Society is defined as “a large group of people who live together in an organized way, making decisions about how to do things and sharing the work that needs to be done. All the people in a country, or in several similar countries, can be referred to as a society.”[1]
The concept of society (مُجْتَمَع) is intrinsically linked to the discussion of authority, because it’s the authority and government which plays the greatest role in shaping and controlling society. The Ottoman historian Tursun Beg (d.1499) said, “With the pen of scribes, the ruler turns the noble into a wretched, and the wretched into a noble…with the sword of executioners he takes lives. As such he manifests the attributes of the Necessary Existent as if he shares the sultanate with Him except that the ruler of the world is a mortal.”[2]
The source of authority (masdar al-sultah) is based on societal concepts which are in turn based on the Islamic ‘aqeeda which forms a distinct viewpoint of life, and which influences the type of authority that is established. This is why Ibn Al-Qayyum said, “Ponder upon the Hikmah (Wisdom) of Allah عز وجل where He has made people’s kings, leaders, and those of authority over them, of the same kind as their own deeds. It is as if the people’s deeds appeared in the forms of their kings and leaders.”[3]
Society consists of individuals who through their regular interaction with one another form permanent relationships which are based on concepts. These relationships must be managed by a political authority because as Wael Hallaq says, “No society can live without an ordering apparatus that, by necessity, requires some type of discipline.”[4]
As soon as a person steps outside their house and starts to interact with others in whatever form, then societal concepts and the law of the land kicks in to manage these relationships. When going to buy goods you need to use the currency of the country. Shops won’t accept currency which isn’t legal tender. When driving you have to follow the traffic laws. If you decide to drive on the opposite side of the road it will end in a crash and maybe loss of life.
The Prophet ﷺ described the reality of society and these relationships in a famous hadith known as Hadith al-Safina (Hadith of the Ship) where he ﷺ said,
مَثَلُ الْقَائِمِ عَلَى حُدُودِ اللَّهِ وَالْوَاقِعِ فِيهَا كَمَثَلِ قَوْمٍ اسْتَهَمُوا عَلَى سَفِينَةٍ، فَأَصَابَ بَعْضُهُمْ أَعْلاَهَا وَبَعْضُهُمْ أَسْفَلَهَا، فَكَانَ الَّذِينَ فِي أَسْفَلِهَا إِذَا اسْتَقَوْا مِنَ الْمَاءِ مَرُّوا عَلَى مَنْ فَوْقَهُمْ فَقَالُوا لَوْ أَنَّا خَرَقْنَا فِي نَصِيبِنَا خَرْقًا، وَلَمْ نُؤْذِ مَنْ فَوْقَنَا. فَإِنْ يَتْرُكُوهُمْ وَمَا أَرَادُوا هَلَكُوا جَمِيعًا، وَإِنْ أَخَذُوا عَلَى أَيْدِيهِمْ نَجَوْا وَنَجَوْا جَمِيعًا
“The example of the person abiding by Allah’s order and restrictions in comparison to those who violate them is like the example of those persons who drew lots for their seats in a boat. Some of them got seats in the upper part, and the others in the lower. When the latter needed water, they had to go up to bring water (and that troubled the others), so they said, ‘Let us make a hole in our share of the ship (and get water) saving those who are above us from troubling them.’ So, if the people in the upper part left the others do what they had suggested, all the people of the ship would be destroyed, but if they prevented them, both parties would be safe.”[5]
These relationships must be managed by an authority which prevents anyone overstepping the limits and threatening society. In the case of the hadith above, the authority (ship’s captain) is the one who would prevent the drilling of a hole in the bottom of the ship.
Ibn Khaldun elaborates on this point. “We have explained before that human beings cannot live and exist except through social organization and co-operation for the purpose of obtaining their food and other necessities of life. When they have organized, necessity requires that they deal with each other and satisfy their needs. Each one will stretch out his hand for whatever he needs and (try simply to) take it, since injustice and aggressiveness are in the animal nature. The others, in turn, will try to prevent him from taking it, motivated by wrathfulness and spite and the strong human reaction when one’s own property is menaced. This causes dissension, which leads to hostilities, and hostilities lead to trouble and bloodshed and loss of life, which lead to the destruction of the species. Now, (the human species) is one of the things the Creator has especially (enjoined us) to preserve.
