2009/10/13         INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE

“MIDDLE EAST/WEST ASIA-MALAY WORLD RELATIONS: OPPORTUNITIES FROM GLOBALIZATION”

“West Asia/Middle East-Malay World Relations: Islamic Political Perspectives”

Prof. Dr. Hassan Ko Nakata,

 Center for Interdisciplinary Studies for

Monotheistic Religions of Doshisha University, Japan

?????????? ?????? ??????????? ????????? ??? ???????? ????????? ?????? ???????? ??????????

O David! Lo! We have set thee as a viceroy in the earth; therefore judge aright between mankind

Introduction ? Realizing Utopian Dream

              New Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama writes in his article “A New Path for Japan”; All great historical ideas started as a utopian dream and ended with reality. Whether a particular idea remains as a utopian dream or becomes a reality depends on the number of people who believe in the ideal and their ability to act upon it.

              Actually, this is the quotation of the words of Count Richard Nikolaus Eijiro von Coudenhove-Kalergi (1894 - 1972)[1], who is regarded as the spiritual father of EU (Europe Union).

1. Necessity of Unity for Ummah  

              The integration of Europe was considered just a utopian dream after World War II in which European nations killed each other to result in more than 60 millions of casualties. But now we are seeing borderless EU with a united currency, Euro, in which people, money and commodities are freely moving neither prevented by the border nor imposed taxes or tariffs. The utopian dream of the United Europe has been realized into EU thanks to the firm indomitable resolution and noble devotion for the ideal of the men of the cause like Count Coudenhove-Kalergi.

However, these words should be issued by us, awake Muslims, who are aware of obligation to integrate ourselves, or Ummah, in Dar al-Islam, or Abode of Islam, under the banner of Khilafah, or Vicegerency of Apostle of Allah, while defeatists are brainwashed by the West to believe that the integration of Ummah by reestablishing Dar al-Islam and Khilafah is merely a utopian dream impossible to realize.

              Speaking at the first EPU (European Parliamentary Union) conference in 1947, Coudenhove-Kalergi argued that the constitution of a wide market with a stable currency was the vehicle for Europe to reconstruct its potential and take the place it deserves within the concert of Nations.  It suggests that we Muslims also should start from making a wide free market and a stable currency. And here I point out that Coudenhove-Kalergi also criticizes the concept of “Modern/Western territorial nation state” as the worst kind of idolatry, saying; We are experiencing the most dangerous revolution in the world history: the revolution of the State against the man. We are experiencing the worst idolatry of all the time: the deification of the state.

In reality, making a free market and a stable common currency is intermingled with the liberation from the false deity of the nation state, because the nation state imposes its fiat money on people and encloses the global market by its border. We will return to these topics later.

More than a half century ago, Umesao Tadao, a famous Japanese ecologist, in his book An Ecological View of History: Civilization in the World Context  (Bunmeino Seitaisikan, originally published in Japanese in 1957) argued that before the hegemony of European colonialism there were 3 great civilizational empires in the world, i.e, Qing Empire (Dynasty) in China, Mughal Empire in India and Ottoman Empire in Middle East, and Chinese Civilization and Indian Civilization were beginning to revive but Middle East or Islamic Civilization was left behind. It is quite a pity that newly revived India is identified as rather Hindu-Civilization while Mughal Empire was an Islamic dynasty, separating itself from Islamic Pakistan, and Pakistan failed even to keep unity and lost the East part by independence of Bangladesh as the result of bloody civil war with 3 millions of causalities and has fallen hind India not only in economic development and technology but also in internal security.

Today we see that the revival of China and India is becoming more and more obvious day by day.  How about the Middle East, the heartland of Islamic Civilization?

Unfortunately, the Middle East is still split into tens of territorial national state separated politically by the borders set by their former suzerains even after passing a half century since their independence and economically also their commercial relations with the West are by far the bigger than their mutual relations.

What is the most deplorable is the case of Arab countries, needless to say, historically speaking the Arab is the nation of the Prophet Muhammad(ss), nation of Qur’an and nation of Islam, as well as they share same history, same culture, and same language so that they are reading same books, same newspapers and same magazines, and watching same TV programs and films. And they organized themselves into League of Arab States in 1945, which has currently 22 members and their constitutions advocate that each of them is a part of Arab nation (Ummah Arabiyyah), not Nation of Islam(Ummah Islamiyyah). But despite all such facts, they have not achieved integration yet and still remained divided to pieces politically and economically, even on the level of Arab nationalism, to say nothing of Islamic Unity.

