Reading done on November 12 2018
"Jihadi Weeping"
- by Thomas Hegghammer – Near and Middle Eastern Studies at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, 2018.
- Gorgias Press LLC
"Weeping is widespread in jihadi groups, and those who cry are respected and seen as better warriors for it. That is because weeping is viewed as a credible sign of devotion to God with no connotations of unmanliness. Shedding tears is part of the culture of jihadi groups along with other social and artistic practices such as poetry recitation, hymn-singing, and dream interpretation. This domain of militant activity has only recently begun to be explored, and it can help understand why people are attracted to groups such as Islamic State and al- Qaeda. This essay will take a closer look at weeping in jihadi groups as an illustration of what the study of culture can reveal. After a few remarks on jihadi culture in general, we will look at why jihadis weep, when they weep, and how their weeping differs from that of other groups. We will see that militant Islamists have an unusually sentimental internal culture, which suggests emotional rewards play a significant role in decisions to join and stay in such groups" (Hegghammer 2018, 505).
"We know a great deal more about jihadism today than we did on 9/11, but much of that knowledge is limited to two domains: operations and doctrines. The attack histories, organizational structures, and recruitment methods of jihadi groups have been meticulously studied, and we have a good understanding of the movement’s core ideas. However, jihadis do many things that are neither operational nor doctrinal. For example, they enjoy poetry, music, graphic art, and films. They per- form religious rituals, interpret each others’ dreams, and discuss visions of the after-life. They throw parties, tell jokes, and play sports. They dress in particular ways and have their own slogans and gestures. Judging by available testimonies, these cultural activities fill up a large proportion of life in the jihadi underground" (Hegghammer 2018, 506).
"What all these activities have in common is that they are apparently superfluous; they do something other than fill the basic military needs of jihadi groups. A rebel organization needs weapons and training, but it should be able to do without dream interpretation. It has to communicate an ideological program, but need not do so in verse or with music. As such, the music, poetry, and dream interpretation are elements of a jihadi culture, to use anthropologist Edmund Leach’s understanding of culture as the “frills and decorations” of a social group" (Hegghammer 2018, 506).
"Jihadis believe that dreams can contain messages from God about what they should do or what will happen in the future, and because militants are afraid of missing these messages they discuss the dreams they remember in search of information" (Hegghammer 2018, 507).
"Expressing concern for the well-being of Muslims around the world is strictly speaking not a devotional act, but rather a political one. Here jihadis are stretching the notion of devotion to fit their political worldview" (Hegghammer 2018, 510).
"[I]n jihadi culture, weeping does not detract from a fighter’s perceived manliness. This, of course, sets jihadi culture apart from the more stoic culture of conventional militaries and that of non-Islamist extremists (such as neo-Nazis), who generally frown upon weeping (Hegghammer 2018, 510).
"Interestingly, the “fallen comrade situation” presents a dilemma for tear-prone ji- hadis, because the Islamic tradition offers two opposing norms for it. On the one hand, one is not supposed to weep for martyrs, but rather express joy at their death, because they have entered the highest levels of paradise" (Hegghammer 2018, 511).
"However, as the examples above suggest, it seems that jihadis have been leaning toward the more liberal interpretation and allowed people to weep over fallen comrades. While these self-reported weeping episodes are useful for understanding jihadi norms, it would be naïve to think that militants do not also cry for personal reasons at odds with their norms and ideology" (Hegghammer 2018, 511).
"Nonmilitant Sunni ultraconservatives, so-called Salafis — or quietist Salafis — differ from jihadis in one important regard, namely, that they recommend weeping in private. The jihadis, by contrast, often weep in each others’ company and cry ostentatiously, which quietist Salafis do not like. A French quietist Salafi told this author in an interview that “weeping is a private, intimate matter. This thing where you cry during communal prayer and make lots of sounds, it’s showing off.” A subset of the quietist Salafis, the so-called Madkhalis, are particularly opposed to showing emotions and sensitivity" (Hegghammer 2018, 512).
"As such, the jihadis have more in common with other branches of Islam, nota- bly with Shiʿites and Sufis (and to some extent the Tabligh movement). In these communities communal and ostentatious weeping is very common. In Sunni Islam, weeping was long primarily associated with Sufism" (Hegghammer 2018, 512).
'There is a minor difference between jihadi weeping and Sufi weeping in that the latter is purely devotional and apolitical. The “weeping for the suffering of the Mus- lim nation” is thus a specifically jihadi practice, as is the crying in anticipation of martyrdom" (Hegghammer 2018, 512).
"The jihadi sentimentalism also points to a potentially deeper social-scientific insight, namely, that people may join and stay in jihadi groups in part because of the emotional rewards offered by life in the jihadi underground. Thus far, the dominant models for conceptualizing jihadi recruitment have assumed decision-making processes in which cognition reigns supreme (Hegghammer 2018, 513).
"For example, the notion that economic deprivation fuels recruitment rests on the idea that individuals join based on a rational weighing of the relative material benefits of participation versus nonparticipation. Similarly, the notion that Western foreign policy fuels jihadism rests on the assumption that individuals join based on an expectation that their participation will improve the geopolitical standing of Muslims (Hegghammer 2018, 513).