Kufr

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Kufr ( Arabic كفر 'Unbelief') in Islam denotes the rejection of belief in God ( Allah ), the denial of the prophecy of Muhammad and the Koran as God's revelation. Such an "unbeliever" is a kaafir كافر(Plural: kuffār and kāfirūn ). Consequently, followers of other monotheistic religions - Jews and Christians - are also called kāfir / kuffār . The antonym to Kufr is Iman , the Islamic belief in God.

In ashShaafi'ee the term appears "al-kaafir al-Kitabi" الكافر الكتابي, ie the unbelieving owner of the scriptures from whom a Muslim can inherit, but not the other way around. The book owners ( ahl al-kitāb ) are already mentioned in the early exegesis of the Koran as unbelievers ( kuffār ). The Koran commentator Muqātil ibn Sulaimān († 767 in Basra ) justifies this as follows: "... because the Jews and Christians join in their prayers in temples and churches (God other gods) ...". The disbelief of book owners ( kufr ahl al-kitāb ) is - according to the legal scholar Ibn Qayyim al-Jschauziya († 1350) - not as serious as the disbelief of polytheists, i.e. H. the follower of the ancient Arabic deities . The Andalusian legal scholar of the Malikite school of law Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr († 1071 in Játiva ) defines the group of those liable to pay the jizya accordingly: the Muslim authorities take the jizya from every kāfir kitābī , i.e. from Jews and Christians, also from Zoroastrians , idolaters and from "all other kinds of unbelievers ( ahl al-kufr ), be they Arabs or non-Arabs". This tax is not collected from apostates , i.e. from those who have fallen away from the religion as Muslims, but are treated and punished according to other aspects of Islamic law. that is, they are "to be killed after a waiting period" (see Kāfir ); In contemporary Arabic usage, the term ( kāfir ) for followers of the book religions ( kitābī ) is common in this form.

Kufr in the Koran

The Arabic verb with the consonants k - f - r ( kafara  /كفر) has different meanings in both ancient Arabic poetry and the Koran . The basic meaning is “to cover”, “to hide”, “to cover”: “In a night whose clouds covered the stars” ( kafara ) - it says in a poem by Labīd b. Rabīʿa (early 7th century ).

The main meaning of the verb in the language of the Koran is “to be or will be disbelieving”, “not to believe”, “to deny something”, “to fall away from belief” and is in contrast to the verb āmana , “to believe”. In Sura 2 , verse 253 stipulates that

“But they were divided. Some of them were believers ( āmanū ), the other unbelievers ( kafarū ). "

So also in sura 61 , verse 14 - with reference to the children of Israel.

This comparison between "believing" and "being unbelieving" becomes clear in sura 16 , verse 106:

"Those who do not believe in God ( kafara ) after having believed ( baʿda īmāni-hi ) [...], God's wrath comes upon them and they have to expect a great punishment."

With the preposition bi- kafara means “not to believe in something / in someone”. In sura 18 , verse 37 it says:

"Don't you believe in him who made you out of earth, then out of a drop (sperm) and then formed you into a man?"

Kufr and the other religious communities

In the non-Quranic literature the verb fulfills the same function: One serves the only god and denies the idol worship and the idols. He who, after believing and accepting Islam ( kafara baʿda īmāni-hi / islāmi-hi ), becomes a disbeliever ( kafara ), i.e. This means that he does not follow the religious doctrine, does not believe in the Koran and in the Messenger of God ( kafara bi- ) is an unbeliever: kāfir (Part. Active).

Those who commit kufr by falling away from Islam have a special place in Islamic law; this type of kufr is considered ridda , apostasy, and is punishable by death.

The so-called script owners ( ahl al-kitāb ), i.e. H. the Jews and Christians , are mentioned several times both in the Koran and in legal literature as kuffār / kāfirun (pl. of kāfir ). An important passage from the Koran is sura 5, verse 44:

"Those who do not decide according to what God (in Scripture) had revealed are the (true) unbelievers ( kāfirūn )."

