[W]hatever dispute and difference of opinion may arise in a Muslim society … it should be referred to that fundamental Law which God and His Prophet have given us. Thus the very nature of this principle demands that there should be an institution in the state which should undertake to adjudicate in strict accordance with the Book of God and the Sunna of the Prophet.1
As we have seen, Islam, in terms of ‘din’, is synonymous with the Islamic state: you cannot have one without the other. This was Mawdudi’s central aim: to create the vision of a modern state that is informed within a framework of his paradigms of the Qur’an, the Prophet, and the Rightly Guided Caliphs. In many respects, he seems to be calling for a return to the Caliphate, but it is much more complex than that. The Islamic state was central because Mawdudi had little faith in individuals to live pious lives, and so they must be led by the virtuous. This is best expressed in Mawdudi’s ‘trinity’ of religion (iqamat-i din), virtuous leadership (imamat-i salihah) and divine government (hukumat-i ilahiyah). The continuity between Islam and politics was, for Mawdudi, like the relation of ‘roots with the trunk and the branches with the leaves [of a tree]’, for, ‘In Islam the religious, the political, the economic, and the social are not separate systems; they are different departments and parts of the same system.’2 This was also all part of Mawdudi’s jihad:
Of all the factors of social life which impinge on culture and morality, the most powerful and effective is government … Hence the best way of putting an end to the fitna [strife] and purifying of life of munkar [evil] is to eliminate all mufsid [corrupt] governments and replace them with those which in theory and practice are based on piety and righteous action, the objective of Islamic Jihad is to put an end to the dominance of the un-Islamic systems of governments and replace them with Islamic rule.3
It is fascinating to see how Mawdudi utilizes common Islamic terminology to fit into his own agenda of an Islamic state. His very understanding of the word ‘Muslim’ means that you cannot call yourself a true Muslim unless the end goal of your faith is to strive for an Islamic state. In fact, strictly speaking, until that Islamic state, this ‘virtuous order’, is in existence, your religious credentials are open to question, at the very least. One step taken to strive for being a good Muslim is to join the Jamaat-e-Islami, for ‘Ours is not a party of the enlightened missionaries or the religious missionaries. It is a party of God’s soldiers [Hezbollah]. This party therefore, has no option but to take control of political power.’4 It is not a matter of choice, for there is ‘no option’; it is God’s will and thus a moral imperative placed upon all Muslims.
Hence Mawdudi’s need to construct his vision for an Islamic state and, again, this cannot be seen as purely a utopian vision so far as Mawdudi was concerned, although it may well be the case so far as anyone else was concerned. For it to remain unobtainable would make a mockery of Mawdudi’s whole philosophy. The Islamic state, as conceived by Mawdudi, was seriously meant as a real and genuine possibility. In fact, much more than that: it was a heart-felt imperative. We are, therefore, justified in considering the viability of his Islamic state and not dismissing it as a mere pattern in the heavens for which Mawdudi believed it could not become concrete on this earth.
When Mawdudi writes of the Islamic state, he is not making reference to any specific nation, not even Pakistan. In fact, he does not think in terms of national boundaries, for the Islamic state, the umma, is a moral and ideological entity. National boundaries and, indeed, nationalism, is a western colonial construct and therefore has no place in Islam. In terms of leadership, as we have seen, the ultimate authority rests with God, and here lies the real problem. How can a state governed by the dictates of God be anything other than authoritarian? Yet Mawdudi takes great pains to argue that the Islamic state would be democratic, using such terms as ‘democratic caliphate’ and famously ‘theo-democracy’. He argued that it would be democratic because the leaders would be elected. However, we need to consider the question of who would be eligible to elect the leader and, once elected, how much independent authority this leader would have to enact new laws. The way to consider this is to break up the sections of the Islamic state into Muslims as a whole, women and non-Muslims.
Mawdudi portrays his vision of the Islamic state as a workable proposition by dividing the organs of the state into three: the legislature, the executive and the judiciary,5 and defining their powers and functions accordingly:
1 The legislature. For this, Mawdudi uses the Islamic terminology Fiqh – ‘the body which resolves and prescribes’ (‘Ahl al-hal wa’al-’aqd’). As it is limited by the divine code, it cannot legislate in contravention of the directives of God and His Prophet. Therefore, its functions are:
a To enact the directives and provide rules and regulations to enforce them.
b Where the directives of the Qur’an and Sunna are capable of more than one interpretation, it has the authority to give preference to one.
c To enact laws in ‘the general spirit of Islam’ where there is no explicit provision in the Qur’an and Sunna.
d Where there is no guidance in the Qur’an, Sunna or with the Rightly Guided Caliphs, the legislature can formulate its own laws.6
2 The executive. The institution of the executive in Mawdudi’s Islamic state (which he compares with the Ulul-Amr in the Qur’an) would engage in the actual enforcement of the rules and regulations put forward by the legislature. The executive must be obeyed ‘on the condition that it obeys God and His Prophet and avoids the path of sin and transgression.’7
3 The judiciary. This, Mawdudi compares with the Qada (as examined in Chapter 8). These courts of law are established to enforce, ‘the Divine Code and not to violate it as they are doing at present in almost all the Muslim States’.8
Mawdudi admits that – in defining the relationship between the legislature, the executive and the judiciary – there are ‘no clear-cut instructions on this point’.9 However, Mawdudi states that the conventions of the Prophet’s period and that of the Rightly Guided Caliphs provide the required guidance in such matters. According to this guidance, ‘the Head of the Islamic state is, as such, the supreme head of all these three different organs. The Prophet enjoyed the same status and this position was maintained by all the Righteous Caliphs.’10 However, as has been demonstrated, even if such an elaborate government had existed at that time, the authority of previous Caliphs would not have been such that they would have had the status of ‘supreme head’ and, at the same time, have been true to the ‘Divine Code’.
Concerning the actual authority of the supreme head, Mawdudi remarks:
The position of a man who is selected to conduct the affairs of the state is no more than this: that all Muslims delegate their Caliphate to him for administrative purposes. He is answerable to God on the one hand and on the other to his fellow ‘Caliphs’ who have delegated their authority to him.11
At this point one needs to be clear what Mawdudi understands by the term ‘Caliph’; as he seems to be suggesting that all Muslims are Caliphs and that, therefore, we are talking of a ‘democracy’ (in the sense that all Muslims have equal representation in the affairs of state). Yet, at the same time, one is bound by the laws of God, which implies a theocracy. It is worthwhile quoting Mawdudi at length on this point:
Islamic theocracy is not controlled by a special religious group of people but by ordinary Muslims. They run it according to the Qur’an and Sunna. And if I am allowed to coin a new word, I would call it ‘theodemocracy’. It would grant limited popular sovereignty to Muslims under the paramount sovereignty of God. In this [state], the executive and the legislature would be formed in consultation with the Muslims. Only Muslims would have the right to remove them. Administrative and other issues, regarding which there are no clear orders in the Shariah, would be settled only with the consensus of Muslims. If the law of God needs interpretation no special group or race but all those Muslims would be entitled to interpret (ijtihad) who have achieved the capability of interpretation.’12
From the above quote, one is led to believe that the democratic principles of consultation do indeed suggest democracy, and Mawdudi points out that the state would be controlled by ‘ordinary Muslims’. But when one digs a little deeper there are serious limitations placed on the citizen. While there would be ‘no special group or race’, no mention here is made of non-Muslims, and this will be considered below, and, most importantly, Mawdudi’s understanding of what counts as a Muslim is crucial here, recalling that ‘din’ is very narrow indeed. Mawdudi allocates powers of ijtihad to those Muslims ‘who have achieved the capability of interpretation’. According to Mawdudi’s own calculations, the percentage of Muslims with any true knowledge of Islam is not more than .001 per cent. Thus, although he makes allowance for ijtihad, this authority would be limited to a very small minority. This reflects Mawdudi’s concern over the piety and virtue of the majority of human beings, so-called Muslims included, for when, ‘laws are made with the will of the people, experience has shown that the common people themselves cannot understand their interests. It is a natural weakness of human beings that in most matters relating to their life they consider some aspects of the matter and overlook others; generally their judgement is one-sided.’13 Regarding those few who are chosen to be God’s representatives, Mawdudi quotes sura 24:55: ‘Allah has promised to those among you who believe and do righteous deeds that He will assuredly make them to succeed (the present rulers) and grant them vicegerency in the land just as He made those before them to succeed (others).’
Mawdudi concludes from this that the term ‘vicegerency’ (Khalifat) refers to state rule; that is, sovereignty belonging to God alone; which is a somewhat tenuous link as the sura has no overt political reference. Indeed, this promise of vicegerency is more commonly interpreted as a reference to the earth, not to the state, and this interpretation is in accordance with the general principles that the Qur’an upholds. Also, the prestige that one can achieve through righteous deeds is generally perceived in a social sense; the authority one gains through one’s honesty, justice and piety is, in itself, an earned position of respect and a social acknowledgement of that person’s qualities. This is not synonymous with political power. What of those who do not fit within Mawdudi’s category of the pious Muslim? Mawdudi’s political power relies on coercive means towards those who will not comply to those in power:
the concept of ul amr [the word used in the Qur’an for those who hold authority] is for all those who are responsible for the collective affairs of the Muslims … In short, who has authority in whatever capacity among Muslims deserves obedience. It is not correct to dispute with them and disturb the life of the community.14
While Mawdudi’s conception of the early days of Islam displays a very organic and democratic system, this is in conflict with his own personal distrust for the modern Muslim to either choose a leader or to be a leader that is chosen by the majority of the population. It is worthwhile quoting Mawdudi at some length of his vision of what the Caliph once was:
He was not just the president of the state but the prime minister as well. He attended the parliament himself, presided over its meeting and fully participated in its debates. He was responsible for the affairs of his government and accounted for his personal affairs as well. He had neither an official party nor an opposition party; the entire parliament acted as his party as long as he followed the right path, and the whole parliament acted as the opposition party if he followed the wrong path. Each member was free to oppose or support his decisions; even his own ministers used to oppose him in the parliament. Nevertheless, the president and his cabinet got along very well; no one ever resigned from his office. The khalifa was answerable not only to the parliament, but to the entire qaum [nation] for all his activities, even concerning his private life. He faced the public five times a day in the mosque and addressed them at Friday prayers. People could find him in the streets and muhallas, and anybody could stop him to ask for his rights. Not only could the members of parliament question him on prior notice but anyone could ask him questions at public places.15
There has never been, so far as can be assessed, a period in history where such a form of government has existed in the Islamic community, and one has to question the viability of Mawdudi’s political philosophy in a modern nation-state. Mawdudi himself is forced to conclude that, ‘It can only become practicable when society has been fully prepared in accordance with the revolutionary principles of Islam.’16 Obviously he is envisioning a society that does not at present exist. Unfortunately, he bases his philosophy on a past that also did not exist and on an erroneous interpretation of Islamic sources.
Presuming that women would constitute approximately half the population of Mawdudi’s Islamic state, the subject of women’s authority within it is of considerable importance. Mawdudi starts Purdah and the Status of Woman in Islam by outlining the status of women in different ages and civilizations. It would be preferred if this unfortunate text on women could simply be put aside and ignored. However, as a ‘traditionalist’, Mawdudi’s views on women can tell us much about contemporary traditionalist writings on gender that set out to respond to western images of women and it is important as, although written in 1939, it remains hugely influential and provides a paradigm for subsequent traditionalist writings on the subject. Indeed, his text has been repeatedly reprinted and is still often quoted as an authoritative source.
The short opening chapter provides a series of generalizations concerning the cultural attitudes towards women in Ancient Greek, Rome, Christian Europe and modern Europe. One common theme runs through each of these accounts of these civilizations: the increase in what is perceived by Mawdudi as sexual perversion and corruption coincides with (and, presumably is the cause of ) the decline in these respective civilizations. With the advent of the twentieth century in Europe, Mawdudi identifies three ‘doctrines’17 of western society:
1. Equality between the male and female. Mawdudi’s concern is not so much that woman obtains moral equality, but that woman is allowed to work in the job market on equal terms. This, Mawdudi sees as a ‘wrong concept of equality’,18 because the woman becomes so absorbed in economic, political and social pursuits she neglects her obligation to care for the family.
2. Economic independence of woman. As women have become economically independent, they no longer feel any obligation to have a husband or family: ‘Hundreds and thousands of young women in every western country like to live unmarried lives, which they are bound to pass in immoral, promiscuous and sinful ways.’19
3. The free intermingling of the sexes. This has led to ‘an ever-growing tendency towards showing off, nudeness and sex perversion’.20 Men are growing more voracious in their sexual appetites while women put aside all moral restraint to attract the opposite sex.
Before stating that women in the pre-Islamic era (jahilliyah) and, in western society up to the modern period, had no freedom, rights or dignity, Mawdudi paints what he sees as a dark, satanic picture of a decadent and corrupt western society. For example, there are ‘members of the same sex … involved in homosexuality to the extent that they have lost all interest and desire for the opposite sex’21 and people reading ‘magazine articles providing contraceptive information’.22 Considering such things as wrong, gives the reader a hint at least of Mawdudi’s attitude. He put much of this moral decline down to, ‘the depraved moral condition of women which is reflected by their attire, nudity, increasing smoking habits and their free and unrestricted intermingling with men’.23 He then goes on to quote an American committee of moral reformers known as the Committee of Fourteen, which states that it has ‘revealed that almost all ballrooms, night clubs, beauty salons, manicure shops, massage rooms and hairdressing shops in America have turned into houses of prostitution.’24
Also, according to an ‘estimate’25 (although Mawdudi does not quote his source), 90 per cent of the American population is afflicted with venereal diseases. It is unfortunate that Mawdudi’s choice of sources generally lack academic credence and his own personal attitudes shine through blatantly in a dogmatic and, frankly, somewhat bizarre manner. This needs to be emphasized to show that there is much more than a mere suspicion that, in Mawdudi’s Islamic state, female liberty would be a misnomer.
Some nations have given woman the position of governor over man. But no instance is found of a nation that raised its womanhood to such a status and then attained any high position on the ladder of progress and civilisation. History does not present the record of any nation which made woman the ruler of its affairs, and won honour and glory, or performed a work of distinction.26
Where woman has attained at least some degree of equality with man, ‘it has already corrupted community life’.27 Although Mawdudi insists that, as human beings, man and woman are equal, he adopts his usual approach to such egalitarian principles by qualifying them:
It has been established by biological research that woman is different from man not only in her appearance and external physical organs but also in the protein molecules of tissue cells.28
Thus, this ‘equality’ only exists in the sense that man and woman are both ‘human beings’, but that is where it both begins and ends; stating that women are, in a sense, ‘disabled’ to such an extent during menstruation that it would affect her powers of concentration and her mental abilities. At such a time:
a lady tram conductor … would issue wrong tickets and get confused while counting the small change. A lady motor driver would drive slowly as if under strain, and become nervous at every turning. A lady typist would type wrongly, take a long time to type and omit words in spite of care and effort, and would press wrong keys inadvertently … ’29
And so on. In short, a woman’s mental and nervous system becomes, ‘lethargic and disorderly’:30 she loses her mental balance and is even more likely to commit a crime or suicide!
