http://apostasyandislam.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
http://apostasyandislam.blogspot.com/
Nurjahan
Ruby Amatulla [see no 13]
[CEO,
GNL-USA]
On
Apostasy and Islam:
100+
Notable Islamic Voices affirming the Freedom of Faith
Dr.
Mohammad Omar Farooq
Upper Iowa University
April 2,
2007
[Compilation in Progress; farooqm59@yahoo.com]
Freedom of faith is essential to Islam. Prophets and Messengers of Allah along with their communities had to struggle for their freedom of faith. That Islam is by choice is unambiguously stated in the Qur'an and reflected in the Prophetic legacy. However, throughout history, the issue has been clouded due to mixing the issue of apostasy with treason. Now one of the biggest tools of anti-Islam/anti-Muslim propaganda is based on the issue of apostasy, claiming that Islam does not uphold the freedom of faith. Even our own children are getting confused and many are quietly disavowing our wishy-washy position on as fundamental an issue as freedom of faith/religion.
Undeniably, the traditional position of Muslim scholars and jurists has been that apostasy [riddah] is punishable by death. The longstanding problem of the traditional position, as held by Classical jurists or scholars, can be explained and excused as not being able to see apostasy, an issue of pure freedom of faith and conscience, separate from treason against the community or the state. However, the accumulated experience over the history in terms of abuse of this position about apostasy even against Muslims as well as the changed context of a globally-connected, pluralistic society should help us appreciate the contemporary challenges in light of the Qur'anic norms and the Prophetic legacy. In this context, while the classical misunderstanding about this issue of apostasy is excusable, the position of some of the well-known contemporary scholars is not.
Sayyid
Abul A'la Maududi (commonly known as Maulana Maududi), the late
founder and leader of Jamaat-e-Islami and a leading independent,
revivalist Islamic personality of 20th century, is frequently
referred to for his ardent argument for capital punishment for
apostasy. He argued that there is a broad agreement of the leading
jurists on this issue. He claims:
"To copy the
consecutive writings of all the lawyers from the first to the
fourteenth century A.H. would make our discussion very long. Yet we
cannot avoid mentioning that however much the four Schools of Law may
differ among themselves regarding the various aspects of this
problem, in any case all four Schools without doubt agree on the
point that the punishment of the apostate is execution." [The
Punishment of the Apostate According to Islamic Law]
Such a sweeping claim is misplaced because the alleged agreement is about apostasy-cum-treason, not about solely apostasy. Furthermore, any claim of consensus (ijma) on almost anything should be taken with a great deal of circumspection. [see The Doctrine of Ijma: Is there a consensus?]
Another well-known Muslim scholar and jurist of our time, whom I also generally hold in high regard, is Dr. Yusuf al-Qaradawi. He asserts: "The duty of the Muslim community — in order to preserve its identity — is to combat apostasy in all its forms and wherefrom it comes, giving it no chance to pervade in the Muslim world." Similar to Maulana Maududi, he also claims ijma on this: "That is why the Muslim jurists are unanimous that apostates must be punished. ... apostasy is a criminal act." [Apostasy: Major and Minor]
Dr. Al-Qaradawi also fails to separate apostasy from treason. It is unfortunate that such scholars of high repute have shown such serious lapse in recognizing that, as Dr. Irfan Ahmad Khan, a scholar and Qur'anic exegete, argues: "Freedom of faith and religion is meaningless without the freedom to change one's faith."
Then, also there are scholars, even in the USA, who are either wishy-washy or ambivalent in regard to their positions. Some are too much beholden to the traditional views held in the past, right or wrong. Views and positions of scholars and leaders, such as Maududi and al-Qaradawi, not only provide powerful ammunition for propaganda against Islam and Muslims, but also confound the mind of our own community, including our youth, whose discerning mind sees through the double-standard or self-contradiction quite transparently.
While many contemporary Muslim scholars have expressed their views affirming the freedom of faith, the collective voice of Muslims is still feeble and little known. In this write-up we have collated opinions and positions of various Muslim scholars, academics, intellectuals, imams, professionals, community leaders and others on this issue. Even young students are voicing against the double-standard that contradicts the Islamic values and principles.
These voices, representing a broad spectrum of Muslim community/ummah, are tipping the scale of the discourse on this issue in favor of affirming and upholding the pristine Islamic principle about freedom of faith. It also debunks the claim of unanimity (ijma), which was not quite true in the past, and it is even less true in the present.
Some additional explanatory notes: (a) Views of some of the early scholars might not be categorical or without variant reports. However, the excerpts included can be basis for identifying them as the precursors of the contemporary views on this issue. (b) There are (or have been) many scholars, early and contemporary, who hold that in case of apostasy capital punishment is not warranted, but have sanctioned or kept open the possibility of other punishments. Their views have not been included here. (c) There are also scholars who believe that punishment of apostasy is not hadd (mandatory, specified punishment based on the Qur'an or sunnah), but it is subject to ta'zir [discretionary punishment, determined by the proper Islamic judicial system]. In this collection, their views have not been included either.
Before the views and opinions of a broad spectrum of Islamic voices are presented below, two brief statements about apostasy in the Qur'an and in hadith are in order.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Punishment of Apostasy in the Qur'an
As presented in excerpts from numerous sources below, and links to works available online, there is no worldly punishment solely for apostasy [i.e., changing of one's faith/religion] mentioned in the Qur'an.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Punishment of Apostasy in Hadith
Readers are invited/urged to explore a vast amount of resources/links presented at this blog, where scholars authoritatively have shown that none of the hadiths about apostasy is without problem or weakness. Also, there is no hadith confirming punishment or retribution solely for apostasy. In every single case, where punishment has been meted out, riddah involved treason or rebellion. The following is an example of how the Prophet dealt with solely apostasy.
A bedouin gave the Pledge of allegiance to Allah's Apostle for Islam. Then the bedouin got fever at Medina, came to Allah's Apostle and said, "O Allah's Apostle! Cancel my Pledge," But Allah's Apostle refused. Then he came to him (again) and said, "O Allah's Apostle! Cancel my Pledge." But the Prophet refused Then he came to him (again) and said, "O Allah's Apostle! Cancel my Pledge." But the Prophet refused. The bedouin finally went out (of Medina) whereupon Allah's Apostle said, "Medina is like a pair of bellows (furnace): It expels its impurities and brightens and clears its good. [Sahih al-Bukhari, Vol. 9, #318]
Notably,
as Dr. M. E. Subhani explained in his book:
“This was an
open case of apostasy. But the Prophet neither punished the Bedouin
nor asked anyone to do it. He allowed him to leave Madina. Nobody
harmed him.” [Apostasy
in Islam
(New Delhi, India: Global Media Publications, 2005), pp. 23-24.]
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Below we present a unique compilation of 100+ notable Islamic voices, who have expressed their views on punishment of Islam. As mentioned earlier, opinions of those scholars, who have vehemently rejected or repudiated capital punishment of apostasy but have left room for punishment - discretionary or otherwise - of apostasy, also have not been included here.
We will continue to update this collection. If you know of anyone whose publicly articulated position is missing from this compilation, please let us know [with relevant citation].
Hadrat
Umar Ibn Abdul Aziz
[d. 97 AH/720 AD]
[popularly known as Umar II and regarded as
part of the Khulafa-i-Rashidoon]
Some people accepted
Islam during the period of Umar bin Abdul Aziz, who is called the
fifth rightful caliph of Islam. All these people renounced Islam
sometimes later. Maimoon bin Mahran the governor of the area wrote
to the caliph about these people. In
reply Umar bin Abdul Aziz ordered him to release those people and
asked him to re-impose jizya on them.
[Musannaf
Abdur Razzaq,
pp. 171-10, cited in M. E. Subhani,Apostasy in Islam (New Delhi,
India: Global Media Publications, 2005), pp. 23-24. Abdur Razzaq ibn
Humama (d. 211 AH). This is the earliest musannaf (a hadith
collection arranged in topical chapters) work in existence.]
Ibrahim
al-Nakha'i
[d. 95 AH]
[a leading jurist and traditionist among the
generation succeeding the Companions]
According to
al-Nakha'i, apostate should be re-invited to Islam, but should never
be condemned to death. [He] maintained the view that the invitation
should continue for as long as there is hope that the apostate might
change his mind and repent. [referred to in Chapter: Freedom
of Religion
in Mohammad Hashim Kamali’s Freedom of Expression in Islam
Islamic Text Society, 1997]
Sufyan
al-Thawri
[d. 161 AH]
[known as 'the prince of the believers concerning
Hadith' (amir
al-mu'minin fi'l-Hadith)
and is the author of two important compilations of Hadith, namely
al-Jami'
al-Kabir,
and al-Jami'
al- Saghir]
According
to al-Thawri, apostate should be re-invited to Islam, but should
never be condemned to death. [He] maintained the view that the
invitation should continue for as long as there is hope that the
apostate might change his mind and repent. [cited in Kamali, as
above]
Shams
al-Din al-Sarakhsi
[d. 389 AH]
[An eminent Hanafi jurist and author of
al-Mabsut]
"The
prescribed penalties (Hudud) are generally not suspended because of
repentance, especially when they are reported and become known to
the head of state (imam). The punishment of highway robbery, for
instance, is not suspended because of repentance; it is suspended
only by the return of property to the owner prior to arrest. ...
Renunciation of the faith and conversion to disbelief is admittedly
the greatest of offenses, yet it is a matter between man and his
Creator, and its punishment is postponed to the day of judgment
(fa'l-jaza'
'alayha mu'akhkhar ila dar al-jaza').
Punishments that are enforced in this life are those which protect
the people's interests, such as just retaliation, which is designed
to protect life." [al-Mabsut,
X, p. 110, quoted in Kamali cited above.]
Abu
Al-Walid Al-Baji
[d. 474 AH]
[a noted Maliki jurist; a contemporary of Imam Ibn
Hazm]
... observed that apostasy is a sin which carries
no prescribed penalty (hadd), and that such a sin may only be
punished under the discretionary punishment of ta'zir ... [mentioned
in Kamali cited above]
Imam
Abu 'Abdullah Al-Qurtubi
[d. 1273 AD]
[Eminent Malike Scholar of hadith and
fiqh]
"Al-Samara'i in his comment on this verse
(an-Nahl:107) has quoted from Qurtubi's al-Jami the remark that the
verse conveys an admonition that the wrath of Allah will be incurred
by the apostate but there is no hint of any other punishment."