The Koran exegesis refers the passage consistently to the "owner of the scriptures" and does not differentiate between Jews and Christians, since both religious communities do not use their scriptures according to their original revelation. In Revelation, they are attacked in a similar sense in several places and their beliefs are questioned. Correspondingly it says in sura 5, verse 17:

"Those ( la-qad kafara ʾllaḏīna ... ) who say: God is Christ ( al-masīḥ ), the son of Mary [...]"

And in sura 5, verse 73:

"Those who say: God is one of three [...]" are unbelievers "

The fate of those who “disbelieve” ( kafarū ) is described in Sura 2, verse 161 as follows:

"On those who disbelieve and die in this condition, the curse of God and the angels and men as a whole [...]"

The Koran exegesis understands the unbelievers named here to be those who deny the prophecy of Muhammad , accuse him of lying, i.e. H. Jews and Christians, members of other religious communities, and also the polytheists among idolaters (i.e. the Arabs on the Arabian Peninsula ), in short: all who are outside the Muslim community. In legal doctrine, Jews and Christians are unbelievers; i. kuffār , but kufr of the polytheists, i.e. followers of idolatry , who ( al-mušrikūn ), according to Ibn Qayyim al-Ǧauziyya in the 14th century, is more serious - as mentioned at the beginning - than kufr , the disbelief of book owners, i.e. of Jews and Christians .

Kufr in Islamic Law

In the modern understanding of law, the following terms stand for kufr :

The term kufr therefore means “unbelief” in the Qur'anic and post-Qur'anic times both in traditional literature ( sunna ) and in Fiqh up to the present day. In the Islamic understanding of law, it is common to understand kufr , unbelief, three groups: Judaism, Christianity and all those communities that do not have a book revealed (by God). The latter are also called polytheists - muschrikūn  ; marriage to them is forbidden in the Koran.

“And don't marry pagan women until they become believers! A believing slave is better than a pagan woman, even if you please. And do not marry (believing women) to pagan men as long as they do not believe! A devout slave is better than a pagan man, even if you should like him. "

- Sura 2, verse 221

The legal doctrine of the Hanbalite Abū Yaʿlā in the late 10th century represents kufr in this sense, which is still valid today:

" Kufr includes three communities: Judaism, ( al-yahūdiyya ), Christianity ( an-naṣrāniyya ) and those who agree that they have no (revealed) scripture."

asch-Schāfiʿī († 820) does not provide for a punishment for a Christian's change of religion (apostasy) to Zoroastrianism or for a Zoroastrian converting to Christianity: "We do not urge this person to repent and neither do we kill them because they left unbelief (kufr) and joined (another) unbelief ” .

This understanding of kufr , as evidenced by quotations from the Koran and by legal doctrine, is used for the present by the encyclopedia of Islamic law. issued by the Ministry of Waqf and Islamic Affairs (Kuwait 1995, Volume 35, pp. 14-29).

The Hanafi jurist and theologian al-Kasani (. St 1189), a teacher in the Madrasa al-Halawiyya in Aleppo distinguishes four types of kufr :

  • Denial of the Creator's existence: the atheists ( ad-dahriyya );
  • Recognition of the existence of the Creator, with denial of the unity ( tauhid ) of God: ie the Zoroastrians and idol worshipers;
  • Recognition of both the existence and the unity of God in denial of the divine message: that is, the philosophers;
  • Recognition of the existence, the unity and the message of God, while denying the prophecy of Muhammad : ie the Jews and Christians.

Correspondingly, in modern religious circles, the non-Islamic world is referred to as bilād al-kuffār ("lands of unbelievers"). In common usage today, a non-Muslim is called a kāfir .