During pregnancy, a woman is ‘mentally deranged’ and, after delivery, ‘exposed to various troubles’. During the period of breast-feeding the ‘best of her body is turned into milk for the baby’. There follows the lengthy period of bringing up the child, which requires her ‘fullest attention’.31 Consequently, Mawdudi allows for little time left in life for women to partake in society outside of rearing children, and no mention is made of man’s role in this particular process, except:
For the continuance of the race man’s only function is to impregnate the female. He is then free to have any pursuit in life. In contrast to this, the woman has to bear the whole burden of responsibility. It is to bear this burden that she is fashioned right from the time when she is a mere clot of blood in her mother’s womb.32
Consequently, Mawdudi has moved on from talking of ‘equality’, to the qualified ‘equipotential’, and then to determining woman’s burdensome destiny from the moment of her conception. Mawdudi does not consider it to be ‘fair play’ to require women to undergo the hardships in the economic field; to shoulder social responsibilities that man must so reluctantly bear; to make her take part in promoting the cause of industry and commerce, agriculture, administration of justice and defending the country.
Above all, will it be just and right to require her to allure men’s hearts also by her presence in mixed gatherings and provide them with means of entertainment and pleasure?33
We know Mawdudi’s answer to this: to allow such a thing would be unfair and ‘sheer inequality’. A woman, burdened so heavily ‘by nature’ should not have such additional duties in society. Besides which, even if she had equal duties, ‘she cannot in fact be expected to perform them with manly vigour.’34 As an example of woman’s abilities:
Imagine for a while the plight of a land or naval force which wholly consists of women. It is quite possible that right in the midst of war, a fair number of them might be down with the menstrual discharge, a good number of delivery cases forced to stay in bed, and a fair percentage of pregnant ones fuming and sulking uselessly.35
Mawdudi describes woman as ‘tender’, ‘plastic’, ‘soft’, ‘pliable’, ‘submissive’, ‘impressionable’, ‘yielding’, ‘timid’, and, basically, incapable of functioning in spheres of life which demand: ‘firmness and authority, resistance and cold-temperedness, and which requires the exercise of unbiased, objective judgement and strong will-power’.36
Mawdudi then proceeds to qualify his earlier remarks that men and women have ‘equipotential’ by stating that, in fact, men and women do not have equipotential in all aspects of life. In the same way that Mawdudi looks at history in an attempt to justify his notion that no nation has prospered under a woman ruler, he now states that no woman’s genius is as great as men such as Aristotle, Kant, Hegel, Shakespeare, Napoleon, Saladin, and so on. His ignorance of social conditions is quite remarkable, and his attempt to balance such apocryphal remarks by proclaiming that no man could ever be as great a mother is rather typical of anti-feminist rhetoric.
From what Mawdudi has said so far, it seems fairly self-evident that woman’s authority in his Islamic state will be somewhat restricted. For Mawdudi, the men are naturally generals, statesmen and administrators, and women are the wives, mothers and housekeepers: ‘This is the division of labour which nature herself has devised between the sexes.’37
His outlining of woman’s authority can be categorized into four parts:38
1 Man is to carry out the ‘laborious’ social duties of earning a living and his education should be designed to prepare him for this.
2 Women are to look after domestic affairs and make home life ‘sweet, pleasant and peaceful’. Likewise, her education should gear her towards these duties.
3 Woman is to ‘maintain the family system and save it from confusion’. The man must be the leader of the family.
4 There must be ‘safeguards in the social system’ to prevent individuals from ‘confusing and mixing up the different fields of activity of the two sexes’.39
It is evident that Mawdudi does not envisage equal education for both sexes; the woman is only to be taught how to cook, sew and rear children. Therefore, she would already be disabled and discriminated against should she wish to engage in activities outside of the home; not that she would be given the opportunity in the first place in Mawdudi’s state:
They are allowed to go out under necessity. But this permission is neither unconditional, nor unlimited. Women are not allowed to move about freely and mix with men in social gatherings.40
Regarding the political role of women, Mawdudi states in Human Rights in Islam that, ‘In Islam there is a functional distribution between men and women and according to that the field of politics and administration belongs to the men’s sphere of responsibility.’41 He also quotes the well-known hadith: ‘A nation that entrusts its affairs to a woman can never prosper.’ This hadith is a perfect example of the use of an unreliable source to substantiate Mawdudi’s personal political philosophy; it is the kind of dogmatic quote that goes completely against the spirit of the Qur’an.42
Woman’s political representation is equally circumscribed; although he appears willing to extend the right to vote to women, he considers the present system of universal adult franchise harmful and would therefore like to qualify it with a certain level of education,43 and yet has previously stated that women will not, in fact, be given access to such an education. The election of women to the legislative assemblies ‘is absolutely against the spirits and precepts of Islam … active politics and administration are not the field of activity for womenfolk’.44 The best Mawdudi will do is to provide a separate assembly made up of women only who are elected by women only: its role to ‘look after the affairs of women such as female education, female hospitals, etc.’45
His book The Ethical Viewpoint of Islam, published in 1947, gives us a clear indication of his stance on society as a whole and Islam’s position within it. He sees the world, both the western world and the Islamic world at the time, as in a state of sickness and decay and, therefore, in need of a cure:
