The Broken Mirror: How the Contemporary Jihadist. Narrative is Re-Shaping the Classical Doctrine of Jihad

Very few words in contemporary history have become as popular as the polysemous word jihad: probably the most controversial and debated concept presently associated with Islam. It is a verbal noun, both inspiring and frightening, which seems to overwhelm political debates about radical Islam. However, as always happens when technical terms become popular labels, jihad has become an overstretched word, an ideological banner, with an imprecise and broad significance, often disconnected from the classical doctrine, which the contemporary jihadist ideologists nonetheless refer to. Its doctrinal, legal, religious and moral boundaries are constantly contested both by Muslim and non-Muslim authors. Even more puzzling is the debate on the limits and regulations of jihad, and if jihad truly represents the Islamic version of Bellum justum. In other words, the current debate has transformed jihad into a sort of a ‘meta-concept’. One, however, that offers totally divergent narratives according to those who use it and which serves to foster political identities for a range of very different movements, from ‘religious nationalist’ groups to transnational, or ‘glocal’, ones. In this chapter, we will try to follow its historical evolution and its transformation from a multifarious concept to a codified set of legal doctrines to a powerful mobilizing ideology in the 20th century, up to its current transformation into a sort of universal brand, deprived nonetheless of an acknowledged copyright.