People, thus, cannot persist in a state of anarchy and without a ruler who keeps them apart. Therefore, they need a person to restrain them. He is their ruler. As is required by human nature, he must be a forceful ruler, one who exercises authority.”[6]
Allah ta’ala says,
وَلَوِ ٱتَّبَعَ ٱلْحَقُّ أَهْوَآءَهُمْ لَفَسَدَتِ ٱلسَّمَـٰوَٰتُ وَٱلْأَرْضُ وَمَن فِيهِنَّ ۚ بَلْ أَتَيْنَـٰهُم بِذِكْرِهِمْ فَهُمْ عَن ذِكْرِهِم مُّعْرِضُونَ
“If the truth were to follow their whims and desires, the heavens and the earth and everyone in them would have been brought to ruin. No indeed! We have given them their Reminder, but they have turned away from it.”[7]
Ummah is the source of authority
In an Islamic society, these concepts which underpin the societal relationships must be based on the Islamic ‘aqeeda (belief), which creates a distinct viewpoint of life. This viewpoint then creates an opinion on which interests are deemed important and necessary, leading the people to establish an authority to fulfil these interests. In the words of Alexander Hamilton, “What is government itself but the greatest of all reflections on human nature?”[8]
Taqiuddin an-Nabhani (d.1977) says,“Authority (sultah) means looking after people’s interests. People’s viewpoint towards actions and things as being interests or not differs according to the difference in their viewpoint about life.
Hence, according to this viewpoint, their viewpoint about the interests is formed, and according to its change their viewpoint about the interests changes.
Therefore, if people were in agreement in their viewpoint about the interests, in a country such as Iraq[9] for instance, the authority would lie in the Ummah; and if there were no foreign power, stronger than her, intellectually and militarily, dominating her, she would in such a country establish someone to run her affairs, i.e. she would establish the authority that manages her interests, or she would keep silent about those who appointed themselves to manage her interests.”[10]
Tocqueville (d.1859) writing in the mid-19th century on democracy in America makes a similar observation. “The inhabitant of the United States attaches himself to the goods of this world as if he were assured of not dying, and he rushes so precipitately to grasp those that pass within his reach that one would say he fears at each instant he will cease to live before he has enjoyed them. He grasps them all but without clutching them, and he soon allows them to escape from his hands so as to run after new enjoyments… Death finally comes, and it stops him before he has grown weary of this useless pursuit of a complete felicity that always flees from him.”[11] He continues, “that their principal affair is to secure by themselves a government that permits them to acquire the goods they desire and that does not prevent them from enjoying in peace those they have acquired.”[12]
Rousseau (d.1778) again made a similar point[13] on the relationship between society and authority. “The first and most important deduction from the principles we have so far laid down is that the general will alone can direct the State according to the object for which it was instituted, i.e., the common good: for if the clashing of particular interests made the establishment of societies necessary, the agreement of these very interests made it possible. The common element in these different interests is what forms the social tie; and, were there no point of agreement between them all, no society could exist. It is solely on the basis of this common interest that every society should be governed.”[14]
These points make it clear that authority in origin is with the ummah, i.e. they are the source of authority (masdar al-sultah).
Notes
[1] https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/society
[2] Hüseyin Yılmaz, ‘Caliphate Redefined: The Mystical Turn in Ottoman Political Thought,’ Princeton University Press, 2018, p.184; Tursun Beg, Tarih- i Ebu’l- Feth, 15
[3] Ibn al-Qayyim, Miftaah Daarus-Sa`aadah (1/177-178), https://shamela.ws/book/6840/252#p1 Translation courtesy of Fahad Barmem. https://ilm4all.blogspot.com/2012/01/people-will-recieve-leaders-which-they.html
[4] Wael B. Hallaq, ‘The Impossible State: Islam, Politics, and Modernity’s Moral Predicament,’ Columbia University Press, p.98
[5] Sahih al-Bukhari 2493, https://sunnah.com/bukhari:2493
[6] Ibn Khaldun, ‘The Muqaddimah – An Introduction to History,’ Translated by Franz Rosenthal, Princeton Classics, p.247
[7] Holy Qur’an, Surah Al-Muminun, ayah 71
[8] Federalist no. 51
[9] This is Iraq 1961 and not Iraq in 2025.
[10] From the writings of Taqiuddin an-Nabhani 1961
[11] Alexis De Tocqueville, ‘Democracy in America,’ The University of Chicago Press, 2002, p.506; first published in 1835.
[12] Ibid, p.511
[13] In Rousseau’s model the people are sovereign and therefore the government is there to fulfil their interests, whereas in an Islamic state the sharia is sovereign so the government fulfils the peoples interests within the limits of the sharia. If the people wanted alcohol legalised for Muslims [dhimmi are permitted to drink] then no Islamic government could ever undertake this no matter the demand since the sharia is the ultimate law in the state. This has already been discussed in the article Sovereignty in an Islamic State.
[14] Jean Jacques Rousseau, ‘The Social Contract,’ Translated by G. D. H. Cole, public domain, Book II, p.18
Islamic Civilization 