Thus the moral vices, which the greatest part of humanity was nurturing within itself for ages, now stand fully exposed before us … Only the stark blind can now harbour the delusion that all is well with the diseased humanity … We see whole nations exhibiting, on a huge scale, the worst morals which the conscience of humanity has always condemned with one voice … Every nation, by its own free choice, selects its worst criminals and places them at the helm of its affairs … There is no form of villainy … which these nations have not been guilty of, on a huge scale and with the utmost shamelessness … It is obvious that collective vices make their appearance only when individual vices have reached their nadir … mankind is passing through a period of intense moral decadence which grips by far the greatest majority of human beings. If this state of affairs continues a little longer the time is not far when humanity will meet with a colossal disaster, and long ages of darkness will supervene.46
With a world so full of vice, and facing the prospect of a new dark age, Mawdudi looked for a radical transformation which involved the antithesis of contemporary values. Values such as pluralism, atheism, sexual equality and promiscuity, emphasis on the individual, humanism, and so on were the vices, the diseases from which society must be cleansed. For the cure:
The conclusion to which I have been led is that there is only one correct basis for morality and that basis is supplied by Islam. Here we get an answer to all the basic ethical questions and the answer is free from the defects noticeable in philosophic replies and untainted by other religious creeds which create neither firmness and integrity of character nor prepare man to shoulder the immense responsibilities of civilised life.47
The only way to live an ethical life – synonymous with being a Muslim – is to live in a truly Islamic state. In Mawdudi’s view, ‘the sex instinct is the greatest weakness of the human race’48 and ‘It is only Islam which can provide a wholesome atmosphere for the development of high morals and noble traits of character and which can guarantee true progress of man’s intellectual, spiritual and physical abilities.’49 An Islamic state, therefore, would ‘prevent the sexual urge from running wild, to moderate and regulate it in a system’.50
Given what Mawdudi has to say on the sexual urge and its implications for civilization, he argues that the fundamental principles underlying the social system of Islam helps to rein in and regulate this sexual urge. He cites the Qur’anic prohibition on marrying family relations51 and adultery. Through these restrictions, ‘Islam has closed all the ways to sexual anarchy’.52 However, the sexual urge needs to be channelled somehow, and this is to be achieved through marriage and the creation of the family. Man’s position within the family is that of provider: ‘It is obligatory on his wife and children to obey him, provided it does not involve them in the disobedience of Allah and His Prophet.’53 The woman’s role is to be ‘queen of the house’,54 which means that it is her duty to run the house but it is not obligatory, according to Mawdudi’s references to the hadiths of Al-Bukhari, for her to offer the Jum’ah prayers, or to go on a jihad, attend the mosque, nor to join a funeral prayer (in fact the latter is forbidden). According to a hadith by Al-Tirmizi, a woman cannot go on a journey except in company with a mahram (a close male relative with whom she cannot marry). Mawdudi quotes the Qur’anic verse that says, ‘Stay in your homes and do not display your finery as women used to do in the days of ignorance.’55 However, Mawdudi is dismissive of the beginning of this verse, ‘Wives of the Prophet! You are not like other women’ which seems to suggest very strongly that the Prophet’s concern was with his wives rather than women generally. This concern need not have been because of a question of modesty, but rather their ‘celebrity’ status and the fact they had such access to the Prophet meant that they could not live as other women could do.
When a woman does go out of the house or is keeping company with certain males, she must cover certain parts of the body (the term used for this obligation is satr). For males, incidentally, satr requires covering the body between the pit of the stomach and the knee, but for women it is much more comprehensive. Referring to a number of hadiths from different collectors, women are required to cover their whole body except the face and the hands from all people, except her husband. No man, again with the exception of the husband, is to touch any part of her body, so shaking hands would also not be permitted.56
Mawdudi quotes the well-known verse sura 24:30–1, which says that Muslim men and women must ‘restrain their eyes’ from the opposite sex and that women should ‘draw their over-garments close on to their breasts, and should not display their decoration’ except before close relatives, other women and slaves. It is one thing to call for a degree of modesty from both sexes but Mawdudi also quotes sura 33:59 which says something similar to the previous verse quoted above: ‘Oh Prophet, enjoin your wives and daughters and the women of the Muslims to draw their outer-garments close round them.’ Again, the call for modesty is evident, yet Mawdudi then says, ‘This verse especially enjoins the covering of the face.’57 However, nowhere in this verse does it refer to the face. Rather, Mawdudi relies upon his own selection of (male) commentators of the verse:
A person who considers carefully the words of the Qur’anic verse, their well-known and generally accepted meaning and the practice during the time of the Holy Prophet, cannot dare deny the fact that the Islamic Shari’ah enjoins on the woman to hide her face from other people, and this has been the practice of the Muslim women ever since the time of the Holy Prophet himself. Though the veil has not been specified in the Qur’an, it is Qur’anic in spirit.58
That final sentence in the quote above is key here: ‘Qur’anic in spirit’. Given that the Qur’an does not actually call for the veil, then there is no reason to suppose it is in the ‘spirit’ of the Qur’an for women to cover the whole of the body, including face and hands.
The problem encountered with any state that possesses a set ideology is that that are serious repercussions for those who do not agree or reflect that ideology. A Muslim can lead a believer’s life only in an Islamic state and society, for ‘Who so judgeth not by that which Allah hath revealed: such are disbelievers.’59 Man-made judgements are, therefore, to be regarded with suspicion. As Mawdudi has stated, where man-made judgements have to be made then they should at least be made by the most pious of Muslims. It follows from this that the non-Muslim could not possibly hope to obtain any significant position of power in Mawdudi’s state. Mawdudi fails to accommodate religious pluralism politically. His isolationist policy for non-Muslims is reminiscent of Byzantine ‘protection’ of the Jews, and the ‘millet’ in the old Ottoman state.60 Non-Muslims, or zimmis, who have, nonetheless, affirmed their loyalty to the state are classed as citizens, and would, therefore, have citizens’ rights. However, Mawdudi distinguishes the zimmi from the Muslim and he is not an adherent of equal rights, believing such ideals are the resting place of hypocritical nations that fail to practise what they preach. Rather than attempt to achieve the ideal of equality, Mawdudi would prefer to avoid being accused of hypocrisy and so states quite categorically that non-Muslims would not be treated with equal status in his state: only the Muslims would be given the ‘burden’ of running the state. It is interesting that he refers to the running of the state as a ‘burden’ as this is the same word he uses when referring to the responsibility of men apropos that of women: men have a ‘duty’ and ‘responsibility’ to work, earn a salary, and so on, and these are, therefore, burdens. Likewise, the pious Muslim is burdened with the responsibility of running the state, which the fortunate non-Muslims – or not-so-pious Muslims – are relieved of.
Mawdudi guarantees protection of ‘life and limb, property and culture, faith and honour’61 for zimmis, for Islam enforces only its laws of the land on them and gives them equal rights with Muslims in all civil matters. Not dissimilar to models of previous Islamic states in history, notably the Ottoman, zimmis can follow their own laws, including the making and selling of alcohol (to fellow non-Muslims) and the raising and selling of pigs (again, only to fellow zimmis). Politically, however, the position of the non-Muslim is limited. He or she cannot be the head of state, of course, but nor can the zimmi be a member of the shura. Having said that, the non-Muslim may be allowed to participate in the legislative assembly, on the condition that this does not affect adversely the ideological basis of the state. How ‘adverse’ this can be is certainly open to question. The non-Muslim cannot preach beliefs that are contrary to Islam: that is, they cannot hold, entertain or publish opposing or differing views and beliefs. Again, terms such as ‘opposing’ or ‘differing’ are ambiguous. Mawdudi quotes the Qur’an, ‘There shall be no compulsion in religion’ (2:256) and projects a tolerant image in Islam for other beliefs and convictions. In his Human Rights in Islam, there is no mention of apostasy by Mawdudi, although in The Islamic Law and Constitution he adopts a more dogmatic approach stating that zimmis will not be forced to adopt Islam and can propagate their religion and win converts, but only so long as this activity is among non-Muslims: Muslims are not to be converted to another religion. Interestingly, those Muslims who do show an inclination towards a change of faith are condemned, rather than the non-Muslim who tempted them in the first place. Of note are Mawdudi’s remarks during the Court of Inquiry into the anti-Ahmadiyya riots of 1953.62 Mawdudi, together with the ulama, declared that apostasy is punishable with death in Islam; for Islam is not only a matter of personal faith, but part of the social order. Therefore, a change of faith is the same as an attack on society and may be classed as treason. Parenthetically, the crime of apostasy applies not only to a person who, as an adult, converts to Islam and later recants, but equally to those who are born a Muslim and later wish to abandon or change their faith.
Mawdudi’s concern for the solidarity of a superior Islamic nation against all other political systems – those promoters of jahiliyya – results in less accommodation of ethnic and religious diversity within its boundaries. One suspects that zimmis would be tolerated more as a member of a separate community. An ideological state cannot, by its very nature, integrate with those that do not share its ideology. Only the law of God can prevail; all other sources of authority in society must be rejected. Uniformity of conduct under God’s law would inevitably take precedence over any kind of national integration based on the secular ideals of political accommodation of ethnicity and pluralism. As P. J. Vatikiotis has pointed out:
Surely, the essence of secularism, apart from the separation between religion and state, is the acceptance of the proposition that there is no finality to forms, no exclusive possession of absolute and indivisible truth. A corollary of this is the recognition of alternative notions about man and the world and, more significantly, the toleration of these alternative views. This implies scepticism, not certitude towards absolutist assertions, and experimentation with alternative forms.63
The perfect Islamic state by definition is ‘perfect’; there is a ‘finality of form’, and so there is no flexibility. Any expression of other forms of belief would need to be contained and restricted. It is evident from Mawdudi’s writings that this would indeed be the case: non-Muslims would be ‘tolerated’ but provided they toe the line and do not upset the ideological basis of the community.
One final point: Mawdudi strives to account for most of the fundamental rights offered by modern democratic states in his Islamic system as well as remain faithful to traditional dogmatic restrictions on political liberty and freedom of conscience and belief. Thus, he asserts that the right of life, liberty and property belong to all citizens (Muslims and non-Muslims); freedom of conscience, of association, etc., are guaranteed, and there can be no imprisonment without trial in an Islamic state.64 Mawdudi attempts to show that Islam has adopted a more enlightened attitude to slavery than the west were able to achieve in the eighteenth century. Although Mawdudi’s language regarding slavery in Islam seems occasionally vague and evasive, the principle he adopts is that Islam encourages the setting free of slaves, and even that the freed men could partake in politics – or at least, their descendants could – provided, of course, they ‘embraced Islam first’ and that they were male.65 However, Mawdudi is not altogether clear as to what would be the status of those who did not embrace Islam.
He is doctrinal on the question of female slaves, explaining that Islam allows for the conversion of slaves into concubinage (following the precedents of the Prophet, the Pious Caliphs and the rulings of the Muslim jurists) with whom sexual relations are legitimate without the necessity of marriage: once they have been given to their master, they become his personal property. Mawdudi adopts a very defensive tone on this issue, declaring that before the arrival of Islam, slaves were treated much more cruelly; it was the arrival of Islam that provided them with a degree of legal protection and they were treated more humanely. Mawdudi, though perhaps deliberately vague on this issue, is also confronted with his own demons: the inner conflict between adhering to the original Islamic sources – his salafi inclinations – and the need to recognize that times and attitudes have changed in some cases for the better. While admitting that slavery is wrong by wishing to improve the status of slaves, his reliance on tradition cannot allow him to apply his own human rights ideals to real-life circumstances; for to do this would be to break with tradition and with the primary sources of his constitution.
Although Mawdudi was often critical of the ulama, this captiousness was directed not so much at the nature of the religious body, but at the lack of authority the body had over the political sphere.66 However, Mawdudi’s vision of an Islamic state ruled by ‘those who have achieved the capability of interpretation’ would certainly seem to imply the structure of the ulama, only with more power. The degree to which one is able to participate in the state would be according to the degree of one’s piety and expert knowledge of the traditional sources of the divine law. It is a theocracy, because pure doctrine would dominate, yet, historically, no such pure theocratic state has existed, even at the time of the so-called ‘golden age narrative’. Generally, ultimate political authority has rested with rulers who have acted largely independent of religious control. Giving the Ottoman Empire as just one example:
It is true that Islamic states have theoretically possessed mechanisms for declaring acts of rulers ultra vires. Decrees of the Ottoman sultan required a ruling (fatwa) by the highest religious authority, the shaykh al-Islam, that they did not infringe on the sharia, and the shaykh al-Islam could even depose the sultan. That was the way the Ottoman state worked in principle, but the reality was that the shaykh al-Islam was chosen by the sultan and was utterly dependent on him. When such an official declared a sultan unfit to rule, that was merely a matter of legalising what others in the power structure had decided.67
Now, of course, Mawdudi would not necessarily disagree with the view that throughout much of Islamic history, so-called Islamic states were not Islamic at all, for he would dismiss much of history as in any way Islamic by his rigorous standards. What Mawdudi would not accept, however, is the view that the golden age narrative was not as ‘golden age’ as he might suppose. In Mawdudi’s Islamic state, authority – the body to which the power to make and enforce laws is given – would rest with a small number of individuals, acting as representatives of God. This conception of authority is reminiscent of medieval European societies rather than any modern democratic system. Mawdudi’s claim that his Islamic society would be a ‘theo-democracy’, therefore, seems to beg the question: where is the democracy?
Mawdudi’s outline of the state is authoritarian in the sense that political coercion is required to implement Islamic theology throughout all elements of life. Mawdudi has shown throughout his writings a lack of trust in general human will and has, therefore, chosen to exclude it as a weakness and a distraction from his political aims. His objective is not to organize a society on the basis of equity and justice – which would seem entirely ‘Islamic’ in spirit – but to interpret the sovereignty of God as the submission of the individual will to the coercive power of the state apparatus. As such, Mawdudi is oblivious to the twentieth-century political arena where all political philosophies are necessarily influenced by the international context and the socioeconomic conditions that are prevalent at the time. The fact that it may be conceivable to organize a society on a level that would allow individual free will is a concept that Mawdudi distrusts entirely:
It is obvious that to organise collective life, in all circumstances there is a need for coercive power, which is called the state. No one has ever denied this need except for the anarchists, or communist theory, which contemplates a stage when humanity would not need a collective state. All these are idealistic contemplations which cannot be supported by observation and experience … Human history and the knowledge of human nature show that the establishment of civic life is essentially dependent on a coercive power.68
The charge can be made against Mawdudi that he also comes across as idealistic, presenting a vision of Islam that bears little resemblance to historical reality or experience of human and civil nature. The talk of state coercion leaves an unpleasant taste in the mouth, implying, as it does, suppression of free will and difference of opinion. However, the Islamic state could not be otherwise, for human beings – unless they are pious Muslims – cannot be left to their own devices. Mawdudi does not leave the reader in any state of optimism:
If you wish to organize your political and economic life in accordance with the teachings of Islam, then you need not divide yourself into different parties. Only one party, the Hizb-i-Allah (the party of God) is sufficient for all these tasks. Why? Because in an Islamic society there is no conflict between capitalists and workers, landlords and peasants, rulers and the ruled.69
This is about as idealist as a person can be, and historical experience would incline the reader to feel fear and suspicion rather than positive optimism. For Mawdudi, the state is din; it enters all spheres of activity: ‘Acceptance and submission by the people to a paramount authority are required in the state. This is the meaning of din as well.’70
