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CHARACTERISTICS OF KHARIJITES

Kharijites' is a special mentality. They had been a blend of fair and foul. In their totality they were men with such manners that ultimately they stood amidst the enemies of Ali and his personality did repel them but did not attract them.

We attempt a description of the fair and positive and the foul and negative points of their mentality; they in totality rendered it dangerous, rather horrible:

(1) They had a self-sacrificing and combatant mentality. For the cause of their dogmas and ideas they made desperate efforts. In the history of the Kharijites, we come across such sacrifices that are rare in human annals. This devotion and selflessness lent them vigor and courage.

Ibn-e-Abdur Rabbahoo says about them "In all sects none can be found more profound in belief, more assiduous in practice, and readier to die than they were. One of them received a spear blow. The spear had penetrated fatally. He went to his assailant and said, "Oh God! I have rushed to You to please You".

Once Mo'awiyah sent a man to bring back his Kharijite son. The father could not dissuade the son from his determination. In the end he said, "My son, I will return to bring thy little son to thee so that on seeing him paternal love is invoked in you and you give up". He said, "By God! I am more fond of a fatal blow than I am of my son".

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They were worshippers and pious. They would worship during the nights. Earthly pomp and vanities had no attraction in themselves for the Kharijites. When Ali sent Ibn-e-Abbas to advise the people of Nahrawan, on his return Ibn-e-Abbas said in their praise, "Twelve thousand men whose foreheads bear patches as evidence of their excessive worship, they have so often placed their palms on dry burning sands while prostrating before Allah that their hands have become stiff like camel soles. Their robes are old and worn out. But they are people determined and categorical".

Kharjites were strict in complying with the formalities and dogmas of Islam. They did not indulge in what they considered to be a sin. They had evolved their own standards. They never violated them. They would disown a sinner. Ziyad the son of unknown killed one of them and thereafter he summoned his (deceased's) slave and enquired about his routine. The slave said, "I never served him meals in the day time and did never prepare bed for him during the night. He used to keep fast during the day and offer prayers the night through". Their every action was inspired by their belief. They were dogmatic in all their performance. They struggled for the promo­tion of their doctrines. About them Ali (peace be upon him) says: "Do not kill of the Kharijites any more after me, because the one who seeks the truth but goes amiss, is not like the one who seeks falsehood and finds it".

That is to say: "They differ from the accomplices of Mo'awiyah. These people wanted the truth but had fallen in error, while the others were jugglers essentially and their line was the line of falsehood. Hereafter, if you kill them it will be to the advantage of Mo'awiyah who is worse and more dangerous than they are".

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Before exhausting all characteristics of the Kharijites, it appears essential to deal forthwith an issue relevant to their piety, continence and Pharisaism, viz. in combat with those arid, petrified, haughty, self-righteous people, Ali's bold and courageous stand is one of his biography's excep­tional salient charms to which no match can be cited.

Ali drew his sword against such people who were looking good, refined, pious and poorly dressed formalists and he did them all to death.

If we would have been in his companions' stead and would have seen such countenances, certainly we would have felt agitated and objected to Ali "After all why to draw your sword against such a people"?

Of many instructive lessons in the history of Shiaism in particular and of Islam in general is this very tale of the Kharijites.

Ali is aware of the exceptional importance of this aspect of his action. He repeats it and says:

"I pulled out the eye of this sedition. Except me, none had the courage to handle them when the wave of their darkness and deception had assumed tide and underneath their madness had aggravated".

"In this context, Amir-ul-Momineen (PBH) has got two valid argu­ments:

The deception and confusion created by this movement:

(i) The apparent piety and the features of the Kharijites were of such a pattern that it would put every faithful Muslim in doubt. For this reason a dark wave of ambiguity and an atmosphere of doubt and double-mindedness obtained.

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(ii) The other argument is that the arid formalists have been compared with dog for its madness. The same madness when it appears in a dog, the dog would bite whosoever comes across it. This disease is microbic (virus). Whenever the teeth of the mad dog bite a man or an animal through its saliva the microbes are transfused into the blood of such man or animal. After some time the bitten men and animals will also become mad, bite others and render their bitten mad. If this situation continues, it assumes exceptionally dangerous proportions.

It is for this reason that wise men would immediately kill a mad dog, so that at least others may be saved from microbic spreading of madness. Ali says: "They have created the situation of a mad dog. They have become incurable. They would bite and afflict others aggravating the number of the mad ones".

