MUSLIM WORLD-VIEW — An Islamic Perspective

Quran and Hadith for this specific situation. Following the Hijrah, a state was established in Madinah under the leadership of the Prophet. To describe a situation such as this, later jurists devised the term Dar ul-Islam. But neither the Quran nor the Hadith uses the term Dar ul-Islam for the Madinah of the Prophet’s time. In fact, the Quran uses Dar us-Salaam for Paradise (10:25). There is no bit of land on this earth for which the terms Dar ul-Islam or Dar ul- Iman (Abode of faith) are used in the Quran. Islam does not allow the use of terms such as Dar ul-Islam, Dar ul-Kufr, and Dar ul-Harb, etc. for such situations. Devising such terms by the Abbasid period jurists amounted to transgressing their bounds. They exercised ijtihad in a matter where they were not authorized by the Shariah. The coining of such terms by the jurists was an error in judgment. A student of Islam should reject this ijtihad. In the terminology of the Shariah, it is an invention (bid‘a) and must be rejected. It is clearly mentioned in the Hadith that regardless of who does so, introducing anything new into Islam is not permissible. Muslims find great appeal in the 'community-oriented approach', but such things are short-sighted, narrowminded and closeted representations of reality that have no appeal for anyone else. The coining of such terms as Dar ul-Islam, Dar ul-Kufr and Dar ul-Harb is an extremely serious matter. It relates to the Muslim world-view. It is responsible for inculcating the mentality of 'the chosen people' among Muslims. It is the sign of the decline of a nation. We learn from the Quran that God does not divide human society on the basis of such demarcations as Dar ul-Islam, Dar ul-Kufr and Dar ul-Harb. God sees and deals with all human beings in the same light. The Quran refutes notions of God’s 'favoured people' in the strongest of terms. The Quran tells us that in the eyes of God, everyone’s worth is determined by their personal actions or character, rather than by their belonging to a particular race or community (THE QURAN 53:39). One verse of the Quran in this regard will suffice for this purpose: