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Other traditions
Islamic systems
What is Islam?
• Is Islam really a unitary concept?
• The areas where people who follow the
Islamic religion live are far apart and have
different cultures and histories
What is Islam?
• Is Islam really a unitary concept?
• The areas where people who follow the
Islamic religion live are far apart and have
different cultures and cultures
• In what sense can religious identity be
said to be more important than class,
gender, nation, culture or history,
especially when discussing a political
system?
5 Pillars of Islam
• Shahada: there is no God but God and
Mohammed is his Prophet
• Salat: prayer to be performed 5 times a
day
• Zakat: the giving of alms
• Sawm: fasting during Ramadan
• Hajj: pilgrimage to Mecca
• But what about Jihad?
Islam and politics
• Is it true that there is no separation between
religion and politics in Islam?
• What is the role of the shari’a?
• And what is the shari’a?
• Is it laws derived from the Koran?
• Or is it the body of laws developed over time by
Muslim jurists/sages?
• Shari’a fairly limted in scope: personal status,
inheritance and some types of taxation
• What is the status of laws that cannot be
referred back to the Koran?
Different types of Islam
• Sunni: associated with the Caliphs and the Ummayad dynasty.
Majority of Muslims
• Shia: followers of Ali. Minority of Muslims
• Kharjites. Early fundamentalists
• Ahmadiya/Qadia not regarded by other Muslims as Muslim. Modern
• Alawi in dispute
• Druze likewise
• Ismaili
• Nation of Islam US group Farakhan
• Salafy
• Sufi: mystics
• Wahhabi first modern fundamentalists
Some important historical dates
• 571 birth of Mohammed [the Prophet]
• 622 the Hegira
• 632 death of the Prophet. Creation of the
Caliphate [khalif=successor]
• Koran produced under second and thir
Caliphs 634-656
• 656 Ali became Caliph. Ummayad
rebellion. Split into Sunni and Shia
branches
More important historical dates
• Abbasid dynasty 758-1258. Umayyads
fled to Spain
• 1258 Mongols captured Baghdad.
Abbasids fled to Egypt
• Ottomans captured Egypt 1517 and held
caliphate as sultans until abolished 1924
• With dismembering of Turkish/Ottoman
Empire, today’s “states” emerge
Some contemporary significant
dates
• Soviet “liberation” of Afghanistan
• Iranian revolution 1978-9
• Hamah uprising and massacre in Syria
1982
• Assassination of Sadat 1981
• FIS electoral success in Algeria 1990-91
then covil war
• Attack on World Trade Centre 1992 and
2001
Western perceptions
• Tendency to think of Islam as a phenomenon of
the Middle East. Untrue Indonesia largest
Islamic state by population, followed by Pakistan
and, surprisingly, India
• Tendency to think of Islam as violent religion:
assassains and terrorism
• Since feminism, position of women unacceptable
• Islam is somehow “international” in character [Al
Qaeda is everywhere!]
“Islamism”
• To distinguish between Muslims and violent
sectarians the term “islamist” has been coined
• This is regarded as a totalitarian ideology by
many commentators
• Islamists are concerned about social differences
and poverty
• They feel their culture is under threat from the
West
• They wish to recreate the Golden Age, but
without rejecting modern technology
• Iran and Sudan the type states
More on Islamists
• Important movements in Jordan [where they are the
majority party], Algeria, [where the military expelled them
from government]
• Began by calling for return to the Sharia, but have had to
make ideas more concrete and modern.
• Like market-oriented social democrats, but Old Labour in
their attitudes to women. Definitely not “New Men”
• “Islam reformulated as a modern ideology” Middle East
Quarterly debate
• Urban dwellers, not tribalists
Rise of Islamist Movements
• Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt early in 20th
Century the first
• Others emerge in the 1970s
• Are they primarily religious?
• Or primarily social or protest movements?
• Or as Ulam suggests of MarxismLeninism, ways of coping with rapid
industrialistaion and modernisation?
Institutions
• Caliphate. First four “the Patriarchs” –
direct followers of Mohammed himself.
Then the Ummayad dynasty
• Tribes
• Imam: spiritual leader originally Ali and his
successors
• Emirs: local governors who usurped the
secular authority of the caliphs from the
fall of the Abbasids in the 12th century.
Government of Saudi Arabia
• Chief of State and Head of Government: the
monarch
• Crown Prince, Deputy PM and Heir apparent
chosen by the monarch
• Council of Ministers appointed by Monarch
• Legislature: 90 member consultative council and
chair[man] appointed by monarch
• Constitution based on Shari’a and basic law of
1993
Government of Iran
• Head of state: Leader of the Islamic revolution
Ayatollah Khamenei, appointed for life by
Assembly of Experts
• President elected for four-year term by universal
suffrage: Khatami
• Legislature: 290 seat Islamic Consultative
assembly [elected]
• Guardian Council [responsible for ensuring all
laws and practices are in accordance with Islam
Government of Sudan
• Govt an alliance of the military and the
National Congress Party [formerly the
national islamic Front]
• Chief of State and Head of Govt. Lt. Gen
Bashir
• Majority of Cabinet from NCP
• Legislature: 270 popularly elected, 90
appointed. Elections widely regarded as
rigged