[S. A. Rahman's Punishment of Apostasy in Islam, p. 47, referring to
Nu'man 'Abd al-Razzaq al-Samara'i. Ahkam al-Murtadd fi al-Shari'at
al-Islamiyyah, Beirut, Lebanon: Dar al-Arabiyyahya lil-Taba'at wal
Nashr wal-Tauzi, 1968]
Abu
Hayyan al-Andalusi
[d. 1355 AD]
[Maliki scholar and author of Qur'anic commentary
Bahrul
Muhit]
"Ibn
Hayyan, a well-known exegetist, has expressly mentioned a definite
opinion that no apostate can be coerced into rejoining the Muslim
community." [mentioned in S. A. Rahman, Punishment
of Apostasy in Islam,
India, Kitab Bhaban, 1996, p. 55]
Ibn
al-Hammam al-Hanafi
[14th century AD]
[Eminent scholar]
"There is
no punishment for the act of apostay, for its punishment is greater
than that, with God." [mentioned in S. A. Rahman, Punishment
of Apostasy in Islam,
India, Kitab Bhaban, 1996, p. 45, citing Sharh
Fath al-Qadir
with commentary by Chalpi on Fath
al-Qadir,
Vol. IV, pp. 388-9]
Shaikh
Rashid Rida
[1865-1935]
[Eminent Islamic scholar; disciple of
Afghani/Abduh]
"This verse reaffirms the one which
occurs in Surat al-Baqarah (II:256), and both proscribe compulsion
in religion. Both of these passages proclaim and uphold that people
are free to pursue religious beliefs of their own choosing. No
one is to be compelled to abandon the religion he professes nor must
anyone be exposed to punishment and torture for the sake of
religion."
[quoted in chapter Freedom
of religion
by Dr. Mohammad Hashim Kamali's Freedom
of Expression in Islam,
Islamic Text Society, 1997]
Maulana
Muhammad Ali Jauhar
[1878-1931]
[Indian author, scholar and a leading figure of the
Khilafat Movement]
"M. Muhammad Ali Jauhar had, it
seems, sponsored the thesis that Islam did not sanction any
punishment for apostasy." [mentioned in S. A. Rahman,
Punishment
of Apostasy in Islam,
India, Kitab Bhaban, 1996, p. 6]
Shaikh
Mahmud Shaltut
[1893-1963]
[A prominent Egyptian Islamic scholar. He was the
shaykh or grand imam, i.e. the leader, of Al-Azhar Islamic Institute
in Egypt from 1958 to 1963]
"Mahmud Shaltut analyses
the relevant evidence in the Qur'an and draws the conclusion that
apostasy carries no temporal penalty, and that in reference to this
particular sin, the Qur'an speaks only of punishment in the
hereafter ..." [mentioned in chapter Freedom
of religion
by Dr. Mohammad Hashim Kamali's Freedom of Expression in Islam,
Islamic Text Society, 1997., Shaltut, al-Islam
‘Aqidah wa-Shari’ah,
pp. 292-93; al-Samara'i,
Ahkam al-Murtadd fi al-Shari’ah al-Islamiyyah,
p. 114 f]
Subhi
Mahmassani
[An
outstanding Islamic scholar and jurist from Lebanon; author of The
Philosophy of Jurisprudence in Islam, 1961]
Mahmassani
has observed that the death penalty was meant to apply, not
to simple acts of apostasy from Islam, but when apostasy was linked
to an act of political betrayal of the community .The
Prophet never killed anyone solely for apostasy. This being the
case, the death penalty was not meant to apply to a simple change of
faith but to punish acts such as treason, joining forces with the
enemy and sedition. [Arkan
Huquq al-Insan fi l-Islam
(Bases of Human Rights in Islam), Beirut: Dar al-‘Ilm
li-l-Malayin, 1979, cited in Kamali, as above]
Shaykh
Muhammad Sayyid Tantawi
[Grand
Imam of al-Azhar since 1996]
"Shaykh Tantawi's
ruling on the subject of a Muslim apostasizing has certainly shed
new light on this subject, while making the non-Muslims realise that
Islam is a religion of moderation. To Shaykh Tantawi, a
Muslim who renounced his faith or turned apostate should be left
alone as long as he does not pose a threat or belittle Islam.
If
the Muslims were forced to take action against the apostate, he said
it should NOT be because he or she had given up the faith but
because he or she had turned out to be an enemy or a threat to
Islam.
Shaykh Tantawi, in his views, shows clearly how simple and moderate
Islam is, a religion that is tolerant and not coercive on anybody.
Shaykh Tantawi repeatedly stresses the need for Muslims to acquire
traditional Islamic knowledge as well as the modern ones so that
they could add to the strength of the Muslim community to defend the
religion." [Introduction
of Grand Imams of Al-Azhar]
Islamic
Research Department, Al-Azhar University
"The
Islamic Research Department of
Al-Azhar University has called the penalty for apostasy as null and
void
and has said that the ways of repentance are open for the whole
life. ... So an apostate can repent over his mistake anytime during
his life and there would be no fixed period for it." [Al-Alamul
Islami,
the weekly organ of Rabita
Alam al-Islami, 23rd
August 2002, quoted in Dr. M. E. Subhani, Global Media Publications,
2005, p. 25]
Dr.
Jamal Badawi
[Professor
Emeritus, St. Mary's University, Canada]
"The
preponderance of evidence from both the Qur'an and Sunnah indicates
that there is no firm ground for the claim that apostasy is in
itself a mandatory fixed punishment (hadd), namely capital
punishment." [Is
Apostasy a Capital Crime in Islam?"
"when
a man in Madinah apostated from Islam, the Prophet (peace and
blessings be upon him) neither ordered his execution nor punished
him in any other way, and when the man finally left Madinah, the
Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) never sent anyone to
arrest him or punish him because of his apostasy."
[Apostasy-Dialogue
with Dr. Jamal Badawi]
Dr.
Mohammad Hashim Kamali
[Professor
of law at the International Islamic University of Malaysia; author
of Principles of Islamic Jurisprudence, 2003 and Freedom of
Expression in Islam, 1994]
"The controversy been
exacerbated further by reliance on the provision in the Sunnah which
authorizes the death penalty for apostasy without due consideration
of other evidence in the Sunnah to the effect that punishment
by death was meant only for apostasy accompanied by hostility and
treason.
... The
Prophet did not treat apostasy as a proscribed offense (hadd), but,
on the contrary, pardoned many individuals who had embraced Islam,
then renounced it, and then embraced it again. ...
[T]he
Qur'an is consistent in its affirmation of the freedom of belief and
it fully supports the conclusion that the objectives of the Shari ah
cannot be properly fulfilled without granting people the freedom of
belief, and the liberty to express it."
[Chapter: Freedom
of Religion
in Mohammad Hashim Kamali’s Freedom of Expression in Islam
Islamic Text Society, 1997]
Dr.
Tariq Ramadan
[Swiss
Muslim Academic and Scholar]
"Q What about apostasy?
What happens if you are born and educated a Muslim but then say: I
have now decided that Islam is not for me. Would you accept that
someone born into a Muslim family has a right to say that they no
longer believe, and that families and communities must respect
that?
A) I have been criticised about this in many
countries. My view is the same as that of Sufyan Al-Thawri, an
8th-century scholar of Islam, who argued that the Koran does not
prescribe death for someone because he or she is changing religion.
Neither
did the Prophet himself ever perform such an act. Many around the
Prophet changed religions. But he never did anything against them.
There was an early Muslim, Ubaydallah ibn Jahsh, who went with the
first emigrants from Mecca to Abyssinia. He converted to
Christianity and stayed, but remained close to Muslims. He divorced
his wife, but he was not killed." [Interview:
Tariq Ramadan]
Ayatullah
Murtadha Mutahari
[d. 1979 AD]
[Prominent and influential Iranian scholar,
cleric, academic, and political figure].
The late
Ayatollah Mutahhari highlighted the incompatibility of coercion with
the spirit of Islam, and the basic redundancy of punitive measures
in the propagation of its message. He wrote that it is impossible to
force anyone to acquire the kind of faith that is required by Islam,
just as 'it is not possible to spank a child into solving an
arithmetical problem. His mind and thought must be left free in
order that he may solve it. The Islamic faith is something of this
kind. ['Islam and the Freedom of Thought and Belief’,
Al-Tawhid,
p.154, cited in Kamali mentioned above]
Dr.
Hassan Turabi
[Sudanese
Islamic leader and intellectual]
"Q) You believe
that apostasy should not be punishable by death. There has been a
recent case of an Afghan who was about to be killed for apostasy but
was saved under the pretense of mental illness. The case was
recognized internationally as Italy wants to grant him asylum.
A)
There are too many Quranic verses to recite (regarding this). We are
ordered to debate with Christians and Jews except those who are
unjust. We believe in their prophets who are our prophets too. We
believe in their books even if some distortion took place. We are
ordered to treat them cordially." [Interview
with al-Sharq al-Awsat]
"To
be punishable [as a capital offence] apostasy has to be more than
just intellectual apostasy. It would have to translate into not only
sedition but actually insurrection against society.” [quoted
in Globalization and the Muslim World: Sub-Saharan Africa in a
Comparative Context]
Kyai
Haji Abdurrahman Wahid
[former
President of Indonesia and leader of Nahdatul Ulama]
"Muslim
theologians must revise their understanding of Islamic law, and
recognize that punishment for apostasy is merely the legacy of
historical circumstances and political calculations stretching back
to the early days of Islam. Such punishments run counter to the
clear Koranic injunction "Let there be no compulsion in
religion" (2:256).