In the Islamic umma , religious and political deviants were also accused of kufr, the fight against which had to take place within the framework of jihād , in a fight sanctioned by religion. The struggle of Muslims against Muslims, the latter apostrophized as kuffār , already meets us in the position of the Ḫāriǧites in early Islamic history. The Almohads saw their fight against the Almoravids as jihad, since the latter, as heretics, represented the doctrine of the human characteristics of God ( taǧsīm ). Muḥammad ibn Tūmart , the founder of the Almohad movement, called on his followers in two letters to fight against the infidels (kuffār) within the Islamic umma.

See also

literature

  • W. Björkman: Kāfir. In: Encyclopaedia of Islam . New Edition, Volume 4, Brill, Leiden 1997, pp. 407-409.
  • Yohanan Friedmann: Tolerance and Coercion in Islam. Interfaith Relations in the Muslim Tradition. Cambridge University Press, 2003, ISBN 0-521-82703-5 .
  • Rudi Paret : The Koran. Translation. Commentary and Concordance . W. Kohlhammer, 1979, ISBN 3-17-005102-4 .
  • MJ Kister: “Do not assimilate yourselves…” Lā tashabbahū. In: Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam. (JSAI) 12 (1989), pp. 321-353. With an appendix by Menahem Kister: pp. 354–371.
  • Manfred Ullmann (adaptation): Dictionary of the classical Arabic language . Volume I: (ك). Otto Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 1970, ISBN 3-447-01276-5 .
  • Fuat Sezgin : History of Arabic Literature . Volume II: Poetry to about 430 H . Brill, Leiden 1975, ISBN 90-04-04376-4 , pp. 126-127 .
  • al-Mausu'a al-fiqhiyya . tape 35 . Ministry of Waqf and Religious Affairs, Kuwait 1995, OCLC 65059556 , p. 14-29 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ K. al-Umm. Volume 6, p. 170, Beirut. Dār al-maʿrifa. 1393 d. H.
  2. ^ Fuat Sezgin: History of Arabic literature. Volume 1, pp. 36-37. Brill, Leiden 1967.
  3. ↑ MJ Kister: "Do not assimilate yourselves ..." Lā tashabbahū .... In: Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam. (JSAI) 12 (1989), pp. 321-353; here: p. 321. Note 1.
  4. ↑ an "original unbeliever" could either be killed or enslaved (in classical Islamic law) in captivity. (see also Kāfir ). Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr: al-Kāfī. Beirut 1407/1987, Volume 1, p. 217.
  5. ↑ Maǧallat ash-sharīʿa wa-ʾl-lugha al-ʿarabiyya. Umm al-Qurā, Mecca, Volume 13, No. 22.
  6. ↑ MJ Kister, 1989, p. 321, note 1.
  7. ↑ al-mausūʿa al-fiqhiyya . Volume 35, p. 15.
  8. ^ Yohanan Friedmann: Classification of Unbelievers in Sunni Muslim Law and Tradition . In: Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam . tape 22 , 1998, pp. 163 ff . (here 166 with further references).
  9. ↑ Yohanan Friedmann, 2003, p. 57 and 1998, p. 166.
  10. ↑ Yohanan Friedmann: Charadscha min Kufrin ILA Kufrin. 2003, p. 56, note 6
  11. ^ The Encyclopaedia of Islam . New Edition. Brill, suffering. Volume 4, p. 690.
  12. ↑ al-mausūʿa al-fiqhiyya . Volume 35, pp. 18-19.
  13. ^ Julius Wellhausen: The religious-political opposition parties in old Islam. Weidmann, Berlin 1901, p. 12 ff.
  14. ↑ É.Lévi-Provençal: Documents inédits d'histoire Almohade. Paris 1928, pp. 1ff .; Albrecht Noth: The Ribāṭ of the Almoravids. In: Wilhelm Hoenerbach (Hrsg.): The Orient in Research. Festschrift for Otto Spies on April 4, 1966. Wiesbaden 1967, pp. 509–511.