Infidel

{{Short description|Disbeliever in central tenets of a religion}} {{About|religious disbelief|cheating in a relationship|Infidelity|other uses|Infidel (disambiguation)}} {{Redirect|Unbeliever}} [[File:Gustave Doré - The Baptism of Infidels.jpg|alt=|thumb|379x379px|Gustave Doré, ''The Baptism of Infidels'' ]]{{Redirect|Nonbeliever|religious non-belief|Irreligion}} An '''infidel''' (literally "unfaithful") is a person who is accused of disbelief in the central tenets of one's own religion, such as members of another religion, or irreligious people.<ref>See: * James Ginther (2009), The Westminster Handbook to Medieval Theology, Westminster, {{ISBN|978-0664223977}}, Quote = "Infidel literally means unfaithful"; * "Infidel", The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, Houghton Mifflin Company. "An unbeliever with respect to a particular religion, especially Christianity or Islam"; * [https://web.archive.org/web/20130717050846/http://oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/infidel Infidel], Oxford Dictionaries, US (2011); Quote = "A person who does not believe in religion or who adheres to a religion other than one’s own"</ref><ref name="Infidel-Oxford">{{cite web |url=http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O999-infidel.html |title=infidel |work=The Oxford Pocket Dictionary of Current English |year=2009 |publisher=Oxford University Press |access-date=2010-06-20 |quote=a person who does not believe in religion or who adheres to a religion other than one's own.}}</ref> Infidel is an ecclesiastical term in Christianity around which the Church developed a body of theology that deals with the concept of infidelity, which makes a clear differentiation between those who were baptized and followed the teachings of the Church versus those who are outside the faith.<ref name="IESS">{{cite web|url =http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1G2-3045301127.html| title = "Infidels." ''International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences. 2008''|publisher = MacMillan Library Reference|access-date = 2010-06-20}}</ref> Christians used the term ''infidel'' to describe those perceived as the enemies of Christianity.

After the ancient world, the concept of otherness, an exclusionary notion of the outside by societies with more or less coherent cultural boundaries, became associated with the development of the monotheistic and prophetic religions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam (cf. pagan).<ref name="IESS" /> In modern literature, the term infidel includes in its scope atheists,<ref name="Atheist">{{Cite book|url = https://archive.org/details/worksthomasjack07jackgoog|page = [https://archive.org/details/worksthomasjack07jackgoog/page/n13 5]|title =The Works of Thomas Jackson, Volume IV|publisher = Oxford University Press|quote=Atheism and irreligion are diseases so much more dangerous than infidelity or idolatry, as infidelity than heresy. Every heretic is in part an infidel, but every infidel is not in whole or part an heretic; every atheist is an infidel, so is not every infidel an atheist.|access-date=2011-04-08|year =1844}}</ref><ref name="Kaafir">{{Cite book|url = https://archive.org/details/bengalannualali00richgoog|page = [https://archive.org/details/bengalannualali00richgoog/page/n229 209]|title =The Bengal Annual|publisher = Samuel Smith and Co.|quote=Kafir means an infidel, but more properly an atheist.|access-date=2011-04-08|year =1830}}</ref><ref name="Atheism">{{Cite book|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=cymM4xEM76wC&q=atheism+catholic+church&pg=PA462|title =Catechism of the Catholic Church|publisher = Burns & Oates|quote=2123 'Many... of our contemporaries either do not at all perceive, or explicitly reject, this intimate and vital bond of man to God. Atheism must therefore be regarded as one of the most serious problems of our time.' 2125 Since it rejects or deniest the existence of God, atheism is a sin against the virtue of religion.|access-date=2011-04-08|isbn =9780860123248|date =2002-06-23}}</ref> polytheists,<ref>See: *Ken Ward (2008), in Expressing Islam: Religious Life and Politics in Indonesia, Editors: Greg Fealy, Sally White, {{ISBN|978-9812308511}}, Chapter 12; *Alexander Ignatenko, Words and Deeds, Russia in Global Affairs, Vol. 7, No. 2, April–June 2009, p. 145</ref> animists,<ref>Whitlark & Aycock (Editors) (1992), The literature of emigration and exile, Texas Tech University Press, {{ISBN|978-0896722637}}, pp. 3–28</ref> heathens, and pagans.<ref>See: *{{cite book|last=Tibi|first=Bassam|title=Political Islam, World Politics and Europe|year=2007|publisher=Taylor & Francis|isbn=978-0415437806|page=47}} *Mignolo W. (2000), The many faces of cosmopolis: Border thinking and critical cosmopolitanism. Public Culture, 12(3), pp. 721–48</ref> A willingness to identify other religious people as infidels corresponds to a preference for orthodoxy over pluralism.<ref>See: *Cole & Hammond (1974), Religious pluralism, legal development, and societal complexity: rudimentary forms of civil religion, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, Vol. 13, No. 2, pp. 177–89; *Sullivan K. M. (1992), Religion and liberal democracy, The University of Chicago Law Review, Vol. 59, No. 1, pp. 195–223.</ref>