People of goodwill of every faith
and nation must unite to ensure the triumph of religious freedom and
of the 'right' understanding of Islam, to avert global catastrophe
and spare millions of others the fate of Sudan's great religious and
political leader, Mahmoud Muhammad Taha, who was executed on a false
charge of apostasy." [Extremism
Isn't Islamic Law]
Grand
Ayatollah Hossein-Ali Montazeri
...
a significant Shi'a religious authority, states that the above
verses do not prescribe an earthly penalty for apostasy and adds
that it is not improbable that the punishment was prescribed by
Muhammad during early Islam due to political conspiracies against
Islam and Muslims and not only because of changing the belief or
expressing it. Montazeri defines different types of apostasy. He
does not hold that a reversion of belief because of investigation
and research is punishable by death but prescribes capital
punishment for a desertion of Islam out of malice and enmity towards
the Muslim community. [Wikipedia:
Apostasy in Islam;
direct BBC
Persian link]
Dr.
Muhammad Ma'ruf al-Dawalibi
[former
Professor of Law in University of Damascus, Syria; member, Supreme
International Council for Mosques, Makkah]
"... it
has never been proved that the Messenger of God exacted punishment
on apostates by killing them. This was also what the caliph Omar Ibn
Abd al-Aziz did. ... Shaikh Mahmud Shaltut ... says that many
scholars are of the opinions that hudud punishment cannot be proved
by hadiths reported by single individuals. He also says that
disbelief in itself is not justification for shedding blood. The
real justification would be aggression against Muslims, fighting
them ..." [quoted in Prof. Dr. Ala'Eddin Kharofa, Nationalism,
Secularism, Apostasy and Usury
in
Islam,
A.S. Noordeen, 1994, p. 13]
Sheikh
Gamal Al-Banna
[Egyptian
Islamist thinker, author, and journalist]
In an article
titled "No Punishment for Ridda [Muslims leaving Islam];
Freedom of Thought is the Backbone of Islam," Al-Banna quoted
all the Koranic verses on the subject, and then said: "These
verses are clear with regard to ridda in Islam; they make no mention
of any torture or punishment for the murtadd in this world, like the
punishments for thieves or murderers. The [only] dreadful and
terrifying punishment is the rage of Allah. This is compatible with
the policy and spirit of the Koran, and the many other texts
included in it, that are based on belief in persuading the
individual and his intent without coercion or pressure, and that
state that his freedom is maximal... [Sheikh
Gamal Al-Banna: Social and Religious Moderation Vs. Political
Extremism]
Dr.
Abdul Aziz Sachedina
[Professor,
Religious Studies, University of Virginia]
"The
ethics of Islamic law allow for an interesting dilemma in regards to
the issue of free speech because there is no clear understanding
between civil and religious violations. There are certain acts, such
as apostasy, that don’t fall under the jurisdiction of the
legal system and don’t have a defined penal punishment as
outlined in the Qu’ran. 'There can be no particular punishment
for apostasy from a legal point of view,' Sachedina said. 'From a
religious point of view, only God has the power to punish you.'
[Cultural
Differences Explain Muslim Reaction to Danish Cartoons, Sachedina
Says]
Dr.
Rachid Ghannouchi
[leading
Islamic thinker and philosopher, and also a scholar on the European
Council for Fatwa and Research]
"The first challenge
was that of ar-ridda (the turning away or back, or apostasy, from
Islam), which Ghannouchi views more as a military insurrection than
an act of apostasy." [quoted in Dr. Azzam Tamimi's Democracy:
The Religious and the Political in Contemporary Islamic Debate]
Organization:
Council of American-Islamic Relations [CAIR]
“Islamic
scholars say the original rulings on apostasy were similar to those
for treasonous acts in legal systems worldwide and do not apply to
an individual's choice of religion. Islam advocates both freedom of
religion and freedom of conscience, a position supported by verses
in the Quran, Islam's revealed text … ‘Religious
decisions should be matters of personal choice, not a cause for
state intervention. Faith imposed by force is not true belief, but
coercion. Islam has no need to compel belief in its divine truth. As
the Quran states: ‘Truth stands out clear from error.
Therefore, whoever rejects evil and believes in God has grasped the
most trustworthy hand-hold that never breaks.’ (2:256)
‘We
urge the government of Afghanistan to order the immediate release of
Mr. Abdul Rahman.’Before issuing its statement, CAIR consulted
with members of the Fiqh Council of North America, an association of
Islamic legal scholars that interprets Muslim religious law.”
[CAIR
Calls For Release Of Afghan Christian]
Dr.
AbdulHamid AbuSulayman
[Former
Rector, International Islamic Univresity, Malaysia; former Chairman,
International Institute of Islamic Thoughts]
"The
conceptual confusion occurs in the early period of Islam, because
this political conspiracy took the form of apostasy while the real
goal was to destroy the Muslim community. The confusion lies in
taking the act for what it appeared to be and not for what it was
meant to be. They mistook political conspiracy for an exercise of
the human right of freedom of belief and choice. The jurists seemed
to exercise little analysis concerning the whole question. The word
apostasy alone determined their position.
This
misunderstanding of the significance of the word apostasy in the
Qur'an and the punishment to it in the Hadith of the Prophet (PBUH)
destroyed in the classical jurisprudence the basis of the Islamic
concept of tolerance and human responsibility.
The early
Muslim position on apostasy ... was not directed against freedom of
conscience and belief but towards enforcing the policy of
Islamization of the warring Bedouin tribes and toward checking
conspiracy." [The
Islamic Theory of International Relations: New Directions for
Islamic Methodology and Thought,
IIIT, 1981, p. 104]
S.
A. Rahman
[former
Chief Justice of Pakistan]
... the Qur'an is silent on
the question of death as the punishment for apostasy, despite this
subject occurring no less than twenty times in the Holy Book. Rahman
then traces the chain of transmission of the Hadith which proclaims
'kill whoever changes his religion'. ...
As this is a
solitary Hadith (ahad), Rahman finds some weakness in its
transmission (isnad). Rahman's conclusion is also supported by other
evidence, such as the fact that neither the Prophet himself nor any
of his Companions ever compelled anyone to embrace Islam, nor did
they sentence anyone to death solely for renunciation of the faith.
[cited in Kamali, mentioned above]
Dr.
Khaled Abou El Fadl
[Distinguished
scholar and Professor of Law and Islamic Studies, University of
California, Los Angeles, USA]
But while the Koran
mentions ridda,
it never calls for the execution of apostates. There is no record of
the prophet killing an apostate himself. And executions of apostates
have been rare in Islamic history. "The common argument is that
it clearly contradicts the Koran, which says there should not be
compulsion in religion," said Khaled Abou El Fadl, an Islamic
law expert and professor at the University of California, Los
Angeles. [In
Kabul, a Test for Shariah]
Dr.
Fathi Osman
[Commenting
on 2:256]
"This principle of freedom of faith is assured
in many other Qur'anic verses. As examples, we read 10:99, 11:28,
88:21-22. Forcing any person to act in any way nullifies the moral
and legal responsibility of that person in such an action, whether
it is good or evil; consequently, he/she cannot be respectively
rewarded or punished for that forced action. Accordingly, imposing
Islam by force on any human being will never bring out God's
accpetance and reward to the imposer or the one upon whom it was
imposed. ...
Another report attributed the reason of
revelation [of 2:256] to another incident, in which two sons of a
Yathribi were persuaded to be Christians by some Syrian merchants
whom they joined. Their parents wanted to get them back by force,
but the Prophet stressed their right to make their own free
decision, and the verse was revealed to support what the Prophet had
said. Al-Zamakhshari, the distinguished linguist and commentator of
the Qur'an, commented on the above verse: 'God has not conducted the
matter of faith through compelling and forcing, but through
enabling] the person to make his/her own decision] and willfully
choosing.' " [Concepts of the Qur'an: A Topical Reading, 2nd
Ed., Los Angeles, CA: MVI Publication, p. 808]
Dr.
Sheikh Mohammed Ali Al-Hanooti
[Mufti
of Greater Washington]
"The issue of apostasy falls
under the umbrella of man’s free will, freedom of expression
and belief. The Holy Qur’an states unequivocally that nobody
can be compelled to either become a Muslim or remain one. In Surah
4: 137, Allah says, “Behold, as for those who come to believe,
and then deny the truth, and again come to believe and again deny
the truth and thereafter, grow stubborn in their denial of the
truth, God will not forgive them, nor will He guide them in any
way.” This ayah very clearly shows that even after rejecting
Islam twice, no punishment is prescribed for the apostates.
The
punishment for apostasy mentioned in Islamic literature is derived
from hadiths whose authenticity is not certain (as these hadiths are
ahad -from one source, but not mutawatir- from a consensus of
sources). Even among those scholars who accept them as authentic,
there is vast difference of opinion on the interpretation and
elaboration of the hadiths. Such hadiths have been traditionally
cited as justification for executing apostates, but these were
circumstantial rulings where legal authorities of that time deemed
the punishment justified, as the act of apostasy in question, or in
some cases, mass apostasy was comparable to treason or to an
organized crime outfit, where the apostates would ally themselves
with the opponents of the state.
Such hadiths, which
have, in the past, been cited to justify punishment for apostasy,
therefore, cannot stand against the Qur’an, which provides no
textual evidence for such action. On the contrary, the Qur’an
states in Surah 10: 99: “If it had been the will of your Lord
that all the people of the world should be believers, all the people
of the world would have believed! Would you then compel them against
their will to believe?”
In conclusion, the Qur’an
is the definitive clear authority for protecting the rights of an
individual in expressing himself in faith and supercedes any of the
distorted interpretations of the hadiths in question. Executing a
person because of conversion to another faith contradicts the
Qur’an, the ultimate source of Shari’ah." [The
Ruling on Apostasy]
Dr.
Mahmoud Ayuob
[Professor
of Islamic Studies, Temple University]
Summary: After
determining what constitutes apostasy (riddah),
defined as 'an act of rejection of faith committed by a Muslim whose
Islam had been affirmed without any coercion', the author looks at
the understanding of riddah
in the Qur'an and the Tradition. From this study he concludes that
there is no real basis for the riddah
law in either of these sources. ["Religious Freedom and the Law
of Apostasy in Islam," Islamachristiana,
Vol. 20, 1994, pp. 75-91]
Islamic
Center of Long Island, New York
"The
Quran states categorically and unequivocally, there shall be no
coercion in matters of faith. (2:256). This cornerstone tenet of
Islamic faith is violated when an individual is put on trial for
converting away from Islam. This verse, very clearly teaches that
faith is a personal matter between the individual and God."
