Jihad ( /dhd/; ihd [dihd])…

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Jihad
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Jihad (English pronunciation: /dhd/; Arabic: ihd [dihd]), an Islamic term, is a religious duty of Muslims. In Arabic, the word jihd translates as a noun meaning "struggle". Jihad appears 41 times in the Quran and frequently in the idiomatic expression "striving in the way of God (al-jihad fi sabil Allah)".[1][2][3] A person engaged in jihad is called a mujahid; the plural is mujahideen. Jihad is an important religious duty for Muslims. A minority among the Sunni scholars sometimes refer to this duty as the sixth pillar of Islam, though it occupies no such official status.[4] In Twelver Shi'a Islam, however, Jihad is one of the 10 Practices of the Religion.

There are two commonly accepted meanings of jihad: an inner spiritual struggle and an outer physical struggle.[1] The "greater jihad" is the inner struggle by a believer to fulfill his religious duties.[1][5] This non-violent meaning is stressed by both Muslim[6] and non-Muslim[7] authors.

The "lesser jihad" is the physical struggle against the enemies of Islam.[1] This physical struggle can take a violent form or a non-violent form. The proponents of the violent form translate jihad as "holy war",[8][9] although some Islamic studies scholars disagree.[10] The Dictionary of Islam[1] and British-American orientalist Bernard Lewis both argue jihad has a military meaning in the large majority of cases.[11] Some scholars maintain non-violent ways to struggle against the enemies of Islam. An example of this is written debate, often characterized as "jihad of the pen".[12]

According to the BBC, a third meaning of jihad is the struggle to build a good society.[5] In a commentary of the hadith Sahih Muslim, entitled al-Minhaj, the medieval Islamic scholar Yahya ibn Sharaf al-Nawawi stated that "one of the collective duties of the community as a whole (fard kifaya) is to lodge a valid protest, to solve problems of religion, to have knowledge of Divine Law, to command what is right and forbid wrong conduct".[13]