The Imperialism-Importation Premise

For Qutb, the most damaging legacy of Western imperialism for Muslims was that Islam had been relegated to a purely spiritual doctrine and deprived of jurisdiction over all realms of this worldly life. Qutb frequently sought to draw the distinction between Islam, for which this separation between religion and secular power is entirely alien, and other religions such as Christianity, Buddhism, and Hinduism for which it is logical (SJI 20; ‘AII 8). That some Muslims had been complicit in importing secular doctrines from the West (the notorious “hulul mustawrada”—“imported solutions”—decried by Islamist groups) only made this alien imposition all the more pernicious. One of the most obnoxious features of the false consciousness from which many of his contemporaries suffered was their tendency to measure Islam by the standards of the West, whether this involved proving Islam's compatibility with secularism, democracy, human rights, or modern just war theory.

In Basic Principles of the Islamic Worldview, this modern dilemma is given a history. “In the history of Islam, there came a time when the original Islamic way of life, derived from the correct Islamic concept, came in contact with other ways of life and cultures predominating in the conquered lands” (BPIW 6; KhTIM 10). This contact led to the sullying of the original pure Islamic “concept” with Greek philosophy, which in turn led to the “intellectual indulgence” of theology and other “tendencies alien to the Islamic concept.” The early rationalist theological school of the Mu'tazilites and the later neo-Platonic tradition of Islamic philosophy are identified as the bastard offspring of this encounter.

Elsewhere, the more or less historically based account of “what went wrong” in Islam given in Social Justice in Islam and Basic Principles of the Islamic Worldview is given a transhistorical interpretation in the form of Qutb's well-known concept of jahiliyya. Traditionally, the term used to describe the pagan “ignorance [of God]” of the pre-Islamic Arabs, for Qutb (and his Pakistani counterpart Mawdudi), jahiliyya was used in a starkly Manichean mode to identify everything in the world (ideas, concepts, lands, even persons) that was un-Islamic, insufficiently Islamic or impurely Islamic. “When we speak of a jahili society, we are not referring to conditions that might have prevailed during a particular period of history. Jahili is every society in which humans are subjugated by others” (ISQ, v. III, 5; FZQ, v. 1, 557). Jahiliyya is a permanent threat to Islamic authenticity, no less than in the time of the Prophet, and in the postcolonial world as likely to come from internal traitors as from external aggressors (M 37–42; MT 46–54; Shepard Reference Shepard2003).

The Authenticity-Integrity Premise

Following logically from the premise that Muslims are today, and perennially, beset with the threat of ideological imperialism and the dilution of pure Islamic “concepts” with anything alien is the premise that Muslims have an obligation to discover and apply authentic Islamic solutions that by definition must be pure and integral, just as the Qur'an urged the first Muslims “with clear determination to erase all aspects of the jahili society from which Islam saved the Muslim community, [thus] removing whatever vestiges of that society remained, and fashioning the distinctive features of the Islamic society and bringing its unique personality into sharp relief” (ISQ, v. III, 3; FZQ, v. 1, 555).

Before any claim about Islam's distinctive features and essential superiority is advanced, the assertion on Qutb's part is that it is a communal obligation to search for solutions derived from Muslims’ own heritage. Qutb compares “spiritual resources, intellectual capabilities, and moral and ethical traditions” to economic and political resources—no one would think of borrowing capital or importing raw materials before examining one's own stocks (SJI 19; ‘AII 7). And, yet, that is exactly what his contemporaries sought to do.

This borrowing is a clear historical betrayal of Islam's spirit and origins, for the Christian divide between the spiritual and the worldly never belonged to Islam, according to Qutb. In support of his basic claim that Islam's “adherents cannot be true Muslims unless they practice their faith in their social, legal, and economic relationships [and] a society cannot be Islamic if it expels the civil and religious laws of Islam from its codes and customs,” (SJI 26; ‘AII 11–12; Judy Reference Judy2004) Qutb cites Qur'anic evidence in addition to history. Qur'anic verses 4:68Footnote ¹⁴, 59:7Footnote ¹⁵, and 5:48Footnote ¹⁶ are cited to the effect that any fragmentation of the essential unity of religion and politics is entirely alien to Islam. This is to be developed later into his concept of “hakimiyya”: divine rulership and sovereignty.

For sure, the extreme extent to which Qutb stresses the need for absolute purity and isolation from other influences and standards of evaluation, and his indebtedness to right-wing European critics of modernity (e.g., Alexis Carrel), places Qutb squarely within what some scholars have referred to as a “generic fascism” percolating in his milieu (al-Azmeh Reference al-Azmeh1991, 45). However, the premise that Islam is completely self-contained and completely self-justifying is, if anything, overshadowed in Qutb's writings by the claim that Islam is ideally suited for application in this world because it is an essentially practical, this worldly doctrine.

