did not refer to political infighting, but rather to the religious coercive system, that had already been put to an end by them. (Fathul Bari, Vol. 8, p. 60) From this we learn that the war against fitna was a war of limited duration, temporary in nature, meant to be engaged in only until its specific purpose had been served. Invoking the Quranic exhortation to do battle against fitna in order to validate acts of war which had quite other aims is highly improper. This verse could be cited only if the same state of affairs as existed at the time of its revelation were to prevail once again. The biographers of the Prophet Muhammad  have put the number of ghazwa (battle) at more than 80. This gives the impression that the Prophet Muhammad  in his 23-year prophetic career waged about four battles in a year. But this impression is entirely baseless. The truth is that the Prophet Muhammad  in his entire prophetic life, engaged in war only on three occasions. All the other incidents described as ghazwat were in actual fact examples of avoidance of war and not instances of involvement in battle. For instance, in the books of Seerah, the incident of AIAhzab is called a ghazwa (battle), whereas the truth is that on this occasion the armed tribes of Arabia, twelve thousand in number, reached the borders of Madinah with all intentions of waging war but the Prophet and his companions dug a deep trench between them, thus successfully preventing a battle from taking place. The same is the case with all the other incidents called ghazwa. The opponents of the Prophet repeatedly tried to get him embroiled in war, but on all such occasions, he