[Islamic
Center of Long Island’s Position Regarding Apostasy]
Dr.
Asghar Ali Engineer
[Director,
Institute of Islamic Studies, India]
"No wonder than
that Qur’an not only does not prescribe any punishment for
apostasy it is against any such punishment. … In view of such
clear exposition how can one maintain that one who becomes apostate
(murtad) should be punished with death? Such a punishment goes
completely against the principle of freedom of faith laid down in
the Qur’an. Since according to the Qur’an human beings
are responsible for their acts, they have been created free and only
a free agent can be held responsible for ones acts, good or bad.
This is quite clear from the story of Adam who was warned not to go
near a tree in paradise but was left free to decide and he decided
to test the fruit of the tree and as a result was expelled from it.
This story itself is sufficient to establish principle of freedom of
choice in the Qur’an. … Today human rights are of vital
importance and modern scholars are also engaged in the project of
showing these rights as quite compatible with Islam. And, if some
‘Ulama insist on death sentence for apostasy it is not only
crime against freedom of conscience and democratic rights but also
serious disservice against Islam." [Islam
and Punishment for Apostasy]
Dr.
Abdullah Saeed
[Director,
Centre for the Study of Contemporary Islam, University of Melbourne,
Australia]
"This book argues that the law of
apostasy and its punishment by death in Islamic law is untenable in
the modern period. Apostasy conflicts with a variety of foundation
texts of Islam and with the current ethos of human rights, in
particular the freedom to choose one's religion. Demonstrating the
early development of the law of apostasy as largely a
religio-political tool, the authors show the diversity of opinion
among early Muslims on the punishment, highlighting the substantial
ambiguities about what constitutes apostasy, the problematic nature
of some of the key textual evidence on which the punishment of
apostasy is based, and the neglect of a vast amount of clear
Qur'anic texts in favour of freedom of religion in the construction
of the law of apostasy.
Examining the significant
challenges the punishment of apostasy faces in the modern period
inside and outside Muslim communities - exploring in particular how
apostasy and its punishment is dealt with in a multi-religious
Muslim majority country, Malaysia, and the challenges and
difficulties it faces there - the authors discuss arguments by
prominent Muslims today for an absolute freedom of religion and for
discarding the punishment of apostasy." [Book Intro: Freedom of
Religion, Apostasy and Islam, Ashgate Publications, 2004]
Dr.
Mohamed Shahrour
[Islamic
Thinker and Scholar, Syria]
“Let us consider how
the history of Islamic jurisprudence has dealt with the issue of
freedom and justice in relation to apostasy (al‑riddah). We
have to distinguish between two types of apostasy: that of
politics and that of creeds and beliefs. To rebel against the
government and attempt to oust it and rule in its stead is political
apostasy. … when we persuade or coerce people into believing
or disbelieving, we are actually disregarding and belittling God’s
Word. … I wish to emphasize that Islamic respect for freedom
and Muslims’ awareness of its value cannot be established by
force and coercion, for the enforcement of any democratic ideal
would be no different from the ‘just tyrannical’
leadership.” [The
Concept of Freedom in Islam]
Dr.
Irfan Ahmad Khan
[A
respected scholar of the Qur'an, president of the World Council of
Muslims for Interfaith Relations and Chair of the Interreligious
Engagement Project. He is also a trustee of the Council for a
Parliament of the World's Religions. He is the author of a new
Qur'anic translation and commentary, Reflections
on the Quran: Understanding Surahs Al-Fatihah & Al-Baqarah.
Chicago, Illinois]
“[N]o one has any right to use
pressure of any kind to make a person change or stop from changing
his/her religion. An individual out of his/her own free will should
himself or herself do entering into a religion or coming out of a
religion.” [Freedom
to Change Ones’ Religion]
Dr.
Imad-ad-Dean Ahmad
[President/Director,
Minaret of Freedom Institute, Maryland, USA]
"Discussions
of Islamic law by non-Muslims (and, all too often, by Muslims as
well) suffer from confusion between the concepts of apostasy and
treason. The majority view is that the death penalty applies only to
treason during wartime, including providing aid and comfort to the
enemy, rather than mere conversion. According to the Constitution
[Article III, section 3], treason consists only 'in levying war
against [the United States], or in adhering to their enemies, giving
them aid and comfort.' That Muhammad shared this view can be seen in
the fact that he never executed apostates except when they made war
or propaganda against the Muslims." [On
the American Constitution from the Perspective of the Qur'an and the
Madinah Covenant by Dr. Imad-ad-Dean Ahmad]
Dr.
Mohammed Fadel
[Faculty
of Law, University of Toronto, Canada]
"It is
certainly true that the vast majority of Islamic legal scholars in
the middle ages prescribed the death penalty for apostates, after an
appropriate period for the defendant to repent. This was not,
however, a universal position, as an early (and quite respected and
important authority, Ibrahim al-Nakha'i, argued that an apostate has
the rest of his natural life to repent. More importantly, the origin
of the crime of apostasy is political/military treason, not freedom
of conscience. Early works of Islamic law make this clear. Almost
inevitably, questions of apostasy are raised in the context of a
Muslim 'defecting' and joining the ranks of the enemy.
This
should not be too surprising given the religious nature of polities
in that day and age. In today's world, polities are not
religion-based, but based on citizenship, and accordingly, the
original logic behind the rules of apostasy have lost their force.
For that reason, many, but not all, contemporary Muslim thinkers
reject the notion that apostasy should be a capital offense. Of
course, that does not mean that, in times of crisis, demagogues
cannot abuse obsolete rules to wreak havoc." [Interview]
Shaikh
Dr. Taha Jabir al-Alwani
[former
Professor of Fiqh and Usul al Fiqh at Imam Muhammad b. Sa'ud
University in Riyadh. Founding member, the International Institute
of Islamic Thought (IIIT) in the USA in 1981; founder-member of the
Council of the Muslim World League in Makkah; , a member of the OIC
Islamic Fiqh Academy in Jeddah since 1987; and President of the Fiqh
Council of North America since 1988.]
"Apostasy is
not a simple act. It has several parts. We cannot simply say that
someone left the religion. We must look at the reasons and actions
that come before leaving the religion. Suppose one becomes an
expatriate and fights against the U.S, (for example). This person
would be tried and convicted of treason and usually killed. But if
one leaves a religion without causing harm to others or engages in
treason, then there is no punishment. The Qur'an is blatant about
the fact that there is no compulsion in religion. Some people at the
time of the Prophet would convert in the morning and leave Islam at
night. The Prophet then announced that those joining in Islam in
good faith are welcome, but those who join only to then leave and
discredit Islam and then encourage others to fight Islam, that is
considered treason and treated as a crime in the same way as U.S.
law." [Interveiew]
Dr.
Mohammad Omar Farooq
[Associate
Professor of Economics and Finance, Upper Iowa University]
"Indeed
the Qur’an specifies no worldly punishment for apostasy.
Hadith refers to only those cases that involved political treason,
not apostasy. Also, these hadiths are not mutawatir and thus do not
yield certainty of knowledge. In addition, there is no ijma or
consensus on this. On the contrary, even some Classical jurists have
rejected such punishment.
Of greater importance is the
fact that the Qur’an is explicit and insistent about the
freedom of faith for all. If Islam upholds the freedom of choice in
faith and if “Let there be no compulsion in deen” means
anything, then orthodox position on apostasy is unacceptable and
unislamic. There is no ambiguity about it. In this world we make
precious choices. Muslims should propagate their faith to the best
of their ability: Islam in its essence represents the ultimate
truth. Nonetheless we are also to respect each other’s right
to choose in this world. Muslims’ responsibility is sincere
and capable propagation. And most assuredly there is no provision
for compulsion of faith in Islam – before embracing the faith
or after." [Apostasy,
Freedom and Da’wah: Full Disclosure in a Business-like Manner]
Dr.
Louay Safi
[Executive
Director of ISNA Leadership Development Center; Ex-President,
Association of Muslim Social Scientists]
“Traditionalist
scholars have long embraced classical positions on apostasy that
consider the rejection of Islam as a capital crime, punished by
death. This uncritical embrace is at the heart of the drama that was
played in the case of the Afghan convert to Christianity, and which
would likely be repeated until the debate about shari’ah
reform and its relevance to state and civil law is examined and
elaborated by authentic Muslim voices. … Indeed, one cannot
find in the Qur’an any support for the apostasy (ridda)
penalty. … I am inclined to the increasingly popular view
among contemporary scholars, that ridda does not involve a moral act
of conversion, but a military act of rebellion, whose calming
justifies the use of force and the return of fire. … A
Christian or a Jew who converts to Islam is no more a Christian or a
Jew, but a Muslim and must be respected as such. By the same taken a
Muslim who convert to Christianity is no more a Muslim, but a
Christian and must be respected as such.” [Apostasy
and Religious Freedom]
Dr.
Ingrid Mattson
[President,
Islamic Society of North America; Professor of Islamic studies at
Hartford Seminary in Connecticut]
"Given the
importance to her of individual choice, Mattson is well aware of the
major questions Westerners have about religious freedom in Muslim
countries - and whether Muslims have the right to convert to other
faiths. A few converts have had their children taken away or have
been persecuted as a result. A specialist in Islamic law, Mattson
says this is an area that is now being widely examined and
contested.
'Many scholars have convincingly argued that
apostasy is not a crime, while treason is, based on cases from the
early days of Islam, where people who left the community for other
religions were not punished, while those who left the political
community and betrayed it were.'
What happened
historically in some Muslim societies, she says, was that no
distinction was made between community affiliation and religious
affiliation. But today's world makes other demands, and she supports
the case being made for separation of the two." [Muslim
convert takes on leadership role]
Dr.
