Peaceful interreligious relations in Islam derive from covenants and treaties

What Muslims and non-Muslims think about Islam matters for peaceful interreligious relations. Islam is predicted to be the world’s most followed religion by the latter half of this century, surpassing Christianity for the first time. So far this century, the world’s fastest growing religion has been viewed by many non-Muslims with antipathy and fear, often in reference to historic conflicts between Muslim and Christian empires and in response to more recent acts of violent extremism and terrorism. The centrality of fulfilling covenants and treaties in Islam has been understated in discourses about Islam, yet it is mentioned in the Qur’an alongside the religion’s most central tenets including belief in God and the Day of Judgement, prayer and charity to define righteousness (Q2:177) and the characteristics of a believer (Q23:2-9). This article looks at covenants in the Qur’an and historic documents, that recent research indicates were issued by the Prophet Muhammad (d. 632) to Christian and other communities of his time, to offer some deeper insights into interreligious relations in Islam.

posts, cartoons published by influential media organisations, news articles, and even academic scholarship. A 2019 report by The Guardian newspaper into the world's most used social media platform, Facebook, found that an Israel-based network coordinated the dissemination of anti-Islam posts that 'stoke deep hatred of Islam across the western world and influence politics in Australia, Canada, the UK and the US by amplifying far-right parties'. Radicalisation researcher Tahir Abbas observes that the far-right has seen a shift 'away from Nazism, fascism and anti-Semitism' to define its cause as a 'defence against the perceived threat from Islam'.
Anders Breivik, the convicted terrorist responsible for the 2011 Oslo attacks that killed 77 people, asserted in his 1516-page manifesto, 2083: A European Declaration of Independence, that the true history of Islam is a '1400-year jihad' against non-Muslims. Breivik was an inspiration for the Australian terrorist, Brenton Tarrant, convicted for the 2019 Christchurch mosque shootings that left 51 Muslims dead and 40 injured. In his 74-page manifesto, The Great Replacement: Towards a New Society, Tarrant stated that his attack was 'for revenge against islam [sic] for the 1300 years of war and devastation that it has brought upon the people of the West and other peoples of the world'.
One may be able to dismiss such claims as the propaganda of convicted terrorists if they were not reinforced by ostensibly reputable journalists and academics. For example, in The Atlantic article, 'What ISIS Really Wants', author Graeme Wood contends that 'the Islamic State is Islamic. Very Islamic. Yes, it has attracted psychopaths and adventure seekers, drawn largely from the disaffected populations of the Middle East and Europe. But the religion preached by its most ardent followers derives from coherent and even learned interpretations of Islam'.
Even more concerning (due to the higher standards expected from academics) is that such views also pass as academic scholarship. Samuel Huntington's influential Clash of Civilizations theory claims that conflict between 'Islamic' and 'Western' countries is inevitable as demonstrated by '[f]ourteen hundred years of history', specifically 'the continuing and deeply conflictual relation between Islam and Christianity'. According to Huntington, the problem the West faces is not from 'violent Islamist extremes' but 'Islam' itself as the religion is inextricably linked to militarism; that 'Islam's borders are bloody, and so are its innards'. More recently published academic articles also contend that militarism is 'firmly rooted' within the Islamic tradition, dismissing scholarship on the defensive nature of jihad as 'apologetic', and that Islam is 'positively correlated' with suicide attacks, while omitting from the analysis how geopolitical factors, illegal invasions and occupations, and violations of human rights and international humanitarian law have contributed to the emergence of militant groups in Muslim-majority countries.

Muslims disagree
The dominant narrative which sees Islam as violent and intolerant of non-Muslims is not shared by the majority of Muslims, including Muslim Australians. A national survey of Muslim Australians found that 93.3 percent strongly agreed or agreed that 'someone who dies attacking innocent civilians is not a martyr', 89.5 percent said 'Islam never permits armed conflict against civilians/non-combatants' and less than one per cent agreed that 'Islam generally permits armed conflict against civilians/non-combatants'. Additionally, 92.2 percent of the survey respondents said that 'engaging with non-Muslims as family, friends, colleagues and in general social interaction' is 'normal and good'. Less than one percent said that such engagement with non-Muslims is discouraged or forbidden in Islam.

Islamic studies
The field of Islamic studies has two main camps of scholars: traditionalists and revisionists. For most of its history, the field has been led by the traditionalists who accept the traditional Muslim account of the origins and history of Islam, life of Prophet Muhammad, and compilation of the Qur'an. The traditional Muslim account is problematic, however, especially for historians, as it largely relies on literary sources rather than documents, archeological and other material evidence.
The extant literary sources, including sira (biographical accounts of Muhammad's life) and hadith, were compiled centuries after the time they purport to describe and contain numerous inconsistencies, including with the Qur'an, the preeminent text of

A theory of covenants in Islam
There are a few notable studies of covenants in the Qur'an, such as those by Rosalind Ward Gwynne, Tariq Jaffer, Joseph Lumbard, and Andrew O'Connor. The promise made was eternal and universal and was not limited to St. Catherine alone. The rights conferred by the charter are inalienable and the Holy Prophet Muhammad (Peace Be Upon Him) had declared that Christians, all of them, were his allies and he equated ill treatment of Christians with violating God's covenant. It is noticeable that the charter imposed no conditions on Christians for enjoying its privileges and it was enough that they were Christians. They were not required to alter their beliefs, they did not have to make any payments and they did not have any obligations. The charter was of rights without any duties and it clearly protected the right to property, freedom of religion, freedom of work, and security of person.
He adds that 'the above-mentioned promise made by the Holy Prophet Muhammad (Peace Be Upon Him) to those professing the Christian faith had not been adhered to by his followers in the present case'. This case is particularly significant as the Supreme Court of one of the world's largest, most influential Islamic republics invoked a covenant of the Prophet, affirming his commitment to peaceful, respectful interreligious relations. Justice Khosa's ruling not only suggests the court's recognition of the historicity of the Covenant with the Monks of Mount Sinai but that the document is relevant today and expresses Islam's expectation that a Muslimmajority state must protect its Christian citizens and treat them fairly and justly.
The prospects of intensified religious persecution and interreligious conflict this century are high given what has occurred over its first two decades. It is crucial that misinformation and prejudice are met with authentic, empirically-verified knowledge guided by principles of justice, compassion and wellbeing. The study of covenants in the Qur'an and between Prophet Muhammad and non-Muslims of his time offers an alternative narrative to long-held and widely shared notions of adversarial interreligious relations. Extremists such as Al Qaeda and ISIS do not represent Islam or Muslims and a clash of Islam and the West is not inevitable. Human beings of any religion or none may succumb to their grievances, greed, group solidarity or some other motivation by which they cause harm to others. There is certainly a case to be made, however, that the message of Islam, as enshrined in the Qur'an and covenants of Prophet Muhammad, sees humanity's diversity as part of God's creation and seeks to regulate interreligious relations through covenants and treaties as a means by which all people may experience their earthly existence in peace and security.