Osama bin Laden means well. This is evident from his declarations, juridical decrees, lectures, epistles, and written reminders, which Bruce Lawrence has made available in Messages to the World: The Statements of Osama Bin Laden (2005; hereafter referred to by the page numbers in parentheses) a single volume. Duty, Osama claims, compels Muslims' support for jihad against the ‘Crusader–Jewish Alliance’ (7, 23). But many attack his goals and behavior as immoral. Initiatives he has supported or directed represent his strategy for fulfilling his duty and demonstrate its apparent immorality at the same time: notably, attacks on U.S. embassies, the 9/11 attacks, and more recently an alleged plot to detonate hydrogen peroxide bombs in public transportation venues. Moreover, his willingness to kill innocents generally is self-evidently wrong, as is his blanket hatred of Jews, Americans, and Christians (56, 87); although on one occasion he has declared that ‘many in the West are polite and good people’ (142).

We might posit Osama's moral failing without further explanation, or we might try to understand this failing. The former strategy reduces debate to his word against ours. Understanding the basis of Osama's moral failings should result in a more reasonable response to his enmity.

If we grant that Osama means well and that his moral view has a theoretical grounding, and if we wish to argue that he is mistaken, if not misguided, then our next step is to identify where his moral position fails. Generally a moral position fails if its theoretical underpinning is bad or one misapplies a theory that is in principle morally acceptable.

Osama's moral theory is generally deontological, that is, based on the assertion that an act is morally good if it is done from duty and morally bad otherwise – although he occasionally makes his case on the basis of rewards that a dead jihadist is supposed to receive (29, 121, 248, 270–273) or the right to wage jihad against the aggressor (76). Deontology is opposed to consequentialism, the theory that an act is morally good if the consequences are good and morally bad if the consequences are bad; and virtue theory, the view that morality is primarily about the agent's character, which is virtuous to the extent that she is habitually able to know the good and to do the good, the good being the mean between the extremes of excess action and deficient action. Deontology has much to recommend it, but Osama misapplies it and fares even worse in the light of virtue theory. The opposite of virtue is vice, the tendency to act either deficiently or excessively, relative to the more moderate option. This essay claims that Osama's commitment to duty is vicious, both in his commitment to duty and his application of deontology.

To support this claim we will identify Osama's basic moral argument, point out its shortcomings, and demonstrate the inferiority of its deontological nature to virtue theory in the matters that concern him.

Osama argues that Muslims have a duty to defend Islam against the Crusader–Jewish alliance, even if this means killing its members along with innocent bystanders. He characterizes this duty as a duty to wage jihad against the alliance (41, 69). On occasion he puts this jihad in terms of ‘targeting’ (205) or ‘terrorizing’ (39) alliance members. More often he speaks specifically about killing them (61, 108, 129).

For Osama this call to jihad rests on two premises: (1) the Crusader–Jewish alliance is an aggressor against Islam; and (2) all Muslims have a duty to defend Islam against aggressors, even if this means killing them.

Osama is wrong because his basic argument is unsound. A flawed argument is either invalid or valid but unsound. It is valid if the truth of its premises would guarantee the truth of its conclusion; it is invalid if it is logically possible for the premises to be true ant the conclusion to be false at the same time. It is unsound if it is valid, but at least one premise is false. Here is an invalid argument:

1. 1. All Saudis are Arabs.

2. 2. Some Saudis are Muslims.

3. 3. Therefore, some Saudis are not Muslims.

It's logically possible that all Saudis are Muslims, which would make premises 1 and 2 true, but the conclusion false.

Here is a valid argument:

1. 1. All Saudis are Arabs.

2. 2. Some Saudis are Muslims.

3. 3. Therefore, some Muslims are Arabs.

If the premises are true, then the conclusion must be true, so the argument is valid.

A plausible summary of Obama's argument shows it validity:

1. 1. All Muslims have a duty to defend Islam against its aggressors, even if that means killing them.

2. 2. All members of the Crusader–Jewish alliance are aggressors against Islam.

3. 3. Therefore, all Muslims have a duty to defend Islam against all members of the Crusader–Jewish alliance, even if it means killing them.

If the premises are true, the conclusion must be true. In other words, Osama's argument is valid.

But as we shall see, it is unsound. That is, at least one premise is false.

Regarding the second premise – that the Crusader–Jewish alliance consists of aggressors against Islam – who belongs to this alliance and what have they done that constitutes aggression against Islam?

Osama follows George W. Bush's lead and divides the world into two sides: for Bush the two sides are America and its allies against the terrorists; for Osama one side is the global Crusader alliance with the Zionist Jews, led by America, Britain, and Israel, and the other side is the Islamic world (73).

Osama charges the alliance with occupation and oppression.

Early on, Osama was upset primarily with Saudi Arabia's collaboration with the West, especially in the regime's (1) permitting the United States to take the lead in freeing Kuwait from Iraq (xiii), thus getting a toehold in the Arab peninsula; and (2) the regime's supporting a Jewish state in Palestine (3–22). In time Osama came to see evil intent by the alliance in the Muslim world at large (9, 10, 16, 17, 25, 33, 47, 51, 60, 105, 163, and 164).

Osama charges the alliance with oppression ranging from support for corrupt regimes in the Muslim world (27, 28, 170, 171); to theft of the Muslim world's ‘wealth and oil’ (162); to trying to impose a new world order (51); to massacres through economic sanctions and military action (29, 40, 104, 137, 138, 164, 240); to annihilation of Islam itself (151).

The premise that all members of the Crusader–Jewish alliance are aggressors against Islam is false. The premise rests on two assertions: (1) there are only two sides to the conflict: the Crusader–Jewish alliance and the Muslims whom the alliance is attacking; and (2) the alliance is guilty of occupation and oppression. Thus, the premise is true only if these two assertions are true. But neither is true, at least no necessarily.

First, there are more than two sides to the conflict. Bush and Osama believe that the two sides are contradictory: neither side's position can be true at the same time nor false at the same time. An example of contradictory assertions is, ‘All Arabs are Muslims’ and ‘Some Arabs are not Muslims’. It is impossible for both of these to be true at the same time or to be false at the same time.

But the two sides in the Bush/Osama distinction are contraries, that is, they cannot both be true at the same, but they can both be false at the same time. Consider, for example, this sentence: All Arabs are Muslims or All Arabs are Christians. Both claims are false. Similarly, it is possible to be against Bush's ‘crusade’ and against Osama's call to jihad at the same time, as a pacifist might be, for example.

Since the who of this premise – The Crusader–Jewish alliance is an aggressor towards Islam – is false, we could move to the next premise – Islam has a duty to defend Islam against aggressors. But let us complete the discussion by examining the what of this premise. Perhaps the United States has engaged Muslim leaders in order to secure American interests. Perhaps the United States has supported Israel in its struggles with Palestine. And, perhaps, the U.S. military and fiscal strategy in Muslim countries has contributed to non-combatants' deaths. But much of this has occurred with the support of Muslim authorities who oppose Osama, but not Islam. Moreover, the thriving presence of many Muslims in the United States and its allied countries, suggests that neither the U.S. nor its allies is out to annihilate Islam.

This may not prove that a key premise – the Crusader-Jewish alliance is an aggressor toward Islam – in Osama's argument is false, but the two grounds that Osama offers for this premise – the who and the what – are doubtful enough to render it weak.

* * *

Now for the premise that Islam has a duty to defend itself against its aggressors. We see that Osama's argument is unsound because, while valid, it contains at least one false premise. We can also see that Osama's commitment to duty rather than virtue. contributes to his position's failure.

If Osama meant only that Muslims have a right to self-defense this would be difficult to deny. But Osama says something stronger. First, he says that Muslims have a duty to defend themselves against aggression. Yet, it may be more reasonable sometimes to abide the aggression. Second, he says that this duty consists of killing the aggressors, including those who are guilty by association. This seems too absurd to warrant further consideration. But rather than name-call, we may level some pointed objections. Osama defends this premise on two grounds: religious and logical (117–118). On religious grounds, he cites the Qur'an; the hadith, that is, sayings of the Prophet Muhammad; Muslim jurists; and Muslim scholars. On logical grounds he cites the lex talionis – the law of retaliation (‘an eye for an eye…’) – as axiomatic and draws conclusions from there.