Zaki Badawi
[Principal
of the Muslim College; Chairman of the Imams and Mosques Council
UK;, Chairman of the Muslim Law (Shariah) Council UK;, Vice-Chairman
of the World Congress of Faiths;, and a Director and Trustee of
UNICEF UK]
... forcing people to believe things just
makes them hypocrites. The Koran has no compulsion, no punishment
for going away. ... [Inter-faith
meeting March 2005]
Organization:
Muslim Public Affairs Council
“...
[T]he Quran mandates that religious freedom be respected.
Furthermore, the Prophet Muhammad himself never sentenced an
apostate to death. 'While apostasy may be a sin in the eyes of God,
it is not considered to be criminal behavior,' Dr. Maher Hathout
writes in his recent book 'In Pursuit of Justice: The Jurisprudence
of Human Rights in Islam' (available through Amazon.com).
'We
strongly oppose the state's use of coercion in regulating Islamic
belief in such a manner, since faith is a matter of individual
choice on which only God can adjudicate.'" [MPAC
Joins Calls for Release of Afghan Christian]
Imam
Feisal Abdul Rauf
[Founder
and CEO of the American Society for Muslim Advancement (ASMA
Society) and Imam of Masjid Al-Farah, a mosque in New York City]
On
page 31 of What's
Right With Islam,
Imam Rauf maintains that: “What is right about any religion or
societal structure is therefore the extent to which individuals and
societies fully manifest the principles of the Abrahamic ethic”.
Just prior to this conclusion, he lists a number of failings of the
Muslim community in this respect after the Prophet Muhammad (peace
be upon him) passed away – namely, the disappearance of the
rule of law applied by an independent judiciary; the judgment that
apostasy is the equivalent of treason; continuation of the practice
of slavery despite the many Quranic verses that sought to eliminate
that institution; and, the on-going oppression of women. [What's
Right With Islamby Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf -A Critical Commentary]
Dr.
Saif Ad-Deen 'Abdul-Fattah
[Professor
of political theory at Cairo University, known for his remarkable
contribution to the branch of jurisprudence that deals with
al-maqasid (the objectives of Shari`ah)]
"I think
that the rule that governs the issue here is Allah's saying [There
is no compulsion in religion] (Al-Baqarah 2:256). Religion cannot by
any means be compared to a trap; whoever is trapped in it can never
get out. Muslims are in no need of new hypocrites. From this point,
I can assure that those who apostatize are always to be asked to
repent. The incidents of apparent apostasy in our history are those
of collective apostasy. This kind of collective apostasy is
considered as cases of state security and national security, in
which the penalty for apostasy is applied to protect the whole
state." [Freedom
and the Cartoon Crisis: From the Incident to the Approach]
Dr.
M. Cherif Bassiouni
[President,
International Human Rights Law Institute at DePaul University]
“A
Muslim's conversion to Christianity is not a crime punishable by
death under Islamic law, contrary to the claims in the case of Abdul
Rahman in Afghanistan.While there is long-established doctrine that
apostasy is punishable by death, that has also long been questioned
by Islamic criminal justice scholars, including this writer.”
[Leaving
Islam Is Not a Capital Crime]
Sheikh
Muhammad Al-Mukhtar Al-Shinqiti
[Director
of the Islamic Center of South Plains, Lubbock, Texas]
"What
I understand from different hadiths on the issue is that apostasy
has two different aspects: one, as an intellectual position, i.e. a
Muslim who is no longer convinced of the truth of Islam. The second
apostasy is in the meaning of political treason and military
rebellion against Muslims. During the time of the Prophet Muhammad
(peace and blessings be upon him), the person that changed his
religion joined the pagan army and fought against Muslims, and that
is, in my view, what meant by: 'one who reverts from Islam
(apostate) and leaves the Muslims.' Therefore, apostasy as purely an
intellectual position has no prescribed punishment in the Islamic
law, but if a Muslim committed treason against the Muslim Ummah and
joined the enemy fighting against Muslims, then he would deserved
the death punishment, especially at times of war. Even in secular
laws in some countries the penalty for treason is capital
punishment.
This does not mean that apostasy is not a
great sin – indeed it is the worst of all sins, and Allah says
that He will punish those who committed such a heinous act. But not
every sin that is punishable on the Day of Judgment has punishment
in this world." [Islamonline
Live Fatwa Session]
Dr.
Asma Afsaruddin
[Associate
Professor of The Classics/Middle East Studies, University of Notre
Dame]
"Asma Afsaruddin, who teaches Islamic studies
at the University of Notre Dame, said that Islam 'threatens
punishment in the next world, but that is God's prerogative. The
Qur'an has no penalty prescribed for apostasy.' [Afghan
Christian averts death for apostasy as Italy grants asylum]
Organization: Muslim American Society [MAS]
"We
at MAS Freedom oppose the possible execution of Mr. Abdul Rahman on
both humanitarian and religious grounds. To purse such an action
would not only be a flagrant violation of the standards of human
rights which the Karzai regime claims to embrace, but it also runs
contrary to the Holy Quran, which forbids compulsion in religion."
[MAS
Freedom Foundation Responds to The Issue of Apostasy in Afghanistan]
Dr.
Chandra Muzaffar
[A
Malaysian political scientist; President of the International
Movement for a Just World (JUST)]
"The Noble Qur'an
itself views those who leave Islam --- the murtadd( apostate)-with
utmost displeasure. It says, " Those who believe, and then
disbelieve, and then( again) disbelieve, and then increase in
disbelief, Allah will never pardon them, nor will He guide them to
the (right) way ( Surah 4:137). But the Qur'an does not prescribe
capital punishment or any other form of punishment for the apostate.
Neither does the Sunnah. It was only when apostasy was coterminous
with rebellion against the nascent state that the Prophet( may peace
be upon him) had established in Medina, that the death penalty was
imposed. The Righteous Caliphs followed the Prophet's example. The
jurists who came after them adopted a different approach. They felt
no necessity to differentiate between mere peaceful change of faith
and violent rebellions. Consequently, their rulings evolved into
mainstream jurisprudence which is what the ulama of today have
inherited." [From
Fiqh to Qur'an: Resolving Apostasy]
Dr.
Hesham A. Hassaballa
[M.D.;
author and scholar; Beliefnet columnist]
“This
entire “what to do with apostates” debate has raised an
extremely important question in my mind. Despite the overwhelming
evidence in the Qur’an against the death penalty for those who
choose to leave the fold of Islam, despite the fact that the hadith,
when understood correctly, does not contradict the Qur’anic
position, it is amazing that some people still cling on to the
opinions of scholars on this issue. People continue to retort to me,
“All of the 4 imams have upheld death for apostates.”
[Are
The Scholars The Same As God Himself?]
Dr.
Maher Hathout
[MPAC's
Senior Advisor; Charter Member of the Pacific Council on
International Policy; member, Board of Directors of the Interfaith
Alliance; retired physician]
“The problem with the
argument for punishment for apostasy is that it cannot be applied in
any Islamic state without giving rise to the potential for abuse by
the state itself. Erroneously equating moral with political power in
the determination of law has led to the political repression that we
see in Islamic countries today.” [In Pursuit of Justice, p.
157, quoted in Statement
on Afghan Christian Convert]
Dr.
Riffat Hassan
[Chair,
Religious Studies, University of Louisville]
“In
the context of the human right to religious freedom, it is necessary
to mention that, according to traditional Islam, the punishment for
apostasy is death. In other words, a person who is born a Muslim or
who becomes a Muslim is to be put to death if he or she later
chooses to renounce Islam. There is nothing in the Qur’an
which suggests any punishment at all, let alone the punishment of
death, for a Muslim who renounces Islam. There is absolutely no
reason to assume that the Qur’anic dictum, “Let there be
no compulsion in religion” (Sura 2:256), which modern Muslims
apply with such magnanimity to non-Muslims does not or should not
apply to Muslims also. (I believe that the death penalty was not
meant to be a punishment for apostasy alone but for apostasy
accompanied by “acts of war” against the Muslims.”
[On
Human Rights and the Qur’anic Perspective]
Dr.
M.E. Asad Subhani
[Head
of the faculty of Islamic Studies at the College of Education in
Zanzibar, Tanzania]
... argues that the dominant Muslim
position on apostasy as deserving death is, in fact, not sanctioned
in the primary sources of Islam, the Qur'an and the Hadith, the
traditions attributed to the Prophet Muhammad ... [Book
review: Apostasy in Islam]
Imam
Ziad Hamdan
[Islamic
Society of Milwaukee]
Speaking at the main Friday prayer
service, Imam Ziad Hamdan said that conversion is a personal
decision and is not subject to the intervention of the state. In
doing so, he drew upon his own understanding of the Qur'an, the
Muslim holy book, and echoed the opinions of many North American
Islamic scholars and of the Washington-based Council on
American-Islamic Relations. ... Hamdan said in an interview Friday
that clerics have an obligation to enter into a discussion with the
man to point out his errors, but that judgment and punishment are up
to God. [Conversion
is personal, area Islamic leaders says]
Dr.
Zulfiqar Ali Shah
[Religious
Director, Milwaukee Islamic Society; member of Fiqh Council of North
America; former President, Islamic Circle of North America; CEO,
Universal Heritage Foundation]
That view [of Imam Ziad
Hamdan] was reinforced by Zulfiqar Ali Shah, the Milwaukee Islamic
society's religious director. He also is a prominent scholar and a
member of the Fiqh Council of North America, an association of
Islamic legal scholars that interprets Muslim religious law. Shah
said in an interview that the council and most other scholars in
North America hold that an individual has the freedom to choose a
faith, or to leave a faith, without earthly punishment.
"Islam
does not allow coercing anybody into the Islamic religion,"
Shah said. "And even if it comes to apostasy, 'Irtidad,' the
word which means apostasy in the Qur'an appears 14 times, and all
the 14 times the Qur'an does mention that there is punishment in the
life hereafter, but it says nothing about this worldly life
whatsoever." [Conversion
is personal, area Islamic leaders say]
Maulana
Inayatullah Asad Subhani
[Scholar;
author of many thought-provoking books on Islam; India]
And
there is no bigger misconception-strengthened with misinterpretation
of Islamic thoughts over the years-other than the belief that Islam
doesn't tolerate apostasy. Ulama have tried to strengthen it through
their emphasis and several leading Muslim reformists have failed to
tackle the issue. This misconception has also presented Islam as a
medieval and killer religion. Islam baiters have time and again
tried to carry the point by pointing out that Islam orders the
killing of a person if he reverts to other religion from Islam.
