“The Concept of Khilafah: Spreading the Rule of Law all over the World”
NAKATA Ko, Doshisha University
1. Introduction
The aim of this paper is to show (1) that the mission of the highest priority in Islam is to spread the rule of law all over the world, i.e, Khilafah, not the proselytization for the Islamic faith, (2) that Khilafah is secular, pluralistic and anti-totalitarian, (3) that Khilafah is nothing other than the Rule of Law, and (3) that we can understand the reality of Khilafah more clearly by comparison with the classical Chinese political thought than by comparison with the Western one.
2. Islamic law as a Jurist’s Law
Islamic law is said to be a typical jurist’s law beside Roman law. Actually, while Roman law became law after its authorization by the Emperor and he is above the law, formation of the Islamic law had been independent from Khalifah’s authorization, rather the jurists, Fuqaha’ had rejected any interference from Khalifah in its formation, needless to say admitting that Khalifah is above it.
Islamic law is still valid for all the Muslims, in spite that the rulers of the Western-made territorial nation states in the former Dar al-Islam have no longer enforced Islamic law, because the ruler has nothing to do with the formation of Islamic law, and consequently its validity is not depending on their enforcement.
Thus the legitimate Islamic polity is still Khilafah, even if its throne is now vacant. Among the contemporary jurists, Fuqaha’, there is still consensus that the establishments of Khilafah is obligatory. Not only the most widely-read book of Fiqh (Islamic Jurisprudence) among the contemporary jurists, al-Fiqh al-Islami wa Adillatu-hu(11 vol.), written by Dr. Wahbah al-Zuhaili, but the most voluminous and authoritative Encyclopedia of Islamic law officially edited by the Ministry of Islamic Affairs of Kuwait and Supreme Council of Islamic Affairs of Arab Republic of Egypt, al-Mawsu‘ah al-Fiqhiyyah,(45 vol.) declare definitely that the establishment of Khilafah, Nasb al-Imam, is obligatory.
3. Definition of “Khilafah”
Here we use the term “Khilafah” as the name of Islamic polity according to Sunni Islamic science. In literatures of Fiqh and Usul al-Din(Theology), Khilafah is synonymous with Imamah Kubra, but we prefer to the term Khilafah lest it should be confused with Shiite Imamah. As for the Shiite theory, Imam is the divinely appointed infallible successor of the Apostle of Allah Muhammad. On the other hand, Sunni Khalifah is neither divinely appointed nor infallible.
The inaugural speech of the first Sunni Khalifah Abu Bakr, ; “as long as I follow Allah and His Apostle, follow me. Supposing I disobey Allah and His Apostle, it is not obligatory for you to follow me.”(narated by al-Tabari),shows clearly that the Sunni Khalifah, the successor of the Apostle, was homogeneous as the fallible Apostolic deputy officials under the reign of the Apostle who obeyed the Divine commandments embodied in Qur’an and Sunnah. Namely, Khilafah is “the rule of law” contrary to Imamah which is “the rule of man”, for the Divine Will is known through Shari‘ah, Divine Law, according to Sunni thinking, while it is known only through the divinely appointed infallible Imam according to the Shiite Imamology.
4. Khalifah of the Earth
Khalifah must also be one person and two or more Khalifahs(Khulafa’)’ coexistence is severely forbidden. The Prophet Muhammad ordered loyalty to single Khalifah in one age in order of accession to the throne, saying,; “although there is no prophet after me any longer, Khulafa’(successors) will appear and their number will quite a large. Give loyalty in order one by one, and follow the authority which Allah vested in them.” (Muslim), and he did not only rejected the legitimacy of the second and following Khalifahs but ordered decisively execution of them, saying,; “When the pledge of allegiance is given to two Khalifas, kill the second one.” (Muslim)
When the Prophet Muhammad passed away, many tribes of Arabia refused to give Zakah(charity) to Madinah, the capital of the Khalifah Abu Bakr. At this time, the Khalifah Abu Bakr subjugated them in spite that they confessed “there is no god but Allah and Muhammad is the apostle of Allah” and performed the prayer (Salah). This battle is called “apostasy(Riddah)” war. This decision of the Abu Bakr shows that the supremacy of the headship, Khilafah, and the unity of the Ummah(Muslim community) are fatal for Islam.