              Why can we Muslims not unify ourselves into one polity, Khilafah, not make one territory within which there is no border to prevent free movement of people, money and commodities, Dar al-Islam, despite that we have one God, Allah, One Prophet, Muhammad(ss), One Holy Scripture, Qur’an, and One law system, Shari‘ah, while China can integrate 56 ethnic groups with more than one billion population into one polity and India can also integrate 21 language groups with more than one billion population into one polity ? If we cannot, how we can claim that we are Ahl al-Tawhid, nation of the Unity, the worshipers of Rabb al-Ard, Lord of the Earth, neither Lord of Saudi Arabia, nor Lord of Malaysia?

              Under the false “globalization”, which is in reality nothing other than spreading the brutal rule of the law of the jungle all over the world, not only nation states are forced to transform themselves into regional blocks to survive, the most successful of which is EU, but commercial companies are also compelled to make alliance or merger to survive as we see in major oil company, automakers, banks, chain stores and so on, and those which failed alliance has bankrupted one after another.

              If Muslim countries failed to unify themselves, they would be defeated more and more politically and economically and left behind not only by the West but also China, India and other nations in development.

              What is the main purpose of the integration of Muslim countries into Dar al-Islam or Khilafah? It is to abolish borders within it to guarantee the complete freedom of the movement of people, money and commodities. And what is crucial is the 100% freedom of migration, about which advocates of the false “globalization” is keeping quiet intentionally.

The economic effects of migration are "profound," says Dilip Ratha, an economist at the World Bank. "Even a small increase in migration can produce significant welfare gains, and those welfare gains can be much larger than complete trade liberalization."[2]

The Islamic world has 74% of the oil reserves of the earth, 57% of the gas reserves, 1 trillion dollars in foreign exchange and gold reserves and 4,700,000 military personnel, exceeding the United States and China combined. Thus, only if unification of Muslim countries and freedom of migration were achieved, the optimal distribution of natural resources, money or capitals, and labor force or man power would be realized.

              Thanks to the “globalization” and the global financial depression as its result, it becomes clear and self-evident that we Muslims need politico-economic unity so that we could survive and would not be defeated in the economic war and left behind by the advancement of the rest of the world. And this politico-economic unity is called Khilafah and the territory whose ruling system is Khilafah is named Dar al-Islam.

2. Obligation of establishing Khilafah and Dar al-Islam

              Now, we outline here what the required Islamic unity is. First we turn to the definition of Khilafah and some of its rules according to Fiqh, the classical Islamic jurisprudence, citing the most detailed encyclopedia of Fiqh, officially endorsed by the Ministry of Awqaf an Islamic Affairs of Kuwait.[3]

              Khilafah is synonymous to Imamah Kubra and defined as “the general headship for the religion and this world as the vicegerency of the Prophet”[4], its become obligatory, Fardh, by academic consensus, Ijma‘,[5] its neccesity is also inferred from Prophetic Hadith; When three persons go on journey, let them choose one of them as their leader”(Abu Dawud),[6] and it is not lawful that there is two Khalifah at the same time, only one Imam is legitimate.[7]

Fiqh prescribes the uniqueness of Khalifah and strictly forbids its plurality, because the Islamic order includes security of the freedom of immigration. An angel says in Qur’an,; "But was not God's earth spacious that you might have emigrated therein?' (????? ????????? ???????????? ?????????????? ????????? ???????????? ???????? ????? ??????? ???????? ?????? ??????????????? ??? ???????? ????????? ?????? ?????? ?????? ??????? ????????? ?????????????? ?????? ?????????????? ??????????? ????????? ????????? ????????) (4:97), and Ibn ‘Abbas explains this verse,; “…My earth is specious…” as “the land of al-Madinahb is safe, so immigrate to it.” Namely, al-Madinah, Dar al-Islam should be the place to which all the Muslims can immigrate. The oneness of the Khalifah symbolizes the oneness of the Islamic order, and the Islamic order secures free movement of the human being, and commodities in its territory, Dar al-Islam.

The earth belongs to nobody, but solely to Allah. No one is allowed to cut it into parts and restrict immigration in it. Unlike the ideology “territorial nation state” of modern Western Europe, it is not allowed to divide human beings by the states.

It is because Allah created human beings as various ethnic groups so that they could know each other, as Allah says,; "We have indeed created you from a male and a female, and made you nations and tribes that you may come to know one another.”