And
there was none who could answer this widely held belief as well as
put forth a convincing argument about the misinterpretation of
Qur'anic teachings by ulama.
Inayatullah Subhani says
that neither Islam forces any person to embrace Islam nor it forces
him to remain within its fold. He writes 'apostasy has been
mentioned several times in Qur'an. It also describes the bad
treatment that will be meted out for committing apostasy, but it
never talks of punishment for the crime in this world.' Maulana
mentions three ayaat (verses) from Qur'an on apostasy (Al-Baqara
217, Muhammad 25-27 and Al-Maida 54 )and then says that none of
these ayaat prescribes any punishment for that though these ayaat
pass strictures on the people who commit it. He mentions several
other ayaat on the same issue and then concludes that none of these
ayat prescribes either death penalty or any other punishment for
apostasy in this world. He then adds that had there been some
punishment in Islam for apostasy there was no reason as to why the
issue was mentioned repeatedly in Qur'an but no punishment was
prescribed.
He emphasizes that people who were awarded
death penalty for reverting to other religions from Islam during
either the time of the Prophet (SAW) or during the reign of his
caliphs were not given the punishment for the crime of apostasy but
for the fact that they were at war with Muslims and Islamic
government. [Book Review: Apostasy
doesn't carry death penalty in Islam]
Organization:
Islamic Center of Southern California
We
believe this trial, as well as apostasy laws in Afghanistan and
other so-called Muslim states mandating the killing of apostates,
violates two fundamental tenets of Islam.
a. Freedom of
religion – The Quran states categorically and unequivocally,
“there shall be no coercion in matters of faith.”
(2:256). This cornerstone tenet of Islamic faith is violated when an
Islamic nation puts on trial individuals for converting away from
Islam. Based on this verse, we see that faith is an intimate matter
between a person and God. There is no room for a nation, or a pseudo
religious clergy, to take on a role that God has reserved for
Himself in judging the relationship between a person and the
Almighty.
b. Sanctity of human life - one of the
paramount goals of Islamic law (Sharia) is the protection of human
life. [Statement
on Afghan Christian Convert]
Dr.
Abidullah Ghazi
[Executive
Director, IQRA International Educational Foundation, Skokie, IL;
USA]
"The instances of mutual respect and
cooperation afforded those Muslims living in North America are too
numerous, while incidents of impudence and intolerance, seemingly
inspired by the Shari’ah code, have displayed the exact
opposite in several Muslim-majority lands. ...
There has
also existed historically a long tradition of acceptance diversity
of culture and faith in Islamic civilization, a fact that has to be
remembered by those wishing to jettison this value in favor of
insularity and narrow-mindedness.The question nowadays for the
Muslim community in the West is how we want this very same culture
of freedom and choice that we enjoy as minorities reflected in
Muslim-majority societies. In the globalized reality of today,
Western Muslims have a special duty to promote similar attitudes of
respect for human rights, tolerance and mutuality in Muslim-majority
societies. ...
While much has been made of the official
radd penalty in the Western media these days, the fact is that
historically this penalty has been rarely enforced, and usually when
it was, it was due to some unmitigated political upheaval caused by
the said apostasy. ...
As a believing and practicing
Muslim who is deeply involved in inter-religious dialogue and
understanding, I call on all Muslim judicial systems and
legislatures worldwide (where the radd law exists) to contemplate
the decorum for this modern age in which we live and bring our
age-old and well-tested values in line with universal values. It is
high time that Muslims learn to respond to all such challenges
intellectually and academically, not through passionate or repellent
reaction." [An
Issue of Conversion]
Dr.
Ziauddin Sardar
[A
cultural critic, Muslim scholar, most prolific author, and editor of
Futures: The Journal of Planning, Policy, and Futures
Studies]
"Most Muslims consider the Shari'ah,
commonly translated as ‘Islamic law’, to be divine. Yet,
there is nothing divine about the Shari`ah. The only thing that can
legitimately be described as divine in Islam is the Qur’an.
The Shari`ah is a human construction; an attempt to understand the
divine will in a particular context. This is why the bulk of the
Shari`ah actually consists of fiqh or jurisprudence, which is
nothing more than legal opinion of classical jurists. The very term
fiqh was not in vogue before the Abbasid period when it was actually
formulated and codified. But when fiqh assumed its systematic legal
form, it incorporated three vital aspects of Muslim society of the
Abbasid period. At that juncture, Muslim history was in its
expansionist phase, and fiqh incorporated the logic of Muslim
imperialism of that time. The fiqh rulings on apostasy, for example,
derive not from the Qur'an but from this logic." [Rethinking
Islam]
Dr.
Abdullahi Ahmed an-Naim
[Professor
of Law at Emory University School; the director of the Religion and
Human Rights Program at Emory; formerly the Executive Director of
the African bureau of Human Rights Watch.]
"To
Muslims, Shari‘a is the 'Whole Duty of Mankind,' moral and
pastoral theology and ethics, high spiritual aspiration, and
detailed ritualistic and formal observance; it encompasses all
aspects of public and private law, hygiene, and even courtesy and
good manners. To attribute inadequacy to any part of Shari‘a
is regarded as heresy by the majority of Muslims, who believe that
the whole of Shari‘a is divine. This widespread view creates a
formidable psychological barrier, which is reinforced by the threat
of criminal prosecution for the capital offense of apostasy (ridda),
a real threat today in countries such as the Sudan." [Abdullahi
Ahmed An-Na’im, Toward
Islamic Reformation: Civil Liberties, Human Rights, and
International Law
(Syracuse Uni. Press 1996), p. 11].
" ... although
ridda
(apostasy) is condemned by the Qur'an in the strongest terms, the
Qur'an does not prescribe any punishment for apostasy in this life.
Nevertheless, the majority of Muslim jurists have classified
apostasy as a hadd
punishable by death as prescribed in the Sunna. Such classification
violates the fundamental right of freedom of religion, sanctioned by
the Qur'an in numerous verses. Relying on the higher authority of
the Qur'an for freedom of conscience, and arguing that the available
Sunna imposing the death penalty can be explained by the special
circumstances of the cases in question, some modern Muslim writers
have mainteained that apostasy is not a hadd.
This approach, however, does not address the other negative
consequences of apostasy under Shari'a, under the discretionary
power of ta'zir.
To remove all constitutional and human rights objections, the legal
concept of apostasy and all its civil and criminal consequences must
be abolished. Whatever Sunna authority may exist for penal and other
legal conseuences of apostasy should be taken as transitional and no
longer applicable in accordance with the evolutionary principle
explaned in Chapter 3." [p. 109]
Dr.
Jeffrey Lang
[Professor
of Mathematics, University of Kansas, USA; author of three
thought-provoking, must-reading books]
"The command,
'Let there be no compulsion in religion; truth stands out clear from
error' (2:256), would seem to argue against a penalty for apostasy
ouside of a manifest act of political treason. The majority trend of
those traditions of the Prophet related to incidents of apostasy
also point to this conclusion. In the first place, there are
authenticated traditions in which no action was taken against
apostates. ... Secondly, there are the group of traditions that
associate apostasy with high treason. ... While the death penalty
for apostasy still has important implications for Muslims in
countries like Iran, Saudi Arabia, and perhaps Pakistan, it is of
little immediate consequence to Muslims now living in western
countries, where the idea of killing someone for having second
thoughts about one's faith is highly repugnant. The evidence
resorted to in classical texts to justify execution for a mere
change of faith might better suggest limiting such a punishment only
to cases of aiding and abetting an enemy of the state."
[Struggling to Surrender, Amana Publications, 1994, pp. 210-211]
Dr.
Abdul Hakim Winter
[Professor
of Islamic Studies, University of Cambridge, U.K]
"The
issue of the punishment for apostasy is a fascinating example of
debates unfolding in Islamic law. Islam has four orthodox schools of
law, and traditionally the majority view in all four of them held
that apostasy carries the death penalty. In recent years, however,
many Muslim scholars have pointed out that even among the medieval
writers there are leading figures who, on the basis of the Muslim
scriptures, have contested this. An example, from the Hanafi school,
would be al-Sarakhsi; and from the Malikis, al-Baji. The reason for
the difference of opinion (hardly an uncommon phenomenon in Islamic
law!), is that the Qur'an nowhere lays down a penalty for apostasy,
and the Hadith texts have been interpreted in very contrasting
ways.
For this reason, Shaykh Mahmud Shaltut, the highest
religious authority in Egypt during the 1960s, issues an opinion to
the effect that apostasy was not a criminal offence in Islamic law.
This view has been followed widely in the Muslim world."
[Online
Dialogue: The Future of Muslims in the West]
Dr.
Amir Hussain
[Department
of Theological Studies; Loyola Marymount University; California,
USA]
Unfortunately, many Muslims and non-Muslims alike
are unaware of the historical contexts that shaped the development
of Islamic law. The harsh measures that some Muslims impose on those
who leave the faith must be understood in light of Islam's
beginnings as a persecuted tradition. Muslims were threatened by the
polytheists in Mecca, and a series of battles occurred between
Muhammad's community in Medina and the polytheists of Mecca. In that
context the death penalty as a punishment for apostasy was not so
much a matter of religious affiliation as a matter of political
identity. By reverting back to polytheism after having converted to
Islam, one would actively be siding with the polytheists of Mecca
and would therefore undermine the Muslim community. In effect,
apostasy was comparable to treason, an offence which still carries
the death penalty in several jurisdictions in the United States,
though no longer in Canada
.In the modern period,
extremist Muslims seem almost to take delight in applying those
early precedents to apostates today. The classical jurists of
Islamic law, however, were hesitant to rule on cases of apostasy,
however, precisely because of the capital nature of the offence.
They preferred to let God decide the matter on the day of judgment.
