This document was written when I was in high school. I have little or no authority on this topic. Make of this what you will.
The Taliban is a group started by Pashtun (major ethnic group in Afghanistan) Afghani Islamic students, who were educated in Pakistan under a radical militant sect of Deobandism which was preached to people in refuge camps located in Pakistan. Deobandism is an Islamic movement started in British India with two of its main goals being to unify and reform Muslims in India, there being a small population of Muslims and an imposing threat of British culture that could corrupt many young Muslims. The Taliban took the teachings from this sect of Deobandism and fused them with their own beliefs from Afghanistan. This group began to take over Afghanistan in 1994. In 1996 they imposed a form of Islamic holy law, or Shari’a, in controlled areas. Under Shari’a all citizens are entitled to five rights: life, intellect, family, property and religion. The Taliban took these rights mainly from women by making it so that women could not be educated over the age of eight, could not work at all, could not reveal more than their eyes and palms and could not leave the house without a male relative. Other restrictions upon the general population were the banning of television, photography, movies, kite-flying and chess. Punishments of breaking these laws are harsh, for example, the public amputation of the hand if you steal, stoning to death if you commit adultery or imprisonment if your beard was not the required length. This same year Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, was taken and the year after the Taliban effectively controlled 2/3 of the country. The Taliban’s interpretation of Islam being greatly influenced from a Deoband education in Pakistan it is possible that other people have been and can be educated by these same people spreading their fundamentalist interpretation of Islam. The Taliban itself can spread its constrictive interpretation of Islam to other people through education. This is still a problem because the people learning these disjointed Islamic views can form Taliban-like groups and are likely to be recruited by terrorist organizations due to their educators close ties with these organizations.
The Taliban is widely known as the government that harbored Osama bin Ladin and many terrorist groups. It is the Islamic group that formerly ruled Afghanistan and imposed strict and unreasonable laws on Afghanis, made apparent through intense media coverage. The laws imposed by the Taliban greatly reduced Afghani freedom and the punishment for breaking a law was generally severe. Why were the Taliban’s laws so constrictive? Why were the Taliban’s punishments so severe? The tight bond between the religious beliefs and the government of the Taliban is the culprit. The religious beliefs of this Islamic group originate greatly from Deobandism, a part of the popular Sunni sect of Islam, and partially from traditional Pashtun (major ethnic group in Afghanistan) customs.
First of all, Sunni Islam is the major sect of Islam with ninety percent of all Muslims adhering to the Sunni beliefs (Sansal). This sect claims to be the continuation of Islam as defined from revelations given to Muhammad and through how he lived his life (Sansal). Its name comes from the importance of the Sunnah or the example set by the life of the prophet Muhammad (Sunni Islam). The Sunnah connects to the establishment of Shari’a, or Islamic law, as the examples of how Muhammad lived his life were taken as how every Muslim should live (Sansal). Sunni Islam is very literal in its interpretation of the Koran.
Deobandism originated after 1857 in Colonial India after the Sepoy Mutiny (Butt). The Sepoy Mutiny occurred due to rumors circulated that the British Military was using pork fat to seal rifle cartridges (Culon and Henderson 49). Many sepoys, Indian soldiers serving in the British Army, were Islamic and Islam considers the pig to be unclean (Culon and Henderson 49). Since soldiers had to bite the rifle cartridges to use them, sepoys refused orders to use them (Culon and Henderson 49). Encouraged by Indian princes who opposed British rule, sepoys began to mutiny (Culon and Henderson 50). In the ensuing bloodbath, hundreds of Europeans were massacred (Culon and Henderson 50).
The British quickly regained control (Culon and Henderson 50). Splits had occurred amongst the rebel leaders and the sepoys had no real goals or ambitions (Culon and Henderson 50). The majority of princes who had previously made treaties with the British remained loyal (Culon and Henderson 50). These three events caused the mutiny to fail. In response to the mutiny, the British banned Muslims from access to colonial privileges, such as education (Hahn).
