Looking at the darker side of Islam

The Third Choice - Islam, Dhimmitude and Freedom, by Mark Durie (Deror Books, $24.95)

reviewed by Geoff Clark

This book explains the conditions under which Islam is a theological and political threat to other religions (especially Judaism and Christianity) and calls for a more intelligent and informed understanding of how Sharia law and Islamic states treat non Islamic religious minorities. It is not anti Islam but rather argues for a clearer understanding of Islamic history, tradition and theology, especially the Islamic treatment of other religions in states and jurisdictions where Islam is the dominant power as in the Middle East.

Dr Durie, who is vicar of St Mary's Caulfield, examines one section of Sharia theology and practice which is violent, intolerant and overlooked by many Islamic and non Islamic commentators. According to Sharia law, Islamic rulers and conquerors should treat their subjugated Christian, Jewish and other minorities according to the laws of dhimmitude which are embedded in Sharia law. Durie traces the application of dhimmitude from the earliest years of Islam - when the Prophet Mahomet attacked a Jewish community - to the Ottoman Empire and modern Pakistan.

Durie's aim is to warn those who see Islam as a religion of tolerance and advocate of religious pluralism. He observes that such apologists overlook the intolerant and bloody injunctions of dhimmitude which have played out in Islamic conquests and jihad. Dhimmitude requires Islamic leaders and believers to treat their non Islamic citizens in one of several ways such as forced conversion and enslavement, slaughter or the forced payment of taxes.

Although an entire chapter specifies numerous historical occurrences of the persecution of Jews and Christian, Durie concludes that during the 19th and 20th Centuries, dhimmitude and its onerous taxes and discriminations had largely disappeared. But he marshals the evidence for recently increased Muslim persecutions. The final chapter lists numerous contemporary examples of how dhimmi minorities are being treated. In Pakistan, for example, marriages between Muslim women and non-Muslim men are not recognised, and children born to such marriages are illegitimate. The Coptic minority in Egypt is also subject to growing discrimination and recently, Coptic churches have been attacked and burned.

The problem for many Christians and others living as a minority dhimmi community is often compounded by their leaders who are unwilling to challenge the laws of dhimmitude and thereby appear to collude with the Islamic majority against their own communities. Durie is very critical of many Christian leaders who misunderstand Sharia law and in the name of Christian charity and broadmindedness, accommodate and even excuse some of Islam's less attractive attributes (to a western liberal) such as the treatment of women. Some of his targets include Bishop El-Assal, a former Anglican bishop of Jerusalem who, he claims, "takes up Islam's causes as their own" (p205).

Others, he says, including Mary Robinson, Tony Blair and Barack Obama (pp211-213), make public statements without understanding the full teachings of Sharia about religious minorities in Islamic jurisdictions.

The earlier chapters in the book are scholarly and closely argued, while later chapters assume a more polemical point of view.