His starting point is that ‘There is no meaning to this life except to be judged obedient to god’ (248; see also 25, 108). To show that such obedience requires killing the aggressors, Osama cites verses from the Qur'an, e.g., 4:84 (41) and 9:5-the famous ‘Verse of the Sword’ (187). But as with any proof texting, Osama is susceptible to at least two objections. First, he often quotes only part of a verse, thus changing its meaning. For example, Osama offers this selection:

But as Lawrence notes, Osama leaves off the end of the verse: ‘but it is best to stand fast’ (118, n. 22). Lawrence notes several other instances of Osama's misquoting or partially quoting selections from the Qur'an, for example, 3:86 (122, n. 29); 4:102 (184); 8:72 (28); 9:5 (109, 187); and 9:118 (81, n. 23).

Second, other verses in the Qur'an contradict Osama's position. For example,

One could argue, as has David Bukay, that certain verses in the Qur'an abrogate other verses, but it is apparent that Osama's use of the Qur'an is still too one-sided to withstand scrutiny (‘Peace or Jihad? Abrogation in Islam’, Middle East Quarterly 14.4, 2007).

Osama also frequently refers to hadith. For example, ‘The people are close to an all-encompassing punishment from God if they see the oppressor and fail to restrain him’ (25). Again one can use this strategy against Osama. For example, even he admits that the Prophet forbids the killing of innocents (118, 141) and that the Prophet's mission was ‘spreading the message of God, not killing people’ (139). And Osama provides quotes from two hadith that seem to work against him: ‘The best jihad against a despotic sultan is the word of truth [not killing]’ (4) and ‘A judge cannot make a judgment between two people when he is angry’ (199).

Osama also cites ancient jurists. A notable example is 14^th-century Syrian jurist Taqi ad-Din Ahmad ibn Taymiyya's, whose fatwa reads: ‘the first obligation after the (profession of) Faith is to repel the enemy aggressors who assault both sanctity and security’ (xx; See also, 5, 9, 11, 26, 42, 61, 80, 118, 229, 249–50). But this is misleading, since Taymiyya was referring specifically to a duty to repel the invading Mongols (xx).

Osama also refers selectively to contemporary scholars. For example, Lawrence notes Abdalla Azzam's Defending the Land of the Muslims is Each Man's Most Important Duty (1985) as a strong influence on Osama (xvi). But Osama tends to be antagonistic toward these scholars: ‘No official scholar's decrees have any value as far as I'm concerned’ (141) – and the feeling appears to be mutual, as is evident from Muhammad Said Tantawy, the Grand Mufti of Egypt's juridical decree condemning Osama's views as sacrilegious and having nothing to do with Islam (141).

Thus, Osama's religious appeals can work both for his views and against them, depending on an arbitrary selectivity. But Osama also makes a logical appeal, relying primarily on the lex talionis: ‘“What America is tasting today is but a fraction of what we have tasted for decades’” (104; see also 106–129). This law, he argues, justifies killing even innocents and women: ‘Those who kill our women and our innocent, we kill their women and innocent, until they stop doing so’ (119).

This appeal weakens Osama's deontological argument. To see this, compare Osama's version of deontology with its most famous version: Immanuel Kant's. In his Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals, Kant, like Osama, assumes that there is universal moral law, that duty derives from that law, and that the moral good entails acting from duty. But where Osama lets the lex talionis inform one's sense of duty, Kant offers the more nuanced ‘Categorical Imperative’.

Kant offers several versions or ‘formulae’ of the Categorical Imperative, including ‘Act always and only as if the maxim behind your act could by your will become universal law’ and ‘Act always in such a way as to treat rational beings as ends in themselves and never merely as means’. Regarding the first formula, suppose for example, that I need a prescription drug to save my wife's life. I promise the pharmacist I will pay for the drug tomorrow. The pharmacist agrees, enabling me to give my wife the drug now, thus saving her life. But I know that I will have no money tomorrow or any time soon. Nevertheless, I made the false promise with the best of intentions: to save a life. Wasn't this morally proper? The maxim behind my act is ‘One must make a promise one intends to break’. But a promise one intends to break is not a promise. It would be logically impossible to make such a promise, which means it could not be a universal duty.