The Practicality Premise

The assertion of Islam's practicality is a core distinguishing feature of all 20th century Islamist thought. When we speak of modern Islamist movements and thinkers as belonging to modernity, this is most clearly discernible in their repackaging of Islamic law and ethics as an accessible and attractive “system” ready to square off in battle as a fully formed, fully coherent alternative to Marxism, capitalism, and liberalism (see, e.g., Euben Reference Euben1999, 78; Shepard Reference Shepard1989). This revolution in form and style, as much as anything else, is what distinguished self-trained thinkers such as Qutb and Mawdudi from their more traditionalist jurist counterparts, although jurists and other classically trained scholars were, of course, to catch up in due course.Footnote ¹⁷

However, what is important to note about this claim is that it is not just a matter of politicizing Islam into a militant theology of liberation through praxis à la Marxism or satyagraha.Footnote ¹⁸ Rather, what is at stake is a general claim about the nature of Islamic ethics and governance. The basic notion is that “the essential spirit of this religion is this—that practical work is religious work, for religion is inextricably bound up with life and can never exist in the isolation of consciousness in some world of conscience alone” (SJI 28–29; ‘AII 13). Certain obvious questions follow. What is the nature of this practical work? What is the significance of this practical work being of a religious nature? Is the point that practical work is subject to a rigorous set of religiously given moral guidelines? Or that religion endorses, and thus sacralizes, practical work as humans are wont to pursue it? Qutb's answer is something like “all of the above.” Untangling the various ways in which the preceding possibilities are validated is an important task in understanding modern Islamist conceptions of political morality.

This claim to Islam's practicality is in two parts. First, that Islam is a comprehensive theory of everything, from the origins of the cosmos to the ethics of daily life. Second, that Islam's ethics of this worldly social life are deeply pragmatic and perfectly suited to man's needs.

(i) The first part of the claim about Islam's essential pragmatism is well known and has largely been presented previously. It is the famous claim that Islam “discusses the nature of the servitude to God that permeates both the universe and human life. It expounds the nature of the universe, of life and of man; their origin, attributes, and conditions; the relations that exist among them; and finally the connection that links them all to the supreme divine reality. It joins this all together in a single, logical concept” (BPIW 97; KhTIM 96). It is perhaps the defining feature of modern Islamism that it presents Islam as a comprehensive philosophical outlook that holds self-creation and justice, private perfection and human solidarity, in a single vision and thus ascribes modern misery and alienation to the fragmentation of this comprehensive system. What is important for our purposes is only the fact that Qutb's description of Islam as a distinctly practical doctrine follows for him from Islam's metaphysical origins and absolute comprehensiveness. God has overlooked nothing in the creation of the shari'a, including the most mundane of mankind's social needs, and therefore “we should not despair of the ability of the shari'a to govern modern society” (SJI 34; ‘AII 18).

The first implication of the practicality of the religious Law is that humans are not permitted to act in this world individually and collectively purely according to conscience, reason, or custom, even if humans are often capable of arriving at roughly sound moral judgments through intuition or inspiration (ilham; see Griffel Reference Griffel, Amanat and Griffel2007, 51–53). This is Qutb's well-known concept of hakimiyya—God's sovereignty and rulership over even mundane human affairs. Muslims (all humans, in fact) are charged by God with obedience and with acting in accordance with the Law and failing to do this, regardless of any this-worldly benefits which (post-)Muslims might attach to this false freedom, is the great crime of the modern world. “If we look at the sources and foundations of modern modes of living, it becomes clear that the whole world is steeped in jahiliyya . . . based on rebellion against the sovereignty of God on earth. It attempts to transfer to man one of the greatest attributes of God, namely sovereignty, by making some men lords over others . . . in the more subtle form of claiming that the right to create values, to legislate rules of collective behavior, and to choose a way of life rests with men, without regard to what God has prescribed” (M 8; MT 8).

In other words, the Law, as it pertains to social and political life, is demanding. References to the demands of the Law are copious in Qutb's writings. For present purposes, it suffices to note that for Qutb it is a central task of the Law not only to accommodate human desires (what we discuss later), but also to confront them. “The stability that characterizes the fundamentals and values of the Islamic concept . . . protects Islam from the corruption that would befall the universe as a whole were it to be prey to the whims and passions of man, without any restraint or firm basis” (BPIW 84; KhTIM 84).

