Islam: Peaceful or Violent?

In its original essence Islam means peace but in a modern context Islam and peace seem to be mutually exclusive terms. On the 29thof August 2011, I interviewed Mufti Junaid Akbar the leader of Masjid Taqwah, a mosque located at Bald Hills, to discuss how Islam is identified and perceived by the Australian society both internally and externally in correlation with the success of interfaith dialogue due to these societal perceptions. Religious violence is often married with phrases such as “terrorism”, “fundamentalism” and “fanatic” with an immediate association towards Islam due to the creation of a global conscious. Thus, the media has an ability to indoctrinate “Islamophobia” into society by framing, labeling and stereotyping Muslims with negative connotations driven by moral panic and fear. By isolating Islam as a violent religion the media creates a barrier for interfaith dialogue in the pursuit for peace and as a result, Mufti Junaid Akbar advocates that education of the truth of Islam is essential in developing an understanding that is critical to obtain interfaith dialogue through encouraged participation.

Religion and violence are intrinsically related in a continuous relationship that is derived from several factors including globalisation, misinterpretation and exclusivity. Volf (2000, p. 862) argues that “the resurgence of religion seems to go hand in hand with the resurgence of religiously legitimised violence… [as] religions are by nature violent.” However, when asked to describe religious violence Mufti Junaid Akbar maintained that violence within Islam is intolerable which asserts the misunderstood and misconstrued identity of what Islam is, even to a practicing Muslim. It can be argued that the construction of a religious identity promotes notions of exclusivity and isolation that act as a catalyst in mobilising causal factors of religious violence that essentially “define, propel and sustain conflict” (Smock 2008, p. 2). Essentially, globalisation or a worldly communal consciousness supports this exclusivity and allows understandings that were previously contextualised to be decontextualised giving rise to identifiers of fundamentalism (Swatos 2005, p. 332). Mufti Junaid Akbar asserted that those Muslims who are labeled fundamentalists are not Muslims as they do not understand the means of revelation which is corroborated by Oommen (1994) stating that fundamentalism is “text without context.” To support this claim I presented Mufti Junaid Akbar with a passage from the Quran in Surah 9:5 that states “fight and slay the Pagans wherever you find them, and seize them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in ever stratagem (of war).” As an isolated text it has an undeniable violent nature however it has not been contextualised with the Quran commentaries that Mufti Junaid Akbar presented in the Quran’s defense to place this passage in the original historical context. Evidently, religious violence is constructed through global means of exclusivity and identity that is essentially misinterpreted and misunderstood but it often exploited through global media mediums that asserts the cohesive relationship between religious violence and Islam.

Islamophobia is driven by the media’s ability to capture and frame moral fears and panic and position Islam in a negative light. Dalrymple (2004, p. 18) argues that Islamophobia is “the principal Western statement of bigotry against ‘the Other’.” In addition, Edward Said (cited in Lebling 1980, p. 119) describes the functions of ‘the Other’ which “has sought to reduce the richness of Arab life and civilisation to a set of easily manageable and unchanging stereotypes.” Thus, the fear of ‘the Other’ being Islam or Muslims has been indoctrinated by the media’s ability to frame and capture this fear that propagates an “us” and “them” dichotomy (Hopkins 2008, p. 46). This dichotomy gives rise to mediatisation which refers to “the tendency to acquire information about politics and to receive political messages form a plurality of sources in the mass media … that are in competition with each other for the attention of consumers” (Alonso, Keane & Merkel 2011, p. 204). Evidently, the mediatisation of Islam presents Islam in the public sphere as a phenomenon to be feared, exploited and discriminated against that essentially initiates Islamophobia within Australia. The media was a reoccurring issue Mufti Junaid Akbar raised and strongly expressed his opinion on the media’s portrayal of Islam in the following statement:

All the media does is show negative information about Islam. It will not inculcate a harmonious society, it will cause a lot of friction between the multi cultural people who live in that society… putting fear in the people, there is no message there... There is no chance that the Muslims are going to take over Australia. We want to live here like any other normal person in peace… You can’t deal with the media because they are very powerful. In the UK riots Muslims played a good part in solving that problem but you didn’t see that.

Mufti Junaid Akbar’s opinion is in corroboration with the assumptions many Australians have about Muslims that “their [Muslims] beliefs are antithetical to Australian values; that they [Muslims] cannot assimilate; that they [Muslims] are inherently violent and condone extremism” (Rane et al. 2011, p.129). Evidently, the media utilise xenophobic and Eurocentric notions to frame Islam as a religion associated with violence that effectively indoctrinates particular opinions in Australian society that have the potential to prevent interfaith dialogue due to either ignorance or a lack of understanding.

However, the education of Islam has the potential to overcome the negative representations of Islam and encourage community engagement in interfaith dialogue that is essentially an intrinsic component of peace. Smock (2008, p. 1) highlights the importance of interfaith dialogue as it “aims to defuse interfaith tensions that may cause future conflict or derive from previous conflict.” Interfaith dialogue is not a new phenomenon as Mufti Junaid Akbar stated “wherever the prophet has a chance to solve the problem by dialogue he solved it by dialogue.” As a pre-service teacher I discussed education as a gateway to interfaith dialogue with Mufti Junaid Akbar who is also a teacher and asserts the importance of interfaith dialogue in peacemaking but also admits the difficulty in achieving interfaith dialogue due to the lack of participation and sees education as a powerful tool in changing this difficulty. Holden (2006) conducted research on Islamic perspectives of Year Ten and Eleven students that highlights this difficulty with fifty percent of students believing Muslims are terrorists which inevitably leads to a lack of understanding, injustice and prejudice towards Islam. To combat these statistics Shatiq and Abu-Nimer (2007, p. 18) argue that interfaith dialogue can be achieved by “fostering strong educational programs in Islamic studies within the context of a pluralistic society.” By contextualising Islam through education the inherent meaning of Islam as being a religion of peace may be achieved to be a ground for interfaith dialogue (Yaran 2007, p. 88). Mufti Junaid Akbar strongly emphasised that the importance of education as it teaches true wealth which is identified in the following excerpt:

Wealth is something that never separates from a person ever... As soon as a person dies those things a person struggles with their entire life are the first to be separated from them… So in reality true wealth remains with a person in this world, in the grave and in the hereafter and that is the wealth of belief…True wealth is belief in God and virtuous acts which will never be separated from you.

Evidently, the promotion of true wealth by investing in the belief of virtuous acts enables the achievement of interfaith dialogue. As a result, education can be a successful gateway in achieving interfaith dialogue by encouraging the participation needed to foster understanding.

The identification of Islam as a violent religion is a reflection of the global consciousness created by the misinterpretation and misunderstanding of Islam on a spiritual and scriptural level. Clearly, globalisation plays an essential role in the mediatisation of religion that asserts Islam as a violent religion that reflects xenophobic and Eurocentric ideologies that creates a distinguished “us” and “them” dichotomy. The identification of Islam as the “Other” strongly effects the outcome of interfaith dialogue as participation is limited due to the negative connotations associated with Islam. However, inclusive and appropriate education of Islam is an essential tool in changing the current dichotomy and allowing interfaith dialogue to become more susceptible and successful in Australian society. Evidently, Mufti Junaid Akbar reinforced hope in the attainment interfaith dialogue by highlighting the misconceived internal and external issues surrounding Islam and realigning these misconceptions with the true essence of Islam.

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