Treason is a useful, but incomplete, analogue when explaining the rulings of apostasy to a new Muslim. In studying the issue of executing apostates, I found many analogues in Christian history, and I came to understand that the killing of heretics by the Church in medieval Europe was necessary to preserve the social order, since religion was the basis of peace and security. In the modern system, it is the nationstate and its symbols that are worshiped, so to betray your country is one of the worst crimes imaginable. Betraying the nation in a system of nationalism is a clear and present threat to the prevailing public order, just as heresy threatens the public order in a system based upon religion.

There’s no question that the breakdown of the social order leads to much evil and killing, as with the reign of terror that accompanied the fall of the French monarchy. Heretical “enlightenment” thinkers like Voltaire and Rousseau were instrumental in shaping these events, so there’s no question the Church would have been as justified in executing them as they would be in executing a murderer. And indeed, that’s what would have happened to the likes of Voltaire and Rousseau a few hundred years earlier, when Europe had not yet drifted so far from Christianity. The motto goes “a small amount of prevention is better than a large amount of cure.”

After coming to this understanding, it was very easy for me to accept the line of thinking that many of the regimes ruling over Muslim majority lands had, generally speaking, fallen into apostasy. The signs of the betrayal of Islam and the Muslims and their service to hostile interests are abundant and apparent for those who care to see, and it was also plain to see that this betrayal was resulting in much killing and corruption.

For the same reason, however, it has never been easy for me to accept individual takfir of every individual belonging to a governments, especially after living in the Muslim lands and seeing the condition of the people. This goes more so for those who are apparently striving to establish Islam, even if they are very far from the sunnah in their methodology and have many flaws in their aqeeda.

It’s clear to me that participating in the colonial governments the kuffar constructed to rule over the Muslims is a betrayal of the religion. But I can also see that this is not clear to many of those participating in these governments— in fact, in many cases, if ordinary people realized the extent to which they are complicit to an agenda of their enemies, they would change their actions.

As far as the comparison to treason goes, it is also complicated by the absence of a unified Muslim polity. The sharia protects us in the dunya and akhira, yet once we are embedded in the global secular order, it is challenging secularism which becomes the true heresy and the main threat to the public order. So confined to the nation-state, it can seem that preservation of a secular order serves the interests of the Muslims.

So it can appear to someone that betrayal of Islam is actually defense of Islam. In fact, the systems installed over the Muslims were designed with precisely the intent of convincing Muslims to participate in the colonial projects of their enemies. Are the one who participates in this betrayal with awareness and the one who does so without realizing it equal?

Absolutely not, and the one thinks they are has not grasped the essence of Islam.

أَبِي هُرَيْرَةَ قَالَ: قَالَ رَسُولُ اللَّهِ صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ: ” لَمَّا قَضَى اللَّهُ الْخَلْقَ، كَتَبَ فِي كِتَابِهِ عَلَى نَفْسِهِ، فَهُوَ مَوْضُوعٌ عِنْدَهُ: إِنَّ رَحْمَتِي تَغْلِبُ غَضَبِي

The Prophet ﷺ said: “When Allah decreed the Creation He pledged Himself by writing in His book which is laid down with Him: ‘My mercy prevails over my wrath.'”

Hadith 1, 40 Hadith Qudsi

عَنْ ابْنِ عَبَّاسٍ عَنْ النَّبِيِّ صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ قَالَ إِنَّ اللَّهَ وَضَعَ عَنْ أُمَّتِي الْخَطَأَ وَالنِّسْيَانَ وَمَا اسْتُكْرِهُوا عَلَيْهِ

Ibn Abbas, radhi Allahu anhu, reported that the Prophet ﷺ said, “Verily, Allah has overlooked for my nation their honest mistakes, forgetfulness, and what they are forced into doing.”

Sunan Ibn Mājah 2045

It’s also detrimental treat ignorant Muslims who become unwitting agents of the enemies of Islam the same as those who willingly betray Islam and the Muslims. The sincere Muslims embedded in systems of kufr, but who are deceived by them, can be the greatest assets in the struggle to reestablish Islam, because they understand the operation of systems of kufr and are well positioned to oppose them.

This doesn’t mean to participate in these systems and play by their rules, but rather to either provide information to those fighting them from the outside, or by leaving and building institutions capable of exploiting the weaknesses of the occupation governments. For example, having informants inside of the Iraqi government was one of the reasons for ISIS’s success in taking over territory in Iraq. Likewise, in the Afghanistan war, so-called “green on blue” attacks played an important role in disrupting the capacity for US-Afghan cooperation.

The concept of establishing proof, or hujjah, on the Muslim who has fallen into an action which amounts to apostasy is thus also very important in the modern context.

In fiqh, this principle states that the apostate is to be warned and given a chance to repent before the punishment for apostasy is carried out. Typically, this would be implemented by the Islamic authorities, but in the modern context, it is often whole governments that have betrayed Islam by choosing to side with invading forces.

Even in a modern asymmetric warfare context, establishing proof can act as a way of filtering and distinguishing who is simply ignorant of the reality of a situation and who has genuinely chosen to betray their religion. By communicating this warning, it can be possible to determine who is an obstinate enemy, and at the same time recruit supporters from the ranks of treacherous governments.