Segregation and Unity of The Islamic Ummah in The Political Thought of Abul A’la Maududi (Research paper)

The title is a research paper by Mohammad Ali Mirali published in Politics Quarterly, Volume 48, Issue 1, Spring 2018, Pages 237-255.

Political segregation

In spite of the emphasis on Islamic sources and texts on the establishment of the Islamic Ummah and its formation in the early Islamic centuries, this issue gradually began to differentiate and experiences a political segregation. This is due to the incorrect political behavior of the political elites and the incorrect understanding of the Islamic intellectual system when the new elements were replaced in the knowledge sysytem of Muslims.

Two factors

Maududi describes two factors as the most important elements in the split of Islamic unity. The first one was emergence of Soltani's system of ruling in Islamic state by Muawiya after four Caliphs and the second was isolation of the human caliphate, which was common with the democratic methods during the four Caliphs period.

Purpose of the study

The purpose of this study is to investigate the factors of Islamic political segregation as well as the strategy for its reconstruction from Maududi's perspective. The significance of this research is because of the fact that Maududi is one of the great contemporary Islamic thinkers who has been influencing the Salafist groups, which are nowadays are known as the cause of the breakup of and segregation in Islamic Ummah. This article compiles the necessary data and information in a documentary manner and interprets it in an analytical way from the perspective of Maududi.