Author: alani

This is a serialization of the book titled ‘Crisis in Islam’. The full book and its Endnotes may be accessed at:

The previous chapter was concluded by questioning whether the origin of the culture of killing in Islam was religious or political. It is relevant that before searching for the roots of the culture of killing, we need first to consider punishment in Islam.

Reward and punishment, as every Muslim knows, are in Allah’s hands. Allah has willed, in His absolute wisdom, to punish or forgive, as He wants, in this life or in the hereafter. The Almighty also distinguished between offences that call for punishment, dividing them into two parts: an offence that affects the general public being a public offence, and an offence that affects only its owner being a private offence. When the Almighty laid down His rules for nations, He decided that the community has the right to punish for the public offence, but He did not give that community the right to punish for private offence, as He kept that for Him to punish or forgive as He pleases.

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This is a serialization of the book titled ‘Crisis in Islam’. The full book and its Endnotes may be accessed at:

I ended the previous chapter with an enquiry about what Muslims did to Muslims and non-Arabs whose land they invaded. I intend to elaborate on this, not out of a wish to discredit what Muslims have glorified for centuries, but to understand the reasons behind what is happening today. I believe that today’s culture is very much connected to that history, and we must be able to admit that and accept a critical review of our history. We should aim at achieving a rationality that will enable us to understand our message to mankind, if we have any message left.

No sooner had the Prophet departed this world than the age of Jāhiliya (ignorance) raised its head again.[i] That should not be surprising, as ethics and norms do not change overnight.  It may not be easy for every man to shed the dress of ignorance just by reciting the Shahāda (declaration of faith).[ii] (more…)

This is a serialization of the book titled ‘Crisis in Islam’. The full book and its Endnotes may be accessed at:

My friend wrote to me saying: “….. But for the Imāmate and Caliphate to be a political issue is better than being a religious issue.”

But this is the essence of what I aim to achieve here. What I want to show is that the history of Islam as it exists today is a political history and not a religious one; that the Caliphate was political and not religious; and that the Shari’a was not a result of any Divine assignment, but instituted by the fuqahā and politicians to serve the state. I do not, however, mean in any of this that they were all wrong, but I want to state that these policies were not necessarily religious and that we must stop brainwashing peoples’ minds as we have done for the past thirteen centuries, telling them that it was all Divine assignment for the good of ‘the best nation produced for mankind’ and all is of the essence of religion itself. This recognition will allow us to deal rationally and objectively with our history without hiding under a religious cover, attributing every happening, no matter how significant or insignificant it is, to Divine assignment to the Muslims in order to amend this world and whoever is in it.

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This is a serialization of the book titled ‘Crisis in Islam’. The full book and its Endnotes may be accessed at:

The conflict in Islam was, still is and will remain political. Most attempts at portraying what happened in the history of Islam as ideological or intellectual have not been successful. They were mostly attempts to camouflage the political struggle so as to prevent the embarrassment caused by people discovering that the damage done to Islam had resulted from a struggle for power and not as Fuqahā want us to believe, that it was an ideological struggle to interpret the will of Allah. Understanding the political conflict in early Islam will enable us to trace the cause of current events.

But in order to find the roots of that political struggle, we need to go back to the social environment in which Islam was born.

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This is a serialization of the book titled ‘Crisis in Islam’.

The full book and its endnotes may be accessed at:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/d/Books/Crisis-Islam-Dr-Abdul-Haq-Al-Ani-uthor/0993572006/ref=sr_1_1?=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1486203904&sr=1-1&keywords=The+crisis+in+Islam

Chapter 1

What is Political Islam Today?

I do not aim in what I write to re-write history, because history is mostly not what actually happened, but what people believe to have happened. In other words, it is the sum of convictions and not necessarily of facts. That does not mean that all of those convictions are wrong, but it could equally mean that some are false or imaginary or wishful thinking! My objective in writing this is to understand the cause of what is happening now in the Arab world in particular and the Islamic world in general, because it is inconceivable that people from all corners of the earth gather to ruin a country that is not related to them, and some do not even know where it is and why they are in it, just because men that claim to represent religion have poisoned their minds with hatred for the people of Syria or Iraq’s Shi’a. Understanding the causes of what is happening may help us to stop it or prevent its recurrence, enabling us to get out of the dark tunnel where the world finds Muslims today.

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بسم الله وحده والصلاة والسلام على محمد وآله بعده

السلام عليكم

What I am going to say is unconventional and may not be well received by some but I know no other way but to say what I believe when invited to talk.

I am not out to antagonize, insult or upset but I want to let those who are willing to listen realize that the roads to the Lord are as many as His creation.

I base what I say on the Qur’an and my interpretation of that text, and my interpretation, I believe, is as good as any.

I shall be reciting verses from the Qur’an in Arabic as I should, but would follow that recitation with as good an English interpretation as is possible. (more…)