Although in Fiqh, Khalifah is abbreviation of Khalifah Rasul Allah, i.e., the successor of the Apostle of Allah, not Khalifah Allah, the vicegerent of Allah on the Earth, but the connotation of the vicegerent of Allah on the Earth has never been forgotten. Allah is the Lord of the heavens and the Earth, Rabb al-Samawat wa-al-Ard. In this context, the term “al-Ard(the Earth)” is always single contrary to “al-Samawat(heavens; plural)” . That is because the earth is one and indivisible, and consequently, the Khlifah as the vicegerency of Allah on the Earth should be one and indivisible as the lordship of Allah for the earth is one and indivisible, there is no god but Allah.
However, in order to understand the true significance of the adherence of Islam to oneness of the Khalifah, it is necessary to clarify the character of Islamic mission first, even if it results in taking a long circuit.
5. Islamic Mission in its Completed Form
When the Prophet Muhammad began his mission in Makkah, its main contents were faith of the unseen like Allah, the Last Judgment, the paradise and hell, and the ethics such as aids of the poor and the weak, and they were targeted at the individuals. However, after a “city state” centering on Muslims was materialized in Madinah after Hijrah in 622, legal provisions of maintenance of the security by execution of punishments on crimes, such as injury homicide, a burglar, and theft, tax collection, welfare, and dealing of non-Muslims and warfare, i.e., obligations which the political authority should perform, was added. And when Makkah was conquered, the Arabian Peninsula was unified under the banner of Islam, and the revelation given to the Prophet Muhammad was completed, the Islamic mission transformed from propagation of the individual faith and ethics in Makkah term to the liberation of the Earth by spreading the Islamic order.
The transformation of Islamic mission to “the liberation of the Earth by spreading the Islamic order” does not mean abrogation of propagation of faith and ethics on the level of individual and society, but it means that the spread of Islamic order came to given a priority as the aim of group behavior of the Ummah which came to have the military strength which now enables them to establish the Islamic order.
This is shown clearly in Islamic rules of warfare. Allah says,; “Fight those who do not believe in God, nor in the Last Day, and who do not forbid what God and His Messenger have forbidden, nor do they practice the religion of truth, from among of those who have been given the Scripture, until they pay the Jizya tribute, readily being subdued.”(9:29)
And al-Mugirah, a companion of the Prophet, said to the Persian army on the day of battle of Nihavand,; the Prophet who is the Apostle of our Lord ordered “Fight until you worship only Allah or you pay the tax (Jizyah)”. (al-Bukhahri).
If only the Jizyah tax is paid, fighting is no more allowed, even though they don’t embrace Islam. But fighting becomes inescapable when tax payment is refused. That is, the purpose of the jihad was admission of the Islam order by tax payment, not conversion to Islam. In other words, spread the Islam order was the first priority which must be promoted even with military force.
Muslim community started to perform their mission toward the whole world after the completion of the revelation to the Prophet Muhammad and the unification of the Arabian Peninsula. However, what was not allowed to refuse in confronting this mission and was to be forced even by military power was the payment of the Jizyah tax, not conversion to Islam.
6. “Secularism” of Khilafah
The regime of Khilafah is “secular”, although it may sound unexpectedly. Strictly speaking, the concept “secular” is so Western culture-laden that we can not apply it only to Islam but also any other religion like Judaism, Confucianism, Hinduism, and Buddhism, but we use it here just as a matter of convenience for comparative study.
The Western political sciences cannot describe the Islamic governance effectively with the analysis of the Religion-and-Politics-relation because of the lack of clear consciousness of difference of legal system and political system, but if we can differentiate them, it is rather obvious rather that Khilafah is “secular”.