It is an important point of theological principle that “[God's] will is absolute and subject to no restraints; it creates all things simply by orienting itself to them. There is no principle governing it [obliging it: mulzima], nor any form imposed on it, whenever it wills to do what it wills” (BPIW 123; KhTIM 117). Rarely, however, does Qutb describe these God's commands as mysterious to humans or as arbitrary for ultimate human well-being in this world. The following statement encapsulates the compatibility between the theological principle and Qutb's political project: “God wishes that His will should customarily appear to man in the form of consistent norms and regular patterns, which men can observe, perceive and order their lives and interact with the universe accordingly. They must, however, remain aware that His will is absolute and that He does whatsoever He wishes, even if it contradicts the norms and patterns to which they are accustomed” (BPIW 125; KhTIM 118–19). “No principle governing or obliging” God implies precisely God's right to choose to create either a painful, confusing, and seemingly arbitrary moral Law or a consistent, regular, and rewarding one.

For this reason, even when Qutb describes the Law as onerous or demanding, the fulfillment of its strictures never presented as a genuine sacrifice for humans, still less a perpetual tragic drama of the human condition. The demands of religious morality are, at their most demanding, genuinely uplifting of the human self. They are demanding and onerous only, as Isaiah Berlin put it, to our baser, lower selves (Berlin Reference Berlin1969). To our higher selves, they are nothing but guidelines to living in accordance with what we actually want and what actually brings us happiness. Man, we are told, “by his innate nature [fitra], cannot reside in this huge world simply as an isolated and straying particle. He must establish a certain connection with this universe, guaranteeing him stability and allowing him to discern his place in the world. He needs a creed that will explain his environment and his place within that environment. This is both an innate and a perceived need” (BPIW 20; KhTIM 23). “The human soul cannot live alone in deviation from the order of the universe. It cannot attain happiness while in a state of constant flight, deprived of a guide and lacking all foundation” (BPIW 78–79; KhTIM 78). Thus, “Man attains his most elevated rank and highest position when he has attained servitude to God, for he is then in fullest conformity to his innate nature [fitra]” (BPIW 142; KhTIM 132).

(ii) But it is not even in this sense of “Law as positive liberty” that Qutb claims that divine Law “takes people as they are.” Rather, it is in the sense of accommodating even people's ordinary selves. That is, the more important point for present purposes is that the demands of religious morality are presented as appropriate and beneficial, even in a less exalted, more universally intuitive sense.

This theme is addressed most generally in the form of the claim that Islam not only addresses mundane life as part of its comprehensiveness, but also strikes exactly the right balance between two competing realms of human life: spirituality and materialism. Christianity, for Qutb, only addresses man's spiritual needs while neglecting his material ones; indeed, it “seeks to crush down the human instincts in order to encourage [spiritual] desires” (SJI 45; ‘AII 26). Capitalism and Marxism (he sees Marxism as nothing more than the logical extension of capitalism) addresses man's material needs while neglecting his spiritual ones. Only Islam takes both equally seriously and fulfills both to the greatest possible extent. “If in any age we find a desire to overemphasize the pietistic aspect of this faith and to divorce it from the social aspect, or to divorce the social aspect from it, it will be the fault of that age rather than of Islam” (SJI 27; ‘AII 12). “It is Islam, and Islam alone, that enables man to live both for this world and for the hereafter, to work for God and to work for his own livelihood, to realize the human perfection to which his religion is pointing him while engaged in the daily activities that his function as divine vicegerent imposes on him. Nothing is asked of him in return save one thing: that he . . . worship God alone . . . [and] not go beyond the broad sphere of the permitted, which includes all the wholesome pleasures of life” (BPIW 113; KhTIM 109, emphasis added). In support of these points, Qutb cites numerous verses from the Qur'an, including 62:9–10,Footnote ¹⁹ 28:77,Footnote ²⁰ and 55:10.Footnote ²¹ He also presents the argument in the language of generic, semi-Marxist ideology critique. Because Islam promises social justice in this world and warns people against neglecting their natural rights, it “has no need to drug the sentiments of men and summon them to neglect their earthly rights in favor of expectation in the Kingdom of Heaven” (SJI 32–33; ‘AII 17).

But what does it mean for a religion to be practical, or to give human material desires their due? What does it mean to “join [man and the universe] together in a single, logical concept, one appealing to man's essential nature [fitra], interacting with his mind and his conscience, with the totality of his being [kaynuna], easily and painlessly” (BPIW 97; KhTIM 96, emphasis added)? It would seem to require one of two things. A first possibility is a conception of “human nature” that bifurcates the self into an exalted self and a baser self. This, of course, is what Isaiah Berlin described as the ur-logic behind all conceptions of “positive liberty.” On this conception, the normative theory need only prove its compatibility with this idealized conception of nature. Such a theory still leaves plenty of room for rigor and moral demandingness as would be experienced by the empirical, baser self. Islam would then be easy and painless only for our “true” selves, not always for our actual ones. A second possibility, without necessarily foregoing the first and all of its rich possibilities for closing justificatory gaps between theory and inconvenient actual human desires, is to give some consideration to the desires and limitations of the empirical, baser self. It is this second approach that involves setting limits to the demandingness of ideal morality in light of average human capacities for selflessness and deprivation.

