In the Quran it is said that: "Let there be no compulsion in religion."(2:256) If someone does not want to believe God and obey his rules, he cannot be forced to do. If even God's rules cannot be imposed by using force, a person can never have the right to impose his own rules by using power. Although all Muslim dictators claim that their state is the most Islamic one, this is evidence that dictatorships are un-Islamic. Dictators know that what they say is not true, but they also know that gaining and staying in power is much easier by hiding their aims under the cover of Islam. As Mir Zohair Husain, professor in University of South Alabama, says,
Many authoritarian leaders, whether civilian or military are Muslim Pragmatists who manipulate Islamic rhetoric and symbols to stay in power. (Husain, 1995, p172)
According to Ahmad Shafaat, a journalist, even the Prophet Muhammad was commanded by God to do things with the consent. The Holy Quran says that: .".. their affairs are run by mutual consultation."(42:38) Muslims obeyed this rule of consultation properly until the reign of four properly guided Caliphs, Hadrat Abu Bakr, Omar, Uthman and Ali ended. Hadrat Abu Bakr was directly elected by the public and other three Caliphs were chosen by councils of trusted elders. As Shafaat indicates, after Muawiyah, another Caliph, nominated his son, Yazid, as the ruler with force and without consultation, violence, repression, slavery and dictatorship began in Muslim world. Dictatorship started its murders by killing Hadrat Imam Hussain, the Prophet's own grandson, because Hussein had not accepted the rule of a man who came to power illegally, without election and consultation. Muslims all around the world now hate Yazid, the leader...
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...killed or tortured people, he always emphasized the importance of egalitarianism. He acted in this way because he was sent to the world by God to show people how they should behave. His behaviour shows both Muslim and non-Muslim leaders how they should approach their people. Real Muslim leaders should obey the Quran's rule of consultation: .".. their affairs are run by mutual consultation."(42:38) They should not be repressive, everyone can say and think whatever they want. People are equal before God, so they must also be equal in the world. Murders and tortures are strictly forbidden in Islam. Real Muslim rulers must never perfrom these things, also they should prevent them who try to repress people. Any compulsion is forbidden in Islam. The leaders should work for their country not for themselves. If they behave like that, people will live in a more peaceful world.
When a group uses religious ideology to control a population, the religious texts, in the case the Qur’an, are usually interpreted to suit the agenda of the group, because “they have different values and beliefs”2. The reason that the texts are used and intentionally misinterpreted is fairly obvious. Iran, where 99% of the population is Muslim, coupled with the fact that Muslims believe that the Qur’an is the word of god, one who can...
The dictatorship also manages to keep its subjects in line through brainwashing. As Prometheus writes, "Everything which comes from the many is good. Everything which comes from the one is evil. Thus have we been taught with our first breath." Also, as children, the ruled are forced to recite, "By the grace of our brothers are we allowed our lives. We exist through, by and for our brothers," meaning that the only moral justification they have for living is service. By imbuing each subject with the moral premise that the "many" is always good and the "one" is always bad, the dictatorship manages to virtually eliminate any thought of opposition. In opposing the dictatorship, one is opposing the will of all people with one's singular will, and thus is evil. The moral creed that the dictatorship inculcates gives it a moral s...
Many centuries ago in our history, before 1450, both the Byzantine Empire and the Islamic Caliphates both were born. The Byzantine Empire took place in the Eastern Mediterranean while the Islamic Caliphates were located in the Middle East and some parts of North Africa. Both of these empires used religion to govern in their empire, and while both empires didn’t take part in the same religion, both religions still had differences and similarities when it came to governing. Both of the empires were influenced by different religions. The Islamic Caliphates were influenced by the Prophet, Muhammed who taught them the ways of their religion, and on the other hand the Byzantine Empire was influenced by Christianity. The Both the Byzantine Empire and Islamic Caliphates
A common misconception is that a dictator can never come to power by means that are legal. This is not true. Adolf Hitler, the cold hearted dictator of Germany during World War II, is a near perfect example of how a dictator can form a regime legally. Hitler became a dictator when the Reichstag building was set on fire on February 27, 1933 while he was currently the only leader of Germany. A Dutch communist, Marinus van der Lubbe, was tried and found guilty of the crime. Hitler used the countries fear of communism to suspend the German constitution and take executive powers. Some historians believe that a more likely culprit for the Reichstag fire was a Nazi obeying an order from Hitler himself to set fire to the building allowing him to suspend the German constitution and take the executive powers; however, there is no proof that this occurred. So, from what is provable, Hitler became a dictator by working inside of the law (“Hitler Becomes Chancellor” para.8).
...and the fear installed in the citizens. The most powerful people in the Middle East are controlling the government financially, so it makes it hard to stand up against their wrong doings. The citizens don’t have the protection they need to feel stable if they do go against their dictators. Another reason is that they fear the punishment they’ll receive if they do stand up for themselves. They would rather endure the pain of not having freedom than the physical pain they would experience for fighting for their freedom. The Middle East’s traditional ideologies make it hard for people to change their viewpoints. Religion is how people define themselves, so once they lose that they feel like they’ve lost themselves. All in all, authoritarianism will continue to exist in the Middle East because the citizens don’t believe that having a democracy is worth the fight.
Burns, Thomas J. "Islam." Religion and Society. OU Campus' Dale Hall, Norman. 14 Apr. 2014. Lecture.