Mawdudi’s reading of history is to account for its success in becoming a world empire because the umma was united as one ideology. Such a view of Islam as a monolithic ideology ignores its ability to accept a diversity of cultures and belief systems, and cannot be backed up by a historical account of the development of Islam as it spread throughout the Middle East, Africa, Indonesia and Asia. Although the Prophet was against discrimination on the basis of national, ethnic and racial differences, this is not the same as saying that it is the aim of Islam to eliminate such difference: the umma represents unity through diversity. In the past, almost all Muslims lived in intensely community-oriented societies, and so the interests and demands of local authority (the extended family, tribal kinship and ethnic–linguistic groupings) have had to be accommodated within the vast ‘Islamicate’ of the umma: the fact that it has succeeded in accommodating such differences at least partly helps to explain why it spread so widely and rapidly and was embraced by so many differing cultures. Reconciliation between the umma as monolithic and the local community as pluralistic was achieved through the decentralization of power and a toleration of such difference. Thus, while the umma was one and ideally ‘united’, its diversity was presumed. Mawdudi reduces such acceptance of differences and pluralism to the one ideology and the one party. In fact, he goes even further by proclaiming the word ‘party’ to be synonymous with ‘nation’:
The word that the Qur’an has used for the community of Muslims is hizb, which means party … and the basis of the nation is race and descent, and the basis of a party is its programme and its principles … therefore, Muslims in reality are not a nation but a party.71
Mawdudi’s criticism of nationalism rests on the rather simplistic assumption that it rests on race and descent which, of course, is not necessarily the case; other factors apart from common race or common descent may go together to make a nation. Mawdudi’s Islamic state, therefore, would not have national boundaries, but would be the seed of a universal revolution: the universal umma that would submerge all differences, all boundaries, all beliefs into the monolith. It would not be a federation of nations – even if the boundaries of those nations have evolved due to ethnographic reasons – but one great mass; an ideological empire.
There are many contradictions in Mawdudi’s writings, one especially is his criticism of the ulama, and yet the Philosopher-Kings of his Islamic state would surely be the ulama in everything but name. Throughout Islamic history it is unquestioned that rulers, proclaiming themselves as shadows of God on earth, have been able to exercise political rule with little or no regard for Islamic piety, and Mawdudi would be the first to acknowledge this. Mawdudi’s concept of Islamic rule would have the ruler as subject to divine law and the will of those Muslims who are sufficiently pious, which, as has been shown, would be a very small percentage of the population. The makeup of the ruling elite would, therefore, appear little different from what is understood as the ulama, with the key difference that Mawdudi’s ulama would possess considerable political power. Mawdudi’s criticism of the historical ulama has rested on their conservatism and, coupled with that, on their inability to be politically active. Such a criticism is well founded, for, although sharia law would often dominate over matters of marriage, divorce and other social affairs, they rarely entered the political field, and nor did the political rulers feel obliged to be restricted by such laws. Glenn Perry72 cites examples of early Sunni theological debates on the issue of whether a sinner (i.e. the tyrannical and impious rulers of the Umayyad dynasty) could be considered Muslim; the predominant view being expressed that only God can decide. Therefore, the ruler is given the benefit of the doubt and the ulama remain quiet.73 This resulted in the well-known remark by Abu-Hamid al-Ghazali (1058–1111) who said that even ‘an evil-doing and barbarous sultan’ must be obeyed if ‘the attempt to depose him would create unendurable civil strife’.74 The ulama’s role was perceived as the defender of the umma and as a symbol of unity, while the political leaders of the Abassid and Umayyad dynasties ruled by military force that was acknowledged by the ulama as necessary to maintain an orderly society.75
Political power moved from the Umayyad, then to the Persian–Sassanian tradition of the Abbasid, and further away still from the Arab model of authority to Iranian and Turkish elements with political power in the hands of local amirs. The ulama sought to legitimize the amir’s authority so long as the amirs accepted (at least ostensibly) the ‘superiority’ of the sharia and the ulama. However, as Faksh has pointed out, these ‘limits were merely a facade of legal constructs that hardly squared with the situation’.76 In the early days of Islam, the ulama as a class prospered and played a conservative role as mediators between political power and civil society; a number of theological scholars adjured any identification with power, declining to serve even as judges. Professor Anwar Syed has stated that the theologians ‘endorsed secularisation of politics in return for a pact of mutual assistance between the government and ulama’.77 The institution of waqf (private and public endowment of property to mosques and schools which were invariably administered by the ulama) and the ulama’s role as educators and interpreters of religious law insured for them a lucrative and prominent place in society next to the military and bureaucracy. It is therefore natural for them to show a bias towards stability and obedience to secular authority. With the eventual collapse of the Abbasid Caliphate, the Damascene Ibn Jama’a (d. 1333) echoed the sentiments of al-Ghazali:
The sovereign has the right to govern until another and stronger shall oust him from power and rule in his stead. The latter will rule by the same title and will have to be acknowledged on the same grounds; for a government, however objectionable, is better than no government at all, and between two evils we must choose the lesser.78
Therefore, both usurpation (istila) and tyranny (istibdad) are justified so long as the ruler ‘acknowledged’ the sharia law; which is basically the same as saying that the law may be violated so long as the ruler does not explicitly reject the sharia.79 This has resulted in rulers acting in a secular manner, while ostensibly claiming to adhere to Islamic principles; any rulers who blatantly attacked Islam would not usually survive in power for too long.