Qutb does indeed believe that mankind is composed of a dual nature composed equally of earthly clay and God's spirit, following a series of important Qur'anic verses, including 38:71–72,Footnote ²² 91:7–10,Footnote ²³ 90:10,Footnote ²⁴ and 76:3.Footnote ²⁵ His commentary on Q. 91:7–10 is a succinct statement of his position:

However, although we might expect a political “perfectionist” and “revolutionary traditionalist” like Qutb to only be interested in demonstrating compatibility between Islam and the noumenal, “higher” conception of fitra, what is worthy of keeping under consideration is the extent to which Qutb goes in stressing Islam's regard for the empirical, baser self, for average human capacities.

The Islam-Takes-People-As-They-Are Premise

What does it mean for a religion to be practical? In addition to allowing for flexibility in the application of the Law because of the need to react to social realities,Footnote ²⁶ part of its practicality and superiority is the attention it pays to human psychology—human needs, desires, and limitations. Qutb's writings are replete with proclamations that the Islamic moral code not only places demands on human behavior, but also restricts those demands to what humans can bear without great stress, given certain constants about their nature. Islam is declared to be “suitable to human nature [fitra insaniyya], responsive to all its aspects, and fulfilling of all its needs” (BPIW 47; KhTIM 45) and to “not injure the individual . . . nor oppose human nature [fitra]” (SJI 127; ‘AII, 87).

(i) As noted previously, some accounts of this essential compatibility between shari'a and human nature are “divine intentionality” accounts. “God created man's nature and constitution [fitratuhu wa takwinuhu] in harmony with the universe” (BPIW 149; KhTIM 138). “Islam gave a unity to all powers and abilities, it integrated all desires and inclinations and leanings, it gave a coherence to all men's efforts. In all these Islam saw one embracing unity which took in the universe, the soul and all human life” (SJI, 42–43; ‘AII 24). “The task of living beings is not to contend with Nature, for they have grown up in her bosom, and she and they together form a part of the single universe which proceeds from the single will” (SJI 39–40; ‘AII 22). Elsewhere Qutb makes quite clear that “God is certainly capable of altering human nature or of creating him with a different nature” (BPIW 133; KhTIM 126).

It is this account that I previously suggested inclines toward a positive liberty conception of the convergence between Law and human interests. Islam is “a religion whose imperatives conform to human nature [fitra], enabling all man's capacities to function for the purpose for which they were created. Man is able to reach his highest levels of perfection through movement and effort, through responding to his aspirations and longings and not by subduing or suppressing them” (BPIW 200; KhTIM 180, emphasis added). “When the soul is at one with its true nature, when its needs and necessities are fulfilled, when its constructive capacities are released, then with ease and without compulsion it will flow in natural harmony with life, will ascend to the lofty summit ordained for it” (HD 29, emphasis added). Furthermore, leaving nothing to chance, Qutb insists that after emancipation from bondage to false gods, from fear of death and injury, and from false social values, the human soul may “remain in subjection to its own nature [dhatiyya], swayed by its pleasures and its appetites, by its desires and its longings. Thus an inner tyranny replaces the outer. . . . The soul that is thus completely freed from strangling desires is the soul that Islam seeks” (SJI 64–65; ‘AII 41–42).

(ii) However, this positive liberty account is not the only, or even the most common, explanation of how Qutb thinks shari'a accommodates human nature. Rather, in numerous points, he stresses that when he refers to Islam's “compatibility with the nature of man . . . [it] is man as familiar to us, with all of his strengths and weaknesses, his inclinations and passions, his flesh, blood and nerves, his body, mind and soul. He is not a being as willed by some extravagant fantasy or a floating dream derived from the operations of pure logic. He is also not the being depicted as the lowest of the low by those who regard him as the creation of dumb nature or of economic forces” (BPIW 195–96; KhTIM 176, emphasis added). Furthermore,

It is clear that while Qutb is confident that “Islam as is” has struck exactly the perfect balance between demandingness and lenience in morality, he nonetheless regards it as a serious and unavoidable obligation of morality to be responsive to an empirically observable human nature. When he writes that “a respect for humanity requires us to look at it more profoundly and with a stronger perception of the profundity of its nature [tabi'a], the authenticity of its innate character [fitra] and its deep roots” his point is to insist that “we be more judicious, more restrained and more precise in our thinking when we try to direct it and establish systems for it. We must not let millions of years of human experience go unheeded and postulate mere theories regarding man's inclinations, nature and behavior and then apply these theories by force and coercion” (SJI 131–32; ‘AII 90). It is in this context that Qutb makes the remarkable statement quoted at the head of this essay: “Justice demands that the social system shall conform to the desires of the individual and satisfy his inclinations—at least so far as will not injure society—as a return for his contribution to it in the way of ability and labor; in the sweat of his brow, in the labor of his thought, and in the exertion of his nerves” (SJI 131; ‘AII 90, emphasis added). In this, if nothing else, Qutb's transformation of the Islamic shari'a-based political vision into a “system” for the modern era seems to share a core anxiety with Rawlsian and other forms of political or justificatory liberalism.

