The 'West' properly defined is a way of living, and this way of living is based on certain fundamental perceptions and assumptions: that is, on certain ideas. One of these Western ideas is that of something called 'society'; another is that of politics; another is that of economics; another is that of religion. Yet other Western ideas are 'human rights' and 'women's rights' and the  idea of 'nation'.  In addition, the way of life which exists in the West is primarily the material way of life where the happiness, the comfort, of the individual is the main concern.

So when people talk or write about Islamic politics or even an Islamic economy, they are already basing their Islam on Western ideas - on the Western way of thinking. Thus, to talk about such a thing as Islamic democracy is really a contradiction, since democracy itself is a Western idea, totally alien to the Islamic 'view of the world' - the Islamic Way of Life and of Living [see below]. For Islam itself is a Way of Life; we Muslims should and indeed must understand that Islam is not a religion - as religion is understood in the West: that is, just rituals and religious observance, and some moral guidance, all separate from what is termed the 'secular' life. For Islam, all life - every moment of every day for every Muslim - must be in accord with the will of Allah. In Islam, there is not and should never be any division of everyday life, any division of thought, or action, into 'politics' or 'religion' just as there should not be, in the life and thought of the Muslim, any attempt to view the world, its peoples and its problems through the ideas of the West.

For Islam, for Muslims, there is only the quest, the striving, to live as Allah has decreed - made evident to us in the Quran, Ahadith and the teachings and rulings of pious, Allah-fearing, scholars, and everything that we do should be for Allah. Islam simply does not need the divisions, the ideas, the concepts, the West has developed: divisions, ideas and concepts which have alienated the West and its peoples from God, and distanced them from understanding all life as dependent upon the Creator

In essence, Islam is a vision of Unity: an expression of the numinous, the scared, truth of tawhid, with the Islamic way of life a means to make this numinosity real in the world. Thus, when we live in an Islamic way we are manifesting, restoring, the sacred, whereas when we live in any other way we are undermining or destroying, or helping to destroy what is sacred. To live according to Islam is to fulfil our purpose, as human beings. To live in any other way is to deny that purpose, and thus deny our very humanity. In essence, the West, with its ideas and concepts and modern way of life, is
the opposite of Islam.

Quite a few Western ideas go back to Ancient Greece - to philosophers like Plato and Aristotle. One of the many Muslims who understood the fundamental difference between Islam and the West - between the Islamic Way and the way of the West - was Hasan Al-Banna, one of the founders of Al-Ikhwan al-Muslimeen. Another was Imam Khomeini, the founder the Islamic Republic of Iran.

The stark truth which we Muslims in the modern world must understand is that the West is a collection of nations whose people are essentially barbarians, despite the technology, the prosperity and the system of education of these Western nations. (And even despite the religion of those nations.) For a barbarian is: (1) someone ignorant of the Word and Will of Allah; (2) someone who does not use the reason with which Allah has endowed us, who is thus ruled by their passions and who thus cannot or will not restrain themselves [and Allah loves those who restrain themselves], and (3) someone who does not have the reasonable behaviour, the honour, and the civilized manners which we Muslims strive to possess (Adab Al-Islam).

Expressed another way, a barbarian is someone who is not aware of their Creator - who does not know or feel how they are dependant upon that Creator, and who thus does not or cannot or will not bow down before their Creator. Someone, in brief, who possesses the pride, the egotism, of Shaitan. Such a person does not believe or understand or even feel that everything that happens, happens because of that Creator. The truth about the barbaric nature of a lot of the peoples of the West today is evident in the behaviour of those people, and evident in the fact that Western governments tolerate and even encourage such behaviour through tolerating and encouraging the films, the advertising, the television programmes, the books, the magazines, and the so-called "popular culture" of music, lack of manners, sexual permissiveness and alcohol which has ensnared and which does ensnare most young Western people.
 

Islam is the Will of Allah whereas the way of the West is the way of Man. Thus the very ideas and ideals of the West are the ideas and ideals of Man, while the very ideas and ideals of Islam are the ideas and ideals which Allah has given us to enable us to live according to His Will. Any way of living other than Islam is therefore fundamentally wrong and contrary to our true nature, as human beings endowed by our Creator with reason and the will to restrain ourselves. This really is the quintessence of the argument against the West.
 