 (?????????? ???????? ?????? ???????????? ???? ?????? ?????????? ??????????????? ???????? ??????????? ??????????????? ????? ???????????? ????? ??????? ??????????? ????? ??????? ??????? ???????) (49:13), and the freedom of the immigration is precondition for mutual-understanding. And Allah orders to travel on the earth to learn the history of nature and the history of human beings by saying,; "... Travel in the land and observe how He originated creation." (???? ???????? ??? ???????? ??????????? ?????? ?????? ????????? ????? ??????? ???????? ??????????? ????????? ????? ??????? ?????? ????? ?????? ???????) (29:20) The liberation of the earth by the abolition of the borders and the unity of the Islamic order are essential conditions for Islamic mission.

The earth differs in climate regionally, and there are differences also in its underground resources, and the life in its certain area may become difficult temporally by disasters caused by man or natural disasters. So, the freedom of migration is the first step that enables the fairness of the life among people. So, abolition of the border which bars migration of people is an indispensable part of Islamic order. And for realizing this, existence of the single Khalifah is necessary, who does not allow the "territorial nation-state" system which is nothing but the cartel of the rulers of each country in the world which divides the world mutually for the purpose to protect their own vested interests.

Khilafah promotes true economic freedom not only by abolishment of borders within Dar al-Islam but also by removal of all the tariffs, for Islam does not approve any tax except Zakah for Muslims[8] Jizyah for Non-Muslims and Kharaj for the utility of state-owed lands. That is why imposing any tariff or tax is not allowed in Dar al-Islam. A great Hanbalite jurist Ibn Taimiyyah(d.1328) says; Levying taxes are what is not allowed by the agreement of legal schools.[9] Another great jurist of Hanafi legal school al-Jassas (d.981) is so strict that he says that every Muslim should fight against those who levy taxes, and he should even kill them if they are armed.[10]

Another important role of Khalifah is a fair distribution of energy resources for sake of Ummah, the whole Muslim community within Dar al-Islam, because the energy resources are neither private property nor governmental property but public property, according to the Prophetic Hadith; A Muslim is a co-owner of three things, (1) water, (2) grass, and (3) fire (???????? ????? ?? ???? ?? ????? ?????? ??????) (Ibn Majah), thus they should be utilized for public interest.

The oil resource underground in the Islam world forms 74% of the deposits of the entire world, however, Muslim countries, such as the Sudan, Somalia, and Afghanistan, are troubled with starvation and absolute poverty, while the oil producing Gulf countries make desperate efforts of construction of the No.1 skyscraper of the world by the wealth stemming from the oil.

The Prophet (ss) says; Those who sleep by full stomach knowing that the neighbor is hungry in his side never have the faith in me. (?? ??? ?? ?? ??? ????? ????? ???? ??? ???? ??? ???? ??) (Hadith: al-Hakim). But the present condition of the Ummah is that the wealth of rich countries does not spread round poor countries, and Muslims of poor countries are not even allowed to emigrate to rich countries though they are Muslim brothers same as citizens of such rich countries, obstructed by the cage of the border of the country. Therefore, the true Islamic order cannot be realized unless unification of Dar al-Islam under the single Khalifah is achieved.

              As the historians admit, “the Islamic Golden Age” was created by Muslims’ vigorous monetary economy with “the expanding levels of circulation of a stable high-value currency (the dinar) and the integration of monetary areas that were previously independent.”[11] So, the success of the Khilafah depends not only on the integration of Muslim countries into the borderless Dar al-Islam but on its stable high-value currency (gold Dinar).

              As the global financial depression (2008-2009) has exposed, the prosperity of U.S. is the result of “a casino economy” or “bubble economy”, not a real, tangible economy, the secret of which is the fact that U.S. has the seigniorage of the dollar, the world’s key currency, namely, thus she can print paper money at her will without any basis of real value after the President Nixon discard Gold standard by making the dollar inconvertible to gold in 1971.

              Islamic specie is only gold and silver as the clause 130 of Al-Majallah, a civil code of the Ottoman Caliphate, prescribes that the Nuqud(species) are the gold and the silver, and its commentator Ali Haidar explains that the banknote is just a commodity (not money). So, we, Muslim nations should mint gold Dinar and silver Dirham as our legitimate species and return to Gold standard in order to take initiative of creating a fair and stable global monetary system based on the gold which will terminate the U.S.’s hegemony for the ferocious false “globalization” of the fraud babble economy.