Woe! To the Muslims of that time! A band of idiots, arid formalists and obstinate pounced upon every one. Which power would confront such untamable serpents and stand against them?

Where is that 'powerful' and 'forceful' who should not give in against these faces of piety and continence? Where is that hand which would wield sword on their heads and would not shiver?

It is for this reason that Ali says:

"None except me could dare take such steps".

Except Ali, except Ali's insight, except Ali's predominant faith, nothing of themselves would have encouraged the believers in God, the Prophet and the Dooms Day to draw sword against them.

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Only the non-believers in God and Islam have the courage to kill such people and not the ordinary Muslims. It is for this reason that while claiming it as his own great distinction Ali says:

"It was I and I alone, to have realized and addressed myself to threat posed to Islam by these arid formalists. Their clotted foreheads, their divine cloaks, their ever-supplicating tongues and even their profound faith unfaltering in its foothold could not blur my insight. It was I who realized it that if they get a foothold, they will afflict all with their own malady and will make the world of Islam stagnant, formalist, superficial and petrified so as to bend the spinal cord of Islam. It was for this reason that the Prophet had said, "Two people will break my back-bone, un-conscientious scholars and idiot formalists".

Ali means to say, "If in the Muslim world I would not have waged war against the Kharijites movement, none else was there to have plucked courage for such a combat. But for me, none could see that these men whose foreheads bear clots as evidence of excessive worship, who are faithful and formalists and pretend to be serving the cause of Islam, are in fact an obstacle in the way of its progress, and are its real enemies and none could wage war against them and shed their blood. I alone have done it. All's policy provided justification for the caliphs and the rulers to come to fight against and shed the blood of the Kharijites. The Islamic soldiers also unhesitatingly followed the commands, because Ali had fought against them. In fact Ali's precedent opened the way for others to heedlessly fight against a class of formalists orthodox but asinine.

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The Kharijites were idiots and ignorant people. Under the influence of ignorance and idiocy they could not appreciate facts and misinterpreted them. These misunderstandings gradually grew into a moral-code and a religion for them. They made immense sacrifices for its solidarity. At the earliest the craze of "Prohibition of the evil" rendered them into a faction with the solitary aim of enforcing Islamic code.

Let us stop here to ponder over an important issue of Islamic history;

When we study the biography of the Prophet, we find that through­out the thirteen years of Meccan period of his mission he permitted none of his followers to wage war or even to offer defence. So much so that when the Muslims felt suffocated, a group of Muslims with his permission migrated to Habasha from Mecca, but all the rest remained there and' forbore the misery. It was only in the second, year of Medinite period that the permission to wage crusade was given.

In the Meccan period the Muslims saw the teachings of Islam and got acquainted with its spirit. The Islamic culture got enshrined in their minds.

The result was that every Muslim by the time he reached Medina was a genuine preacher of Islam, and when the Prophet sent them in different directions, they satisfactorily discharged their duties. And when they embarked on Jihad, they also knew well what were their aims and ideas for which they were fighting. In words of Amir-ul-Momineen (PBH), "They attached to their sword their insight and their calculated and brilliant ideas". The swords so tempered and the men so inspired alone could accomplish their mission in the field of Islam. When we read history and come across their dialogue we are wonderstruck to know the lofty ideas and Islamic culture of a people who till a few years ago knew nothing more than a camel and a sword.

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Unfortunately, during the period of Caliphate, the whole attention was diverted towards conquests. They were indifferent to the requirement of opening of parallel institutions and doors of Islam on others to enter Islam. Because of the monotheism and its justice and equality Islam attracted Arabs and non-Arabs. It was a requisite to educate the people in Islamic culture and civilisation and to make them thoroughly acquainted with the spirit of Islam.

More of the Kharijites were Arabs, may be a few non-Arabs were also amongst them. But all of them, irrespective of their being Arabs or non-Arabs, were fanatics and ignorant of Islamic culture. They wanted to make up all their lacking by extending genuflection and prostrations. Ali (PBH) has given their description from this very angle: "Rude people, devoid of lofty ideas and tender feelings unscrupulous, mean people with slavish mentality have mustered from every nook and issued from every corner. These are men who must first be educated. They should be taught Islamic manners. They must get acquainted with Islamic culture. They should be given in guardianship. Their wrist should be gripped and they should not be let loose with swords in their hand and propagating their views about Islam. They are neither like the migrators who leave their home and hearth for the sake of Islam nor they are Ansar who accept the migrators amidst them­selves".

