This article is part of an ongoing project to document my thoughts during a second reading of Marmaduke Pickthall‘s English translation of the Quran. It’s available for free by Project Gutenberg here, if you wish to read along with me.
Upon exacting my editing criteria, Chapter 8 reduced from 76 verses to 12
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Throughout the Quran, the primary weapon of conversion is fear. The author enjoys intimidating disbelievers so much, he is disposed to interrupting his own narratives so to insert an incongruous threat.
Eight chapter into this abuse, I was surprised to read that Muslims are expected to show equal levels of fear:
They only are the (true) believers whose hearts feel fear when Allah is mentioned, and when His revelations are recited unto them they increase their faith, and who trust in their Lord; Who establish worship and spend of that We have bestowed on them. (008:002-003)
This demand for homogeneous terror makes plain that to be a Muslim, belief is insufficient. There is no sola fide in Islam.
What is not clear is why a true Muslim needs to be fearful, especially given what they believe about the eternal afterlife. Perhaps they need to worry about whether they really are a true Muslim or not? Or are they simply supposed to dread the consequences of apostasy?
Whichever it is, it would seem Allah does not stop at thought-crimes. In Islam, fear is mandatory. In Islam, one is capable of committing ‘emotion-crimes’.
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As this chapter is about war, we might expect Allah to have provided his followers with military advice. For example, he might have taught them how to cast iron and produce superior weaponry. He might have instructed them in the chemistry of explosives, or the mechanics of ballistics.
Instead, the Quran offers a sound (if not obvious) military tactic:
O ye who believe! When ye meet those who disbelieve in battle, turn not your backs to them. (008:015)
Although, that is is little unfair. The next verse suggests that was to mean Allah expects a Muslim to fight a disbeliever rather than retreat or withdraw.
Whoso on that day turneth his back to them, unless manoeuvring for battle or intent to join a company, he truly hath incurred wrath from Allah, and his habitation will be hell, a hapless journey’s end. (008:016)
The message is clear: the only thing Allah hates more than a non-believer is a Muslim who doesn’t take the opportunity to kill a non-believer in battle.
To this end, there are several places in this chapter where Allah encourages Muslims to fight non-believers:
O Prophet! Exhort the believers to fight. If there be of you twenty steadfast they shall overcome two hundred, and if there be of you a hundred (steadfast) they shall overcome a thousand of those who disbelieve, because they (the disbelievers) are a folk without intelligence. (008:065)
Of course, defeat in battle is a sure way to bring this all into question. But the authors of the Quran have anticipated this:
…that Allah might conclude a thing that must be done; that he who perished (on that day) might perish by a clear proof (of His Sovereignty) and he who survived might survive by a clear proof (of His Sovereignty). Lo! Allah in truth is Hearer, Knower. (008:042)
At first, this sounds like there isn’t much Allah won’t claim is ‘proof of his sovereignty’. However, I think this is to mean that only ‘true believers’ survive battle. A good way to immunize the survivors against doubt.
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For the first time, although probably not the last, we are explicitly told that a belief in Islam equips a person with moral sensibilities:
O ye who believe! If ye keep your duty to Allah, He will give you discrimination (between right and wrong) and will rid you of your evil thoughts and deeds, and will forgive you. Allah is of Infinite Bounty. (008:029)
These dispositions must be quite contrary to intuitive empathy because just a few verses before, we are told that Allah hates the deaf:
Lo! the worst of beasts in Allah’s sight are the deaf, the dumb, who have no sense. (008:022)
It isn’t so much that they are deaf – because he takes all the credit for making it so – but because they wouldn’t listen to his ramblings, even if they weren’t deaf.
Had Allah known of any good in them He would have made them hear, but had He made them hear they would have turned away, averse. (008:023)
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Then we come to the subject of the Chapter. First, Allah wishes to stake claim to ‘the spoils of war’, although the specifics of what that entails are yet to be disclosed:
They ask thee (O Muhammad) of the spoils of war. Say: The spoils of war belong to Allah and the messenger, so keep your duty to Allah, and adjust the matter of your difference, and obey Allah and His messenger, if ye are (true) believers. (008:001)
However, Allah is willing to share.
And know that whatever ye take as spoils of war, lo! a fifth thereof is for Allah, and for the messenger and for the kinsman (who hath need) and orphans and the needy and the wayfarer, if ye believe in Allah and that which We revealed unto Our slave on the Day of Discrimination, the day when the two armies met. And Allah is Able to do all things. (008:041)
My favorite verse from this chapter sounded rather like a parent telling their child to ‘go outside and play’:
Now enjoy what ye have won, as lawful and good, and keep your duty to Allah. … (008:069)
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