“Kill Them Wherever You Find Them” – A Misunderstood Quranic Verse

By Mass L. Usuf –JUNE 27, 2019

Mass Usuf

Like a person suffering from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (a common disorder in which a person has uncontrollable, reoccurring thoughts), there are many who often derogatively question about the verse on ‘killing’ in the Quran. The relevant reference is in Chapter 9 Verse 5 which states:

“And when the sacred months have passed, then kill the polytheists wherever you find them and capture them and besiege them and sit in wait for them at every place of ambush. But if they should repent, establish prayer, and give zakah, let them [go] on their way. Indeed, Allah is Forgiving and Merciful.” 

Mr. Know-All

These days one cannot escape not hearing utterances of words from the Arabic vocabulary relevant to Islam. Some of the terms like ‘Sharia ‘, ‘Hijab’, ‘Hadith’, ‘Madarasa’, ‘Quran ‘, ‘Jihad‘ and so on. On many occasions, I have directly confronted a few of these people by simply asking them, “Do you know what ‘Sharia’ means?” “Have you any knowledge of what you are speaking about?” “Do you know the etymology of the word ‘Sharia’.” Sadly, the answer I have always heard is ‘No. I don’t know” or “Not that much.”

It is without proper knowledge that every Tom, Dick and Harry, pretending to be experts, come before the media to express opinions. Amongst them are politicians, monks and the misguided ordinary people. Since most of the Sri Lankan audiences think not with their brains but with their hearts, they automatically become captivated listeners of these pseudo experts. A simple case of the blind leading the blind. 

Then there is another category of pseudo-experts. These are Google experts. They write copiously in social media, newspapers, making comments etc. Most of them visit anti-Muslim or anti-Islamic sites in Google and obtain their information from unauthentic sources.There are thousands of such sites dedicated to spreading misinformation not only about Islam but on other religions too.

These half-baked pundits not only do a lot of damage to society by creating misperception in the minds of the unwary public but, also, expose themselves as a set of CLOWNS to the discerning.

Kill the polytheists

Mark Twain said, “it is easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled”. The widespread misperception about this Quranic verse is both illogical and irrational. Sadly, when a person is biased even the truth will look like falsehood. What is sometimes difficult to understand is that these stupid questions are being asked mostly by educated people who are considered intellects!  Are they not betraying their own intelligence quotient levels?  Mark Twain is spot on in his quote.

If one does not know, to learn from those who know is normal. What is not normal is when the person without knowledge acts as if he is conversant with the subject. Not only that such person even takes that extra effort to interpret the meaning of something of which he has no knowledge of.  

This column proffers an explanation to the above misperceived verse. The reader’s kind attention is drawn to think wisely and independently without prejudice.   

Firstly, Muslims have been living in Sri Lanka for more than a thousand years. This Verse was in existence since then. If they had started killing from that time onwards, today no polytheist would be living in Sri Lanka. In reality, is that the case? Be honest and question yourself, has any Muslim ever threatened to kill you just because you are not a Muslim? 

All of this started after 21/4. The consequence of sustained unethical, unprincipled and disgraceful media campaign to create fear psychosis among the people. Again, I remind the reader to think wisely.  

Common sense

Secondly, let us use our common sense. Take the separatist war waged between the Sri Lankan armed forces and the LTTE.  What do you think the leader of the LTTE would have told his combatants in the war zone? Would he have said to embrace and greet the soldiers of the Sri Lankan army or kill them wherever they find them?  On the other hand, what would the commander of the army platoon tell his soldiers? He would encourage them to kill the LTTE combatants wherever they find them, capture them, besiege them and sit in wait for them at every place of ambush. The commander surely would not ask his soldiers to embrace and greet the LTTE combatants. 

The Mahavamsa

Thirdly, a journey into the pages of the Mahavamsa reveals interesting details. Chapter XXV of the Mahavamsa is titled, ‘The Victory of Dutthagamani’. Logically, for there to be a victor some other had to be vanquished. Let’s read what the Mahavamsa records, 

“ …. Phussadeva blew his conch shell, the army of the Damilas was scattered; nay, Elara turned to flee and they killed many Damilas. The water in the tank there was dyed red with the blood of the slain, therefore it was known by the name Kulantavapi.”

Here, the widespread killing of the Damilas is described by the water tank turning into red with blood. Further, look at what Dutthagamani said in the battlefield with regard to his opponent King Elara, as written in the Mahavamsa:

“King Dutthagamini proclaimed with beat of drum:`None but myself shall slay Elara.‘ When he himself, armed, had mounted the armed elephant Kandula he pursued Elara and came to the south gate (of Anuradhapura).”

Read More