The Prophet Muhammad’s government was based on “unity of Religion and Politics”, thus “religious.” As already stated, the Prophet Muhammad was governing based on Allah’ revelation. That is, a political decision of the outbreak of war etc. was also made based on Divine Will. And much of revelation had taken the form of the individual command responding to each situation, a legal system had not been formed yet, a political system and legal system were still undifferentiated. That is, the Prophet Muhammad’s government is “religious”, in the meaning that it was based on the transcendental authority of the divine will of a revelation of Allah to which common believers has no access, and is based on the “unity of Politics and Religion” in the meaning that both of the law and the politics were based on transcendental authority in the undifferentiated form because the legal system and the political system was still undifferentiated.
The Prophet Muhammad’s government was typical “hierocracy” or “theocracy” in terminology of Western political sciences in the meaning that the religious person who represents divine will governs. However, the revelation ceased since the death of the Prophet Muhammad, and the Khalifah does not have access to the Divine Will. Thus there was no transcendental element in the Khalifah’s political determination, it was carried out through the realistic worldly calculation of political interests, and it was completely same with the Khalifah’s subordinates.
In the 8th century of the infancy of the Islamic legal system, Fuqaha’, jurists as specialists of the Fiqh, Islamic law, appeared and Qadi, official judges, came to be appointed out of such jurists since Abu Yusuf(d.798) took the position of Qadi, Islamic Judge, a famous disciple of Abu Hanifah(d.767) who himself staunchly rejected its position in spite of persecution. After this, although the idea that the Khalifah inherits the judicial duty of the Prophet was not lost, it becomes a custom that the Khalifah entrusts his judicial authority to jurists, thus executive power and a judicial power has been divided completely.
Islamic legal system is a legal system after all, as same as Common Law(of Britain) is a legal system, so both of them are neither irrational nor mysterious beyond the understanding by the reason, but completely rational, in the meaning that the function of both these legal systems has nothing to do with the divine inspiration, and what is needed is not an understanding by faith but an understanding by professional training of legal reasoning.
We can understand this more clearly, if we take into consideration the fact that the existence of the mystic called Sufi who receives the inspiration from God is recognized widely in the Islamic history, and among jurists there are a lot of such mystics or Sufis, but at the place of a judicial trial, such inspiration is never adopted as a proof.
The Islamic law was “secularized”, after the system of Islamic law had been materialized and the jurists had become professionals. That is, the trial is not performed by the transcendental authority which receives the inspiration from God to which common people has no access, but by the jurist who receives special professional training of legal reasoning, based on the legal provisions found in the authoritative classics of Islamic jurisprudence to which any lettered man can refer.
As for the origin of law, the fact that the origin of the Islamic law is a divine revelation does not mean that its legal system is divine. Because, whether the legal system is religious or secular, the origin of all the laws is related to the “myth” of foundation of the country, thus inevitably “sacred” and “irrational”, as in the United States’ Declaration of Independence it is stated, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed, by their Creator, with certain unalienable Rights.” Therefore, it is unsuitable to call the Islamic law “religious” only because its origin is based on the divine revelation.
The transcendental authority which has access to the divine will to which common people has no access, i.e., the religious authority which Western political science assumes, is in the hand of mystics called Sufis in Islam.
In Sunnite Islam, the Prophetic authority, is divided into political authority, “legal authority”, and “religious authority” in the narrow meaning, and succeeded by Khalifah, Fuqaha’ and Sufis respectively, but we don’t discuss about role of Sufis in this paper.
That is, in Islam, law, religion, and politics are completely divided and the Khilafah is secular regime separated from religion not only in its administration but in its jurisdiction also.
7. Religious Pluralism and Anti-totalitarianism of Khilafah
The Islamic law is pluralistic because it is divided into “common” law which all the residents should obey and “religious” law which only Muslims should obey and admits for the other communities their autonomy according to their own religious law.
Khilafah based on this pluralistic Islamic law is secular because it secures the safety to all the residents by ruling according to Islamic “common law” and leaves to Muslims and non-Muslim communities the self-government in the domain of religion which contains not only a religious rite but family law, a dress code, etc.
