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Jihad: No Excuse for Terrorism
| Article
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11152 |
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Section : |
CURRENT ISSUES
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Date : |
3 / 1986 |
2,131 Words |
| Author
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William F. Willoughby
William F. Willoughby covered the religio-political scenes in
Washington and around the world for a quarter of a century,
serving as Washington bureau chief of Religious News Service,
religion news editor and columnist for The Washington Times.
He is currently publisher of Religion Today. |
As the growing frustrations over international terrorism continue, particularly where it is known that Palestinians and other Arabs are involved, it is tempting for the extemporaneous analyst to attribute this kind of terrorism's genesis to the Moslem concept of jihad, or what is too facilely termed a "holy war."
This is a dangerous mistake that could lead to trouble in trying to combat terrorism.
At an Islamic conference last year in Teheran, some Iranian scholars advanced a concept of jihad, based, wisely, on broad Moslem teachings rather than the Shi'ite teachings generally adhered to in Iran, to justify Iran's war against fellow Moslems in Iraq.
Dr. Majid Khadduri of Washington, D.C., a much-respected Islamic scholar connected with the Johns Hopkins University Washington Center, said that when Moslems are involved in terrorist acts, particularly those against unarmed, innocent civilians, such individuals are operating outside the sanctions of the Moslem faith.
Jihad, he said, neither historically nor contemporarily, condones actions such as those which killed innocent people at the Vienna and Rome airports.
They are the acts of individuals acting contrary to the precepts of their religion, he said.
Khadduri, in his book The Islamic Conception of Justice, published by the John Hopkins University Press, says that the jihad, to which many antagonists of
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