of paradise.” Variants of this “bird” tradition
state that the martyrs’ souls are “like birds with
God,” “turned into green birds,” “in the bellies of
birds,” or are “in the crops of green birds.” These
birds are said to “nestle in (golden) lamps that
are hung (muallaqa) under the Throne of God,”
and their dwellings are near the “lote tree of the
boundary.”
In modern times, the definition of shahid has
widened to include any personal/individual “sacri-
fice” for God’s cause or “trial” sent by God result-
ing in death, such as dying abroad, dying from
epidemic disease or natural disaster, in childbirth,
by pleurisy or drowning, to protect one’s family
or property, and finally the jihadist “effort” of the
Ulama (“the ink of the scholars is of more value
than the blood of the martyrs”). The widespread
politicization of Islam after the 1960s has led to
Shii ideologies of martyrdom linked to the political
jihad of “revolution,” as in the discourse of Ayatol-
lahs Khomeini, Taliqani, and Mutahhari in Iran, or
to guerrilla “resistance” movements that practice
proactive martyrdom, as in hizbUllah in Lebanon.
Models of Sunni martyrdom have also kept pace,
inspired by such jihadist ideologues and organiza-
tions as hasan al-banna and sayyid qUtb of al-
Ikhwan al-Muslimun, or “mUslim brotherhood,”
in egypt; Abu al-Ala Mawdudi of Jamaat-i islami
in pakistan, bangladesh, and northern india; and
hamas, which has religiously underwritten Pal-
estinian intifada as an all-out civilian “resistance”
specializing in martyrdom/sUicide bombings. Both
Shii and Sunni jihadist ideologies of martyrdom
are part of a multifront religious “struggle” against
the hegemony of the West (whether interpreted
as European colonial/postcolonial regimes, such
as France in North Africa, Russia in aFghanistan,
Zionist Israel in the Arab Middle East, or active
imperialist powers in the Muslim world today, prin-
cipally the United States in its unilateral support
for and interventions on behalf of israel and more
recent military presence in Saudi Arabia and post
9/11 incursions in Afghanistan and iraq). Sunni
and Shii jihadists define their task as resisting
“secular” Western-style democracy and working
for sharia-oriented governments and reinfusions of
Islamic “values” in the Sunni umma throughout the
Muslim Middle East, southeastern Europe, Central
and South Asia, and Southeast Asia. Such postmod-
ern Muslim “fighters” for the faith and “martyrs”
for the umma now include women and children
as well as the more traditional male “soldiers” for
Islam. The “rewards” for these more tender martyrs
seem focused on how they will be remembered
in this world rather than on male-ordered defini-
tions of “paradise.” They are willing to expend
their lives, using the power of their powerlessness,
against what they perceive to be a more powerful,
unjust, and oppressive enemy.
See also aFterliFe; Jihad movements; shiism.
Kathleen M. O’ConnorFurther reading: Sunni: David Cook, Martyrdom in
Islam (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007);
Maher Jarrar, “The Martyrdom of Passionate Lovers.
Holy War as a Sacred Wedding.” In Hadith: Origins and
Developments, edited by Harald Motzki (Burlington, Vt.:
Ashgate/Variorum, 2004); Rudolph Peters, ed., Jihad in
Classical and Modern Islam, a Reader (Princeton, N.J.:
Markus Wiener, 1996); Christopher Reuter, My Life Is
a Weapon: A Modern History of Suicide Bombing (Princ-
eton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2004); David M.
Rosen, “Fighting for the Apocalypse: Palestinian Child
Soldiers.” In Armies of the Young: Child Soldiers in War
and Terrorism (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University
Press, 2005). Shii: Mahmoud Ayoub, Redemptive Suffer-
ing in Islam: A Study of the Devotional Aspects of ‘Ashura’
in Twelver Shi’ism (The Hague: Mouton, 1978); Mehdi
Abedi and Gary Legenhausen, eds. Jihad and Shahadat:
Struggle and Martyrdom in Islam (Houston: Institute
for Research and Islamic Studies, 1986); Kamran Scot
Aghaie, The Martyrs of Karbala: Shi’i Symbols and Ritu-
als in Modern Iran (Seattle: University of Washington
Press, 2004); Ali Naqi Naqvi, The Martyr of Karbala:
English Translation of Allama Ali Naqi Naqvi’s “Shaheed-
e-insaniyat” (Karachi: Islamic Culture and Research
Trust/Muhammadi Trust of Great Britain and Northern
Ireland, 1984); Lara Deeb, An Enchanted Modern: Gendermartyrdom 459 J