(iii) But what are these desires that Qutb assumes are enduring in human nature and that even religion must (thus) respect and accommodate? This, of course, is the crucial question that every moral theory must answer. Every moral theory must give an account of which desires and inclinations are immoral or excessively unreasonable and must not be accommodated by morality, and which are both reasonable and perduring—“natural”—and thus may be accommodated without great harm to morality's aims.

Qutb tends to be most understanding of mankind's limitations in the realm of material and physical desires. “Islam looks at man as forming a unity whose spiritual desires cannot be separated from his bodily appetites and whose moral needs cannot be divorced from his material needs” (SJI 45; ‘AII 26). He quotes the Qur'an's reference to man's “love of gain” (Q. 100:8) and natural “avarice” (Q. 4:128), but observes in God's commands a “liberality with His mercy.” The Law is thus presumed to take nonideal facts into account. “Accordingly, when Islam comes to lay down its rules and laws, it counsels and controls, that natural ‘love of gain’ is not overlooked, nor is that deep natural avarice forgotten; selfishness is rebuked, avarice is dealt with by regulations and laws, [but] no duty is enjoined on man beyond his capacity” (SJI 46; ‘AII 27). “Islam is aware of the instinct to love oneself and to love money” (SJI 109; ‘AII 74) and “man is charged to enjoy himself within boundaries . . . to give himself his due” (SJI 80; ‘AII 53). A ubiquitous theme throughout Qutb's writings (indeed, virtually all mainstream Islamic legal and ethical writings) is that God has created the world for man's enjoyment, within reason, and that humans should feel no guilt about the lawful enjoyment of wealth, food, and sex. All of this is justified through dozens of Qur'anic verses, most parsimoniously in Q. 3:14–15: “Alluring to man is the enjoyment of worldly desires through women, and children, and heaped up treasures of gold and silver, and horses of high mark, and cattle, and lands. All this may be enjoyed in the life of this world.”

Accordingly, humans also have an inclination to act on their natural aptitudes, dispositions, and endowments [mawahib, isti'dadat], and bridle at unnatural restrictions on their freedom. By way of “freeing Islam from the narrow interpretation of social justice as understood by communism,” Qutb distinguishes between moral or spiritual equality and natural equality: “We cannot deny that some individuals are born with natural dispositions [isti'dadat fitriyya] to healthiness, or physical integrity, or stamina; while others are born with a predisposition to sickness, or debility, or weakness.” “Is” then quickly becomes “ought” for Qutb: “Thus, to deny the existence of outstanding endowments of personality, intellect and spirit, is a piece of nonsense which is not worth discussing. So we must reckon with them and give them the opportunity to produce their greatest results, taking from their production whatever we see as necessary for the welfare of society. On no account must we close off the outlet for such endowments or discourage them by making them equal in reward with lesser abilities; we must avoid shackling such gifts and stifling them, and thereby depriving of their fruits the community and the human race alike” (SJI 47–48; ‘AII 28–29). Importantly, Qutb does not regard this essential realism as a necessary but regrettable concession to reality, the way that some strict egalitarians regard paying doctors more money to deploy their talents as quite clearly a matter of giving in to a form of blackmail or bribery. Allowing persons to develop their talents even at the cost of societal inequalities is permissible because “Islam admits the reasonable [al-ma'qula] causes of these [material] differences as being differences in strength and in endowment. It does not permit differences which depend on rank and station” (SJI 48; ‘AII 29, emphasis added).

A similar claim for the Law's having essentially preempted human disobedience by conceding certain inevitable human desires is given in the realm of retributive justice. In Islamic law, unpremeditated homicide is treated as a civil offense, and the victim's family is permitted to exact recompense in either money or blood (al-Misri Reference al-Misri and Keller1991, 582–93). In his presentation of this feature of Islamic criminal law, Qutb takes the scriptural foundation of this punishment for granted, commenting only on its function in light of human moral psychology. He presents the shari'a rule essentially as a concession to human inclinations, as if Islam knows that man is inclined to take revenge, and thus “prescribes a principle of vengeance, awarding it as a legal right to the next of kin and permitting him to exact it in full; yet at the same time it exhorts as strongly as possible that men should forgive, forbear, and pardon” (SJI 110).

