The Qur'an is often misunderstood to be a book penned from cover to cover by its author. Individual verses are often mistaken to be conveying a general command to all Muslims. Instead of understanding the whole dialogue said in response to a given situation, lessons are drawn from parts of verses thereby failing to understand the correct meaning. Interestingly, these verses are so easy to be understood that they do not even require any additional information from any external source.
In this series, we shall go through a few commonly referred verses. Our
approach shall be very simple. We'll
read the verse, read those before and if needed, read those after. In
this way, we'll get a clear picture of what is being talked about and who is
being addressed. We'll let the
Qur'an speak for itself and realize that Qur'an alone answers all the doubts.
One of the most commonly quoted verses is the 191st verse of the second
chapter. The verse is presumed to be commanding all the Muslims to kill
all the non-Muslims. We begin by reading the actual and complete
verse,
Qur'an 2:191 "And kill
them wherever you overtake them and expel them
from wherever they have expelled you, and fitnah is worse than killing. And do
not fight them at al-Masjid al- Haram until they fight you there. But if they
fight you, then kill them. Such is the recompense of the disbelievers."
The primary cause for this misunderstanding is the presumption that
"them" at the beginning of the verse refers to "all non
Muslims". However, the verse goes on to say "from where they
have expelled you". Any reasonable person could question that if the
verse refers to all the non-Muslims, where have they all expelled the
Muslims from? It certainly seems to be talking about a certain group
of people that expelled the other group.
The reason to fight does not end here. Not only has this group of people
expelled the other, but the Qur'an also holds these people responsible for
spreading "fitnah" as well. Fitnah is an
extensive word that means causing corruption, sedition, terror, mischief,
rape, violence, etc. So do all non-Muslims spread fitnah? Has no Muslim
ever spread fitnah?
The verse also makes more clear its context by specifying the place,
Masjid Al Haram and stating "until they fight you there". So,
summing it up, it becomes clear that "them" is a group that expelled
the other group, are responsible for spreading fitnah, and in this context,
probably live somewhere in the vicinity of Masjid Al Haram. These are the
disbelievers that the verse precisely talks about.
Now, when reading any book and while coming across a pronoun, we always
go back to see the noun used in the first place that it refers to. And in this
case, we go back to the previous verse i.e. 2:190
"Fight in the way of
Allah those who fight you but do not transgress. Indeed. Allah
does not like transgressors."
With this, it becomes evident that it talks about fighting "them" back,
those who fight you. Furthermore, the verse says "but do not
transgress", which means not to go beyond the limits of what is
morally, socially and legally acceptable, for Allah does not like the
transgressors.
These specifications of transgression were always commanded by the
Prophet to his people before going into the battlefield. And the same was
commanded by his companions to their successors. The most important of
these were summarized by the Prophet's companion and first Caliph, Abu Bakr
(r.a.), in the form of ten rules for the Muslim army. Addressing
his army, he said,
"O people! I charge
you with ten rules; learn them well! Stop, O people, that I may give you ten
rules for your guidance in the battlefield. Do not commit treachery or deviate
from the right path. You must not mutilate dead bodies. Neither
kill a child, nor a woman, nor an aged man. Bring no harm to the
trees, nor burn them with fire, especially those which are fruitful. Slay
not any of the enemy's flock, save for your food. You are likely to
pass by people who have devoted their lives to monastic services; leave
them alone."
The same was demonstrated by
another companion and Caliph, Hazrat Ali (r.a.) when he said at the
Battle of Siffin, that Islam does not permit Muslims to
stop the supply of water to their enemy. All of these commandments can
be traced back to the teachings of the Prophet of Islam (peace be upon
him).
All these violations fall into the category of
transgressions and the verse 190 prohibited it prior to the
command to fight back those who fight you, expel you and spread
"fitnah". Finally, the Qur'an in the next verse also states very
beautifully that if these people cease to fight, then there shall always be
hope from Allah, for them to be forgiven and return to the righteous
path.
"And if they cease, then indeed, Allah is Forgiving and Merciful." [Qur'an 2:192]
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