Posts
|
ISIL (the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant) has renamed itself "the Islamic State", and its leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi has been appointed its Caliph.
Caliph, from the Arabic Khalifa meaning successor, was the title of Islamic rulers after the death of Muhammad. The caliphate survived many historical vicissitudes and was eventually abolished when the Ottoman Empire was defeated in the First World War. But it is part of the Salafi perception of the pure and original form of Islamic rule, and has been much discussed as part of the ideology of al-Qa’ida and of many earlier Islamic revivalist movements. Although no Caliph since the seventh century has in fact ruled the whole Islamic world, the Salafi concept is that he should.
A document issued by the new Islamic State declares that the new Caliph's authority already embraces wide areas in Iraq and Sham (Syria or greater Syria), and that the land from Aleppo in northern Syria to Diyala in eastern Iraq now submits to him, but claims that he has already received allegiance (bay’a) as "Imam and khalīfah for the Muslims everywhere… The legality of all emirates, groups, states, and organizations, becomes null by the expansion of [the caliphate’s] authority and the arrival of its troops to their areas." All other Islamic authorities are denounced as tawāghīt, a Koranic word usually taken to mean "false god" and translated in the document as "rulers claiming the rights of Allah".
No comments:
Post a Comment