A devious attempt to equate Gita with Quran by blatant recourse to taqiyah

By: Ram Ohri, IPS (Retd)

“I am with you: give Firmness to the Believers
I will instill terror into the hearts of the Unbelievers.”

Quran 8.12
. . . . . . . .

Recently a very clumsy attempt was made to downgrade the Gita during an interactive discourse organized by Times of India on a quixotic topic, ‘Jihad in the Gita and the Quran’. The title of the debate implied that the doctrine of jihad has been preached both in the Gita and the Quran - something totally false and highly offensive to Hindu ethos. The participants were Maulana Wahiduddin and Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, while the well known columnist, Narayani Ganesh, acted as moderator.

First things first. The scriptural soul of Hinduism, the Gita, does not preach, nor even remotely mentions., anything comparable to the Islamic doctrine of jihad which is a permanent holy war against all non-Muslims, as ordained in Islamic scriptures. It is difficult, nay impossible, to fathom the intent of Times of India group to select such a wonky theme suggesting that jihad has been sanctioned in Hindu scriptures, too !. There is no moral equivalence between what Gita preaches and what Quran ordains. The choice of the subject of the discourse shows total mental bankruptcy because it tries to equate the two incomparable scriptures. Apparently the leading lights of Times of India group as well as Narayani Ganesh have neither read the Gita, nor Quran. Otherwise they would not have ventured to wade into the minefield of jihad which has tormented innumerable civilisations and countless countries for centuries and taken toll of crores of innocent lives. The attempt to underline some kind of spiritual equivalence between the Gita and the Quran is nothing short of an affront to sacred Hindu beliefs, nay to the Gita, itself.

It is a pity that Sri Sri could not see through the clever game being played by the sham-secularist newspaper to bring down Gita to the level of jihadi orthopraxy, enshrined in the Quran. Nor could he rebut the inane profanity hidden in the theme. The Gita does not command Hindus to kill all non-Hindus, or for that matter, not even atheists. Sri Krishna advised a wavering Arjuna at Kurukshetra to wage war in the cause of righteousness and justice, and nothing more. Even after explaining the import of ‘dharma’ and righteousness, Sri Krishna left the final choice about taking up arms to Arjuna, saying that it was for him to make the correct decision, in according to ‘dharma’.

On the other hand, Jihad is not, repeat not, merely a struggle with one’s self, as claimed by Maulana Wahiduddin. It is Islam’s holy war against ‘kaffirs” (in Indian context read Hindus) as ordained in the Quran Importance of jihad has been highlighted by M.J. Akbar, in his tome, The Shade of Swords, where in the Introduction itself he has reiterated that “jihad is the signature tune of Islamic history”1. Elaborating the Islamic doctrine he says that though the Prophet did say that the ‘greater’ jihad (i.e., jihad-e-akbar) was the struggle to cleanse the impurity within, it was the lesser jihad (i.e., jihad-e-asghar) which had “powered the armies of Islam and made them all conquering”.2 For Muslims, M.J. Akbar, continues, jihad is not merely a question of cleansing the inner spirit; it is also a call for holy war regularly heard since the beginning of Islam. He has drawn pointed attention to the saying by the Prophet himself that “Paradise comes under the shade of swords”3. A similar message was conveyed to his jihadi hordes by Osama bin Laden during an interview on CNN news channel on May 10, 1997, when he proclaimed that the acme of this religion (i.e., Islam) was jihad. M.J. Akbar’s exposition of jihad is a clear rebuttal of the falsehood being preached by Maulana Wahiduddin and several others to hoodwink the gullible Hindus.

The claim of Maulana that jihad has nothing to do with the concept of holy war against infidels is again comprehensively rebutted by the well known exposition of jihad by Sheikh Abdullah bin Muhammad bin Humaid (a former Chief Justice of Saudi Arabia) in his commentary titled, ‘Jihad in the Quran and Sunnah’. The learned scholar, an acknowledged authority on Islam, emphasizes that Allah has ordained that Al-jihad (i.e., the holy fighting in Allah’s cause) should be carried out by the following three means :

( i ) with the heart (i.e., intentions or feelings) ;
(ii) with the hand (ie., with weapons, etc.) ; and
(iii) with the tongue (i.e., by speeches and preachings, in the cause of Allah).