Is there such a thing today as a Muslim community - a State - following the Will of Allah? There are nations where the majority of people are born Muslim, but any devout Muslim striving to follow the will of Allah who goes to such places, or lives in them, knows full well that Islam is not a Way of Life for many of the people in those places. That is, such people do not fully obey, or strive to obey, the Will of Allah in all that they do - their lives are not focused upon Allah, not centered round Islam; for their aim is not taqwa, but rather something worldly, of benefit to themselves or their family. To understand this is to understand how far we Muslims are from creating and living in an Islamic way in an Islamic community.  The truth seems to me to be that what was the Islamic world has come under the influence of Western ideas, Western ways, as a consequence of which people have drifted away from Islam and in particular their governments and rulers have forgotten their duty to Allah and instead seek after Western goals, Western aims, Western materialism.
 

We really have to stop thinking in terms of Western ideas, as we must start thinking in pure Islamic terms. What we must never do, or never try to do, is base our understanding of Islam on Western ideas, and judge Islam itself by these Western ideas.

Thus, we must stop thinking in terms of politics, of sociological theories, of economics, of 'human rights' and all such Western ideas (and stop using these terms in relation to Islam) - and instead start thinking only in terms of the Will of Allah.

As I with my limited knowledge understand it, this is what being Muslim means - an awareness of Allah, an awareness of Muhammad as His Messenger, as the human being par excellence, and an awareness of our duty to strive to live on a daily basis according to the Will of Allah - that is, according to Adab Al-Islam, with piety (taqwa) while fulfilling our Allah-given obligations (one of which is Jihad).

In one way - the inner way of personal awareness of our Creator, Allah - the West is fundamentally irrelevant. In another way, the West is the fundamental obstacle to the creation of a practical world-wide Muslim community where we can live as Allah intended us to live.

No Muslim can really be part of, or consider themselves part of, Western society and Western culture. For such society and culture is, on the personal level, haram, and on the outer practical level an obstacle in the way of creating and maintaining an Islamic community whose members live according to the Will of Allah, for surely an Islamic community means Muslims being in charge of this community, with the laws of such a community being the laws of the Shari'ah.
 

Islam and the Western Idea of Democracy

This is so for two reasons. Firstly, because the ideal of democracy is to give power, and authority, through the vote, to individuals - regardless of the qualifications, the morals, the piety, the knowledge or way of life of those individuals. This is in total opposition to Islam.

In true Islam, authority (and respect) resides in those who know, who fully understand and who live by the will of Allah. To know the will of Allah is to know the holy Quran, the Sunnah and the Shari'ah. Those who do know, and who live by what they know, guide others - it is their duty to guide other, less knowledgeable Muslims, just as it is the duty of those less knowledgeable Muslims to willingly accept such guidance and respect those favoured by Allah with knowledge, scholarly learning, understanding and taqwa. This is so in Islam because it is the Will of Allah as expressed in the holy Quran and in the Sunnah.
 

The second reason why democracy is un-Islamic is because in democracy, it is individuals who make laws, and they make them based upon man-given, man-derived social and political ideas. Further, these laws are constantly being changed - every change of government sees new laws, based on the social and political ideas of the winning political Party.

In complete contrast, in Islam the laws have been given to us by Allah - and they are complete and prefect. Any attempt to change these laws - to try and 'update' them and make them seem more 'relevant' [that is, more in accord with Western ideas] - is wrong, and indeed evil because it is contrary to the Will of Allah who has said:

"This day I have perfected your Way of Life for you and completed My favour upon you and have chosen for you as your Way of Life Al-Islam." (Surah 5:3 Interpretation of Meaning)
 

The Islamic Community and the Khilafah

This means, as Hasan Al-Banna understood, the restoration of the Khilafah, the creation of free and independent Islamic societies through Jihaad and revolutions so that, through these, we can live as God's vicegerents on Earth in a free and noble society where our humanity, expressed as it is through Islamic morals, Islamic manners and the Islamic quest for justice, reason and knowledge, can be not only be expressed but flourish.
 
 

Abdul Aziz