Moreover, pluralistic Khilafah is anti-totalitarianism. All residents are not forced conversion to Islamic ideology, although the Khilafah is based on Islam. Non-Muslim is not required any inward commitments to Islam. It is sufficient for them to observe Islamic “public law” only externally. Even for Muslims, Khilafah does not interfere in the inside of their mind. The obligation of Khilafah is merely the enforcement of the “external” Islamic law.
Moreover, Khilafah does not interfere in individual’s “privacy” in private space as well as it does not interfere in ones interior faith. It is because Islam strictly prohibits revealing the hidden wrong, and inquiry and espionage by the Holy Qur’anic verse ” And spy not “(49:12).
So Khilafah is located just in the opposite poles of a police state. Khalifah controls only infringement of the Islamic rules in public space, and he leaves the referee to Allah about the individual act in private space.
Unlike the nation-state based on the totalitarianism, in the meaning that it presupposes that the nation is homogeneous entity, which kidnaps its children and confines them to brainwash with its official ideology during a certain period under the name of compulsory education, the education is not the job of Khilafah regime. In Islamic history, although Khalifahs and kings built schools, Madrasah, it was not their “official” job but their personal or individual contribution. That is, in the Khilafah, education is left to the family and the society.
The political responsibility for the maintenance of security, order, and peace under the pluralistic and anti-totalitarian Khilafah is shared only among Muslims under Khalifah according to their capability, contrary to the deceptive fabrication of national representative system of the so-called “democratic” nation-state, in which it is to be assumed by all the citizens.
Under Khilafah non-Muslims are not required any political responsibility for the cause of Islam in which they do not believe but required only tax payment and outward observation of Islamic “common” law as “passive citizen”, while all the Muslims assume the responsibility for participation in Khilafah as a judge, a soldier, etc. according to one’s capability as a “positive citizen” because of his faith in the cause of Islam.
Such secular, anti-totalitarian and pluralistic Khilafah is the political system that enables the realization of the Islamic order which Muslim community has the mission to spread to the whole earth even with resort to military force.
8. Islamic order as the Rule of Law
As we have explained, the mission of Khilafah is to spread Islamic order. Now we try to argue that Islamic order is nothing but the rule of law, moreover, that Islamic order is the very Rule of Law and there is no rule of law except Islamic order in the contemporary world.
A famous German legal philosopher Gustav Radbruch (d.1949) pointed out that the law has 3 mutually contradicting elements, Gleichheit (justice), Zweckmäßigkeit (purposiveness or effectiveness) and Rechtssicherheit(legal certainty), but the most fundamental is the legal certainty. The legal certainty means stability and predictability. The law should be unchanging and continuous to some ranges of time as well as understandable and well known to people.
As for the stability, the Islamic law system started to be formed around in 8-9 century and had been established around in 12-13 century and has little change since then. It remains unchanging and valid, thus it is still taught from the elementary school to the graduate school of the university in the Muslim world.
Citing Justice without Frontiers, by Weeramantry, C, (Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1997, p.132), even Wikipedia admits that the supremacy of law was developed by Islamic jurists before the twelfth century, so that no official could claim to be above the law, not even Khalifah.
Comparing to Islamic law, only Common Law of England has some limited stability, but “the rule of law” had been established only late in 17 century thanks to the efforts of Lord Chief Justice Edward Coke(d.1634) and the like, and it had never ceased to be developed until courts of law and equity were combined in 1873 and 1875 and the current features of the common law had been completed.
Even this English Common Law is said to be influenced by Islamic Law through Norman conquest of England by the Normans, who conquered and inherited the Islamic legal administration of the Emirate of Sicily since the publication of legal scholar John Makdisi’s “The Islamic Origins of the Common Law” in the North Carolina Law Review, (Makdisi, John A. (1999), North Carolina Law Review 77 (5): 1635–1739.)
Criticizing John Austin’s(d.1859), a famous British legal positivist jurist, theory that law is the command of the sovereign backed by the threat of punishment, H. L. A. Hart (d.1992), one of the most influential legal philosopher of the 20th century, pointed out in his famous The Concept of Law that the ad hoc orders of the rulers cannot be called law. Such things like 12,000 yen flat-rate benefits enacted in 2008 under Aso Cabinet in Japan, 200 million dollar of bailout for AIG(American International Group), and imposing 90% tax on bonus for its executives, both of which were legislated under Obama government in 2009, do not deserve the name of law. Even if they were legislated by parliaments or Congress under the name of law, they are in reality nothing other than arbitrary ad hoc commandments of “men”. Nowadays there is no country where the true “rule of law” exists, even though there might be a Rechtsstaat which rules “by law”.