==Etymology== The origins of the word infidel date to the late 15th century, deriving from the French ''infidèle'' or Latin ''īnfidēlis'', from ''in-'' "not" + ''fidēlis'' "faithful" (from ''fidēs'' "faith", related to ''fīdere'' 'to trust'). The word originally denoted a person of a religion other than one's own, especially a Christian to a Muslim, a Muslim to a Christian, or a gentile to a Jew.<ref name="Infidel-Oxford"/> Later meanings in the 15th century include "unbelieving", "a non-Christian", and "one who does not believe in religion" (1527).

==Usage== Christians historically used the term infidel to refer to people who actively opposed Christianity. This term became well-established in English by sometime in the early sixteenth century, when Jews or Muslims were described contemptuously as active opponents to Christianity. In Catholic dogma, an infidel is one who does not believe in the doctrine at all and is thus distinct from a heretic, who has fallen away from true doctrine, i.e. by denying the divinity of Jesus. Similarly, the ecclesiastical term was also used by the Methodist Church,<ref name="Oxford University">{{cite book|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=kxEEAAAAQAAJ&q=A+Dialogue+between+a+Believer+and+an+Infidel&pg=PA305| title = The Wesleyan-Methodist magazine: A Dialogue between a Believer and an Infidel|publisher = Oxford University|access-date = 2007-03-25| year = 1812}}</ref><ref name="Methodist Review">{{cite book|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=gslWAAAAIAAJ&q=infidel+methodist&pg=PA972| title = The Methodist review, Volume 89|quote=Is it conceivable that a Spirit which is invisible, and imponderable, and impalpable, and yet which is the seat of physical and moral powers, really occupies the universe? The infidel scoffs at the idea. We observe, however, that this same infidel implicitly believes in the existence of an all-pervading luminiferous ether, which is invisible, and imponderable, and impalpable, and yet is said to be more compact and more elastic than any material substance we can see and handle. |publisher = Phillips & Hunt|access-date = 2007-03-25| year = 1907}}</ref> in reference to those "without faith".<ref name="William Lister">{{cite book|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=wQcFAAAAQAAJ&q=meaning+of+infidel+methodist&pg=PA72| title = The Primitive Methodist magazine|quote=It is sometimes translated infidels, because an infidel is without faith; but is also properly rendered unbelievers in the strict Gospel sense of the word.|publisher = William Lister|access-date = 2007-03-25| year = 1867}}</ref>

