Islam and the Golden Rule

I have been away for a while. But I have been keeping up with responses for Jihad Watch's usual assortment of ridicule and smears for Islam and Muslims.

A few weeks ago, Ali Sina, Robert Spencer's friend and fellow co-author for a book they wrote, said the following:

The problem with the good teachings of Muhammad is that they are reserved for fellow Muslims. When the hadith says “None of you [truly] believes until he wishes for his brother what he wishes for himself,.” it is talking about the fellow Muslims. The brotherhood in Islam does not extend to everyone.

Does the brotherhood of Christianity or Judaism extend to everyone? If I die as a Muslim, what will happen to me under Christianity, i.e. heaven or hell? Anyway, he also said this:

A clear example that Islam is not based on the Golden Rule is the verse (48:29): “Muhammad is the messenger of Allah; and those who are with him are strong against Unbelievers, (but) compassionate amongst each other.” This is the perfect definition of fascism.

There are many other verses that show the brotherhood in Islam is not universal. The non believers have no rights and should not be treated in the same way that Muslims are to be treated. The entire Quran is a breach of the Golden Rule. The Quran tells Muslims to slay the unbelievers wherever they find them (2:191), do not befriend them (3:28), fight them and show them harshness (9:123), smite their heads (47:4), etc. Are these verses compatible with the Golden Rule?

Islam is the only doctrine that calls upon its believers to do evil to others for the simple fact that they are not believers.

There's a lot more, but it's quite a bit to respond to.

So, what is the Golden Rule exactly? It is the idea to want for others what you would want for yourself. In Islam, the greatest thing a believer could want is to be obedient to God's commands. Likewise, this is what any believer in God would want for his fellow human being, to be obedient to God's commands. I doubt devout Christians like Sina would argue with this perspective since in his faith the greatest thing any Christian could want is to also gain "salvation."

The erudite scholar of Islam, Shaikh Muhammad Afifi al-Akiti, said the following regarding the hadith Sina quotes above:

Imams al-Nawawi and Ibn al-'Imad (may Allah be pleased with them both!), for instance, were among our scholars who understood "brotherhood" in this Hadith (from the phrase: li-akhIhi [his brother] in the matn) to include all of humanity, i.e., the brotherhood of mankind (in the other ta'wil, brotherhood simply refers to Muslims). In fact, Imam Najm al-Din al-Tufi, the Hanbali mufassir, more plainly than any other medieval interpreter of this Hadith, used the expression "mahabbat al-insan" [the love for mankind]. [Tufi, Ta'yin, 125]. This, it turns out, is not astonishing, for his own Mujtahid Imam related a Hadith (reproduced below) that bears out the full relevance of our topic.

The implication of mahabba [love] with respect to brotherhood, whether taken in its universal sense (of mankind) or in its limited sense (of Muslims only), is that we wish for him what we wish for ourselves as well. So in the case of Muslims, for example, our wish is for him to remain in Islam while for the non-Muslim, on the other hand, our wish is for him to be in Islam; the motivation for this love, of course, should be none other than the sincere concern, ultimately, for well-being in the Hereafter. In fact, according to Imam al-Ghazali ( may Allah be pleased with him!), this principle is the acme of sukun, i.e., being at peace with the rest of creation, of which the sum is in fact, good manners or good Adab among people. And the peak of good Adab, says the Hujjat al-Islam, is that "you do not burden people according to your own pleasure, but burden yourselves according to their pleasures so long as they do not violate the Shari'a." [Ghazali, Ayyuha l-Walad, 131]

The most judicious explanation of this Hadith, indeed, was given by the collector, Imam al-Nawawi himself (and the same sharh was again related, but later ascribed by some to another Shafi'i jurist, the meticulous Ibn al-'Imad):
"It is better for that [saying of the Prophet, may Allah's blessings and peace be upon him!] to be interpreted in the sense of universal brotherhood, so that it includes the non-Muslim and the Muslim. Thus he wants for his non-Muslim brother what he would want for himself, that is [read: min li-l-bayan] his converting to Islam; just as he wants for his Muslim brother, his remaining in Islam. That is why it is recommended to supplicate for divine guidance [Hidaya] on behalf of the non-Muslim." [Nawawi, Sharh Arba'in, 123].

So Sina is wrong. The hadith he quotes is not limited to only Muslims, but as some of the great scholars of Islam have noted, it includes non-Muslims as well. While Sina argues that the hadiths mentioned in his article are limited, his proofs are references to verses from the Qur'an that say nothing regarding the nature of relations between Muslims and non-Muslims in the sense of communal relations. The verses he cites have to do with Muslim relations between them and the polytheists of Mecca.

Sina cannot find a verse that says Muslims should wish for the bad health of non-Muslims, or that Muslims should wish for them to suffer poverty, or that Muslims should wish for their destruction. No, in fact there is nothing like that in a general sense in the Qur'an. The Prophet Muhammad, peace and prayers of God be upon him, cared deeply for his people in Mecca, even when they treated him like complete garbage. He wished the best for them, which was that they did not encounter God's wrath by failing to become believers.