Regarding the second version of the Categorical Imperative, I violated it because I treated the pharmacist merely as a means and not as an end in himself.

The lex talionis is a poor substitute for the categorical imperative. As Ghandi purportedly said, if everyone takes an eye for an eye, the whole world will be blind. If the principle is if you take my eye, I may not take anything but your eye in return – then there is room for forgiveness and mercy: the aggrieved may refuse to retaliate. The universal principle here becomes a right, not a duty. But Osama posits a duty to retaliate, which promises a world of blind people if everyone adheres to it. What's more, such a principle could never be satisfied universally, because the last blind mind standing would be without an eye to take. The lex talionis, therefore, could never serve as the universal foundation of duty and Osama's reliance on it renders his moral position untenable.

There are other problems with the lex talionis besides the problem of ongoing revenge. For example, Who should pay for the 9/11 attack on the Twin Towers? The assailants are dead. Fifteen of the 19 attackers were Saudis, although Saudi Arabian officials condemned the act. Should the Saudi Arabian government pay? The citizens of Saudi Arabia? Should American kamikazes fly two passenger jets into Saudi skyscrapers? The lex talionis offers no answer.

Even Kant's version of deontology is problematic. First, he makes it difficult to be moral. He holds that if one acts merely according to duty, one has not acted morally, but how often do we – or can we – consciously call up our duty before acting from it. I have not robbed a bank today and I assume that it is my duty not to rob a bank. But I rarely, if ever, refrain from robbing a bank because it is my duty to refrain. Usually I refrain because it does not occur to me to rob a bank. Even then, I maintain, my refraining from robbing a bank is a morally good thing, regardless of my motive. Very few of us could pass a moral test if it required us always to be acting from duty only.

A second problem with deontology is that it is useless in cases of conflicting duties. Kant denies the possibility of conflicting duties – if a duty is universal, says Kant, then its contrary must be universally prohibited. Experience and common sense say otherwise. Take, for example, Sophie's Choice. In William Styron's book Sophie has arrived at a German concentration camp with her young son and daughter and has been told by an official that she must give up one child to be tortured and killed, or she will lose both of them. Since she has a duty to protect her daughter and a duty to protect her son, whatever decision she makes will violate one of those duties. She gives up her daughter since the son may have a better chance of surviving the camp's rigors. But this decision is based on consequences, not duty. Sophie could not have made this decision on duty alone.

So deontology is problematic and Osama's version of it is more problematic. He may mean well, but he has taken the wrong moral path in pursuit of obedience to God.

Virtue theory offers a better response to Osama's concerns. As Aristotle explains this theory in his Nicomachean Ethics, morality is primarily about the agent's character, not the act's quality. A morally good person is virtuous and a morally bad person is vicious. Virtue is the ability habitually to know the good and to do the good. Good is a species of the perfect: the ‘more good’ something is, the closer to perfection it is. Something is perfect if there is neither too much of it, nor too little of it. Thus, the good is the mean between the extremes of deficiency and excess.

In addition, Aristotle invokes the four traditional or cardinal virtues: courage is the means between cowardice and foolhardiness; justice is the mean between giving someone less than she deserves and giving her more than she deserves; temperance is the mean between deficient use of an available resource and excessive use of an available resource; and prudence – practical wisdom – is the mean between acting on insufficient knowledge and failing to act on knowledge that overwhelmingly calls for such action. Note too, that one definition of integrity is the integration of these virtues into one's life. Thus, to have integrity is habitually to be courageous, just, temperate, and prudent.

Osama's excessive commitment to duty puts him at odds with virtue theory. The suicide bombings and the 9/11 attacks were foolhardy. Innocent people do not deserve to die, so Osama's contrary position is unjust. Osama's use of well-meaning people as instruments of terror is intemperate. And Osama's failure to heed the wisdom of many Islamic scholars is imprudent. It is also worth noting, with Lawrence, that Osama's writings lack ‘any hint of the traditional Islamic values of generosity, hospitality, and tolerance’ (xx).

Osama, lacking integrity, has made a vicious commitment to duty, and thus remains open to moral criticism that ought to be part of any conversation which concerns how to deal with him.