Today, the usage of the term infidel has declined;<ref name="Wheatcroft">{{cite book|url = https://archive.org/details/infidelshistoryo00whea|url-access = registration|page = [https://archive.org/details/infidelshistoryo00whea/page/197 197]| title = Infidels|publisher = Random House|quote=Likewise, "infidel," which had still been in use in the early nineteenth century, fell out of favor with hymn writers.|access-date = 2007-03-25| isbn = 9780812972399| year = 2005}}</ref> the current preference is for the terms ''non-Christians'' and ''non-believers'' (persons without religious affiliations or beliefs), reflecting the commitment of mainstream Christian denominations to engage in dialog with persons of other faiths.<ref name="OSVCE">Russell B. Shaw, Peter M. J. Stravinskas, ''Our Sunday Visitor's Catholic Encyclopedia'', Our Sunday Visitor Publishing, 1998, {{ISBN|0-87973-669-0}} p. 535.</ref> Nevertheless, some apologists have argued in favor of the term, stating that it does not come from a disrespectful perspective, but is similar to using the term ''orthodox'' for devout believers.<ref name="Orthodox">{{cite book|url = https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_8TYrAAAAYAAJ|page = [https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_8TYrAAAAYAAJ/page/n263 188]| title = Infidel Testimony|publisher = J.E. Dixon|quote=When we use the word ''infidel'', we intend nothing disrespectful, any more than we do when we use the word ''orthodox''.|access-date = 2007-03-25| year = 1835}}</ref>

Moreover, some translations of the Bible, including the King James Version, which is still in vogue today, employ the word ''infidel'', while others have supplanted the term with ''nonbeliever''. The term is found in two places: {{blockquote|And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? —2 Corinthians 6:15 KJV}} {{blockquote|But if any provide not for his own, and specially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel. —1 Timothy 5:8 KJV}}

==Infidels under Catholic Canon Law== ===Right to rule=== In ''Quod super his'', Innocent IV asked the question, "[I]s it licit to invade a land that infidels possess or which belongs to them?" and held that while infidels had a right to ''dominium'' (right to rule themselves and choose their own governments), the pope, as the Vicar of Christ, ''de jure'' possessed the care of their souls and had the right to politically intervene in their affairs if their ruler violated or allowed his subjects to violate a Christian and Euro-centric normative conception of Natural law, such as sexual perversion or idolatry.<ref name=williams-48>Williams, p.48</ref> He also held that he had an obligation to send missionaries to infidel lands, and that if they were prevented from entering or preaching, then the pope was justified in dispatching Christian forces accompanied with missionaries to invade those lands, as Innocent stated simply: "If the infidels do not obey, they ought to be compelled by the secular arm and war may be declared upon them by the pope, and nobody else."<ref>Williams, p. 14</ref> This was however not a reciprocal right and non-Christian missionaries such as those of Muslims could not be allowed to preach in Europe "because they are in error and we are on a righteous path."<ref name=williams-48/>

A long line of Papal hierocratic canonists, most notably those who adhered to Alanus Anglicus's influential arguments of the Crusading-era, denied Infidel dominium, and asserted Rome's universal jurisdictional authority over the earth, as well as the right to authorize pagan conquests solely on the basis of non-belief because of their rejection of the Christian God.<ref>Williams, pp. 41, 61–64</ref> In the extreme, the hierocractic canonical discourse of the mid-twelfth century, such as that espoused by Bernard of Clairvaux, the mystic leader of the Cisertcians, legitimized German colonial expansion and practice of forceful Christianisation in the Slavic territories as a holy war against the Wends, arguing that infidels should be killed wherever they posed a menace to Christians. When Frederick the II unilaterally arrogated papal authority, he took on the mantle to "destroy convert, and subjugate all barbarian nations", a power in papal doctrine reserved for the pope. Hostiensis, a student of Innocent, in accord with Alanus, also asserted that "by law infidels should be subject to the faithful". John Wyclif, regarded as the forefather of English Reformation, also held that valid ''dominium'' rested on a state of grace.<ref name=williams-61>Williams, pp. 61–64</ref>

The Teutonic Knights were one of the by-products of this papal hierocratic and German discourse. After the Crusades in the Levant, they moved to crusading activities in the infidel Baltics. Their crusades against the Lithuanians and Poles, however, precipitated the Lithuanian Controversy, and the Council of Constance, following the condemnation of Wyclif, found Hostiensis's views no longer acceptable and ruled against the knights. Future Church doctrine was then firmly aligned with Innocents IV's position.<ref name=williams-64>Williams, pp. 64–67</ref> The later development of counterarguments on the validity of Papal authority, the rights of infidels, and the primacy of natural law led to various treatises such as those by Hugo Grotius, John Locke, Immanuel Kant and Thomas Hobbes.