(iv) However, there is yet a further dimension to Qutb's concern with human nature and the Law. Throughout his writings, he reflects on the necessary conditions whereby humans will willingly conform to the demands of the moral Law. His presentation of Islam as essentially an easy moral code, one that imposes no unnecessary or overly burdensome hardships to the average human self, constitutes a large part of this account. However, his writings also contain frequent speculations on when humans will be led to fulfill even these moderate demands. These reflections constitute an extended (although often unsystematic) reflection on the problems of moral motivation and the perpetual stability of a normatively justifiable system, problems that I introduced previously as the core preoccupations of “realistic utopian” theories.

Still under the topic of property and social justice, Qutb reflects on the psychology of ownership and redistribution per his claim that “Islam is aware of the instinct to love oneself and money . . . and treats all of this psychologically” (SJI 109; ‘AII 74). Previously, it was noted that Qutb regards differences in natural endowments as reasonable sources of social inequalities. He continues to discuss the stakes of failing to permit such reasonable inequalities. “The man who has the greatest abilities and who can produce the most will always overcome the law of absolute equality. Or if he cannot do that, he will hate it and resent it; in which case, either he will rebel or his intelligence will be extinguished, his abilities will atrophy, and his power of production will be lessened” (SJI 54; ‘AII 33, emphasis added). Similarly, the specific legalized practice of social justice is justified in terms of man's psychological needs: freedom from humiliation and protection of his self-esteem. Not only is the need for food the most humiliating need, but asking for charity causes “all one's self-esteem to leave, lost forever.” “Accordingly, Islam makes the right of an individual to a competence a responsibility of the state and of the rich members of the community . . . the zakat is to be received as a right, not given as a charity” (SJI 66–67; ‘AII 43). The concern to avoid the humiliation of the poor is certainly a moral objective in its own right as part of constructing a comprehensive “social citizenship.” It also fits into a consistent pattern of searching for the conditions under which social institutions will not only be justified to persons, but also under which the subjects of those institutions will be motivated to support them.

Similar reflections are forthcoming on the question of inherited wealth, always a core question for theorists of distributive justice. In Islam's law of inheritance, Qutb sees an “equitable balance between effort and reward. The parent who works knows that the fruit of his labors will not be realized in the short and limited span of his own life, but will stretch forward to be enjoyed by his children and his grandchildren. Such a parent will give of his very best and produce as much as he can by which the welfare of the state and of the human race as a whole is served” (SJI 84; ‘AII 56). However, note that the equality and fairness of such a principle is “over and above the fact that it is in accordance with human nature [fitra] and in agreement with the fundamental inclinations of man's soul; for it is with these inclinations that Islam reckons when it establishes its whole social system” (SJI 130; ‘AII 89, emphasis added).

The question of the legitimate origins and extent of wealth provides Qutb with multiple opportunities to reflect both on the extent of human moral capacities and also on the effects of inequality on the stability of a just society. He argues that Islam only permits the acquisition of property through some form of direct effort, thus prohibiting gambling and usury in addition to theft, for “there is nothing like work for reforming the soul, strengthening the body, and guarding the whole nature of man from the diseases of flabbiness, laziness and weakness” (SJI 143; ‘AII 99). Of course, these are personal virtues but ones of no small significance for others because “excessive wealth [makes a man] drink blood and sweat in his greed, voracious in his idleness” (SJI 149; ‘AII 103). Furthermore, in shades of Ibn KhaldunFootnote ²⁷ and Rousseau ([1750] Reference Rousseau and Cress1987), “the lover of luxury is flabby and weak-willed, soft, and with little virility; he cannot rely on his strength, his ambition has failed, and his generosity has vanished. To take part in jihad would hinder the gratification of his petty desires and forbid him his animal pleasures for a time” (SJI 156; ‘AII 110). (Nonetheless, even while railing against the crime of luxury, it is still the “just middle course between luxury and deprivation” (SJI 160; ‘AII 113) that Qutb calls for.) In still thicker shades of Rousseau, Qutb's argument against extreme material inequalities between members of a common society reduces to a concern for the quality of the moral relationship between social unequals.

In its focus on esteem, envy, and corruption, the previous paragraph might as easily come from Rousseau's Second Discourse ([1755] Reference Rousseau and Cress1987). However, I submit that this similarity is not only a matter of a common moral sensibility (on this one question of wealth and virtue), but also a function of their shared concerns with providing an account of the perpetual stability of their realistic utopia.

Observe, thus, how Qutb treats the problem of freedom of conscience. “Complete social justice cannot be assured, nor can its efficiency and permanence be guaranteed, unless it arises from an inner conviction of the spirit.” Qutb's concern here is not with value or epistemic pluralism, but with the conditions for the stability of a just order: “No man will claim justice by law unless he has first claimed it by instinct and by the practical methods that ensure the preservation of instinct. Similarly, society will not persevere with such legislation unless there is a belief which demands it from within and practical measures which support it from without. It is these facts that Islam has in mind in all its ordinances and laws” (SJI 53; ‘AII 32).

