HIZBUT-TAHREER
In the early part of the seventh century, the Muslim OMMAH was born. The word OMMAH means people who adopt an ideology as a way of life and create a unique civilization based on that ideology. Sometimes the word OMMAH is mistakenly translated into nation. The word nation in the western sense refers to a people living within a nation state who may have common origin, language, and history.
The founder of the Muslim OMMAH is the Messenger of ALLAH (THE ONE GOD) Mohammad (peace be upon him). Mohammad (PBUH) started calling the people of a small town in the Arabian Peninsula to a new DEEN called ISLAM. The word DEEN means a comprehensive way of life organizing every aspect of human existence. The word DEEN is mistakenly translated into religion. The word religion in the western sense refers only to a spiritual relationship between man and a supreme being. The word ideology is a fairly accurate translation of the word DEEN.
Prophet Mohammad founded a political entity based on the Islamic ideology, i.e. the Islamic state. By the time of his death it expanded to include all of the Arabian Peninsula. By the end of the first century to the founding of the state, its realm included all of today's Middle East, North Africa, and Spain. Later on it expanded to include Turkey and most of Eastern Europe.
The Islamic State or the KHILAPHA as it is called in Arabic, dominated the world stage for over a thousand years. It succeeded in creating a single OMMAH from diverse and conflicting people. Although it experienced a brief period of decline during the 11th and 12th centuries during the Crusades, it quickly took the initiative and repelled the invaders and enjoyed 500 years as an unchallenged superpower.
During the 16th and 18th century Europe was experiencing great changes. It started to wake up from the Dark Ages. A new ideology, i.e. Secularism was evolving and replacing the christian dominated feudal systems. Empires and feudal lords gave way to the birth of nation states. The Industrial Revolution was in full swing. At the same time the Islamic OMMAH was experiencing an intellectual decline in understanding Islam due to several reasons that I will mention later on.
All of these changes in Europe presented a significant challenge to the Islamic state. Because of the intellectual decline in understanding Islam, the Islamic State failed to meet the new challenge. For example,it made the fatal mistake of rejection the industrial revolution as a product of non Muslims. this caused the balance of power to tilt in favor of Europe. As a result of the Muslim elite started to loose confidence in the suitability of Islam for the new era. They started to accept the western ideology of secularism and the concept of the nation state which resulted in the fragmentation of the Islamic State into weak, backward, and conflicting states dominated intellectually and politically by Europe.
Hizbut Tahreer is an ideological political party whose ideology is Islam. Its objective is to revive the Muslim OMMAH from the state of decline it lives in by making it adopt Islam as its cause and re-establish the Islamic state. The party was established in 1953 in Jerusalem. The founder is Taqui eddin Annabahani, a scholar in the Islamic ideology and a judge. The party expanded in the early 50s through out Palestine, Jordan, Syria, Iraq, and Lebanon. Nowadays, its presence can be felt in most of the Muslim countries, Europe, and the United States.
Hizbut Tahreer accepts both Muslim men and women as members of the party regardless of the nationality or color. The way a person becomes a member is by adopting Islam as his ideology, maturing in the party's culture, and adopting the party's views and opinions.
Hizbut Tahreer was established to achieve the following objectives:
All of these objectives are called for by the islamic ideology. It commands all Muslims to establish organized groups to call for Islam, order what islam orders and prohibit what islam prohibit.This command asks for general objectives and three objectives above are specifics related to the current Muslims case.
Reviving the Muslims OMMAH from its decline and liberating it from all non Islamic influence can only be achieved by raising it intellectually.This means replacing all the ideas and concepts that caused its decline with specific and clear Islamic ideas and concepts. This conclusion was reached by Hizbut Tahreer by studying and analyzing the history of the Muslim OMMAH and identifying the root cause of its decline. This root cause was identified as the severe decline in the Muslim OMMAH's ability in understanding and applying Islam. This decline was due to several factors:
Previous attempts:
Several attempts where made by several movements, Islamic and non Islamic, to revive the Muslim OMMAH from its decline. They all failed. This failure was due to two reasons:
1. The lack of understanding of the Islamic ideology by those who where trying to revive the OMMAH. They called for Islam in a very general way without defining the specific ideas and solutions for revival. They used the status quo as the source for their thinking instead of the Islamic ideology. As a result, they ended up adapting Islam to agree with the status que instead of changing the status que to agree with Islam. As a result, they called for secular ideas such as Capitalism, Socialism, Democracies and Freedoms branding them as Islamic.