Sheikh Abdullah bin Muhammad bin Humaid further elaborates that Allah will reward all those who participate in jihad with lofty dwellings in the Garden of Paradise.3 He clearly states that jihad, or fighting in the cause of Allah, is superior to non-obligatory prayers, fasting, Zakat, Umra and even Haj. As explained in Sahi Muslim No. 4696, Abu Huraira, an important companion of the Messenger of Allah, had emphasized that the Prophet had declared that a Muslim who died, but did not fight in the way of Allah, nor did express any desire or determination for jihad died the death of a hypocrite.4 A similar message for waging a holy war against infidels is contained in Verse 74 of Surah Nisi which says that whosoever fights in the way of Allah, be he slain or victorious, on him we shall bestow a vast reward. Logically a taqiyah practicing cleric like Maulana Wahiduddin should have been confronted with Verse 8.12 and Verse 74 which openly preach jihad through terrorizing the so-called infidels. But unfortunately Sri Sri failed to do so perhaps because of his lack of knowledge about the Quran and the doctrine of jihad. The conceptual framework of jihad has been lucidly enunciated in Surah Anfal, namely the eighth Sura (i.e., chapter 8) and 9th Surah titled ‘Taubah’ of the Quran, although this holy war has been enjoined on the faithful in many other chapters also. In fact, there are more than 200 verses in the Quran exhorting the Muslims to wage a holy war against the infidels.

More importantly the doctrine of jihad has at least four major components, e.g., forcible conversion of the so-called ‘kaffirs’ on pain of death, the scriptural sanction for ‘slaughter in the land’ in verse 8.67 after defeating the kaffirs and recourse to ghanima which means plunder and seizure of the property of the vanquished kaffirs, including carrying away of their women and children. A typical example of the ‘slaughter in the land’ was the beheading of nearly Jews, chained and menacled, under supervision of Prophet Muhammad, in the public square of Medina in the year 627 A.D., after the Battle of Ditch. Another example is from Indian history when after Muhammad bin Qasim’s victory over Raja Dahir of Sind, when Hajjaj reminded bin Qasim of the Prophet’s commandment :”Give no quarter to infidels but cut their throats. Then know that this is the command of the great God. You shall not be too ready to grant protection, because it will prolong your work”.5 The fourth important component of jihad is the imposition of ‘jiziya’ or poll tax on the so-called ‘dhimmies’, i.e., non-Muslims living under protection of the Muslim rulers. Originally meant for only Christians and Jews (the people of the Book) later on it was extended to ‘kaffir’ Hindus also. Otherwise the Quranic punishment for ‘kaffirs’ is death and destruction.

The scriptural sanction for enjoying the spoils of war, including carrying away of women and children of the vanquished ‘kaffirs’ is accorded in verse 8.69 of Surah Anfal which says “Eat ye the spoils of war. They are lawful and pure”. Thus the Quran proclaims that there is nothing improper about plunder and enjoying the spoils of war; it is a mujahid’s prerogative. The only condition imposed is that ‘holy’ one-fifth of the spoils of war (including the captive women) must be sent to the Prophet, and after him, to the Caliph as his share of the war booty. The command about treatment to be meted out to the plundered womenfolk is contained in verse 4.24 which asserts : “ All married women are forbidden (to you) save those (captives) whom your right hand possesses.”6 Obviously, they are to be used as concubines, as indeed they have been throughout history..

Interestingly, Islam has a doctrine of using deception and telling lies to further the cause of Islam. It is called “Taqiyah”, or recourse to deception, which is duly sanctioned in Verse 16.106, which approves that under certain circumstances and Muslim can tell a lie (in the cause of Islam) for which no action will lie against him. ‘Taqiyah’ is also approved in many more Verses , namely 16.106, 3.28, 2.225 and 66.2. Explaining the utility of taqiyah Sahi Bukhari recounts the assassination of a poet, Ka’b bin al-Ashraf under orders of the Prophet.7 The men who volunteered to murder Ka’b used deception to gain the poet’s trust by pretending that they had turned against Prophet Muhammad in order to draw the victim out of his fortress and then killed him. Sahi Bukhari 84:64-65 categorically affirms that Hazrat Ali had confirmed that lying is permissible in order to deceive the enemy.8 . No wonder Maulana Wahiduddin and many others like him keep on confounding gullible Hindus, even Hindu seers, through their lectures laced with taqiyah. Sadly the wayward discourse clearly highlighted that Sri Sri Ravi Shankar has not read the Quran at all. More importantly the discourse further showed his astonishing inability to comprehend what Sri Krishna had preached at Kurukshetra which was in no way comparable to the doctrine of jihad enunciated in the Quran. He failed to point out that Gita preaches the concept of righteousness while doing one’s ‘karmic’ duty, above everything else. But Gita does not sanction the senseless killings of the kind which are ordained in innumerable verses of the Quran. Nor does Gita sanction plunder after victory, nor the carrying away of the hapless women and children of those vanquished in war and sharing them as ‘war booty’.

