"Islam is not a religion; rather, it's an ideology."
What does that mean?


(clash of ideas)

The last two centuries have brought strategic victories for secularism, resulting in the decline of God's Revelation as the source of law that pervades every facet of society. "Religion" has been redefined as a private affair only: God must be kept in the closet and human minds shall decide what is good and what is bad in society. Secularism's approach to life dismisses Islam as religion, simply one guide among many for the private affairs of human beings: the rituals of worship and being a "nice" person.

The infusion of Western secular culture into even the Islamic world has prompted many Muslim scholars and activists to stress that Islam is not a religion; it is an ideology. We intend to give a clear explanation about what is meant by the term "ideology" or "complete way of life" in an ongoing effort to help revive the Muslim mind, so that it can carry Islam as an alternative to Western capitalism.

To grasp what an ideology is, it is important to understand the human being in his or her rawest form. Once we can do this, it will become clear why we need an ideology to govern human life.

Human Beings Versus All the Rest

Like other living creatures, the human being, stripped to its essentials, is an organism that wanders in the earth, interacting with the surrounding environment to fulfill all biological and instinctive needs. Let us understand the difference between these two groups of needs:

q Biological Needs - are required to sustain life. Examples include eating, drinking, defecation, urination, sleeping, and breathing. If these needs are not met the organism will die.

q Instinctive Needs - are the intrinsic drives that every human being inherits. The instinctive needs are basically the survival instinct, sexuality, and the quest for meaning and spiritual connection. These needs if not met won't cause death, but they will produce great discomfort, such as depression or anxiety.

Everything we do in our lives is related somehow to taking care of one or all of these needs. As an example, we like to have a good home or more money in order to enhance our chances at survival. We pair up with the opposite sex to pass our DNA to the next generation, which is related to our sexual instinct. We look up to athletes because they are better than us at certain aspects of life; this is, oddly enough, loosely connected to a search for some kind of meaning in life. On an even simpler level, we work to feed ourselves and use the bathroom in order to fulfill our biological needs. In the end, everything that we do in life is related somehow to these two groups of human needs.

It is important to understand that other creatures also live their lives doing the very same thing. They too determine their behavior to fulfill their biological and instinctive needs. There is one important difference: animals follow their instinctual drives guided mainly by simple positive or negative reinforcement loops. Nothing terribly complicated is going on here: a hungry tom cat will go after the first bird or bunny rustling through the leaves, and he will mate with the first female that smells "right."

Changing animal behavior requires conditioning, but its effects are limited. If the animal is away from a stimulus too long, then it must be reconditioned in order to reestablish the response desired. (In psychology, this is called "extinction.") Human beings, however, do not need electric shocks to learn. Simply giving them the information required is often all that is needed; there is no extinction. A man does not need to experience a bullet in the brain to know that a head wound can kill. So the human displays a level of thinking that allows him or her to process information at higher levels than any animal. It is this level of thinking that allows humans to be more than other creatures. Ultimately, though, it is the actions of human beings, based upon their intellect, that will make them rise.

Admittedly, there are many humans stuck at an animal level all their lives, ready to jump on any female who looks available, or kill another human being for survival or dominance. But people at least have the potential to use their intellect to meet their needs; when that happens, they begin to elevate themselves to a higher plane of existence.

The Role of Ideology

Now that we understand humanity at its rawest, most basic form, it is easy to see why humans require an ideology to direct their lives. It becomes extremely important that a system be in place to satisfy their biological and instinctive needs efficiently and fully, to ensure that one need won't be sacrificed for another need (example: "mortifying the flesh" to connect to the Divine). Such a system or ideology should ensure that all needs are satisfied in a harmonious way, maintaining human tranquility. In fact, any ideology that allows one sector of society to satisfy all its needs at the expense of others, or any ideology that sacrifices one need for other needs is defective and ultimately anti-human.

We know that the human being is a social being who interacts with others in many arenas, including economic, social, and political. An ideology allows individuals to handle all these issues competently. Without an ideology, we are lost in the world of "the survival of the fittest," as they say in the West.

Three Spheres of Life

In addition, we need to understand that there are three basic types of interactions that a human being will experience wherever he or she goes: private, religious, and public. Private interactions are those between an individual and him/herself. Examples of this are eating, drinking, and putting on clothes. Religious interactions are between the Creator and the human, i.e. the 'aqd. Examples of these are salah, fasting, and hajj. The third and final interaction relates either one individual with other individuals or on a broad level, one state with another. This aspect is called the mu'amalat.

All of these spheres of life must be governed by an ideology for the sake of efficiency and the minimizing of oppression among human beings and societies.

The Correct Ideology

Humans are only different from animals when their acts are grounded in intellect. Once we accept this, it becomes equally important that the intellect has the correct ideas to work with. Why? If we expect our ideas to guide our actions correctly, then we should want our ideas to be correct also. So what are the correct ideas we need to consider?

These are the ideas that deal with life, man, and the universe. We are talking about the concepts that deal with the most basic questions: Why are we here? Who put us here? What happens when this life is over? What is my purpose in this life? The answers to these questions shape every other decision we make in this world, and they are starting point for any ideology, whether it be secularism, communism, or Islam. The answers eventually lead to conclusions about what is right and what is wrong in any society, and they are the basis for the creed or belief system of the ideology (i.e., its 'aqeedah).

Every thought we think and every action we do will depend on what we conclude. For example, if we believe that there is nothing happening after this life, then we are likely to "go for the gusto," not having a care for anyone or anything but the police and lawyers! Those among us who fear the hellfire will not steal, even when they can get away with it, because they know their Lord is watching. Those who know that all provisions are provided by Allah (subhanahu wa ta'ala) will not despair when calamity strikes.

The Aqeedah of Islam answers all of those basic questions with intellectual evidence, as opposed to assumptions. Islam is most consistent with human nature, and the ideas and laws that emanate from it can grant tranquility to human beings. We see this happening in the Middle East today: disaster after disaster has been happening there for decades, and the people, as a whole, are relatively stable and tranquil. Meanwhile, a great city in the US is destroyed by one hurricane, and the people there are lost to looting, raping, and killing. This is the result of a materialist ideology that turns all sorts of human beings into ticking time bombs that explode when their "pursuit of happiness" inevitably fails.

In conclusion, Islam is a complete way of life, an ideology. It shapes every facet of human life. Islam is based on the correct 'aqeedah that is intellectually sound. Islam, and only Islam, can bring about a system that is just and humane because its ultimate source is the Creator (subhanahu wa ta'ala) Himself. Until the Muslims regain this ideological understanding of Islam, the ideology of capitalism will continue to colonize the world and widen the gap between rich and poor. Capitalism will take the average Joes and reduce them to corporate slaves. Without the Islamic ideology, not only will Muslims continue to suffer, but non-Muslims too. (Submitted 1/23/2006)