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Emergence of the class of fanatic formalists to whom the Kharijites are a denomination proved to be too costly to Islam. Leave aside the Kharijites, who for all their defects were blessed with chivalry and devotion, another type of the "devout" came into being who lacked these merits as well. They dragged Islam towards monasticism and seclusion. They gave currency to ostentation and dissimulation. They did not have the art to wield an iron sword against the persons in authority. However, they used the sword of their tongue against the virtuous people. They opened a flood of pronouncements of excommunication, infidelisation and attribution of faithlessness against every noble soul. Anyhow one of the most prominent characteristics of the Kharijites was their ignorance and idiocy. Their indis­crimination between letter and binding cover of the Quran and its signifi­cance was the manifestation of their ignorance. Hence they fell pray to a plain fraud of Mo'awiya and Amr-bin-As.

In these people ignorance and worship were twin. Ali wanted to fight against their ignorance but how was it possible to discern between the area of worship, piety, and continence and the area of their ignorance? Rather their worship too was nothing but ignorance. The worship twin with ignorance was of little significance for Ali, the Islamist of the highest order. Therefore he lashed them, their such worship; continence and piety could not serve as a shield against Ali.

Such people and majority of such groups are dangerous because they become tools and instruments in the hands of the crafty people and degenerate into obstruction to the furtherance of Islamic preferences and instigate the bigots against Islamic cause. They (bigot) become swords in their hands and dart in their bow.

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How Ali (PBH) has given delicate and beautiful description of this type:

"The fact is that you are the worst of the people. You are darts in the hand of the Satan who exploits your impious figures for hitting his targets. He through you puts people in doubt and suspicion''.

We have said," Initially the Kharijites emerged to establish an Islamic Precept. But lack of insight and idiocy led them to the extent that they started misinterpreting the Quran and therefrom created a religious bias, resulting in new a religion and a new way of life. A Quranic verse says:"

"Surah Al-Anaam Verse: 57". "Surely command is from non except Allah, He makes the truth manifest and He is the best of the judges".

In this verse "Hukm" is described to be one of special Divine prerogatives. We must see what "Hukm" mean?

Without any doubt herein "Hukm" means Law and Rules of human life. In this verse the authority of legislation has been denied to anyone besides Allah. It has been counted as Divine privilege (Or of a man whom Allah may delegate this authority). But the Kharijites mistook "Hukm" for governance which included even arbitration. They adopted a distinction for themselves and used to say "No command but Allah's". They meant thereby that the governance arbitration and guidance as well like legislation are exclusively in Divine Jurisdiction; and that but for Allah none amongst men has any right to be an arbiter or a ruler over men in the same manner, as he has no authority to legislate.

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Some times while Amir-ul-Momineen might be offering his prayers or addressing people from the pulpit they would interrupt him and cry out "No command but from Allah Neither from thee nor from thy compa­nions".

He would answer "What they say is Right but what they mean is Wrong. It is correct that legislation is from Allah but they mean to say 'none other than God should govern and be an administrator'. People need a ruler good or bad (at least when good one is not available). Under the cover of His authority a faithful will discharge his duty to please Allah; while the infidel will enrich his worldly life till God brings his regime to an end. By means of a government and under the cover of its authority taxes are collected, enemies are fought against, peace of routes is ensured the rights of the weak and humble are snatched from the strong and the cruel so that the Law-abiding are in peace and secured from the sinful.

Short to say that law does not get enforced ipso-facto, an individual or an organization is required to enforce it.

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They were narrow-minded and shortsighted. They had very petty horizons to think about. They had confined Islam and Muslim-hood within the four walls of their own limited vision. Like all other short-sighted people, (heir-second claim was that everyone else had misunderstood or had not understood (Islam) at all. Hence all transgressors and all to land in hell. The first thing such bigots would always do, would be to develop their bigotry into a new creed. They restrict Divine mercy. They would install God on the Throne of wrath always anxious to find men faulting and fond of dispatching the defaulters to chastisement. One of Kharijites' basic beliefs was that a defaulter who has committed a major sin like perjury, backbiting or taking of intoxicants, has apostate stands excommunicated and is liable to be perpetually condemned to fire. But for a very few, all men are to be perpetually put to flames of hell. Bigotry had been one of special characteristics of the Kharijites, but today we find it among the entire Islamic community. It is the same thing that has been earlier said by us that though the Kharijites' practice has vanished yet their spirit survives and exists among a few sects and some people.

We see many arid brains who, except for themselves or their very few likes, view all others as infidels and atheists. They presume Islam and Muslim-hood to be too restricted.

