Islam and Violence Religion & Theology Essay Paper (Essay Sample)

Islam and Violence
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Islam and Violence
Islam religion has often been linked to organized wars throughout history. Different short stories (hadith) describing the life of Prophet Mohammed indicate that he waged war against different groups of people during his lifetime (Peters, n.d). The Koran, also, on various occasions admonishes those of the Islamic faith to engage in jihad as a way of converting non-believers and working for the greater good of the Islamic society, often called the umma (Peters, n.d). Both the lifestyle of the prophet and the Koran form Islamic law. Moreover, in both cases, jihad is advocated as a way of ensuring that the Islamic religion is practiced by all. Therefore, it is safe to say that Islam is historically and inherently violent because the law of the religion allows it and inspires the followers to wage war against the kafir (non-believers) as a holy act with great rewards.
Throughout history, as recorded in the Koran and the Hadiths that describe the life of Prophet Mohammed, war was allowed within the Islamic community as long as a person had a justifiable reason for using arms against other people (Peters, n.d). For Muslims, participating in the jihad meant one would get rewards from Allah for protecting the faith and those killed in such kinds of struggles would go directly to paradise (Peters, n.d). Failure to get involved in a jihad is likened to living in sin and a community that does not fight the non-believer deserves to be punished. The constant insistence on the use of force as a way of converting other people into Islam makes the religion inherently violent.