Justice, equality and security Friday, 15 October 2010 05:05

t is one thing to make pious pronouncements about equality. It is another to really consider everyone’s life to be of equal worth and take the difficult decisions that may be dictated by this principle. It is in the latter test where Islamic record rises above that of others. During the time of Caliph Umar Ibn Khattab, (May Allah be pleased with him), when a Muslim from the Bakr tribe killed a Christian of Hira, his verdict was that the killer be handed over to the heir of the deceased who could either accept blood money or kill him. The heir decided to take his revenge and the Muslim was killed. Obviously because of the deterrence such incidents were rare. However when a similar incident happened in the time of Umar Ibn Abdul Aziz, the fate of the killer was the same. The unequivocal legal Islamic verdict was that the life of a dhimmi was equal to the life of a Muslim and so was his blood money. Caliph Ali (May Allah be pleased with him) spelled out this principle: “Whoever has accepted our protection (dhimma) his blood is like our blood and his blood money is like our blood money.” This was not a sound byte meant for the media. It was the law of the land.

The same is true about equality in the court of law, MacColl’s claims notwithstanding. A Jew or a Christian could bring out a law suit against any Muslim, even the highest office in the land and his testimony was as admissible as that of anyone else. When a Jew filed a claim for the coat of mail of Sayyidna Ali, who was the Khalifa at that time, Ali, appeared before the qadi as an ordinary defendant. Similarly, when a Christian filed a property claim against Hisham ibn Abdul Malik (who later became a khalifah) in the court of Umar Ibn Abdul Aziz, the latter ordered Hisham to appear personally in the court. Based on the evidence the case was decided against Hisham.

Property Rights

It was the same with land and property rights, which were always respected. When Abu Jafar Abdullah Al Mansur (d. 775) decided to build the new capital city of Baghdad, he did not just appropriate the land. He purchased it from the dhimmis who owned it.

Not only land, but Muslim even paid for the debris taken from non-Muslim properties. It happened during the construction of the Masjid in Kufa in the time of Umar ibn Khattab. The Masjid used debris from the long ago abandoned palaces and mansions of Hira. There was no legal heir to these palaces. Yet a compensation was credited to the account of the Christians living there.

Again the verdict of the Shariah was clear. Imam Abu Yusuf wrote: “The khalifah has no authority to appropriate the land of the dhimmis. It belongs to them. They will continue to transfer it through inheritance and sale.”

Religious Rights

The guarantees for religious freedom were written in the treaties Muslims signed with the non-Muslims. Obviously this included rights to their places of worship. This was enforced like anything else in the Shariah. We see this in the presence of a large number of churches from old times in the Muslim world, whether Iraq or Syria or Egypt. We also see this in the restoration of the right when occasionally someone violated it. In one incident, some churches in Egypt were destroyed by Khalifah Al Hadi. They were rebuilt at government expense by Musa Ibn Isa, the governor of Harun Al Rasheed, following a fatwa of Laith ibn Sa’d, the leading scholar of his time.

The story of the Church of John in Damascus, next to the famous Jami Masjid is quite instructive. Successive khalifahs wanted to purchase the church to expand the Masjid. Amir Muawiya tried but the church leaders refused and he kept quiet. When Abdul Malik Ibn Marwan pressured them to sell the church, the priests threatened him that anyone who destroyed the church would be afflicted with dementia or leprosy. Aggravated by that Abdul Malik did accept the challenge and the church was annexed to the Masjid. While their dire predictions did not materialise, it was nonetheless a violation of their rights as provided by the Shariah. So when Umar Ibn Abdul Aziz became khalifah the Christians petitioned him and he decreed that the annexed part must be returned to them. Muslims ended up offering many properties to the Christians to win a deal that would leave the Masjid intact.

The extreme care to ensure the protection of their places of worship can be seen in the actions of Umar ibn Khattab. It is well known that during his trip to Jerusalem, the asr prayer time came when he was visiting a church. But he refused to pray inside the church despite the offer of the patriarch. Instead he prayed on the stairs. He was concerned that if he prayed inside it might lead some later Muslims to try to take the church. To further preempt any possibility of a future misappropriation, he on his own accord, gave the church authorities a written proclamation that Muslims could not offer prayer in congregation even on the stairs. Nor could they call the adhan from it.

Rights and Security

An important issue in discussion of rights is how they are to be balanced against security concerns. What happened in Cyprus during the Umayyad and Abbasid periods shows us the Islamic outlook on this perennial question. After Cyprus was conquered in 29/650, the treaty called for the neutrality of its people in the wars between Muslims and the Romans. But three years later they violated the treaty and openly helped the Romans in their war on Muslims. Amir Muawiya conquered the city again and left them on renewal of the previous agreement. The pattern of signing a treaty and violating it happened a couple of times. Finally under suspicion of yet another breach of treaty, Walid Ibn Yazeed expelled a group of suspects. But it was only a suspicion; there was no hard evidence. So the scholars gave a verdict that it was not permissible under Shariah to expel them and they were allowed to come back.

Things did not stop here. Their attitude of defiance and helping the enemy continued even during the Abbasid period. Ultimately governor Abdul Malik ibn Salih turned to the leading scholars of his time including Imam Malik, Laith Ibn Sa’d, Sufyan ibn ‘Uyaynah, and others to get guidance from the Shariah in dealing with them. The answers ranged from no action, to a one year notice for them to change their behavior, to expulsion after paying double the value of their possessions. Of course, in a modern Western democracy the solution would have been much easier; the people could have been vilified and tried in the media and then punished by some executive order, not to mention tortured to get intelligence to protect the homeland against the real Roman threat.

Another indication of Muslim attitude about the others is seen in the makeup of their courts. Right from the beginning non-Muslims were welcome there. In the Umayyad period tax and accounting departments were headed by Christians and Zoroastrians. The katib (Chief Secretary) of Abdul Malik Ibn Marwan was Ibn Sarjan, the Christian. This pattern has been there throughout history. Even the much maligned Mughal emperor Aurangzeb Alamgir had many Hindus holding leading positions in his court.

To be continued

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