Deobandism rose as an anti-colonialist movement with the purpose of educating Muslim youth in their faith and teaching them how to apply Muslim principles when they could not live in their own religious communities as India was overwhelmingly Hindu (Hahn). The establishment of Deobandism was an admission that the use of force against the British had failed (Butt). The founders of Deoband, such as Haji Imadadullah and Maulana Abdul Haq, had realized that the Muslims in India should concentrate on their own style of learning to be able to withstand the British cultural onslaught (Butt). Deobands opposed all forms of shrine worship, banned all images of the human form and took a restrictive view on the role of women (Hahn).
The schools established by the Deoband movement were called madrasahs (Hahn). After establishing madrasahs in India, Maulana Abdul Haq left India to start a madrasah in Pakistan (Hahn). This madrasah was called Haqqania and many Taliban officials have graduated from this school (Hahn). In 1997 the school was temporarily shut down and its students were ordered to fight alongside the Taliban in Afghanistan (Hahn).
Eventually, Pashtun tribal customs from Afghanistan and Pakistan began to take their toll on teachings of Deobandism (Hahn). These customs caused the Deoband schools to teach a particularly strict interpretation of Islamic law and caused legal systems to appear based more on revenge than on the teachings of Muhammad (Hahn). Much of the Taliban’s beliefs come from their Pashtun tribal customs (Hahn). These customs are just reinforced in attendance to the schools of Deoband that are abundant near the border of Afghanistan in Pakistan (Hahn). Along with reinforcement of prior ideas, ideas on the strict control of women, justice and jihad (literally meaning struggle, interpreted by many radical groups, such as the Taliban, as meaning holy war) are imposed on Deoband students (Hahn).
Madrasahs provide free food, shelter and education to the poorest people in and around Pakistan (Hahn). The Afghani border with Pakistan is rampant with poverty as there are many refugees from Afghanistan. Seeking a better life for their sons, families send them to madrasahs (Hahn). The refugee camps provide a ripe ground for imposing of Islam on these young men that venture off to madrasah.
In the madrasah these students memorize the Koran in Arabic, a language they do not understand as most speak a local Pashto dialect (Hahn). They learn nothing but Islamic subjects such as Islamic law and lifestyle (Hahn). Most teachings on interpretation of Islam in madrasah are literal, with no effort to translate situations in the Koran and Sunnah into modern times. As stated above, Pashtun tribal conditions have changed teachings of Deoband away from their original form, into a more strict and impure Islamic form.
Many comments on the Deoband school have been along the lines that Deobandism is “a sect that propagates … a belief that has inspired modern revivals of Islamic fundamentalism” (Burns). Since many members of the Taliban have attended Deobandi madrasahs in Pakistan, this comment is true in that it has inspired the revivals of Islamic fundamentalism in the modern world. The Deobandi views on Islam were transferred to the Taliban; everything from how women should be treated to the number of times a day a Muslim must pray were taught to these members.
The Taliban came to power in Afghanistan in 1994 with the capture of the southern Afghan city of Kandahar (Bergen 145). Pakistan’s Islamist parties and its powerful spy agency, Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), were instrumental in the Taliban’s rise to power (Bergen 144-145). As the Taliban gained territory, Pakistan quickly put its bets on this group to beat the other factions in the civil war that has plagued Afghanistan since the end of the war with the Soviets (Bergen 145). Pakistan would want a stable Muslim neighbor so it could enact more pressure on India, the largely Hindu country on Pakistan’s eastern border.
In 1996, the Taliban captured Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan (“Moslem Fundamentalists Rebels…”). On September twenty seventh of the same year, the Taliban announced that Shari’a, Islamic holy law, would begin to apply nationwide (“Moslem Fundamentalists Rebels…”). Here is an example of Shari’a in action and being broken:
Driving through town, we encountered the first traffic jam I’d seen in tiny Jalalabad. After a couple of minutes I realized the source: the Taliban had stopped all traffic during prayer time. Out of the window of our car I could see a Talib fighter beating one hapless man with a stick because he hadn’t stopped riding his bicycle. (Bergen 13-14)
The religious police of the Taliban, mohtaseb, are from the General Department for the Preservation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (“Taliban use Islam…”). Their role is to insure conformity with Shari’a. They are judge, jury and executioner. Like the above example, the breaking of Shari’a came with harsh punishment (“Taliban use Islam…”). The Taliban have ordered the stoning to death of couples caught in adultery, the amputation of the hands and feet of thieves and public executions where male relatives of rape and murder victims act as firing squads (“Taliban use Islam…”). The Taliban has also flogged women who allowed faces or ankles to show beneath the mandatory head to toe covers, called burqas, that the Taliban have made mandatory (“Taliban use Islam…”). Mohtasebs had been caught for beating women that wear white socks or sandals without socks (“Taliban use Islam…”). The mohtasebs had also been accused of making up taboos as they go along (“Taliban use Islam…”).