Here it is worth mentioning that in Islam even the taxation is under “the rule of law”, not “the rule of man”, contrary to the West in which the taxation is under “the rule of man” justified by the slogan “No taxation without representation”, hence “the representatives” can impose taxes as they like under the name of “people”. On the other hand, Islam does not approve of any tax except what is legislated by Shari‘ah, Islamic Law, i.e., Zakah for Muslims, Jizyah for Non-Muslims, and Kharaj for the utility of the lands conquered. Any other taxes imposed by human beings are strictly prohibited. A great Hanbalite jurist Ibn Taimiyyah(d.1328) says; ‘Levying taxes are what is not permitted by the agreement of legal schools’.(Ibn Taimiyyah, Majmu‘ah al-Fataws, al-Mansurah, 2001, vol.28, p.155) Another great jurist of the Hanafi legal school, al-Jassas (d.981) is so severe that he says that every Muslim should fight against those who levy taxes(Al-Jasas, Akam al-Qur‘an, 1986, Beirut, vol.1, p.472), and he should even kill them if they are armed. an influential legal philosopher of the 20th century. Consequently, any tariff is not allowed in Dar al-Islam, in which the rule of law is prevalent, because Dar al-Islam is an unified law-governed space, thus it is not permitted to make borders in it to prevent the free movement of people, commodities, and money or capitals by imposing man-made tariffs or any other kind of taxes or fees.
As for the legal certainty as the predictability, Muslims are familiar with Islamic law, both substantial rules, Ahkam Taklifiyyah, and legal concepts, Ahkam Wad’iyyah, because the learning of Islamic law is obligatory on every Muslim. So it is not unusual that ordinary Muslim children learn classical texts books of Islamic law even in elementary school or junior high school.
Comparing to Islam, in Japan, for example, the jurisprudence is not included in curriculum of compulsory education, i.e., elementary school and junior high school at all. Only small parts of the constitution is taught in junior high school as a part of the subject “The Contemporary Society”, and even the penalty of murder of penal law is not taught. There is no rule of law in Japan, where the basics of the law and jurisprudence are not taught to its citizens but they are ordered to be a lay judge to judge others.
9. Khilafah in Comparison
Khilafah is the very Rule of Law, the most stable and certain divine law in the world, which liberates all the human beings from the rule of men and guarantees the security of life, property, and honor for all the inhabitants, ant this law-governed space is called Dar al-Islam or “House of Islam”, in which Khalifah , the head of the Ummah, rules according to Islamic law and plural religious communities coexist enjoying religious self-government. The fact that Khalifah should be single symbolizes the unity of “Dar al-Islam” to guarantee the freedom of movement of human beings, commodities, and information. So the abolishment of borders which hinder the movement of the people is the indispensable essential part of Islamic order. And the outside of this law-governed space, Dar al-Islam, is called Dar al-Harb, literally “House of War”, or “Lawless Land”.
The pivot of Khilafah is the law, Shari‘ah, not the person of Khalifah himself. We find the clearest expression of it in the works of Ibn Taimiyyah. In his book on Islamic politics, al-Siyasah al-Shar‘iyyah, he not only ignored the role of Khalifah but never mentioned about the Khilafah at all. And in his treatise on the revolt, he affirmed that the true revolt which should be subdued as the apostasy is the violation of Law, Khuruj ‘an Shari‘ah, not the revolt against the ruler, Khalifah.(Ibn Taymiyyah, Majmu‘ah al-Fatawa, vol.28, pp.468-469, pp.502-504, pp.520-521)
But the Western scholarship obsessed with the Aristotelian tradition of typology of ruler can neither understand the real nature of Khilafah nor esteem its significance correctly; hence they tend to regard it as the monarchy or dictatorship focusing only on the number of the ruler, if it is one, monarchy, if minority, aristocracy, and if majority, democracy.