Perhaps due to his inadequate knowledge of the Quran and the Hadith, or sheer timidity, Sri Sri could not rebut the bogus contention of Maulana Wahiduddin that jihad means nothing more than trying to control one’s desires and that some Muslims presently engaged in “violent activities which they claim to be jihad” should be ignored because “these people belong to non-governmental organizations”. How is it that all these non-State actors like Al Qaeda, Lashkar-e-Tayyeba, Jasih-e-Muhammad, Taliban, Harkat-ul-Jihad-e-Islami, Hamas, Fatah, Hezbollah, etc., responsible for killing thousands of innocents, are a speciality of Islamic States like Pakistan, Iran, Syria, Palestine, etc ? What is most important is that all these non-state actors are the creation of various Islamic governments who invariably support them in their nefarious activities.

Before closing this rejoinder it must be pointed out that the notorious July 2008 e-mail circulated by Indian Mujahideen had quoted verbatim three Ayats of Quran (in Arabic along with English translation) exhorting the faithful to kill the infidels. After pouring enormous ridicule on Hindu Gods and Goddesses, they had commanded the Hindus to convert to Islam failing which they shall be slaughtered as surely as their forbears had been by Muhammad bin Qasi, Mahmud Ghazanvi and Muhammad Ghauri in the past. And within four months Lashkar-e-Tayyeba’s ten fidayeens carried out the notorious Mumbai Massacre of 26 /11 in which nearly 180 innocents were slaughtered, a ghastly event about which a threat had been duly administered by Indian Mujahideen. That shows the ugly face of the Islamic doctrine of jihad. It is a shame that the preaching of righteous war by Sri Krishna at Kurukshetra is sought to be equated by Times of India group and Narayani Ganesh with what Indian Mujahideen had vowed to do the killings and which hey actually did, in accordance with the Quranic verses.

A much greater shame, however, is the gullibility of Hindu preachers like Sri Sri to acuisece in the falsehood being propagated to equate the Gita, both morally and spiritually, with the Quran. My humble advice to Sri Sri and other Hindu seers is that either they should read in great detail the Quran and the Hadith along with two authentic commentaries, Sahi Bukhari and Sahi Muslim, or they should scruplously refrain from participating in such weird discourses often organized by the sham-secularist groups and individuals to denigrate Hindu ethos and morally equate “adharma” with ‘dharma”.

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1. M. J. Akbar, The Shade of Swords, p. xvi
2. Ibid.
3. Jihad in Quran and Sunnah, published by Maktaba Dar-us-Salam, Riyadh.
4. Suhas Majumdar, Jihad – The Islamic Doctrine of Permanent War, p.20.
5. Dr. Titus, Indian Islam, p. 10.
6. Suhas Majumdar, Jihad – The Islamic Doctrine of Permanent War, p. 29.
7. Sahi Bukhari 52.271.
8. Sahi Bukhari 84:64-65
Copyright @ Ram Ohri

Jinnah to Hafiz Saeed

Similarities in their anti-India agenda
By: G. Parthasarathy

Addressing a gathering of tens of thousands of zealots at the headquarters of the Jamaat-ud-Dawa (earlier calling itself the Lashkar-e-Toiba), on November 3, 2000, the Amir of the Lashkar, Hafiz Mohammed Saeed, thundered: “Jihad is not about Kashmir only. About 15 years ago people might have found it ridiculous if someone had told them about the disintegration of the Soviet Union (Union of the Soviet Socialist Republics). Today, I announce the breakup of India, Inshallah. We will not rest till the whole of India is dissolved into Pakistan.”

Over the past two decades, Saeed has been publicly pronouncing a war that would encompass the whole of India. Till the terrorist outrage of 26/11 no one took him seriously. Shortly after his November 2000 speech, Saeed sent his “mujahideen” into the very heart of India’s national capital, New Delhi, to attack the historic Red Fort on December 22, 2000. Addressing a gathering of political leaders from Islamic parties shortly thereafter, Saeed proudly proclaimed that he had unfurled the green flag of Islam in the historic Red Fort.

Hafiz Saeed was and is no ordinary person. He enjoyed the patronage of former Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, who had sent Punjab Governor Shahid Hamid and his Information Minister Mushahid Hussein Syed to personally call on and pay their respects to Saeed in 1998. The Wahabi/Salafi school of Islam propagated by Saeed was patronised by Nawaz Sharif’s father, Mian Mohammed Sharif, through the Tablighi Jamaat. Moreover, at the grassroots level, the Lashkar is closely linked to the Pakistan Army and the ISI, which provide weapons, training and logistical support to the extremist group. But is Saeed’s talk of “disintegration” of India merely rhetoric of a demented mind, or does it reflect a wider strategic vision within Pakistan and particularly in its armed forces?