====Colonization of the Americas==== During the Age of Discovery, several papal bulls such as ''Romanus Pontifex'' and more importantly ''inter caetera'' (1493) implicitly removed ''dominium'' from infidels and granted them to the Spanish Empire and the Portuguese Empire with the charter of guaranteeing the safety of missionaries. Subsequent rejections of the bull by Protestant powers rejected the Pope's authority to exclude other Christian princes. As independent authorities, they drew up charters for their own colonial missions based on the temporal right for care of infidel souls in language echoing the ''inter caetera''. The charters and papal bulls would form the legal basis of future negotiations and consideration of claims as title deeds in the emerging law of nations during the period of European colonization.<ref>Christopher 31-40</ref>

The rights bestowed by ''Romanus Pontifex'' and ''inter caetera'' have never fallen from use, serving as the basis for legal arguments over the centuries. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the 1823 case ''Johnson v. McIntosh'' that as a result of European discovery and assumption of ultimate dominion, Native Americans had only a right to occupancy of native lands, not the right of title. In the 1831 case ''Cherokee Nation v. Georgia'', famously described Native American tribes as "domestic dependent nations". In ''Worcester v. Georgia'', the court ruled that the Native Tribes were sovereign entities to the extent that the U.S. federal government, and not individual U.S. states, had authority over their affairs. Native American groups including the Taíno and Onondaga have called on the Holy See to revoke the bulls of 1452, 1453, and 1493.{{Citation needed|date=April 2024}}

===Marriage=== According to the ''Catholic Encyclopedia'', the Catholic Church views marriage as forbidden and null when conducted between the faithful (Christians) and infidels, unless a dispensation has been granted. This is because marriage is a sacrament of the Catholic Church, which infidels are deemed incapable of receiving.<ref name="catenc">{{cite web|url=http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08002b.htm |title=Catholic Encyclopedia: Infidels |publisher=Newadvent.org |date=1910-10-01 |access-date=2014-08-22}}</ref>

==As a philosophical tradition== Some philosophers, such as Thomas Paine, David Hume, George Holyoake, Charles Bradlaugh, Voltaire and Rousseau earned the label of infidel or freethinkers, both personally and for their respective traditions of thought because of their attacks on religion and opposition to the Church. They established and participated in a distinctly labeled, infidel movement or tradition of thought, that sought to reform their societies which were steeped in Christian thought, practice, laws and culture. The Infidel tradition was distinct from parallel anti-Christian, sceptic or deist movements, in that it was anti-theistic and also synonymous with atheism. These traditions also sought to set up various independent model communities, as well as societies, whose traditions then gave rise to various other socio-political movements such as secularism in 1851, as well as developing close philosophical ties to some contemporary political movements such as socialism and the French Revolution.<ref name="Royle">Royle, Edwards, "Victorian Infidels: The Origins of the British Secularist Movement 1791–1866", Manchester University Press, {{ISBN|0-7190-0557-4}}</ref>

Towards the early twentieth century, these movements sought to move away from the term "infidel" because of its associated negative connotation in Christian thought, and there is attributed to George Holyoake the coining of the term 'secularism' in an attempt to bridge the gap with other theist and Christian liberal reform movements.<ref name = "Royle"/> In 1793, Immanuel Kant's ''Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason'', reflected the Enlightenment periods' philosophical development, one which differentiated between the moral and rational and substituted rational/irrational for the original true believer/infidel distinction.<ref name="IESS" />

