WAR AND PEACE IN ISLAM — In the Light of Quran and Hadith

at the time when the Prophet victoriously entered Makkah in 630 CE, most of the Makkans were non-believers. They were brought before the Prophet while he was in the premises of the Kabah. The Prophet did not offer them these two choices: ‘Convert to Islam or you shall be put to death.’ On the contrary, he said to these Makkans: “Iz-habu faantum al-tulaqa” (Ibn Hisham). That is: ‘Go, you all are free.’ Although these people embraced the faith of Islam later on, their acceptance of Islam was completely by choice. It was not a matter of forced conversion. In the above Hadith, the words, “Till they say: ‘La ilaha illallah’” symbolically implies surrender, or the ending of war. Following in the footsteps of the Prophet, the primary duty of the believers is to continue the work of peacefully conveying the divine message to mankind. After the death of the Prophet, there were some wars between the Companions of the Prophet and the two adjacent empires—the Byzantine Empire and the Sassanid Empire. But, these wars were started as defensive wars by the Companions, because both these empires had exhibited clear aggression by killing the ambassador of the Muslim state and sending their armies at the borders of the territory of Arabia. This led to initiation of war by the two empires. 20th century Muslim leaders wanted to revive the Muslim ummah. However, their starting-point was wrong. They sought the revival of Muslim history of the later period, when Muslims had established empires. The right beginning for these leaders would have been to seek to revive the original method of the Prophet of Islam, which was communication of the message of God to mankind. But Muslim leaders did not begin their endeavours from this juncture. This was clearly an erroneous judgement on their part, and it led to widespread problems. It exhorted some Muslims to take to violence as a means to pursue their goals, resulting in the enormous tragedies that are unfolding all around us now. o