A. Faizur Rahman

In August this year, the Taliban formally codified their totalitarianism in a 35-article enactment titled the Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice Law which, among other barbarities, enshrines misogyny — the core tenet of the extremist group’s ideology.

The mind behind this atrocity is the “supreme leader” who sententiously calls himself Amir al-Mu’minin Sheikh al-Quran and Hadith Mawlawi Hibatullah Akhundzada. The intolerance of his regime is writ large in every article of the draconian law that seeks to convert Afghanistan into an open-air prison.

In the English translation provided by the Afghanistan Analysts Network (AAN), the law begins: “In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful” when in reality it is the exact antithesis of the Koran’s beneficence and mercy embodied in its most definitive declaration on human liberty, laa ikraaha fid’deen (there shall be no compulsion in Islam).

Indeed, in 10:99, the Quran warns Muslims against religious coercion (tukrihun naas) because it was never its intention to make “the entire humanity on earth” believe in Islam (la aamana man fil arzi kulluhum jamee’an).

As “entire humanity on earth” includes Muslims, the Quran not just prohibits the forcible conversion of non-Muslims but also disallows the imposition of any one interpretation of Islam on unwilling Muslims. Hence, there is no record of the Prophet ever having formulated a law to force his followers to pray five times a day or fast during Ramazan, let alone imposing the burqa on women or banning feminine speech in public.

The original Islamic society was so open that the Quran approvingly mentions how a woman successfully “disputed with” the Prophet (tujaadiluka) about a form of divorce called zihaar which the Quran immediately invalidated (58:1-4).

However, the Talibani law seeks to erase women from the public sphere in blatant violation of the Prophetic understanding of Islam. It warns: “If an adult woman leaves home because of some urgent need, she is duty-bound to hide her voice, face and body” from unrelated men and “in front of non-believing or loose women” thus degrading non-Muslim women too.

In fact, the law demonises all non-Muslims by prohibiting Afghans from “befriending” or “assisting them”, celebrating their festivals, or “imitating” their “appearance or character”.

A pro-restriction procession in Kabul

As for Muslim men, they cannot wear “neckties and other such un-Islamic symbols” or style their hair “in an un-Islamic manner.” They must compulsorily grow a beard which is not “less than the width of a fist” in length. Additionally, “at the set times” they must offer prayers “in congregation in the mosques.”

Owners of “sightseeing and recreation spots” have to build mosques and “ensure that staff and tourists observe congregational prayer” while transport companies make sure “that drivers and passengers are praying at the proper time”. The drivers are also barred from playing music or transporting women who are “not covered”, or unaccompanied by a close adult relative “of sound mind”.

Anyone who is shocked by the atrociousness of these restrictions must know that the Taliban are not the first to turn Islamic liberalism on its head. They have only made rigid the legal moralism that persists in several Muslim societies today.

Saudi Arabia, for instance, has the Hay’a al-amr bil-ma’roof wan-nahy an al-munkar, or the Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (CPVPV) whose dogmatism in March 2002 led to the death of 15 schoolgirls in Mecca when its members prevented them from escaping their burning school for not wearing proper hijab.

Although the CPVPV was stripped of its sweeping powers in 2016 it endures in a milder form under the General Presidency of Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice. In India too, clerical preoccupation with the virtues of hijab is a huge reality.

The obsession with virtue and vice prevails because Muslim rulers, in collaboration with establishmentarian theologians, have been fomenting it for centuries by misinterpreting Quranic advice: “Let there arise out of you a community (ummah) inviting to all that is good (khair), and enjoining what is right and forbidding what is wrong (ya’muroona bil ma’roofi wa yanhawna anil munkar).” (3:104)

This was done by rendering ma’roof (right) and munkar (wrong) in 3:104 as “virtue” and “vice” respectively - a moralistic meaning not intended by the Koran. The interpretational tinkering enabled the cleric-state alliance to acquire unchecked power over the restive masses in the guise of implementing the Koran.

The truth is that 3:104 is just one of the many broad-spectrum ethical Koranic verses that enjoins nothing more than a sense of social probity among Muslims without giving them extra-judicial powers. Nor does it authorise governments to convert the Koran into a legalistic tool to impose any state-defined morality.

In short, 3:104 and other such verses give citizens a limited right to intervene when they see an undeniable wrong (not vice) being committed. An example of this is the “Bell Bajao” (Ring the Bell) campaign started in India by a human rights organisation in 2008. The idea was to save women from domestic violence by encouraging people to ring the doorbell when they hear a couple fighting.

The Quran, otherwise, is clear that moral policing is not a virtue but a vice. In 49:12 it strictly warns Muslims against needlessly suspecting people of immorality (ijtanibu kaseeram minaz zann), or prying into their lives to spread gossip, or to backbite (laa tajassasu walaa yaghtab ba’zukum ba’zan).

For this reason, societies during the time of the Prophet and the first four caliphs were free, not surveilled. The weaponisation of virtue-promotion and vice-prevention happened much later thanks to scholars such as al-Mawardi (c.974-1058), al Ghazali (c.1056-1111), and Ibn Taymiyah (c.1263- 1328) under a “public morals office” called hisbah.

In his book Ihya Ulumiddin, al-Ghazali lists 10 stages of sin-prevention depending upon the level of intransigence. It starts with informing the sinner of “the harm of sin” and ends with beating him up with hands or weapons, or fighting against him with “soldiers.”

The Taliban appear to be following Ghazali’s playbook to the letter. Given the fact that they have become almost invincible militarily, what is needed in Afghanistan is — to paraphrase the French philosopher Foucault — a language of mass discontent and revolt that could transform thousands of forms of distress, misery, and despairs into a force that could defeat the Taliban from within.

Albert Camus said this differently when he offered oppressed societies a modified version of René Descartes’ cogito, ergo sum (I think, therefore I am) — I rebel, therefore we exist.

Faizur Rahman is Secretary-General of the Islamic Forum for the Promotion of Moderate Thought. The article first appeared in the Hindu newspaper.