Without exception in human history, head of state must be one and alone by whatever name the regime is called, democracy, monarchy, republic, or Papacy, in terms of official institution and constitution, and sociologically speaking, no head of state can rule alone with nobody’s support at all. The Caliphate, Khilafah, is not an exception. That is all.
Here it seems useful to refer to Chinese political thought for triangulation. In Chinese political thought, the rule is classified into 徳治Dézhì, or rule by virtue of 儒家Rújiā, Confucian school, and法治Fǎzhì, or rule by law, of 法家Fǎjiā, legalist School.
The ideal of the main trend of Chinese political thought has been dézhì, the rule by virtue, despite Fǎzhì, the rule by law, has been always real politics in the history.
The world view of this Chinese political thought is called 華夷秩序Huayizhìxù, China-barbarian order. In this world view, the moral teaching of Confucianism is pivotal and it is regarded as the very Civilization itself and any country which accepts this teaching become a part of 中華Zhōnghuá Sinocentric world, thus, 王土Wángtǔ, literally Land of King, or 神州Shén zhōu, Divine State, which is the land of the Civilization and the areas outside this Sinocentricworld are called 化外之地Huawaizhidi, uncivilized land. Although 皇帝Huángdì the emperor is regarded as 天子Tiānzǐ, Son of Heaven, he is not above this teaching, but he is required to rule embodying the virtues of this teaching.
For both of them, Islamic political thought and Chinese one, the central idea is the divine order which is the aim to be realized by the politics, not the person of Ruler. In Islam, this order is conceptionalized as the Law, the Revealed Divine law, Shari‘ah, while in China it is called 王道, Wángdào, literally the Way of King, virtuous rule according to Confucian teaching.
Historically speaking, Khalifah had lost his real power early Abbasid (750-1258) and his authority had become nominal and the political power had shifted to his subordinates, Sultans, Amirs, and Waziirs, a parallel phenomenon of which we find rather in history of 天皇制Tennnousei, institution of Japanese Emperor, rather than institution of Chine Emperor itself.
Both of them claim that their political order is universal, thus their rule is the sole legitimate rule. This universalism is expressed by the dichotomy of Dar al-Islam – Dar al-Harb, House of Peace – House of War, Law-governed Space – Lawless Land, in Islam, and 中華, or王土,神州－化外之地, Zhōnghuá, or Wángtǔ, Shén zhōu －Huàwài zhīdì, Sinocentric world, or Land of King, Divine State, Land of the Civilization －Uncivilized Land.
In spite of their universalism, both of them are not totalitarian, contrary to the notion of the modern Western territorial state, but multi-ethnic and multi-religious.
As for the multi-ethnicity, beside the fact that various ethnic groups had coexisted in Islamic Caliphate and Chinese Empire, the political power has been shifted from Arab to Persian, then to Turk in case of Islam, and Chinese history has Mongol dynasty of 元 Yuán(1279-1368) and Manchurian Dynasty of 清Qīng (1644-1911).
Regarding multi-religiousness, though indeed Islam in Khilafah and Confucianism in China were the base of their respective rule, both of them is not “theocracy” in the Western sense, i.e, the rule by the priests, and the “freedom” of religion, in the narrow sense of the West, had been enjoyed by people respectively in their “communal-private” sphere, for there were no “individual” in traditional Islamic and Chinese society, and besides Ulama’ or Fuqaha’ in Islam and 儒者rú zhě in China, who constituted the religious establishment of the Empire, were rather scholars than priests.
In Islam, Christian, Jew, and Zoroastrian were accepted as Dhimmi, protectee, then the category of Dhimmi is expanded to followers of all religions, while in China, Prof. 杜維明Tu Weiming said ;“Taoism, Confucianism, Buddhism and Islam were lumped together as ‘the four teachings’ of China”.( Osman Bakar, “Confucius and the Analects in the light of Islam”, Osman Bakar(ed.), Islam and Confucianism, p.68.)