In an earlier chapter, we have said, "The Kharijites, though not familiar with the spirit of culture of Islam, were fearless. Since they were idiots, they were shortsighted and as they were shortsighted hence heedless to condemn others as liable to apostasy and excommunication. So much so that they thought Islam and Muslim-hood were theirs exclusively, and all such Muslims, who did not accept their belief, were labeled as infidels. As they were fearless, they pursued the persons in authority, and in their own estimation bade them virtue, and forbade them vice resulting in their own condemnation to death. As we have said earlier, in times to come their stagnation, ignorance, fanaticism, sacerdotalism and bigotry survived, but their chivalry, bravery, recklessness and selflessness disappeared".

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Timid Kharijites, that is, the cowardly 'divines' laid down their iron swords, and forgetting about bidding virtue and forbidding vice to the persons in authority, which involved risks to them, took to glorify the latter with the sword of their tongue. They rebuked every graceful person in such a manner that few graceful personalities in Islamic history could avoid being target of their darts. They would brand one as nonbeliever in Allah, the other in the Day of Judgment, the third in the Physical Ascension, the fourth as mystic and the fifth with something else of the kind. In such a manner that if we make their vision to be the criterion then no real sage in all times has been a Muslim. When Ali is declared renegade, the others' fate is so clear. Bu Ali Sina, Khawaja Naseer-ud-Din Toosi, Sadr-ul-Mutahaleen Shirazi, Syed Jamal-ud-Din Asadabadi and last of all Muhammad Iqbal (Lahori) were made to taste from this cup a mouthful.

Bu Ali says to the same effect: Condemning me to infidelity was neither easy nor convenient. No one's belief was stauncher than mine in the world.

I the Peerless and I too an infidel.

Then in whole of world, none has been a Muslim.

Khawaja Naseer-ud-Din Toosi, who was condemned as an infidel by a man titled as 'Nizam-ul-Olema', says:

Nizam the licentious calls me an infidel.

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The lamp of fallacy has no light,

I call him a Muslim, because he cannot be answered but with a lie.

After all one of the peculiarities and characteristics of the Kharijites was their narrow-mindedness. They considered everybody to be an infidel and faithless. Ali argued against their short-sightedness and said: "What a wrong idea it is which you are pursuing" He said, "The Prophet would punish a sinner and thereafter he would offer his funeral prayers; if the commitment of a major sin would have been the cause of infidelity the Prophet would have never read their funeral prayers because funeral prayer for a dying infidel is not permitted as the Quran has prohibited it. He enforced Hadd against a drunkard, cut the hand of a thief and lashed an unmarried fornicator and thereafter permitted them to join the Muslim fold but never cut their stipends from the Public Treasury. Such believers got into marriage, with other Muslims. The Prophet awarded them Islamic punishments but never struck their names off the rolls of Muslims".

He (Ali) said, "Suppose I have committed a sin and have turned infidel as a result of it, why do you declare whole of the Muslim community to be of infidels. Is it possible that the sin and transgression of one person may be so comprehensive as to implicate the others too and make them liable to punishment? Why have you drawn your swords and have resorted to killing both the guilty and the innocent (according to your own judgment)".

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In this context Amir-ul-Momineen pointed out their fault from two angles and his repulsion repelled them twice. One for the reason that they implicated even the innocent along with the guilty and held him also liable. The other for the reason that they thought that the commission of every sin and results in excommunication of the sinners thus they restricted the sphere of Islam, and whosoever stepped out of their imposed restrictions stepped out of Islam.

Here Ali has condemned short-sightedness and narrow-mindedness; in fact the combat of Ali against the Kharijites is a combat against such ideas and such thoughts and not a combat against persons, because had the people not so thought, Ali would not have dealt with them in this manner. He shed their blood for elimination of such ideas and for securing correct understanding of the Quran and to enable the Muslims to find the Quran and Islam as they are and as their Author wants.

It was because of their shortsightedness and defective vision that they got deceived by the diplomacy of placing the Quran atop the launces and thus they wrought about the biggest threat to Islam. Ali had gone to root out hypocrisy and to demolish Mo'awiyah and his thoughts but they obstructed him in the battle, which resulted in those unfortunate events, which shroud the whole of the Muslim community. Under the influence of their shortsightedness, the Kharijites did not consider the whole of the Muslims to be Muslim. They will not eat what was slaughtered by a Muslim. They thought it, permissible to shed their blood. They did not enter into matrimonial ties with them.