House of
Islam and House of War
The world is divided into
the House of Islam and the House of War, the Dar al-Islam and the Dar al-harb.
The Dar al-Islam is all those lands
in which a Muslim government rules and the Holy Law of Islam
prevails. Non-Muslims may live there on Muslim
sufferance. The outside world, which has not
yet been subjugated, is called the "House
of War," and strictly speaking a perpetual
state of jihad, of holy war, is imposed
by the law. The law also provided that the jihad might be interrupted by truces
as and when appropriate. In fact, the periods
of peace and war were not vastly different
from those which existed between the Christian
states of Europe for most of European history.
The law thus divides unbelievers theologically
into those who have a book and profess what
Islam recognizes as a divine religion and
those who do not; politically into dhimmis,
those who have accepted the supremacy of the
Muslim state and the primacy of the Muslims,
and harbis, the denizens of the Dar
al-harb, the House of War, who remain
outside the Islamic frontier, and with whom
therefore there is in principle, a canonically
obligatory perpetual state of war until the
whole world is either converted or subjugated.
Sources: Bernard Lewis, The
Multiple Identities of the Middle East,
Schocken Books, New York, 1998, pp.121-122.
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