All of the laws in Shari’a and how they were enforced came from the Taliban’s education in Deoband schools. The amount of specific laws, such as: “to prevent beard shaving and its cutting; to prevent kite-flying; to prevent idolatry … pictures and portraits should be abolished,” and their barbaric punishments are reminiscent of Hammurabi’s Code of Law (Baladauf).
In conclusion, the Taliban’s laws and punishments were harsh because of their fundamentalist interpretation of Islam. This fundamentalist interpretation was influenced greatly by Deoband madrasahs in Pakistan and by Pashtun tribal customs. The Taliban came in during a time of civil war and chaos in Afghanistan and brought order and civilization that was acceptable during eighteenth century B.C.E.
As a result of the fall of the Taliban to United States lead forces in Afghanistan, the Taliban has begun to adapt guerrilla war tactics. It is possible that the Taliban will attack their former country in order to destabilize it. Taliban members most likely have a decentralized network of communication, just like various terrorist groups have. They can use this network to direct bands of fighters to attack various locations in Afghanistan and then disappear as fighters did in Viet Nam. These attacks could continue to occur and without a strong government capable of protecting the Afghani people, the current government would be overthrown with the want for a strong government capable of protecting them, as happens periodically in South America.
Well armed Islamic neo-fundamentalists, like the Taliban, fit this profile for a strong government. This Islamic group would take power in Afghanistan and eventually enact Shari’a, just as the Taliban did during and after the Afghan Civil War. This group would eventually fail just as the Taliban because of the Dark Age effect Shari’a has on a country. There would be no major developments technologically, scientifically or economically in this country. It would mirror the Taliban.
Another possible outcome is that the interpretation of Islam by the Taliban would begin to be taught in madrasahs, effectively brain washing children in how to think and how the World should work. These children, like today’s students from current madrasahs, would join up with a terrorist group and become a part of an international Jihad aimed at Western interests, mainly those of the United States and Israel. The schools would continue to prey on refugee families in camps all over that want their children to live a better life than they had. The schools would continue to survive and continue to breed fundamental Muslims bent on the destruction of the Western culture as it is a threat to their own.
“Afghanistan: Taliban use Islam for Violence Against Women’s” Woman’s International News Network Vol. 23 Issue 4 (Autumn 97) p52 Online. EBSCO. 22 February 2003.
Baladauf, Scott “Life under Taliban cuts two ways” Christian Science Monitor Vol. 93 Issue 208 p1 Online. EBSCO. 22 February 2003.
Bergen, Peter L. Holy War, Inc. New York: The Free Press, 2001
Burns, John F., “Adding Demands, Afghan Leaders Show Little Willingness to Give Up bin Laden.” The New York Times, 19 September 2001
Butt, J. M. “Position of Islamic scholars on terrorism” The Frontier Post http://www.themodernreligion.com/terror/terror-scholars.html (4 April 2003)
Culon, Jim R. L., and Harry Henderson California Framework Case Studies. USA: D.C. Heath and Company: 1992
Kahn, Aleesha “The Radical Islamic Mind” 2003. SCP Journal http://www.scp-inc.org/publications/journals/J2502/IslamicMind.php (4 April 2003)
“Moslem Fundamentalists Rebels Capture Afghan Capital; Islamic Rule Imposed; Other Developments” Facts on File World News Digest, 3 October 1996. FACTS.com http://www.2facts.com
Sansal, Burak “Muslin Sects.” 1999 http://www.allaboutturkey.com/siisunni.htm (30 April 2003)
“Sunni Islam.” Understanding Islam. http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2001/trade.center/islam/sunni.html (30 April 2003)
I have made an addition to the essay. It was not only the ISI who started the Taliban, the CIA was directly involved as well.