Islamism - "the set of ideologies holding that Islam is not only a religion but a political system."
A recent article in popular US magazine "Newsweek" asserts that radical Islam is a fact of life that we must learn to deal with. While well-written and relevantly informing, this article fails to answer a question that many citizens of the western world are wondering. Does radical Islam represent the practice of true Islam or is it a perversion of Islamic doctrine?
The word "Islamism" is a broad, umbrella term that describes a form of Islamic fundamentalism and envelops a range of activities and practitioners from moderate reformers to radical revolutionaries. Some of Islamism's tenants are less strict and focus on simply encouraging the development of Muslim identity. Other Islamist leaders are anti-democratic militants who advocate the restoration of the Muslim Caliphate, which was abolished in 1924 with the institution of the Republic of Turkey after the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire. Thus, Islamism exists in several forms and spans a wide spectrum of tactics and is not a united movement in the Muslim world
To label radical terrorist attacks as Islamist procedures is only partially correct. Instead, radical Islam represents an increasing dissatisfaction with the current state of Islam. Some Islamists turn to radical methods as they believe that Western society has placed the rest of the world in a subordinate role. (This is true, but many Western countries, including the US, are taking steps to help other countries increase their significance in the global arena and participate in global affairs.) The Muslim world has repeatedly suffered from political and economic stagnation, and radical Islamists believe that this is a result of their subjugation by the Western world. Frustrated by their thwarted attempts to advance their society though conventional means, these men naturally resort to acts of terrorism to further the development of their civilizations.
Radical Islamists are able to justify their actions in a number of ways, from various secular socioeconomic reasons that aim to propel Muslim society into prominence to arguments that try to defend the use of violence by claiming divine inspiration. These "revelations from God" often adulterate otherwise peaceful doctrine into belligerent beliefs that have no basis in Islamic canon and only exist to provide justification and gather support for the radical Islamist and his terrorist actions.
The Jihad is Islam's most misunderstood concept . In Arabic, the word jihād is a noun meaning "struggle" and in Islam refers to both the internal personal struggle to improve one's self and society against the temptations of Satan and to the defense of Islam. The Jihad as a defense of Islam is often incorrectly interpreted as "holy war" by both Western society and radical Islamists, and radical Islamists have used the Jihad as a justification for their actions, from the wars of the Umayyad dynasty in the 7th and 8th centuries to modern-day acts of terrorism. The Jihad as a defense of Islam originally did not entail the use of military force but, rather, the use of missionaries and apologetics to protect the faith from internal and external corruption.
All Abrahamic faiths, including Islam, are religions of peace, and all Abrahamic faiths, including Judaism and Christianity, have used warfare in circumstances that place doubt and ambiguity on their militant actions and motives. Muhammad led many bloody battles but so did King David of Israel and Pope Urban II. Thus, radical Islam is, indeed, a perversion of the original intent of the Islamic concept of Jihad, but it is important to understand that religious institutions are established by man and run by man and that Islam is not the only religion that has been tainted by perversions of doctrine and scripture.
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