If he was tortured for the years that he was in the Ottoman Empire there would be a reason for him killing everybody. He would have become mad at the world and therefore let his anger out on the people that were weaker then himself. But on this account he was putting metal rods up people buttocks and killing them slowly. The insanity would have come after he killed a few people. If he did get tortured then he would have been insecure and not felt safe, which would make him nervous when he felt threatened. Since he was a ruler he could just have the threat eradicated. He would have sort of been like an animal that was trapped in a corner, scared and violent.
“We strive to be like all our brother men, for all men must be alike” (Ayn Rand, Anthem). If everyone is the same no one can be superior, no one will believe they are better; because once someone believes they are better than others they are harder to control. For any dictator to stay in power they need to be in total control of their people; and children are the best and easiest of individuals to mold their minds into what the dictator wants them to believe, think, and do.
The Islamic revival trend of the late 20th century forged the intellection that the ‘resurrected’ Muslim nations were akin to Islamic states. The region considered to make up the Muslim world indisputably comprises nations that maintain majority Muslim populations. The extent to which these nations may be labeled Islamic, however, is dubious. As the omnipresent uniformity ascribed to Muslim nations has intensified with heightened media attention, the variance among systems of governance in these countries has continued to be overlooked. The Islamic presence in these countries, in fact, ranges vastly, from Islamic social groups that strive to revive social morality and eradicate Western culture to established political systems that endeavor to enforce Islamic law.
Khashan, Hilal. “The New World Order and the Tempo of Militant Islam.” British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies. Volume 24, Issue 1 (1997. 5), 5-24.
Imagine yourself in a world where you are constantly having to fear not being able to ever be free from this cage that you've been wanting to get out of for so long. Now imagine that suddenly just being your real life and not just a world that was just imagined, it’s almost too unbearable to think about but this happens. The book “Before We Were Free is a good example of that. The books takes place in the Dominican Republic in the 20th century, when the Dictator at the time was Rafael Trujillo, or in other words El Jefe. Dictators are a ruler with total power over a country, typically one who has obtained power by force. Till this day there are countries that are still ruled by dictators, for example, North Korea However, having a dictator
A dictator is a ruler with total power over a country, typically one who has obtained power by force, and generally not liked by the community. The major dictators of the 20th century left an infamous legacy behind them, all using similar tactics during their reign. Mussolini, dictator of Italy from 1922 to 1942, used his power to abolish all other political parties in Italy, thus making him superior. Hitler gained dictatorship in the 1930’s. In that time, he purged opposition and used his newly confiscated power to create his definition of superior humans, annihilating entire groups due to them not meeting his criteria for appropriate human value.
Thomas W. Lippman gives an introduction to the Muslim world in the book Understanding Islam. He has traveled throughout the Islamic world as Washington Post bureau chief for the Middle East, and as a correspondent in Indochina. This gave him, in his own words, "sharp insight into the complexities of that turbulent region." However, the purpose of the book is not to produce a critical or controversial interpretation of Islamic scripture. It is instead to give the American layman an broad understanding of a religion that is highly misunderstood by many Americans. In this way he dispels many myths about "Muslim militants," and the otherwise untrue perception of Islamic violence. In this way the American reader will become more knowledgeable about an otherwise unfamiliar topic. However, the most significant element of Lippman’s book is that it presents Islam in a simple way that makes the reader feels his awareness rise after each chapter. This encourages him to continue learning about the world’s youngest major religion. Understanding Islam dispels many misconceptions about the Muslim world, and presents the subject in a way that urges his reader to further his understanding of Islam through continued study.
This model should connect different organizations in the Muslim world together and should give a deep insight about the main principles that motivate people and organizations. This model should also offer a better understanding of the situational and cultural factors that exist in Muslim societies (Ali, 2009). Moreover, developing such a model can help to understand the nature of leadership and to understand the factors that help shape leaders in the Muslim world. Additionally, the model will offer researchers an opportunity to understand Islamic culture and the complex environment at economic organization and the developmental and organizational issues in many Muslims countries (Ali, 2009). It will also help to limit the gap between leaders and followers in Muslims societies because organizations in Muslim societies suffer from deep and serious crises (Ali, 2009). These crises can be solved when managers and policymakers in the Muslim world become more pragmatic. They also should know the differences between what is ideal and what is reality, and to know when they should adopt the principles of their faith (Ali, 2009). Furthermore, while Islam is spreading around the world, tribalism remained entrenched in Arab politics and social organization and confusion has persisted for many non-Muslims about what Islamic,
“Are political Islam and democracy compatible?” This question has been troubling both Muslims and non-Muslims living in East and West for a long time now. Contemporary Islamic political thought has become deeply influenced by attempts at reconciling Islam and democracy. Muslim thinkers who deal with political debates cannot disregard the significance of the democratic system, as it is the prevailing theme of modern western political thought. Hence, it is necessary for any alternative political system, whether it is religious or secular, to explore its position with regards to democratic government. In fact, a large literature and media publications have developed over the last century on this heated discourse of democracy versus Islam. While many argue that Islam has all the ingredients of modern state and democratic society, many other reject the phenomena “modernism” and “democracy” as a whole because of their “foreign nature”—alien to “Islamic values”. For Islamists and modernists, the motivation for such effort to either embrace or reject democracy often is to remove suspicion about the nature and goals of Islamic movements and Islamic revivalism or resurgence. But before diving into this discourse, one needs to understand the definition and origins of “democracy.” Although purely a Western ideology in its origin, there is no consensus on the definition of “democracy” as a political system. The Oxford English Dictionary describes democracy as: “A system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state, typically through elected representatives” (“democracy, n.”). In my paper, I will examine whether or not democracy and Sunni political Islam are compatible through the eyes of three revolutionary Sun...