‘Love Jihad’ is one of the contemporary trending topics in
certain sections of Indian media. Love jihad is an interfaith marriage arguably
with a deeper intent and consequent ramifications.
Wikipedia
defines Love Jihad as, “…also called
Romeo Jihad, is an alleged activity under which young Muslim boys and men
reportedly target young girls belonging to non-Muslim communities for
conversion to Islam by feigning love. The term has been used to describe the
activity in India, while similar activities have been reported in places like
the United Kingdom.”1
Love jihad
in its context of use by the India media seems to incriminate Muslim boys. But
aren’t there are two players in this game – a Muslim boy and a non-Muslim girl?
If it takes two to tango, then incriminating the Muslim boy, and absolving the
non-Muslim girl seems unjustified and irresponsible.
The
non-Muslim girl is an active party to this wedlock, so she should be held
equally responsible. If force remains unemployed in this so-called coercing relationship,
the non-Muslim girl becomes a willful participant to this interfaith marriage.
If she is a willful participant, then she is equally responsible, if not more,
for the act of marriage.
It’s
plausible that a girl be attracted to a charitable, loving, kind, handsome,
well educated or an affluent boy and be married to him. The boy could be
attracted to a girl for the same reasons. So attraction is aided by a
particular trait or a combination of traits inherent in the individuals.
As much as
religion is an identity, it’s also a personal trait, for religion is a serious
lifestyle of an individual. But it is implausible that a girl marry a boy merely
for the sake of his religion and not for any of his other personal traits.
Religion
could be a secondary or tertiary appealing trait that attracts a girl to a boy
or vice versa, certainly not the primary. The primary trait that attracts a
girl to a boy, I maintain, cannot be religion, but one or more traits such as
good looks, affluence, benevolence, education, vocation etc.
Elaborating
briefly, in quite a few occasions, a boy and girl would silently observe each
other or at least one would silently observe the other before making the first
move to initiate a verbal conversation. I contend that, during this phase of
silent observation, the girl gets attracted to the boy, not for the sake of his
religiosity, but for the sake of his personal charms.
In the
first few silent interactions (or observations) between a boy and a girl, the
individual’s personal charms achieves the task of attracting the opposite sex. This is the preliminary attraction. Since
words are not spoken during this phase, the religious identity need not be
established for the attraction to mature.
If we
concede that the boy may have malicious intent in coercing the girl towards
marriage for religious purposes, then we contend that the girl succumbs to the
boy’s play not for the sake of his religion, but for one or the other personal
trait that she finds attractive in him.
If the girl
discards her faith to marry the boy and his faith, then this is purely the
decision of the girl, barring any act of explicit coercion (e.g. threat). After
all, in the absence of any direct and explicit coercion for the sake of
religion, the girl merely bites the attractive ‘carrot’ the boy dangles. While
the boy merely dangles the carrot, it is the girl who bites the carrot. Hence
the girl, through her act of accepting the boy and his faith, becomes an active
and a responsible partner in the act of marriage.
If love
jihad were to be factual, the non-Muslim girl becomes an active and an equal
partner if the relationship were to culminate in a marriage. Therefore, it is
unfair to entirely blame the Muslim boy and absolve the non-Muslim girl of any
responsibility, or shall we say irresponsibility.
Steering
away from love jihad, let’s for a moment discuss the deep concerns that could
plague an interfaith marriage. Yes, I presuppose that an interfaith marriage is
a recipe for disaster.
However, we
should concede that if the husband and wife in the interfaith marriage are not
passionate (the word ‘passionate’ is employed in a very deep sense here) about
their respective religion, then the interfaith marriage would remain healthy
from a worldly perspective. Such a marriage is a purely a marriage of
convenience.
On the
other hand, if one partner of the marriage covenant is passionate about his/her
religion, then he/she will encounter stumbling blocks that could potentially
ruin their marriage.
First, religious
tolerance within the marriage is a fallacy, for it states that ‘you-practice-your-religion-and-I-will-practice-mine.’
The essence of religious tolerance is ‘you-do-what-you-like-and-I-will-do-what-I-like.’
Imagine a
wife as a stickler for ethics and the husband expressing his desire to rob a
bank. Wouldn’t the wife, if she is a true stickler for ethics, prevent her
husband from robbing the bank? But if the wife tolerates or does not oppose or
prevent her husband’s desire to rob the bank, would we not say that the wife’s
passion for ethics is a convenient lie?