2. The lack of clarity in understanding the methodology of implementing the Islamic ideas. They focused on the individual's purity piety instead of focusing on the society as a whole. They thought that reviving Islam can be done by building mosques or publishing books or establishing goodwill organizations and neglecting the fact that non Islamic ideas and rules dominate the society. This focus was due to the misunderstanding of society as a collection of individuals only. In fact, the society consists of individuals with perminant relationships. These relationships are conducted based on common ideas and systems. Which results in unifying the feelings of the society toward these relationships. For example, thousands of people on a ship do not constitute a society while tens of people on a village constitute a society. So in order to revive a society all of its ideas and concepts which determines its point of view toward things must be revived.
Hizb Tahreers ideology is based on the islam AQIDA. The word AQIDA means a belief with certainty supported by evidence. it is not a blind faith. The Islamic AQIDA states that :
1. There is only one GOD,ALLAH who created the universe and and every thing in it, sent messengers to organize human life, and will hold every one accountable for his/her deeds in her after.
2. mohammad(PBUH) is the messenger of ALLAH. he received ALLAH's revelation in the form of the Qur'an (the Muslims holy book) and in the form of inspiration exhibited by the prophet's actions and sayings. This revelation addresses every aspect of human life. It organizes Man's relationship with ALLAH in the form of worship, Man's rewith him self in in terms of eating, drinking and dress code, Man's relationship with others in terms of interactions, dealings, and the penal code. This last relationship encompass the political system, the economic system and the social system. The political system includes the ruling system and the islamic State's relationship with other states.
As can be seen, the Islamic AQIDA contradicts the secular ideology from its foundations. In Islam , there is no church to be separated from the state. no one has the right to legislate other than ALLAH. The Muslims only have the executive power and the right to choose a man as the head of the Islamic state.
After an extensive study and research of the status of the OMMAH, the time of the Prophet and his companions, and by referring back to the QUR'AN and the actions and sayings of the Prophet; Hizbut-Tahreer adopted comprehensive and detailed ideas and opinions which are needed to revive the OMMAH and re-establish the Islamic state. These ideas are documented in over 20 books and thousands of booklets and leaflets. They address all aspects of society, State, and domestic and international policy. A significant part of these ideas deal with the methodology of establishing the State, and carrying it worldwide.
The methodology of Hizbut-tahreer us based on and deduced from the actions and saying of the Prophet during his life in his successful effort in establishing the Islamic state and later in carrying Islam to the world. The method for reviving the society and establishing the Islamic State is specified in three stages:
1. Create the nucleus of the Party by molding individuals with the Party’s ideology and methods. This stage was started in 1953 by the founder of the Party Taqui Eddin Annabahani. He contacted interested individuals and organize them into studying rings to create individuals who filly understand the party’s ideology and who are devoted to it
2. Interact with the OMMAH to generate public awareness of the Party and its ideology and then a public opinion which is supportive of the Party and its ideology. And later strive with the Party to implement its ideology by establishing the Islamic State. At this stage the Party’s activities included the following:
One. Continue the studying rings as in the first stage
Two. Educate the public through speeches, lectures, leaflets, etc. to propagate the Party’s ideology.
Three. Enter an ideological struggle with all non Islamic ideas and concepts in order to clarify the OMMAH’s thoughts and expose the shortcomings and errors in these ideas.
Four. Political struggle against the colonial powers and their influence in all its forms whether ideological, political, economical or military. Struggle against the rulers and exposed their negligence in performing their duties and uncover their conspiracies against the OMMAH. Call for the removal of their rule in order to establish the Islamic rule in its place.
Although Hizbut-Tahreer was very firm and uncompromising in its stands against the rulers and their policies, it only used political and ideological means in its struggle. It never used any material means such as arm struggle or terror campaigns despite of all the oppression it suffered in all countries where it is active. The only reason for this stand against material struggle is because Prophet Mohammad never used material struggle during this stage of establishing the State. As a result of the oppression it suffered and the atmosphere that society was put through, the Party started seeking support from the power centers in the society such as the military and prominent people. The purpose was tow fold. First, to protect the Party so that it can deliver its message. Second, accumulate enough support to be able implement Islam by establishing the Islamic State.
THE Islamic ideology and leadership succeeded in the past a way no other ideology had. It transformed the Arab people from a backward and ignorant status to the top of the world stage. It succeeded in assimilating diverse and antagonist people to one powerful and enlightened OMMAH. The Islam conquests were to remove any obstacles between the people and what their intellects guide them to choose. They chose Islam in the millions. This historical fact can contrasted with the colonial conquest of Europe which widened the gap between the winners and losers and still do. Even after all these years the gap between the winners and losers is never grater.
After
the collapse of communism people thought capitalism was the
answer. They were disappointed. The Islamic ideology succeeded in
the past in reviving entire nations and still has the power to do
so. Islam the only alternative not only for Muslims but for the
entire world.