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The Falsehood of Defensive Jihad

The enemies of Islam are attempting to generate among the Muslims that Jihad is a defensive war and not offensive and that initiating war against the enemies contradicts the meaning of Jihad in Islam. They justify their allegation by referring to Allah’s (swt) saying: “But if the enemy incline towards peace, do also incline towards peace.”  [8-61] and also His saying: “Fight in the cause of Allah those who fight you, but do not transgress limits; for Allah loves not transgressors.” [2.190]

They also refer to Allah’s (swt) saying: “To those against whom war is made, permission is given to fight, because they are wronged; and verily, Allah is most powerful for their aid.”  [22-39].

They argue that these verses denote defensive fighting and that the verse of initiating war does not abrogate the verses denoting that Jihad is for defensive situations.

The whole of this allegation is refuted from three aspects:

First: The evidences of Jihad are general and unrestricted; they encompass defensive war and initiation of war against the enemy; they also encompass limited war, unlimited war, and preventive war and so on. These evidences include all types of fighting against the enemy because they are general and unrestricted. To specify them or restrict them to being in reference to defensive war requires a text to either specify or restrict them; and there are no texts as such either from the Book or from the Sunnah; hence they remain general in their evidential aspect and they include all types of wars and all types of fighting against the enemy. Let us review the verses of Jihad in Surat al-Tawbah because this Surah is the last of what was revealed on fighting, thus ruling out any claim of specification or restriction or abrogation. Allah (swt) says: “Fight those who believe neither in Allah nor the Last Day, nor hold that forbidden which has been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger, nor acknowledge the religion of Truth, (even if they are) of the People of the Book, until they pay the Jizya with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued.” [9-29]

Allah (swt) also says: “And fight the polytheists altogether as they fight you altogether and know that Allah is with the pious.”  [9- 36]

Allah (swt) also says: “O Prophet! Strive hard against the unbelievers and the Hypocrites, and be firm against them. Their abode is Hell, an evil refuge indeed.” [9-73]

Allah (swt) also says: “Allah has indeed purchased of the believers their persons and their goods; for theirs (in return) is the garden (of Paradise): they fight in His cause, and slay and are slain: a promise binding on Him in truth, through the Law, the Gospel, and the Qur'an: and who is more faithful to his covenant than Allah. Then rejoice in the bargain which ye have concluded: that is the achievement supreme.” [9-111]

Allah (swt) also says: “O you who believe, fight the unbelievers who gird you about, and let them find firmness in you: and know that Allah is with those who fear Him.  [9-123]

The order to fight has come in these five verses in a general and unrestricted manner: “fight those who do not believe in Allah…”, “fight the polytheists all together…” and so on. The denotation of the order is included and from the five verses, the generality and unrestrictive denotation can be clearly deduced; hence, they are proof that Jihad is fighting the Kuffar, be it initiating the fight, or defending the Muslims or the lands of Islam. They include defensive war, offensive war and all types of war, without any specification or restriction due to the non-existence of any specification of the general rule or any restriction of the unrestricted rule.

As for the verses: ““But if the enemy incline towards peace, do also incline towards peace” , “Fight in the cause of Allah those who fight you, but do not transgress limits; for Allah loves not transgressors”, “To those against whom war is made, permission is given to fight, because they are wronged; and verily, Allah is most powerful for their aid”  and other similar verses, these cannot indicate specification of the verses in Surat  al-Tawbah, nor can they restrict them, because they had all been revealed before Surat al-Tawbah; it is well known that the former does not specify nor does it restrict the latter. This is so because specification amounts to an abrogation of a section from the general rule, since it moves the rule away from its generality by nullifying it in some part and placing another rule instead. Hence, since specification of a rule amounts to abrogation, and since abrogation stipulates that the abrogating rule must come later than the abrogated, these verses cannot specify the verses of Jihad because they had been revealed earlier. The verses in Surat al-Tawbah were the last of what was revealed on Jihad, thus specification cannot be established. Likewise, the same applies to restriction. The restricting text must come after or accompany the unrestricted in order to act as a restriction for it or for the referral of the unrestricted text to a restricting rule to be sound. In this context, the aforementioned verses and their like had been revealed before the verse of Surat al-Tawbah, thus they are invalid in terms of restriction and the unrestricted text cannot be attributed to a restricting rule because the unrestricted was revealed later. Therefore, these verses can neither specify nor restrict the rules of Jihad and consequently, their use as a proof that Jihad is a defensive war becomes redundant and non-applicable. The general rule maintains its evidential aspect due to the absence of any text that may specify it and the unrestricted rule maintains also its evidential aspect due to the absence of any text may either restrict it or make reference to it possible. Therefore, Jihad is fighting the enemies in an unrestricted manner and in a general manner: it includes offensive, defensive, preventive, limited, unlimited and all types of wars.

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