Islamic Dar al-Islam and Chinese 中華Zhōnghuá, Sinocentric world or王土Wángtǔ is a space in which Divine Order is established, and as such its boundary must be rather vague, not clear cut, contrary to the notion of the territorial nation state. The boundary of Dar al-Islam and 中華Zhōnghuá, 王土Wángtǔ is continuously changing according to the religio-cultural condition of the inhabitants and the power relations with the outer world.
Although the similarities are remarkable, there are some important differences between Islamic political thought and Chinese one.
Because Confucian teaching is focusing on moral codes and rules of courtesy while Islamic Shari‘ah includes public law and private law as well as moral codes and rules of courtesy, definition of “self and others” and rules relating “self and others” both inside of Dar al-Islam and outside of it, in Islam is, positively speaking, more articulated, stable and predictable than ones in Confucianism, or, negatively speaking, more inflexible, rigid, fossilizing, difficult to adapt itself to changing situations.
The boundary of 華夷Huáyí is quite ambiguous both at the level of countries and at the level of individuals. We can find only difference of graduation in mastery of virtues of Confucian teaching, while in Islam distinction between ‘self and others’ is rather dichotomic. Consequently, Chinese political thought rejects categorically to spread territory of中華 Zhōnghuá, Sinocentric world or王土Wángtǔ , by force as the condemnable 覇道Bàdào, way of hegemon, and considers its spread through its voluntary acceptance by others yearning for it,王化Wánghuà, Islam rather regards it obligatory to spread its order or the rule of Law, Shari‘ah, not Islamic faith, all over the world by military force, even though this missionary campaign should be performed according to Islamic law of warfare.
Contemporary warfare in which inhumane weapons of mass-destruction are used quite clearly opposes the war ethics of Islam. The Holy Prophet ordered the killing of the enemy but prohibited burning them to death, saying “; “Torment by fire is not allowed for other than the Master of Fire”(Hadith:al-Bukhri, Ahmad) In a contemporary war, soldiers are slaughtered indiscriminately by missiles, bombs, and heavy weapons, without having the opportunity to surrender, and without even seeing the face of the enemy who kills them. Not only soldiers, but even innocent civilians too are massacred through being caught up in the battle. In modern warfare this is called collateral damage, but in Islam it is a serious crime.
However, the boundary between Dar al-Islam, Law-governed space and Dar al-Harb, Lawless land, is in practice not so clear cut and there has been always vague peripheries status of which is ambiguous. Dar al-Sulh, truce area, on which armistice is signed between Muslims and Others, of which inhabitants enter under Islamic order of rule of Shari‘ah voluntarily, especially after the authority of Khalifah declined, who alone has the prerogative of decision of war and peace theoretically.
10. Conclusion
We tried to demonstrate that the mission of the highest priority in Islam is to spread the rule of law all over the world, i.e, Khilafah, not the proselytization for the Islamic faith, that Khilafah is secular, pluralistic and anti-totalitarian, and that Khilafah is nothing other than the Rule of Law.
Then we clarified that Islam shares with Chinese Empire centrality of the universal divine order, multi-ethnicity, multi-religiousness, openness of its boundary but Islam is more articulated in rules relating “self and others” and consider it obligatory to spread Islamic order of Rule of Law, Shari‘ah all over the world even with resort to military force.
However the reestablished Khilafah will not rush into war for Islamic mission, because the contemporary war in which inhumane mass-destruction weapons are used opposes war ethics of Islam clearly. Therefore the relation between the Khilafah, or Dar al-Islam and the external world might be a “peace” by truce in principle. The coming Khilafah in Dar al-Islam, Law-governed space, will vie with Dar al-Harb, Lawless Land, the external world in attracting immigrants under the truce, for which is more comfortable to live in.
In order to find the way of co-existence with Muslims, the West should understand the intrinsic logics of Khilafah and Dar al-Islam, and we hope that our comparative studies would contribute to this aim.
Reference:
Hassan Ko Nakata, The Mission of Islam in the Contemporary World － Aiming for Liberation of Earth through reestablishment of the Caliphate, 2009, Saba Islamic Media, Kuala Lumpur
