Al-ʾIkḫwān al-Muslimūn or the Muslim Brotherhood is an organization that strives for an Islamic world. Since its beginnings, members have become involved in politics and in their communities, but their methods have been constantly questioned. Their influence has become worldwide with groups in several countries across the world ,and it is in Egypt where the organization began.
Beginnings in Egypt
The Muslim Brotherhood began in March 1928 by Hasan al-Banna, an egyptian teacher, after seven of his friends agreed that al-Bana should lead them in better serving Allah. After their request, he accepted, and he along with Hafiz Abdul Hamid, Ahmad Al Hasri, Fowad Ibrahim, Abdur Rehman, Hasabullah, Ismail Izz, and Zaki Al Maghribi swore their allegiance to Al Ikwanul Muslemoon(The Muslim Brotherhood) becoming the first members. Jihad would also become their means to spread Islam(Rinehart 2009: 966). The Brotherhood’s mission was to restore the Islamic Caliphate which was destroyed in 1924 by Turkish President Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. Their motto, “Allah is our objective. The Prophet is our leader. The Koran is our law. Jihad is our way. Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope,” is still in use today, and the group wants to spread Islam worldwide(Lebl 2013: 109).
Al-Bana wanted people to come back to the faith(da’wah) and urged they had an overall renewal(Frampton 2013: 832). Soon after, al-Bana gained a reputation as an iman which he later encouraged his followers to call him by. He told stories of when Allah saved him from his troubles and demanded that he be called a murshid(teacher of spirituality). Al-Bana was a very gifted speaker, so gaining members and their obedience was not problem. He had a story for each person that w...
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There were two men that wanted to be the first caliph (successor) of Muhammad. The first man, named Abu Bakr, many people believed he was a good candidate because he was an old friend and was one of the first ones to convert to Islam. Yet others believed that Ali Talib was the best choice because he was a cousin and a son in law to the prophet. The disputes between the two groups of people would lead to a split; the followers of Abu Bark became the Sunnis and the followers of Ali became the Shia. At the end, the majority of people decided to choose Abu Bark and he became Islam’s first caliph. Abu Bark was Muhammad’s caliph for only two years until he died; even though it was a short period of time, he accomplished big things. For example, the spread of Islam to Byzantines and the Persians. The other caliphs (Umar, Uthman and Ali) expanded the Islamic empire rapidly and grew faster than any other religion. The Muslims conquered a massive amount of land from Indus River, across North Africa and into Spain. There were many factors that help Islam succeed; for example, people would rather fight for God and their salvation instead of fighting for a king, the use of military force by the Muslims and how easy it was to convert to
Speckhard, A. (2013). The Boston Marathon Bombers: the Lethal Cocktail that Turned Troubled Youth to Terrorism. Perspectives On Terrorism, 7(3). Retrieved from http://www.terrorismanalysts.com/pt/index.php/pot/article/view/268/540
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...ncil on American-Islamic Relation (CAIR) as an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood and supporter of terrorism” (CITATION NEEDED.
Many contemporary and former Islamic parties, religious movements, and radical groups across the world assume that the Quran requires establishing an Islamic state based on the instructions of the Quran and the hadiths. Therefore, they are so active and vibrant in the political sphere to realize this idea. They also commonly consider Islam as an unchangeable and essentialist political framework to carry out this command. Hence, many Islamic movements by and large have emerged through the
Before the Nation of Islam came to its existence, there were other activist groups that influenced the Nation of Islam. Prior to the emergence of the Nation of Islam in the 1960’s, there were other successful Black Nationalist groups such as Garveyism (Talhami 130). Marcus Garvey led a “return-to-Africa movement” (Talhami 131). This movement called for all blacks to leave America and return to Africa, and re-claim their original land (Talhami 131). The Garveyite movement wanted Islam to be its official religion being that most Africans were Muslims, and Marcus Garvey believed that Islam was the “black man’s” original religion (Talhami 131), and it had been stated that “This notion gained strength through the desire to seek a national identity linking them to a homeland other than the white dominated United States” (Talhami 130). Drew Ali and Elijah Muhammad were influenced by Islam during the Garvey movement (Talhami 131). Elijah Muhammad was strongly influenced by Marcus Garvey’s philosophy to follow other black leaders, and his political transformation to the Nation of Islam (Talhami 132).
Shehata, S. (2011, November 25). Profiles of Egypt's Political Parties. BBC News. Retrieved from http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-15899548
This paper will first give a background on The Islamic State, the attacks in Paris and Brussels, and then it will analyze how it is beneficial to look at the Islamic States motives using
The origins of al Qaeda date back to August of 1988, when the organization is formed at a meeting where three crucial people to the further development of al Qaeda are present (Wander, 2008). Ayman al-Zawahiri was a lieutenant to Osama bin Laden and considered to be the brains behind the organization. He was a lifetime member of the Egyptian Islamist Jihad, until he decided to merge it into Al Qaeda in 1998. He was a member of Bin Laden’s shura council, which is believed to consist of 20-30 senior members that served as advisors to Bin Laden. The second individual present was ...
Zakaria, F. (2007). The Future of Freedom: Illiberal Democracy at Home and Abroad (Revised Edition). New York: W. W. Norton.
Leadership remains the prerogative of the ruling elite. Arab and Islamic leadership are coercive and authoritarian. Such basic principles as sovereignty, legitimacy, political participation and pluralism, and those individual rights and freedoms inherent in democracy do not exist in a system where Islam is the ultimate source of law. Islamists regard liberal democracy with contempt. They are willing to accommodate it as an avenue to power, but as an avenue that runs only one way.
Toney, Michael S. Organizational Behavior Profile Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb AQIM. Charleston, SC: CreateSpace Independent Platform, 2013. Print.
“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...
As mentioned in the first paragraph, many of the North African countries consider the Muslim Brotherhood to be a terrorist organization. The Muslim Brotherhood themselves, however, originally stated that their goal was to build schools and hospitals and other services, while instilling their non-secular beliefs and ways of doing things. When they were founded around the late 1920’s and the early 1930’s, they saw themselves as doing everyone a favor by making sure that everyone was Muslim. Not everyone believed in or wanted this way of life pushed on to them, particularly the people in North Africa. This led to violent killings and horrible conflict, mainly brought on by the Muslim Brotherhood.