The space of Islamic order governed by the Khalifah or the law-governed space of Islam is called Dar al-Islam. Dar al-Islam is a space where the peace is maintained by a Muslims’ power and the Islamic law is enforced. The law-governed space where Khalifah, the leader of Ummah, rules by Islamic law and many religious communities enjoy religious self-government and live together is Dar al-Islam, and the mission of Islam is transforming this earth of Allah, i.e., the whole world into Dar al-Islam.

Although Islam does not force faith of Islam, but the Islamic order, Islamic law-governed space, and Dar al-Islam must be spread to all the earth even with resorting to military power.

Why? Islam means total submission to Allah, i.e., obedience to only Allah’s command. In other words, Islam means denying rule of all the creatures that command the people beside Allah, whether inanimate idols or human rulers. As for what is related only with the inward mind like a religion in a Western sense, we can liberate ourselves from idolatry or subordination to the creatures only through our own thinking and judging and the liberation from outside by force is impossible. However, when the external rule forced by violence, i.e., political domination, exists, it is necessary to liberate the ruled nations from the rulers by confrontation violence. So, the Sahabah, the companions of the Prophet(ss) and the following generations of Muslims performed the mission of establishing Islamic order all over the world with the sword, Jihad, to liberate nations from the local rulers who enclosed the people to his domain to squeeze them under the name of tax collection and all other means of exploitation.[12]

3. Conclusion - Proposal for Integration

              As conclusion, we would like to propose here the way to realize the utopian dream of integration of Ummah in Dar al-Islam under the banner of Khilafah.

              First, our model is EU, because the substantial essence of Khilafah or Dar al-Islam is the integration of the territory of Muslim countries by abolishing borders and tariffs which prevent free movement of people, money and commodities within it, and it requires the stability of economy and politics which is achieved by the common high- quality currency, i.e., gold Dinar and the most stable, lasting and sustainable law of the world history, Shari‘ah, and the existence of the single Khalifah is rather a symbol of this integrity.

As pointed out before, Coudenhove-Kalergi thought that integration of Europe should start with making a wide free market with a stable currency, and the correctness of his thought has been proved in the history of formation of EU which realizes complete freedom of trade and immigration within its territory with Euro, one of world’s key currencies. So, following EU model, we had better start with making a free market and a stable currency. As for a stable currency, we should reactivate the idea of the Islamic Gold Dinar which the former Malaysian Prime Minister Dr. Mahathir proposed in 2001 but has not still been implemented yet.

As for the integration of Muslim countries, it seems quite realistic that we start with giving perfect freedom of immigration within the whole territory of Muslim countries for all the Muslims regardless to their nationality, race, ethnicity, language, and so on, before the total abolition of the borders within it. Discrimination based on religion is permissible, because we have a precedent in “Law of Return” of Israel, enacted in 1950, which provides that any Jew regardless of affiliation may migrate to Israel and claim citizenship. Why we cannot make our religious affiliation of Islam the base of nationality or citizenship, while the Jew has already done it?

              Regarding political integration, we would like to suggest transforming OIC (Organization of the Islamic Conference) into a platform for reestablishing Khilafah. Despite the fact that its charter refers to “the noble Islamic values of unity and fraternity, and affirming the essentiality of promoting and consolidating the unity and solidarity among the Member States”, in reality, it functions as nothing but organ hindering the real integration of territory of Muslim countries and political unity to perpetuate the status quo of the split of Ummah, in other wards, it has been reduced to a cartel of the rulers for not invading their turf each other. Therefore it should be reformed into a tool for realizing the true unity of Ummah, namely, Khilafah and Dar al-Islam.

              Here, I strongly believe that Malay World can play a vital role for it, because there is freedom of speech and political activity in Malay World to a great extent and awakening of Islam seems quite remarkable, comparing to the Middle East, where most of the regimes are desperately despotic as well as corrupted, thus all the Islamic political movements are almost suffocated and there is little hope for any reform of the regime. As already cited, the legitimacy of Khilafah is based on the Prophetic Hadith, “When three persons go on journey, let them choose one of them as their leader”. It means that the Khilafah is to be established in the process of accumulation of such behaviors of election in various strata of Ummah, thus it needs “democratic” environment which allow people to choose freely the most suitable candidate for the Khilafah.

              Thus, I hope that Malay World will take the initiative in transforming OIC into a platform of reestablishing Khilafah, so that the integration of the territory of Muslim countries and unity of Ummah may be achieved in peace without bloodshed as was with the formation of EU.

              May Allah guide us to the right path, strengthen our resolution, and protect us from conspiracies of enemies within and outside.

Wallahuwaliyyuttawfeeq.