==Implications for medieval civil law== Laws passed by the Catholic Church governed not just the laws between Christians and infidels in matters of religious affairs, but also civil affairs. They were prohibited from participating or aiding in infidel religious rites, such as circumcisions or wearing images of non-Christian religious significance.<ref name="catenc"/> In the Early Middle Ages, based on the idea of the superiority of Christians to infidels, regulations came into place such as those forbidding Jews from possessing Christian slaves; the laws of the decretals further forbade Christians from entering the service of Jews, for Christian women to act as their nurses or midwives; forbidding Christians from employing Jewish physicians when ill; restricting Jews to definite quarters of the towns into which they were admitted and to wear a dress by which they might be recognized.<ref name="catenc" />

Later during the Victorian era, testimony of either self-declared, or those accused of being Infidels or Atheists, was not accepted in a court of law because it was felt that they had no moral imperative to not lie under oath because they did not believe in God, or Heaven and Hell.<ref name="Royle" /> These rules have now given way to modern legislation and Catholics, in civil life, are no longer governed by ecclesiastical law.<ref name="catenc" />

== Analogous terms in other religions == ===Islam=== {{main|Kafir|}}

{{original research|section|date=February 2017}} One Arabic analogue to ''infidel'', referring to non-Muslims, is ''kafir'' (sometimes "kaafir", "kufr" or "kuffar") from the root K-F-R, which connotes covering or concealing.<ref>Ruthven M. (2002), International Affairs, Vol. 78, No. 2, pp. 339–51</ref><ref>"Kaffir", The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, Houghton Mifflin Company, 2006. "''Islam'' An infidel."; Also: "Kaffir" - Arabic kāfir "unbeliever, infidel", Encarta World English Dictionary [North American Edition], Microsoft Corporation, 2007.</ref> The term KFR may also mean to disbelieve in something, be ungrateful for something provided, or to have denounced a certain matter or life style.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%D9%83%D9%81%D8%B1 |title=Wiktionary | publisher=wiktionary.com}}</ref> Another term, sometimes used synonymously, is ''mushrik'', "polytheist" or "conspirer", which more immediately connotes the worship of gods other than Allah.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/541133/shirk |title=Encyclopædia Britannica |publisher=Britannica.com |access-date=2014-08-22}}</ref><ref>[https:/a/archive.today/20130720194152/http://infad.usim.edu.my/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=8105 Islamic Science University of Malaysia, Dr. Abdullah al-Faqih, The meaning of "Kufr" and "Shirk"]</ref>

In the Quran, the term ''kafir'' is first applied to the unbelieving residents of Mecca, and their attempts to refute and revile Muhammad. Later, Muslims are ordered to keep apart from them and defend themselves from their attacks.<ref name="Campo, Juan Eduardo 2009 page 421"/><ref name="J. Brill 1936, page 619"/> The term "People of the Book" (''Ahl al-Kitāb'') is primarily used to refer to Jews, Christians, and Sabians,<ref name=EI>{{Cite encyclopedia|author=Vajda, G | year= 2012 | title=Ahl al-Kitāb |encyclopedia=Encyclopaedia of Islam| edition=2nd|publisher=Brill |editor=P. Bearman |editor2=Th. Bianquis |editor3=C.E. Bosworth |editor4=E. van Donzel |editor5=W.P. Heinrichs|volume=1|page=264| doi= 10.1163/1573-3912_islam_SIM_0383 }}</ref> as Islam considers them to be followers of scriptures previously sent by God.<ref name="Intro">"Infidel" in ''An Introductory Dictionary of Theology and Religious Studies'', p. 630</ref><ref name=kafir>"Kafir" in ''An Introductory Dictionary of Theology and Religious Studies'' p. 702</ref> Islamic rulers in Persia and in India later expanded the term to also include adherents of Zoroastrianism and Hinduism.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Noegel |first1=Scott B. |last2=Wheeler |first2=Brannon M. |title=The A to Z of Prophets in Islam and Judaism |date=2010 |publisher=Scarecrow Press |isbn=9781461718956 |page=249 |language=en|quote=People of the Book. Term used in the Quran and in Muslim sources for Jews and Christians, but also exteneded to include Sabians, Zoroastrians, Hindus, and others.}}</ref> However, in some Quranic verses, particularly those recited after the Hijra in AD 622, the concept of ''kafir'' was expanded to encompass Jews for disbelief in God's sign and killing prophets, and Christians for believing in the Trinity and that Jesus of Nazareth was the son of God, which the Quran considers to be idolatry.<ref name="Campo, Juan Eduardo 2009 page 421">Campo, Juan Eduardo (2009). Encyclopedia of Islam. Infobase Publishing, New York, {{ISBN|978-0-8160-5454-1}}, see p. 421.</ref><ref name="autogenerated1991">Lewis, Bernard. The political language of Islam. University of Chicago Press, 1991.</ref>{{Page needed|date=February 2017}}<ref name="Waldman, Marilyn Robinson 1968">Waldman, Marilyn Robinson. "The Development of the Concept of Kufr in the Qur'ān." Journal of the American Oriental society 88.3 (1968): 442–55.</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Ayah/Ayat |url=http://www.oxfordislamicstudies.com/article/opr/t125/e251 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130219001231/http://www.oxfordislamicstudies.com/article/opr/t125/e251 |url-status=dead |archive-date=19 February 2013 |website=Oxford Islamic Studies |publisher=Oxford University |access-date=9 January 2019}}</ref><ref>Schimmel, Annemarie, and Abdoldjavad Falaturi. We Believe in One God: The Experience of God in Christianity and Islam. Seabury Press, 1979.</ref>{{Page needed|date=February 2017}}