Indeed, the Qur'an is clear that ultimate judgment belongs to God
alone: "Whatever is in the heavens and whatever is in the earth
belongs to God; God forgives whom God pleases and chastises whom God
pleases; and God is Forgiving, Merciful" (3:129). This recourse
to God's judgment is applied differently throughout the Muslim
world; today some pacifist Muslims take it so far as to renounce not
only the death penalty but all violence in the defense of the faith.
When Muslims take upon themselves God's role as judge of a person's
faith, they flout the Qur'anic injunction given to the Prophet
Muhammad himself, that he was to warn people but not force them to
obey: "So therefore remind, for you [Muhammad] are one to
remind, but you are not a warden over them. But whoever turns back
and disbelieves, God will punish him with a mighty punishment. For
to Us [God] is their return, and it will be for Us to call them to
account" (88:21 - 26). It is therefore God who will inflict
punishment when human beings return to God at the end of this
life.
Of course, Muslims believe that human beings still
need law, or else there would be chaos. Even those of us who value
human freedom agree that certain conventions such as traffic signals
should be obeyed. The difficult issue is the intersection of human
justice in this world with God's justice in the world to come.
["Apostasy: turning away from Islam," in Oil
and Water: Two Faiths, One God
(Kelowna: Copper House, 2006), pp. 178-180]
Organization:
Muslim Women's League
[MWL]
The
Muslim Women's League ... [calls] for the release of the Afghan
Christian convert recently on trial for apostasy. We follow the
Qur'anic mandate that "there is no compulsion in religion"
and hope that this case will be resolved justly, as required by
Islam. [Calling
for Release of the Afghan Christian]
Imam
Yahya Hendi
[Muslim
chaplain at Georgetown University; Imam of the Islamic Society of
Frederick; a member and the spokesperson of the Islamic
Jurisprudence Council of North America; adjunct faculty with
Evergreen Society of John Hopkins University’s School of
Professional Development, MD.]
"I call on the
government of Afghanistan to release Abdul Rahman, a man facing the
death penalty for converting from Islam to Christianity. According
to my understanding of Islamic law (Shari’ah), belief is a
personal matter not subject to the intervention of the state.
Shari’ah Law safeguards the right of every human being to
choose his/her own faith and tradition. Shari’ah law should
not and must not be used by politicians to justify inhumane and
cruel treatment of converts and religious minorities living in
so-called Muslim Lands.
What the Islamic Shari’ah
terms Hadd ul-Riddah must be distinguished from the right to convert
out of Islam. Hadd ul-Riddah refers to the original rulings of early
Islamic scholars on apostasy, which were similar to rulings
concerning treason found in legal systems worldwide and do not apply
to an individual's choice of religion. ...
Let it be
known by all humanity, both Muslims and non-Muslims that religious
belief should be a matter of personal choice, not a cause for
government intervention. Faith imposed by force is not true belief,
but rather coercion." [Imam
Yahya Hendi calls for the release of Afghan Christian]
Dr.
Azizah al-Hibri
["Azizah
Y. al-Hibri is a professor at the T. C. Williams School of Law,
University of Richmond; founder and president of KARAMAH: Muslim
Women Lawyers for Human Rights.]
"The whole
punishment for Muslims who leave their people is not about change of
religion at all, whether Christianity or even lack of belief in God,
because God guaranteed for Muslims freedom of faith and freedom of
conscience. The whole idea was, if they were in a state of war and
this person left and joined the enemy who is fighting them, then he
becomes the enemy, and then you fight him like you fight the enemy.
That's what needs to be understood." [CNN
Interview]
Dr.
Radwan Masmoudi
[Founder,
member of the Board, and President of the Center of the Study of
Islam & Democracy (CSID)]
"Freedom of religion
is the only way to build a strong, moral society," says Radwan
Masmoudi, "where people can deal with each other with dignity,
respect, trust, and fairness." Progressive thinkers such as
Masmoudi advocate "liberal Islam," which considers freedom
of conscience a sacred right as well as a central democratic
doctrine. They argue that Muslims must recover the Koranic teaching
that human beings are created free, and that violations of basic
liberties--including freedom of worship--contradict human nature and
the will of God. [The
Unmentionable Freedom]
Ruqaiyyah
Waris Maqsood
[British
Muslim author and educator; authors of many books on Islam]
"As
regards the common misconception about issuing the death penalty for
leaving the faith (apostasy), or vilifying Allah (blasphemy), or
speaking abusively about Allah or his Messenger (pbuh), this was
never the case. The Prophet (pbuh) himself was frequently abused and
hurt and jeered at, but exhorted his followers going through equal
or greater suffering than himself to stand firm and accept the
unpleasantness with patience, hating the evil, but never hating the
people who had been overtaken by evil. The death penalty could be
issued legally in cases of treason or murder, the treason being the
cases of those who had once accepted the rule of Islam in an Islamic
country, but had then not merely turned against it (which anyone
might do - and be pitied for this tragedy rather than attacked;
their actual judgment rested with Allah in the life to Come), but
also actively led physical attacks upon it and coerced others into
doing so." [On
the Hijacking of Islam]
Dr.
A. Rashied Omar
[Research
Scholar of Islamic Studies and Peacebuilding, Joan B. Kroc Institute
for International Peace Studies, University of Notre
Dame]
“Contemporary Muslim jurists are uncritically
transporting medieval juristic positions that were negotiated in
radically different historical circumstances to present day
realities. … number of modern Muslim scholars have argued for
more lenient and humane positions on apostasy, marshalling strong
support for their views. … Notwithstanding these and other
tolerant Islamic positions on religious conversion, Muslims engaged
in interreligious dialogue need to be more honest and forthcoming
about the enormous challenge they face in reforming the hegemonic
traditional Muslim position on apostasy.” [The
Right to Religious Conversion: Between Apostasy and Proselytization]
Imam
Farooq Abo-Elzahab
[Imam,
Islamic Center of Greater Toledo]
“A person cannot
be forced into being a Muslim, and neither should someone be
punished for peacefully abandoning the faith,” according to
Imam Farooq Abo-Elzahab.
"The penalty is up to God
in the hereafter, but there is no penalty on this Earth for
apostasy," Imam Farooq said yesterday. He called the Afghan
government's charges against Abdul Rahman "a kind of nonsense,
a misinterpretation of Islam." [No
earthly penalty for converts, local imam says]
Imam
Sadullah Khan
[Executive
Director of Religious Affairs at the Islamic Center of Irvine,
California.]
“There is not a single instance that
Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) did treat apostasy as a prescribed offence
under hudud (capital punishment) only for leaving Islam. The Prophet
(pbuh) never put anyone to death for apostasy alone rather he let
such person go unharmed.” [Freedom,
Tolerance and the Shari’ah]
Dr.
Najah Kadhim
[Executive
Director of the International Forum for Islamic Dialogue (IFID) and
a senior university lecturer, London, United Kingdom]
“…
why should we feel so insecure about the destiny of Islam and lose
our self-confidence when dealing with other people to the extent of
imposing Islamic ideas and beliefs by force? … We have not
heeded the Qur’anic plea when it has appealed to our senses,
asking us to reflect, to seek to understand the causes of phenomena,
and therefore to be able to construct a great civilization. What we
now have is social retardation, far removed from the civilization
envisaged by the Qur’an. In our efforts to find solutions
to the problems that continue to arise day after day, we retreat
into the past to seek readymade answers. The execution of the
apostate reflects our distrust in the intellect and our blind
adherence to the use of violence, which are the result of our
yielding to inferior animal instincts and our imitating the shameful
attitudes of other nations.” [Has
the Time Come for a Serious Reflective Reassessment of the Fiqh of
the Killing of an Apostate (and many other issues)?]
Javed
Ahmad Ghamidi
Pakistani
Islamic scholar, exegete, and educationist; director of Al-Mawrid
Institute of Islamic Sciences; member of Council of Islamic Ideology
since 2006]
"Instead of interpreting the Hadith in
the light of the relationship between the Qur’an and Hadith,
they [the jurists]have interpreted it in the absolute sense, totally
against the context of the Qur’an. Consequently, in their
opinion the verdict pronounced in the Hadith has a general and an
unconditional application. They have thereby incorporated in the
Islamic Penal Code a punishment which has no basis in the Shari‘ah."
[Islamic
Punishments: Some Misconceptions]
Dr.
Reza Aslan
[Research
Associate at the University of Southern California's Center on
Public Diplomacy; author of "No God But God]
"It's
important, first of all, to understand that the Koran says nothing
about apostasy at all. There is no punishment in apostasy. This idea
of death as a punishment for apostasy actually arose at a time in
which Islam and the state were one. So, apostasy and treason were
considered the same thing. And, therefore, the punishment of death
was for all of it.
Not all Islamic law -- schools of
Islamic law actually agree upon this, just the very conservative
ones. And there are few more conservative schools of law than in
Afghanistan." [Anderson
Cooper 360 Degrees: Death to Christian Converts?]
Dr.
Ahmad Shafaat
[Distinguished
Mathematician and currently, professor, Department of Decision
Sciences and MIS, Concordia University, Montreal, Quebec. A noted
scholar in his own profession, Shafaat also specialized in
Comparative Religon and has authored many books and pamphlets about
Islam, Christianity, and Judaism.]
“It is a
significant fact that the Book of God does not prescribe any
punishment for apostasy. Many Muslims would immediately say, The
Qur`an does not tell us everything. We need to go to the Hadith to
find guidance on matters not touched by the Qur`an. But … The
punishment for apostasy is not a detail that we can expect God to
leave for ahadith, especially if that punishment is death, since
taking the life of a person, if done without a just cause, is
regarded by the Qur`an as tantamount to killing all human beings
(5:32).” [The
Punishment of Apostasy in Islam]
Shaikh
Dr. Ahmad Kutty
[Scholar,
Islamic Institute of Toronto]
“Even though the
penalty for treason was the death penalty (as was the case in the
Law of Moses as well), there was no targeting of people who simply
chose to leave Islam without any implication of treason. To simply
kill anyone who chooses to follow a religion other than Islam is
against the fundamental teachings of the Qur’an. Freedom of
conscience is a fundamental principle of the Qur’an that is
clearly stated in many Qur'anic verses.” [On
Apostasy]
Organization:
Islamic Center of San Deigo
The
position of ICSD on the apostasy case in Afghanistan is the position
taken by CAIR
and
MAS Freedom Foundation, namely that ICSD:
“oppose(s)
the possible execution of Mr. Abdul Rahman on both humanitarian and
religious grounds. To pursue such an action would not only be a
flagrant violation of the standards of human rights which the Karzai
regime claims to embrace, but it also runs contrary to the Holy
Quran, which forbids compulsion in religion.” [ICSD
Response to Apostasy Case In Afghanistan]
Dr.