Of course, there can be no question of searching in Qutb's postwar writings for affirmations of a “liberty (of conscience) of the moderns” (in Constant's and Berlin's sense); we should not contort his approval of Islamic law's traditional tolerance of Jews and Christians into a greater defense of freedom of conscience than it is.Footnote ²⁸ (Indeed, this point takes on importance later.) Rather, Qutb is primarily interested in emphasizing that an Islamic order must not only establish the right laws, but also take care to cultivate the consciousness of those laws’ subjects. Where he does display an interest in an innate human need for negative liberty, it is in the realm of economic behavior, the freedom (discussed previously) to develop one's talents. Contra the Communist view, “economic freedom in itself [here Qutb means the freedom from poverty and deprivation] has no guarantee of permanence in society unless there is also freedom of conscience within the mind. For it produces only another form of tyranny—the repression of individual gifts and abilities and inclinations . . . a repression of the individual, inasmuch as his natural abilities are unable to find an outlet and have no opportunity of growing in competition with others” (SJI 54; ‘AII 33, emphasis added).

(v) Qutb's concern with freedom of conscience in connection with the problem of moral motivation and the stability of a just social order has a deeper dimension than the mere need for a community to socialize its members into common beliefs. This is not about the value of a civil religion “that causes each citizen to love his duties” (Rousseau [1762] Reference Rousseau and Cress1987, 226).

Even Social Justice in Islam, an early text from his Islamist phase lacking in the militant rage of the better-known Milestones (written after a decade of persecution at the hands of Nasser's secular nationalist regime), is perfectly clear that the freedom of conscience sought by Islam is about “freeing the human conscience from servitude to anyone except God and from submission to any save Him” (SJI 55; ‘AII 33). For Qutb, this emancipation from “the instinct of servitude to and worship of any of the servants of God” (i.e., other humans) is nothing less than a comprehensive emancipation from fear. When the human conscience is freed from servitude to anything but God, “and when it is filled with the knowledge that it can of itself gain complete access to God then it cannot be disturbed by any feeling of fear of life, or fear for livelihood, or fear for its station” (SJI 57–58; ‘AII 36).

Of course, fear has often been seen by political theorists as the political emotion par excellence (Robin Reference Robin2004). Qutb's interest in fear is likewise almost exclusively political. “Fear is an ignoble instinct which lowers the individual's estimation of himself, which often makes him accept humiliation or abdicate much of his natural honor or many of his rights,” and it is precisely because “Islam insists strongly that dignity and honor are the rights of man” that “it is particularly anxious to oppose the instinct of fear” (SJI 58; ‘AII 36). Without this fear, man is free to develop a certain kind of moral personality that allows the weak to demand their rights and thus provides for a moral commitment to a just social order.Footnote ²⁹

At this point, Qutb's concern with the need for an Islamic order to devote attention to the conscience and consciousness of its members reveals some important attitudes toward Law and its place in Qutb's realistic utopia. One observes here the way in which both features of “realistic utopian” thought converge: 1, the need to provide an account of stability and (2) the concern to limit morality's demandingness on the average human conscience. Thus, I believe that one can observe in Qutb's writings two distinct kinds of attitudes about the Law and human consciousness: (1) That Islam not only requires the kind of consciousness that supports Law and society, but also organically creates and fosters it once the system is in place; and (2) that Islam points beyond Law to a higher consciousness and supererogatory duties.

(vi) Along the lines of the first attitude, Qutb asserts that “the Islamic concept stirs in the conscience the desire to do good and be steadfast, dynamic and effective . . . [it] annuls and invalidates all kinds of negativism” (BPIW 139; KhTM 129). “The issue in comprehending the Qur'an is . . . to equip the soul with emotions, perceptions and experiences similar to those that accompanied the revelation in the Qur'an” (BPIW 3; KhTIM 7). Like the creation of a just order for Rousseau, Marx, and Rawls, the relationship between realizing Islam as a “system” and individual Muslims adopting the consciousness of believers is that of a virtuous cycle. Religion naturally acts on the minds and hearts of persons in marvelous ways. Inter alia, by striking a balance “between that which inspires fear, apprehension and awe on the one hand and that which inspires security, tranquility and intimacy on the other,” (BPIW 144; KhTIM 134) a religious conception is uniquely capable of filling the Muslim's heart with “comfort and a sense of security.” Qutb interprets these as distinctly social virtues: “Men proceed with their lives, moving forward on the path of God, with firm steps, open eyes, and a vigorous heart, replete with hope” (BPIW 147; KhTIM 136).

