جهاد
Jihād
Striving in the cause of God, which includes the moral struggle, and, under strict rules, defensive fighting.
What it means
The word means “striving”. The Quran commands Muslims to “strive for God as He deserves” (22:78) and, in an early Meccan verse, to strive against the unbelievers with the Quran itself (25:52). The word for armed fighting is a separate one, qitāl.
Permission to fight came after years of persecution, to “those who are fought, because they were wronged” (22:39). The same passage names monasteries, churches, synagogues and mosques as places that fighting is meant to protect (22:40).
Often misunderstood as
That jihad is holy war to convert or kill non-Muslims everywhere.
What the sources say
The Quran limits fighting to those who fight, and forbids exceeding the limit (2:190). The Prophet is reported to have forbidden killing women and children (Sahih al-Bukhari), and Abu Bakr’s instructions to an army, recorded in the Muwatta of Malik, forbid killing the elderly, monks and non-combatants and cutting down fruit trees. A saying reported in Abu Dawud and al-Tirmidhi calls the best jihad “a word of truth before an unjust ruler”.
Term and Arabic as listed in Ismail al Faruqi, Toward Islamic English (International Institute of Islamic Thought, 1995), p. 27, listed as JIHĀD. The definition is restated here.