Introduction

Islam is a monotheistic religion in the Abrahamic tradition, as taught by Muhammad in seventh-century Arabia. Islam’s presence in politics is as old as Islam itself, as Muhammad was a spiritual and political leader at the same time. The same is true for the caliphs who led the Muslim community after him. Although the spiritual guidance of even the initial caliphs was never as authoritative as Muhammad’s, the political nature of their position was undeniable: they were the rulers of Muslims, and Muslim lands (for more on Islam, see box below).

Islam

Islam is a monotheistic religion. Its adherents are called Muslims, and they make up approximately a quarter of the world’s population. Muslims consider Islam the successor of earlier Abrahamic faiths such as Judaism and Christianity, and share their primordial assumptions, including their creation myth, where Adam and Eve are central figures. Islam also involves belief in an afterlife, a Heaven, and a Hell.

Therefore, in a general sense, Islam too starts itself with the first man and woman. In a narrow sense, however, Islam started in 610, when, according to Muslims, the archangel Gabriel revealed the first verses of the Quran to Muhammad in Cave Hira, which is located on a mountain outside the city of Mecca in the Arabian peninsula. A 40-year-old merchant at the time, Muhammad used to spend extended periods of time in isolation in that cave, meditating and contemplating. These revelations continued for a little over two decades, or until shortly before Muhammad’s death in 632, and they constitute the Quran, the holy book of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of Allah, which is “The God” in Arabic.

The Quran is the supreme authoritative text of Islam. It mentions, among other things, biblical accounts, including but not limited to those involving Moses, Mary, and Jesus. These accounts are not always in full agreement with those in the Bible, however. For example, according to the Quran, Jesus is not God, or the son of God, but a messenger of God. He is one in a long line of messengers, beginning with Adam, and ending with Muhammad, while including figures such as Abraham, Moses, David and Solomon in between.

The Quran thus reframes and revises some biblical accounts. From a Muslim perspective, however, the Quran actually corrects these accounts. In fact, Muslims consider the Quran not only the latest but also the final message from God. Moreover, they believe its teachings will remain valid until Judgment Day. In that regard, Islam resembles Christianity, according to which, humans have received their final warning, and these are the end times. In other words, life on earth is short and temporary not only for individuals, but also for the human race as a whole. Therefore, what matters primarily is not this life, but the afterlife. After all, according to both Christianity and Islam, this life is, first and foremost, a preparation for the next.

Approximately thirty years after Muhammad, however, the caliphate as an institution came under the control of one dynasty or sultanate after another, where the position would pass from father to son, with little say from the Muslim community. On the one hand, these sultanates used the caliphate primarily as a source of legitimacy, while on the other expanded Islam’s borders, and built major cities and libraries that became places of attraction for scholars from different parts of the world. The Islamic Golden Age (786–1258) under the Abbasid Caliphate is the epitome of that era.

Approximately thirty years after Muhammad, however, the caliphate as an institution came under the control of one dynasty or sultanate after another, where the position would pass from father to son, with little say from the Muslim community. On the one hand, these sultanates used the caliphate primarily as a source of legitimacy, while on the other expanded Islam’s borders, and built major cities and libraries that became places of attraction for scholars from different parts of the world. The Islamic Golden Age (786–1258) under the Abbasid Caliphate is the epitome of that era.

Although it has been shaped, controlled, and sometimes even manipulated by such powerful political institutions since its early days, Islam has always remained a major social force, and has influenced the prevalent norms and values in Muslim societies and communities. Caliph-sultans were rulers. They were the leaders of Muslims, but they did not have absolute authority. There were always binding Islamic texts. There were always scholars who studied them. There were always sufimasters with spiritual teachings. In other words, caliph-sultans did not have the authority to interpret Islam single-handedly. On the contrary, even a strong sultan had to respect and follow at least some religious rules and traditions.

Differentiating between Islam and the state has thus been a challenging task; where one ends and the other begins is not always clear. The state and Islam are never the same thing at any point, but they cannot be imagined apart either. This symbiotic structure continued for at least a thousand years, and started to change only after a set of landmark events that extended into centuries: colonialism, the fall of Islamic empires, and the emergence of the nation-state. These experiences radically changed the relations between Islam and the state in Muslim-majority societies, as they led to new types of political regimes that often disrupted the longstanding and well-established arrangements.

The regimes that emerged in the post-colonial or post-sultanate Muslim contexts of the 1900s tended to be nationalist, authoritarian, secular, pro-Western, and oddly-enough, anti-Western. These regimes were anti-Western in that they were anti-colonialist. In fact, many of them emerged out of independence movements. Yet, these regimes were pro-Western at the same time in that their leaders were often educated in Western or Western-style institutions, socialized into a Western lifestyle, and adopted the political ideologies that were in fashion in the Western world at the time: secularism and nationalism. They were convinced that secular nationalism was superior to other political ideologies, and that it had contributed significantly to the wealth and power of the West, so they wished to model the regimes of their newly-independent countries after their Western countries of choice.

These post-colonial or post-imperial regimes turned out to be highly authoritarian, however. The absence of democratic norms and institutions left these regimes with significant powers, and accountable to no one. There were few checks or balances, if any. There were no longer political or religious institutions with any real power or authority. There was no longer a caliphate. There never was a particularly strong civil society. There were no international norms or institutions that offered protections against human rights violations. On the contrary, fascism was on the rise in Europe, and some of the worst crimes against humanity were about to be perpetrated.

Under the circumstances, the secular elite in Muslim-majority contexts produced leader-oriented authoritarian regimes. Militant- or soldier-turned rulers in Egypt, Turkey, and other places created secular dictatorships of sorts. The new elites imposed secularism and nationalism on their traditional societies. Both ideologies were unfriendly to Islam, but the secular leaders were determined to bring about change. They thus unsettled long-standing religious institutions. Turkey abolished the Caliphate. Egypt modernized Al-Azhar University. New religious institutions emerged. The Directorate of Religious Affairs in Turkey employed and groomed a new and regime-friendly religious elite. In this new era, Islam came under the control of secular and authoritarian elites, as did many other aspects of public and private life. Only the military concerned the unaccountable political elites, as coups were a constant threat.

Although Islamism emerged in the 1800s as a reaction to Western colonialism, it developed during the 1900s in the context of such ruthless regimes. In fact, many conservative Muslims considered secular nationalism to perpetuate Western colonization, politically and culturally. The rivalry between secular nationalism and Islamism is thus critical to understanding the politics of many Muslim-majority societies. Islamists primarily advocated for respect for religious values, and stronger ties to other Muslim-majority nations, but that was not all. They emphasized social justice, freedom, equality, and sometimes even democracy, among other things. They formed associations, charities, political parties, and other institutions, to the extent their respective regimes allowed them to do so. These institutions taught the Quran and preached piety, but they also fed the hungry and helped the needy. These social activities helped Islamists gain the trust of large populations in the absence of a strong welfare state.

The Islamist discourse against secular authoritarianism was convincing to many. Islamists were thus able to create a large base of sympathizers. They were sometimes even able to find common ground and form coalitions with secular left-wing groups, who were equally critical of authoritarianism, arbitrary rule, social injustices, and severe human rights violations. For example, Islamists and leftists were allied during the civil resistance and demonstrations against the Shah regime in Iran before the 1979 Revolution, which brought Ruhollah Khomeini to power. While these experiences vary across Muslim-majority contexts, national identity and the place of Islam in social and political affairs have always been central to political debates in the Muslim world.