[Fwd: [maimonides] Holy War]

[Guest guest]

Icastes wrote:

>

> For all the obvious reasons, I have been reviewing the _jihad_, the holy

> war. It is not without interest to all on a metaphysical and social level.

> For there are two jihads, the lesser one, _El-jihadul-asghar_, which is the

> social, political, and violent application of the greater holy war,

> _El-jihadul-akbar_. It is a purely spiritual war, inwardly directed.

>

> Peace is the centrality of all things, the unmoved part of the unmoved

> mover, the Euclidean point of all spheres. It is the rest within motion.

>

> The battlefield, whether it be in the Bhagavad-Gita, the Bible, in Homer, or

> Thucycides, is the domain of action where the individual man develops his

> possibilities; it is usually depicted symbolically as a horizontal plane.

> The true battle is in the most general sense, where the individual

> manifestation takes action while the divine part, the principle of the

> individual manifestation, is there alongside, but is not engaged in the

> battle. El-Hallaj says: " We are two spirits conjoined in one and the same

> body. " For the individual, it represents what he is and upon which he is

> dependent, ego and self, individuality and personality, Adam the man and

> Adam the Universal Man.

>

> No matter how we envision war, war has only one purpose: to stop disorder

> and to restore order. While some might argue that war is itself disorder, as

> it is fought within the world of multiplicity and change and manifestation,

> it is the disorder that is meant to balance disorder and to restore harmony,

> balance, equilibrium, or what we would see as the unity of all things. Order

> is unity. And in all multiplicity and manifestation, there is disorder and

> only to the extent that true order is restored can a war be regarded as

> legitimate. War is fought in the disorder that is not unified and that

> itself is destructive. The greater jihad is a cosmic process where what is

> multiplicity and manifested is reintegrated into unity.

>

> The Prophet says when he returns from an expedition: " We have returned from

> the lesser holy war to the greater holy war. "

>

> In this world of multiplicity, of genesis and corruption, _stasis and

> kinesis_, there is often a point when we can no longer see what the unity

> is. Apart from what is unity, the one of all things, this world of

> multiplicity is completely illusory and it is that illusion that has

> inherent in it disorder. It lacks the the unity of existence,

> _Wahdatul-wujud_ in all modes and degrees of universal manifestation.

>

> Thus in the establishment of peace, the restoral of order, the multiplicity

> of this world of genesis and corruption is transformed, so to speak, by

> being brought back to unity, that unity within multiplicity and the

> mulitiplicity that is within unity, _El-wahdatu fil-kuthrati wal-kuthratu

> fil-wahdati_, that unification that occurs at the central point of the

> divine abode or divine station, _El-maqamul-ilahi_. It is here that there is

> no disorder and no contraries. It is the very seat of peace that makes for

> order, equilibrium, harmony. Anyone outside of it is only the way to it at

> best. To be with it is to transcend.

>

> All all cases, whether it be the lesser war that is fought in this world or

> the greater war that is fought within the human soul, a legitimate war is

> fought against the disturbers of order, divine and otherwise, and this

> balancing function is a matter of justice. The lesser war, a poor image of

> the greater war, can only be fought in light of what is truly just to

> achieve any degree of peace.

>

> The greater holy war, the true jihad, is fought within; it is the struggle

> against the enemies that man carries around within himself, against the

> elements within that prevent him from realizing the unity of himself with

> what is universal and divine. One doesn't annhilate these elements, of

> course, as it cannot be done as they have a permanent place in our lives and

> exist for a reason, to be reaborbed into what is one. The greater war is

> man's struggle to bring himself into unity, unity in thought, unity in

> action, and that very hardest of all human unities, the unity of thought and

> action. Thus the intention of the war is of exceptional importance as it is

> part of the unity of thought and action as well. Unity of intention is a the

> ritual orientation, _qiblah_, to the spiritual center of all things, the

> heart.

>

> The realization of peace is to be outside of war. Nothing alters a person at

> peace as he is neither within nor without, a kind of law unto himself, one

> with the universal will. Thus, he is one with the great peace which is

> nothing more than the divine presence itself, _Es-Sakinah_, in the eternal

> presence.

>

> When we consider the jihad as it is meant to be understood, one truly can

> measure and weigh the justice of acts of war as they are fought and

> inflicted on the world. I have referred to the Islamic terminology also for

> obvious reasons, albeit I could have easily referred to Krishna and Arjuna

> or the great war among the Greeks, the first universal war of the West, or

> some of the great battles fought in the Bible, and so on. No matter what

> context we use to understand war and peace, we might reflect on how it

> affects us today when we are called the Great Satan by those who proclaim

> the jihad against us.

>

> Best regards,

>

> Kalev Pehme

>