Look before pointing fingers

YAGYAH Adams (August 24) says there have been 72 military interventions by the West and its allies since WWII. Did he know that during Prophet Muhammad’s (peace and blessings upon him) 10-year stay in Medina, he organised 80 expeditions against the various tribes of Arabia and forcibly converted most of them to Islam.

In fact, just after his death, most of these tribes renounced Islam and Abu Bakr, the First Caliph fought a 2.5-year war called the Ridda wars to force the Arabs back to Islam. Before you point fingers at the West, first look at your own history.

Adams says the West is enslaving millions so a few can live in luxury.

I suggest he looks at Islam’s own record of slavery which was practised as late as 1930 in Turkey after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. Please ponder on this verse where God says, “… Do not let the hatred of a people swerve you from justice (and the truth) … (5:8).

The message of R Galant’s (August 25) letter is that there is a kind of cognitive dissonance that Muslims prefer the cosy decadence of Western life but support the Taliban. Where he is wrong is that he blames the Sharia.

He will obviously point to the verses saying “kill the infidel”. But then he’s reading the Qur’an literally, the same thing many are accusing

Muslim scholars of doing. When I read the Sharia, I see the rule of the Community of Believers, of majority rule, of Ummahism.

Yet the Taliban and the rest of the Muslim world, both Sunni and Shia, believe in Plato’s Rule of Scholars, of minority rule, of Ulamism. Thus, the reason for all the chaos, power vacuums, disunity, civil wars, terrorism, poverty, misogyny and backwardness can squarely be laid at the feet of Plato and not the CIA or America or Zionism.

Finally, Samaoen Osman (August 26), throws up a conundrum. “The way to remedy the ills … would be a more representative government”. Really? Are you suggesting democracy which Muslim scholars and leaders have eschewed? Is there something inbetween Plato’s Scholarking dictatorship one finds in countries like Iran, Saudi Arabia and Egypt and now the Taliban; and the democracy found in countries like Turkey and Malaysia?

It’s either the rule of the people by consent or the rule of dictators by force. There’s nothing inbetween. Rather, any wayward behaviour of the Muslim voter is attenuated by punishment awaiting on Judgment Day – thus Islamic Democracy is rule by the Community of Believers, the “O ye Believers” found in numerous verses.

NAUSHAD OMAR | Zeekoevlei