And, yet, the creation of the social order within which persons live and act is not only supported permanently by this new consciousness, but is also a prerequisite for that consciousness attaining its full fruition and freedom to act. When “the human mind has come to know all this freedom of conscience; it is free from the least shadow of servility, be it to death or injury, to poverty or weakness . . . it is released from the tyranny of the values of social standing and wealth; it is saved from the humiliation of need and beggary, and it can rise superior to its desires and its bodily appetites [then] it can turn towards its One Sole Creator” (SJI 68; ‘AII 44). Note the priority of political conditions for the comprehensive spiritual emancipation of humans. Qutb's view is something like the following: humans are more or less capable of perfecting their moral personality, but require for this not only inspiration (ilham) and moral education, but also social and psychological security in order to fully submit to their better nature. This social and psychological security can only be provided by a political order based on and coercively enforcing in a publicized way a comprehensive moral doctrine.

(vii) Thus emerges a second attitude toward Law. Let us recall first a number of possibly contradictory points that have been observed at various points in this essay. On the one hand, Qutb is a political perfectionist of the most enthusiastic and optimistic sort. Islam promises release from all individual worldly fears and humiliations, perfect justice and solidarity in this world, and eternal salvation after it. Knowledge of these promises inspires in the believer an exalted moral consciousness and practical virtue. On the other hand, the Law that man is commanded to obey in this world is consistently described as easy and undemanding. Importantly, as a theorist of a realistic utopia, Qutb is committed to both propositions.

Thus, although his vision is undoubtedly a sufficiently traditionalist shari'a vision for the Islamic community, he at numerous points looks beyond Law. For Qutb, Law is about what man can be reasonably commanded to do by God, but it is not the peak of human perfection. Law sets the minimum requirements for behavior, within the limits of average persons’ capacities. However, the Law is not the culmination of Islamic moral ideals; Islam sets goals beyond the Law for man to aspire to.

In general, Qutb reserves detailed commentary on the specifics of the Law to his multivolume exegetical work. In his political tracts, he by and large passes over specific rulings of Islamic public, criminal, and private law, as if to say that the traditional interpretations are (for the most part) manifestly correct. For example, in Social Justice in Islam, Qutb summarizes the entire criminal code of Islam in three short pages, barely commenting on its foundation in the revelatory texts. But he devotes chapters to the question of the spirit of the law and the human consciousness that it seeks to create. The following are characteristic statements: “Beyond [Law and duty] Islam appeals to the conscience, persuading it of its responsibility and seeking to raise it above its normal scope; thus it attempts to elevate human life and to draw it ever onward and upward. It leaves a wide space between the lower level of duty, which is prescribed by the Law and the higher level of conscience, which is so desirable and towards which individuals and nations have striven in every age and century” (SJI 110; ‘AII 74). Islam “leaves the minimum level of achievement to the Law, while to exhortation it prescribes the achievement of the supreme level; thus it leaves for man a wide space between these two, a gap that he can overcome as best he may” (SJI 125; ‘AII 85).

Conclusion: Islam's Harmony with Human Nature Proves Its Veracity and Superiority

I suggested at the beginning of this article that, to a great extent, Qutb's preoccupation with solving the problems of moral motivation, the stability of a just order, and the proper demandingness of the Law via the claim to the shari'a's deep harmony with human nature (fitra) serves a primarily apologetic function, as a preexisting and more or less stable feature of Islam that serves to justify Islam at large against any and all other ideological, religious, or moral alternatives. Without seeking to downplay Qutb's efforts or cast doubt on his sincerity, one indeed observes that this argumentative-rhetorical edifice is often put in the service of a grand polemic against all other alternatives.

Out of countless statements to this effect, the following are characteristic and sufficient to establish the present point. “By their very nature [fitra], men will turn towards Islam because it insures a perfect balance of all the aims for which previous religions have striven and between all the passions and desires of human nature [fitra bashariyya]” (SJI 119; ‘AII 79–80). “Since Islam alone takes into account all the aspects of man's humanity, it is also Islam alone that can raise man to the highest level and most perfect state attained in any time or place” (BPIW 196; KhTIM 177). And, thus, unlike Brahmanism and Christianity, not to mention secular ideologies, only

To be sure, Qutb is not alone among realistic utopians in having an interest in psychological plausibility that is largely theory driven. All realistic utopias are just realistic enough to be vaguely plausible, but not so realistic as to either validate immoral motives or to subject the theory itself to invalidation by empirical psychological facts. But to the extent that his is a purely reconstructive project motivated by a dogmatic belief in Islam, Qutb's efforts aim much more explicitly at a certain decisive closure of the question of the relationship between fitra and justice.

However, there is another dimension beyond the mere apologetic claim. The questions of moral motivation, the stability of a just order and the proper demandingness of the Law are also about theorizing the precise way in which Islam calls for political manifestation. I believe that the fullest picture of Qutb's views on the relationship between political order and moral motivation, and their centrality to his thought, emerges only when we pay close attention to his frequent discussions of the earliest period of Islamic history.