Some ''hadiths'' prohibit declaring a fellow Muslim to be a ''kafir'', but the term was nonetheless used fairly frequently in the internal religious polemics of the age.<ref name="J. Brill 1936, page 619"/> For example, some early Sunni texts include members of other sects of Islam, such as the Shia, under the category of infidels.<ref>Wilfred Madelung (1970), Early Sunnī Doctrine concerning Faith as Reflected in the" Kitāb al-Īmān", Studia Islamica, No. 32, pp. 233–54</ref> Similarly, adherents of Wahhabism, a strict, fundamentalist form of Sunni Islam originating in Saudi Arabia, include as ''kafir'' those Muslims who undertake Sufi shrine pilgrimage and follow Shia teachings about Imams.<ref>Williams, Brian Glyn. "Jihad and ethnicity in post‐communist Eurasia. on the trail of transnational islamic holy warriors in Kashmir, Afghanistan, Central Asia, Chechnya and Kosovo." The Global Review of Ethnopolitics 2.3–4 (2003): 3–24.</ref><ref>Ungureanu, Daniel. "Wahhabism, Salafism and the Expansion of Islamic Fundamentalist Ideology." Journal of the Seminar of Discursive Logic, Argumentation Theory and Rhetoric. 2011.</ref><ref>Marshall, Paul A., ed. Radical Islam's Rules: The Worldwide Spread of Extreme Shariʻa Law. Rowman & Littlefield, 2005.</ref>{{Page needed|date=February 2017}} Elsewhere, in Africa and South Asia, particular sects like the Hausas, Ahmadi, and Akhbaris have been repeatedly declared as ''Kufir'' or infidels by other Muslim denominations.<ref>Mark Juergensmeyer (2011), The Oxford Handbook of Global Religions, Oxford University Press, {{ISBN|978-0199767649}}, pp. 451, 519–23</ref><ref>Patrick J. Ryan, Ariadne auf Naxos: Islam and Politics in a Religiously Pluralistic African Society, Journal of Religion in Africa, Vol. 26, Fasc. 3 (Aug., 1996), pp. 308–29</ref><ref>H. R. Palmer, An Early Fulani Conception of Islam, Journal of the Royal African Society, Vol. 13, No. 52, pp. 407–14</ref>