While the “idea” of Pakistan was first enunciated by Chaudhuri Rehmat Ali in 1933 and given shape in the Lahore Resolution of the Muslim League in 1940, the hope in Pakistan, ever since it was born, was that India would be a loose confederation, with units like the Nizam’s domain in Hyderabad and even a “Dravidistan” going their own separate ways. Jinnah often spoke contemptuously of upper caste Hindus while fostering separatism by emphasising on a separate linguistic and ethnic Dravidian identity, characterising the social ethos in South India.

While Mahatma Gandhi tried to address centuries of exploitation and alienation of Dalits in India together with leaders like Dr B.R. Ambedkar, Jinnah endeavoured to foment Dalit alienation. He also encouraged elements in princely states like Jodhpur and Travancore-Cochin to declare independence. His aim was to Balkanise India and ensure domination of the sub-continent by a minority of its population. Jinnah’s approach to the Cabinet Mission Plan of 1946 was motivated by the belief that after 10 years, a united Punjab and Sind in the west, together with Bengal and Assam in the east, would break away from a fragile and fragmented India.

Jinnah shared a common interest with the British in ensuring that there was a weak central government in India, incapable of firmly holding the country together. Jinnah’s aims regarding India were thus not very different from those of Hafiz Saeed, though he was a virtually agnostic Ismaili Muslim who, according to his biographer Stanley Wolpert, loved Scotch whisky and ham sandwiches! Saeed, however, espouses rabid Wahabi causes.

Saeed makes no secret of his contempt for parliamentary democracy based on the principle of “one man, one vote”. But was Jinnah’s demand for a disproportionate share of parliamentary seats for his community on the basis of their having been the “rulers” of India before the British arrived, also not a negation of the concept of “one man one vote,” which is the fundamental principle of parliamentary democracy? It was Jinnah’s quest for “parity” for a minority that forms the basis of Pakistan’s unrealistic yearning for parity with India — a yearning that has led Pakistan to disaster.

Jinnah’s successors, from Liaquat Ali Khan to Gen Pervez Musharraf, have all conducted relations with India in the belief that India’s unity is fragile. Ayub Khan launched the 1965 conflict with India believing that Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri was a weak leader facing serious separatist problems, because of the Punjabi Suba movement in Punjab and anti-Hindu riots combined with the rise of Dravidian parties in the South, apart from continuing insurgencies in the Northeast.

Gen Zia-ul-Haq set up an elaborate network to encourage separatism within India and laid special stress on creating a Hindu-Sikh communal divide in Punjab, in much the same manner as Jinnah had sought to sow doubts in the mind of Master Tara Singh. Such efforts failed the primarily because Hindus and Sikhs alike saw through Pakistan’s game-plans. The ISI effort to “bleed” India in Jammu and Kashmir is a continuation of policies that Pakistan has followed since its birth. It is shocking when Indians, who should know better, extol Jinnah’s “virtues”. His culpability in the communal holocaust he unleashed by his call for “Direct Action” cannot be condoned.

In his book, “The Shadow of the Great Game — The Untold Story of Partition”, former diplomat Narendra Singh Sarila has revealed that well before the Cabinet Mission arrived in India in 1946 two successive British Viceroys, Lord Linlithgow and Lord Wavell, had decided to partition India by creating a Muslim-majority state in its northwest, bordering Iran, Afghanistan and Sinkiang, in order to protect British interests in the oil-rich Persian Gulf. Mohammad Ali Jinnah was coopted to further this British objective around 1939.

Jinnah’s efforts to impose Urdu as Pakistan’s sole national language sowed the seeds of Bangladeshi separatism and of Pakistan’s disintegration in 1971. His assumption of office as an unelected Executive Head of State, who presided over the Cabinet, led to his successors arbitrarily dismissing Prime Ministers and staging a takeover of Pakistan by a military-dominated feudal elite — a malady the country suffers from even today.

The statesmanlike visit of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee to the “Minar-e-Pakistan” in Lahore signalled that India had no intention of reversing Partition and that it wishes the people of Pakistan well. The challenges that Pakistan’s establishment poses will be overcome when the values of secularism, pluralism and inclusive democratic development are established as being more enduring than the fantasies of nationhood based exclusively on religion, which Jinnah propounded, or the hate and bigotry of Hafiz Mohammed Saeed. Banning books whose contents many may find objectionable is not the way to deal with such challenges.

The Tribune, New Delhi
October 3, 3009