Many people in the West, coming out of the Judeo-Christian tradition, have a hard time understanding why anyone would shout out a declaration of the greatness of God while committing an act of violence. Religions are generally assumed to teach benevolence and magnanimity, and so this seems to be a stunning act of hypocrisy. That’s why the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) was so enraged at Fox News recently for noticing that Islamic jihad terrorists so often invoke their deity while in the midst of acts of murder and mayhem.
In a recent press release, CAIR explained that it wrote to Fox, asking that the network correct its description of the phrase “Allahu akbar” as a “terror chant.” CAIR (which has well-documented ties to Hamas) wrote: “‘Allahu Akbar’ simply means ‘God is Greatest’ or ‘God is Great’ in Arabic. It is one of the most common expressions used by some two billion Muslims worldwide in daily prayers, celebrations, times of grief, and ordinary conversation.”
“Allahu akbar” does not mean “God is great,” although that is the most common way it is translated. While “Allah” is generally translated as “God,” the deity of Islam and the Qur’an is so different from the God of the Bible as to call for different terms. Meanwhile, “akbar” does indeed mean “greatest,” or more precisely “biggest,” as well as “greater” or “bigger,” and in this case, the most accurate translation of the phrase “Allahu akbar” would be “Allah is greater.”
That’s certainly what jihad terrorists mean when they scream it out in the midst of their violent acts. They do not just happen to be making a declaration of the greatness of Allah while stabbing or beheading someone. Their shout of “Allahu akbar” is meant to indicate that Allah is showing himself to be greater precisely in and through the act of violence at hand.
This is because the Qur’an designates Muslims as the executors of Allah’s wrath in this world: “Fight them, and Allah will punish them by your hands, and he will lay them low and give you victory over them, and he will heal the hearts of people who are believers, and he will remove the anger of their hearts.” (9:14-15)
If Allah punishes the unbelievers by the hands of the Muslims, then when the Muslims attack unbelievers, they are acting as the instruments of Allah, and so they proclaim his name. The attack also shows that Allah is greater, greater than the god of the unbelievers. For if the infidels’ god were greater than Allah, he would be able to protect his people and prevent the slaves of Allah from attacking them. The fact that the attack takes place at all indicates that Allah is more powerful than the unbelievers’ deity, and hence greater.
Hamas-linked CAIR, however, complains that “to label this universally-accepted religious expression as a ‘terror chant’ falsely associates the faith and religious practices of an entire global community with acts of violence committed by a tiny minority of extremists.”
Related: A Kiss in Indonesia and Its Aftermath Reveal the Heart and Soul of Islam
In reality, it is that “tiny minority of extremists” that is associating the faith and religious practices of an entire global community with acts of violence, and it is not really all that tiny of a minority, either. A recent survey established that 44% of Muslims in the U.S. have a favorable view of Hamas. And then one has to count in the ones who were telling the pollster what they thought he wanted to hear, or what they thought was the safe answer to give. Those who are still, at this late date, counting on “moderate Muslims” to rise up and rein in their violent brethren drastically underestimate the prevalence of what they think of as “extremism” among Muslims in the U.S. and elsewhere.
And so CAIR is right: “Allahu akbar” is not just a “terror chant.” But it is indeed a “terror chant,” whatever else it is, and this unsavory group does nothing to illuminate why that is, much less to do anything to stop it. Instead, it pretends once again that non-Muslims are the ones who are responsible for associating Islam with violence. All anyone has to do in order to believe that is ignore the nearly 50,000 jihad attacks committed worldwide since 9/11 — and stop one’s ears when the perpetrators scream “Allahu akbar.”