Second, to
affirm religious passion and at the same time training their children in both
religions is fallacious as well. To allow their children to dabble with both
religions in order to choose one is akin to endorsing the child to indulge in
both religions.
Endorsing
the child to practice both religions, as if both were fundamentally same,
either reveals the poverty of religious knowledge in the parent or is a serious
blot on the factor of religious passion. No sane parent would endorse their
child to both study and simultaneously indulge in lazing or gaming or being a
cybernaut. These are highly destructive and distractive activities preventing the
child from studying.
Therefore,
not being passionate about their religion is to remain religiously unobtrusive (pun
intended) in the marriage partnership. To be passionate about their religion
and at the same time being religiously unobtrusive is to betray the true
meaning behind the religious passion.
So far, I
have presented two reasons from the perspective of ‘religious tolerance’ and ‘parenting’
to assert that an interfaith marriage is a recipe for disaster for those who
are passionate about their religion.
The third
reason is based on the ‘exclusivity of religions.’ As the term suggests, all
religions are highly exclusive and contradictory to each other.
Allow me to
explain through examples. What would be the state of a marriage between a
conservative girl (being holy and prude) and a hedonistic (pleasure seeking)
boy? It does not take an astrophysicist to answer that this marriage would be
disastrous, unless one party gives in to the other’s ideologies, although they
are mutually exclusive, totally unacceptable and thoroughly unfathomable.
Holiness
and hedonism cannot coexist. A conservative girl is by definition not pleasure
seeking and a hedonist is never holy. Such opposites could never coexist. Similarly
every religion opposes the other in every essential doctrine, so two different
religions cannot coexist in a marriage covenant.
An interfaith
marriage would suffer irrevocably even in the most common aspect of dispensing
with the household’s finances. Just as how a passionate supporter of a particular
political party would never financially support the opposing political party, a
passionate religionist would rather give his money to a project of his own
religion than to an endeavor of another religion. (This does not imply that a Muslim
/ Hindu / Christian would not be charitable to a desperately needy person from
another religion.)
Therefore
when all religions are mutually exclusive, partnership between two individuals
passionate about their respective religions, would not be successful, unless
one subscribes to the other or dilutes his/her own stand.
Does the
Bible endorse interfaith marriages?
The Bible
does not teach anywhere that a Christian can marry a non-Christian and live
happily to glorify God.
The
responsibility of every Christian is to glorify the only true and the living God
of the Bible (1 Chronicles 16:25-29; 1 Corinthians 10: 31, Colossians 3: 17 et
al.). Therefore, living with a spouse who practices another religion is synonymous
to agreeing with the truthfulness of that religion or denying the truthfulness
of Christianity, which consequently does not glorify the God of the Bible.
The bible
does not encourage or endorse a Christian towards interfaith marriage (Cf. 2
Corinthians 6: 14-17; 1 Corinthians 15: 33). The 1 Corinthians 7: 12-14 passage
is at times referred to endorse an interfaith marriage. But this passage refers
to a non-Christian who converts to Christianity while being married to an
unbelieving spouse. This passage does not refer to a Christian marrying an
unbeliever. 1 Peter 3:1 is another similar passage that suggests a marriage
between a Christian wife and a non-Christian husband, where the conversion of
the wife into Christianity happened during the marriage.
But don’t
these passages suggest a happy marriage between a Christian married to an
unbeliever?
While these
passages do not refer to a happy married life, they merely suggest that the
commitment to the institution of marriage be honored. However, if the
unbeliever desires to exit from the marriage covenant, the Bible teaches that
the Christian spouse should not prevent the unbeliever’s exit (1 Corinthians 7:
15).
Therefore, my
conclusion is two-fold:
(1) I personally
do not subscribe to jihad of any form or size. However, within the context of
love jihad, the non-Muslim girl exercises her freewill to marry and convert to Islam.
Hence, the non-Muslim girl is equally responsible, and it is unjust to ascribe
blame purely on the Muslim boy.
(2)
Interfaith marriage is a recipe for disaster provided one or both spouses are
passionate about their religion.
May God
bless us all. Amen.
Endnotes:
1 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love_Jihad
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