Is ISIS Islamic? Probably not. Is it Islamist? Definitely.
An Islamist is one who believes in a version of Islam which would impose a politicized interpretation of the faith over all of society by law. The concept is modernist and overturns more than a millennium of Islamic jurisprudence. Historically, Islam has had an ongoing debate over what powers should go to the Caliphs (political) and the Mullahs (religious). For many, that debate has ended, and they believe Islam (or an Islamist view) should dominate all forms of social order. The founding of the Muslim Brotherhood in 1928 represents a turning point in this argument.
ISIS, as it is currently operating, is a manifestation of the Islamist view that all powers, including the political, social, economic, and religious must fall under control of the Caliph. The Caliph must not only be Muslim, but he must maintain a purist and totalitarian form of order in his area of control.
Where does this Islamist ideology come from? Why is it important to understand it?
The Caliph of ISIS is Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who may have been born in Samarra Iraq, in 1971. He is a shadowy figure who makes few public appearances. His one known public appearance, since emerging as the head of ISIS, was in Mosul, Iraq in July of 2014. The timing was significant, as ISIS had just invaded and taken over large segments of northern Iraq. It should be noted that Baghdadi has the rough equivalent of a PhD in Islamic studies.
Baghdadi’s one known public appearance was a sermon. During this sermon, Baghdadi quoted beliefs from Sayyid Qutb and Abu A'la al-Maududi (and others). Sayyid Qutb is one of the two key leading figures of the Muslim Brotherhood, along with Hassan al-Banna Al-Maududi is a former Muslim Brotherhood member who went on to found the Jamaat-e-Islami in 1941. The Jamaat-e-Islami is widely regarded as the sister organization to the Muslim Brotherhood in South Asia. Baghdadi also drew from other key Islamist figures such as al Qaeda’s Ayman Zawahiri and al Qaeda co-founder Abdullah Azzam, both former Muslim Brotherhood members.
Understanding the underpinnings of Baghdadi’s beliefs is important, as they are drawn from the Muslim Brotherhood and Jamaat-e-Islami. These two groups are the well spring or the source of ideology for almost all other Islamacist supremacist organizations, including ISIS itself. Contained in a recent UK government report was the following observation: “The Muslim Brotherhood have promoted a radical, transformative politics, at odds with a millennium of Islamic jurisprudence and statecraft.”
The basic beliefs of ISIS can be determined to be driven by the following ideological/theological concepts. ISIS is:
1. Islamist, in that it believes a politicized version of Islam must dominate all other forms of social order in a caliphate, which should become global. Their interpretation of Sharia controls all forms of human activity.
2. Salafist, in that it venerates a highly idealized and puritanical form of lifestyle based on the first three generations after the Prophet Mohammed.
3. Takfirist, in that it believes it has the right to determine who follows the path of their interpretation of Islam and to kill non-believers, including other Muslims.
4. Jihadist, in that it believes in the use of both offensive and defensive violent jihad to defend and expand the territorial base of their caliphate.
Almost all Islamist groups derive their ideology from the same well spring and have the same basic objective – a global caliphate. What differentiates them is not the objective but the strategy. ISIS believes in an absolutist approach to all opposition who must be either immediately converted or killed. Other groups, such as the Muslim Brotherhood or the (Shia) Khomeneists, maintain that a more gradualist and ground up approach is necessary, particularly when they are in a minority status, such as in Europe or North America.
While the basic ideology of ISIS can be seen as common to that of all Islamist groups, their immediate and indiscriminate use of violence as a means of controlling and shaping their narrative is what distinguishes ISIS from the others. While other groups accept the use of violence, they argue that it should be used when it fits the tactical aims of the context and the moment.
Even if ISIS was to be physically destroyed, its narrative will live on in the minds of its adherents in the Levant as well as in the physical spaces it controls in Libya, Gaza, Egypt, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and elsewhere. Defeating the ISIS narrative in the long term is part of a larger ideological struggle, not the outcome of one kinetic war.