The class of ''kafir'' also includes the category of ''murtadd'', variously translated as "apostates" or "renegades", for whom classical jurisprudence prescribes death if they refuse to return to Islam.<ref name="J. Brill 1936, page 619"/> On the subject of the ritual impurity of unbelievers in general, however, one finds a range of opinions, "from the strictest to the most tolerant," in classical Islamic jurisprudence.<ref name="J. Brill 1936, page 619">Björkman, W., "Kafir". E. J. Brill's First Encyclopaedia of Islam, 1913–1936, Volume 4, {{ISBN|9789004097902}}; pp. 619–20</ref> Historically, the attitude toward non-Muslims in Islam has been determined more by socio-political conditions than by religious doctrine. A tolerance toward unbelievers prevailed even to the time of the Crusades, particularly with respect to the People of the Book, with whom Muslims coexisted for hundreds of years. Nevertheless, animosity was eventually nourished by repeated wars with unbelievers, and warfare between the Safavid and Ottoman Empires brought about application of the term ''kafir'' even to all Shias in Ottoman fatwas.<ref name="J. Brill 1936, page 619"/> In Sufism, the term ''kafir'' underwent a special development, as in a well-known verse of Abu Sa'id: "So long as belief and unbelief are not perfectly equal, no man can be a true Muslim", which has prompted various explanations.<ref name="J. Brill 1936, page 619" />

===Judaism=== {{main|Goy|}}

Judaism has a notion of pagan gentiles who are called {{Script/Hebrew|עכו״ם}} ''<nowiki>'</nowiki>acum'', an acronym of the Hebrew phrase ''Ovdei Cohavim u-Mazzaloth'' or, literally, "star-and-constellation worshippers".<ref name = "IESS"/><ref>Walter Zanger, "[http://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/ancient-cultures/ancient-israel/jewish-worship-pagan-symbols/ Jewish Worship, Pagan Symbols: Zodiac mosaics in ancient synagogues]", ''Bible History Daily''; first published 24 August 2012, updated 24 August 2014.</ref><ref>Shay Zucker, "[http://articles.adsabs.harvard.edu/full/seri/IAUS./0260//0000301.000.html Hebrew Names of the Planets]", ''The Role of Astronomy in Society and Culture, Proceedings of the International Astronomical Union'', IAU Symposium, Volume 260; p. 302.</ref> It was also probably influenced by the similar-sounding Hebrew word "עקום" ('aqum), which means "crooked". Goy is the most widely used term for gentiles today, though some consider it pejorative. The Hebrew term ''kofer'', cognate with the Arabic ''kafir'', is reserved only for apostate Jews.<ref name="IESS" />

==Notes== {{Reflist|30em}}

==References== * Williams, Robert A. ''The American Indian in Western Legal Thought: The Discourses of Conquest'', 1990, Oxford University Press, {{ISBN|0-19-508002-5}} * Tomlins, Christopher L.; Mann, Bruce H. ''The Many Legalities of Early America'', 2001, UNC Press, {{ISBN|0-8078-4964-2}} * Weckman, George. ''The Language of the Study of Religion: A Handbook'', 2001, Xlibris Corporation {{ISBN|0-7388-5105-1}}{{Self-published inline|certain=yes|date=December 2017}} * ''Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of Synonyms'', Merriam-Webster Inc., 1984, {{ISBN|0-87779-341-7}} * Espin, Orlando O.; Nickoloff, James B. ''An Introductory Dictionary of Theology and Religious Studies'', Liturgical Press, 2007, {{ISBN|0-8146-5856-3}}

;Attribution *{{Catholic|wstitle=Infidels}}

== External links == {{Wiktionary|infidel}} * [http://www.rosarychurch.net/answers/ap091994b.html Prayer of St. Francis Xavier for the Conversion of the Infidels:] a prayer written by Francis Xavier, Doctor of the Church * [http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/infidel Definition of "infidel"] by the Merriam-Webster dictionary * [http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/unbeliever Definition of "unbeliever"] by the Merriam-Webster dictionary * [https://archive.org/details/infidelshistoryo00whea Infidels: a history of the conflict between Christendom and Islam by Andrew Wheatcroft Random house, 2005]

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