At the end of this course, you are able to situate statements about jihad in the broader academic debate about this subject and judge the extent to which they are rooted in the various Islamic sources.
The objectives of this course are:
- - to familiarise you with the concept of jihad as this has developed historically and as this is presented in the Qur’an, the Sunna and Islamic law;
- - to show you how certain modern Muslim scholars (both mainstream and those who are not) have appropriated this tradition of jihad and shaped it in their own way;
- - to help you contextualise popular statements about jihad in light of the historical development of jihad;
- - to make you understand the academic debate on the nature and development of jihad and why differences among academic scholars exist;
- - to analyse critically what both Muslim scholars as well as academic scholars say and write about jihad and to assess the merit of their statements;
- - to write a paper about an aspect of jihad or a phenomenon related to it on the basis of the knowledge and skills acquired during the course.
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This course focuses on the relation between piety and violence or, more specifically, on the connection between these two concepts in Islam. Violence, in the sense of causing physical harm to others through deliberate and conscious acts, can take numerous forms and, more importantly for this course, can be directed at numerous targets: violence against the outside ‘unbelievers’, inside ‘unbelievers’ (apostates), combatants, civilians, women and children, abject subjects (such as homosexuals), as well as material objects (iconoclasm). This course focuses on the concept of “jihad” in Islam: what does it mean, when is it justified and against whom may it be used? As such, this course gives us insight into the question to what extent religious (Islamic) piety causes, inspires, aids or, conversely, limits and hampers violence.
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