Why did the people dislike the jizya tax?

Answer 1

Answer 1

Jizya was a form of tax laid on non-Muslims residing in Muslim-controlled areas. It was synonymous to the Zakat that Muslims pay every year to the government with the difference that it was for non-Muslims and had numerous exceptions. They people disliked that Jizya because they had to pay money from their own savings to the Muslim rulers. In today's terms, it can be seen as the usual resentment to VAT or other Tax levied on all of us.

Answer 2

The resentment toward the jizya among the Dhimmi has nothing to do with the actual expense of the tax. That is to say that the rate was not in any way unconscionable and (considering many taxes levied in similar periods) was actually quite trivial. The hatred that the Dhimmi have toward the jizya is that it was not intended solely to gain revenue, but to single out and humiliate non-Muslims for their "failure to realize that Islam was correct". It was protection money, similar to what one might give to a mobster who runs a neighborhood so that he does not murder your family. This sense among the Dhimmi that the Muslims would only tolerate them as long as they "paid on time" made them angry. Muslim continual failure to recognize this past continues to incense the descendants of and current Dhimmi in Muslim countries today.