Shahid Athar
[Islamic
activist and author; Indianapolis, IN, USA]
"There
is no death penalty in the Qur’an for apostasy. The Qur’an
says “Let there be no compulsion in religion, truth stands out
from falsehood. Whosoever rejects falsehood and believes in one God
has grasped the most trustworthy hand that never breaks, and God
hears and knows all things.” (2:26). In order to be a true
Muslim, the faith has to accepted in the heart of the person. A
court cannot force him to become Muslim." [Reflections
on God’s Grace, Salvation, Heaven & Hell]
Zainah
Anwar
[Executive
Director, Sisters in Islam, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia]
...
even though apostasy is a great sin it is not a capital offence in
Islam. Therefore a personal change of faith merits no punishment.
Yet in its attempt to introduce the hudud law in the 21st century,
the Islamic party in power in Terengganu chose the most extremist
juristic opinion to codify into law. It is a well-known fact that
the Qur'an is explicit in its recognition of freedom of religion and
there exists as well within the Islamic juristic heritage a position
that supports freedom of religion. [Islamisation
and its Impact on Democractic Governance and Women's Rights in
Islam]
Dr.
Muqtedar Khan
[Assistant
Professor in the Department of Political Science and International
Relations at the University of Delaware]
"...
religious minorities in some Islamic states, such as Afghanistan
under the Taliban, suffer institutionalized discrimination because
of these states’ legalist orientation and their obsession with
the Islamic jurisprudence. Some of the legalist positions in Islamic
states are so strict that non-Muslim minorities find it a challenge
to live normal lives. Blasphemy laws and apostasy laws are well
known for the problems they cause minorities." [Islamic
State and Religious Minorities]
Dr.
Ibrahim B. Syed
[President
of the Islamic Research Foundation International, Louisville,
Kentucky]
“And there is no bigger
misconception-strengthened with misunderstanding of Islamic beliefs
over the years-other than the belief that Islam doesn't tolerate
apostasy. The Christian missionaries and the Western world are
cashing in on it. Ulama have tried to strengthen their point of view
and several leading Muslim reformists have failed to tackle the
issue. This misconception has also presented Islam as a medieval and
killer religion. Islam bashers have time and again tried to carry
the point by pointing out that Islam orders the killing of a person
if he or she reverts to another religion from Islam.No body is
forthcoming to challenge this widely held belief as well as put
forth a convincing argument about the misinterpretation of Qur'anic
teachings by Ulama.The Qur’an is completely silent on any
worldly punishment for apostasy and the sole Tradition that forms
the basis of rulings is open to many interpretations.” [Is
Killing An Apostate in the Islamic Law?]
Dr.
Hasan Zillur Rahim
[Former
editor of IQRA, South Bay Islamic Association; Physicist]
"Many
Muslims have already pointed out the absurdity, illegality and
immorality of apostasy-killing as the hapless Rahman's impending
fate filtered out of Afghanistan. The most powerful indictment
comes, of course, from the Quran: Let there be no compulsion in
religion (2:256). ...
Hopefully, killing for apostasy and
stoning to death (only women need apply) for adultery will soon be a
thing of the past as absolutist clerics realize that their hold over
Muslim minds and hearts is rapidly dissipating. ...
Even
in conservative societies, Muslims are beginning to realize that
faith is a matter of personal responsibility and not a consequence
of authoritarian decree. The days of religious leaders thundering:
'I am right, you are dead' will soon, let us pray, be over once and
for all." [Lessons
from the case of the Afghan apostate]
Dr.
Shehzad Saleem
[Director,
Al-Mawrid, Institute of Islamic Sciences; Editor, Renaissance, a
monthly Islamic journal; Pakistan]
"It is shown on
the basis of the above mentioned feature that the following
directives of Islam are specific to the age of the last Rasul and
his companions and cannot be related to later Muslims: 1. Apostasy
..." [Understanding
the Qur’an: A Fundamental Premise]
Shah
Abdul Hannan
[Chairman,
Islamic Economic Research Bureau; former Chairman, Islami Bank
Bangladesh Ltd., former deputy governor, Bangladesh Bank;
Author/Scholar; Bangladesh]
"On this issue of
punisment of apostasy I hold the same view as that of Dr. Jamal
Badawi, Dr. Hashim Kamali, Dr. AbdulHamid AbuSulayman and such
scholars ... who hold that apostasy has no punishment unless in
conjunction with rebellion or violence. This is my view."
[comment sent directly by email]
Adil
Salahi
[Journalist
and author of many books, including Muhammad: Man and
Prophet]
"Many are the Qur’anic verses that
make clear that all people are free to choose the faith they want.
There can be no compulsion with regard to faith. Indeed, over the
fourteen centuries since Islam began, compulsion was never a policy
of any Islamic government anywhere in the world. On the contrary,
followers of other faiths, including those who worship idols, lived
freely among Muslim communities. Today, you find Christian and
Jewish communities, as well as followers of other faiths, in the
overwhelming majority of Muslim countries. This testifies to the
fact that Islam operates a policy of freedom of faith and worship.
The Hadith you have mentioned is often quoted in support of the
death penalty for apostasy. Many scholars mention that this penalty
is mandatory, which means that it is prescribed and cannot be
changed. However, a fair number of profoundly perceptive scholars
are of the view that this punishment is discretionary, which means
that it can be reduced or even waived. This is the view that seems
to be better supported by Qur’anic and Hadith texts.
...
It is 'deserting the community', which means that the person
concerned did not merely choose to follow a religion other than
Islam, but also he deserted his community and stood in opposition to
it. Scholars make clear that the Arabic statement implies rebellion.
They cite cases of people who changed their faith after adopting
Islam during the time of the Prophet (peace be upon him) and his two
immediate successors, Abu Bakr and Umar, and none of them was
executed. It is to that early period of Islam that we look for
practical guidance in understanding Islamic rules. Had the death
penalty for apostasy been mandatory, none of them would have
refrained from enforcing it." [What
Is the Punishment for Apostasy?]
Dr.
Bashir Ahmad
[Wildwood,
Missouri; USA]
"Islam emphatically affirms full
freedom of conscience and belief. Simple apostasy, which is not
aggravated by rebellion, treason or grave disorderliness, is not
punishable in any manner." [No
Punishment for Apostasy in Islam]
Organization:
Islamic Networks Groups
[Based
in the San Francisco Bay Area, ING, an entreprenurial, educational
outreach organization with affiliates and partners in 20 states,
Canada and the United Kingdom. ING promotes interfaith dialogue and
education]
"No where in the Qur’an does it
mention punishment for apostasy, although the subject of disbelief
is mentioned repeatedly, and the last verse mentioned above
specifically describes a person who disbelieves repeatedly without
any mention of punishment. ... according to numerous Islamic
scholars, the death penalty was meant, not for simple acts of
apostasy, but for political betrayal of the community, or treason,
which is punishable in numerous societies. ... ING calls on all
Muslims to re-examine universal Islamic principals that uphold the
rights of all people to freedom of religion." [Apostasy
in Islam]
Mustafa
Akyol
[a
Turkish Muslim writer]
"In
the early Muslim state, apostasy became regarded as a crime because
it was seen as a rebellion against the state. In other words, the
real consideration was political and, by time, this turned into a
religious rule as well. This is, of course, a deviation we Muslims
should rid ourselves today." [Symposium:
Convert or Die]
Dr.
Mohd Asri Zainul Abidin
[Youngest
national mufti, Malaysia]
Islamic leaders must squarely
address the questions of apostates and other challenges, and not
further damage the Muslim community by their own failure to live up
to religious values. ...
Asked to comment on tensions
raised by the issue of apostasy, Asri said religious leaders were
culpable because they divert focus from the reasons that lead
Muslims to apostasise. Instead, they issued threats of punitive
measures against apostates and non-Muslim supporters. [Malaysia:
Nation's youngest mufti speaks out on apostasy]
Ibrahim
Hooper
[National
Communications Director for the Council on American-Islamic
Relations]
"Islam advocates both freedom of religion
and freedom of conscience. That position is supported by the Quran,
Islam's revealed text, the traditions of the Prophet Muhammad and
the opinions of Islamic scholars both past and present. ... Islamic
scholars say the original rulings on apostasy were similar to those
for treasonous acts in legal systems worldwide and do not apply to
an individual's choice of religion. ... Freedom from coercion also
implies freedom to practice another faith. ... Religious decisions
should be matters of personal choice, not a cause for state
intervention. Faith imposed by force is not true belief. [Islam
and religious freedom]
Ahmad
Faiz bin Abdul Rahman
[Researcher
with the Institute of Islamic Understanding, Malaysia (IKIM) and a
Pro-temp Committee Member of the International Movement for a Just
World (JUST).]
One
of the manifestations of personal liberty is the freedom of the
individual to profess the religion of his or her choice without
compulsion. ... Freedom of religion under Islam would therefore imply
that non-Muslims are not compelled to convert to Islam, nor are they
hindered from practicing their own religious rites. However, many
tend to forget or take for grant that this also applies to Muslims,
in that they are not to be compelled or be put under undue influence
so as to become apostates. In other words, both Muslims and
non-Muslims are entitled to propagate the religion of their
following, as well as to defend it against attacks or seditious
provocation, regardless of whether such an action is launched by
their co-religionists or by others." [Malaysian
Laws on Apostasy Inadequate]
Mirza
A. Beg
[Geologist
and columnist; US]
“The Quran has many references
to apostasy. It does not call for a temporal punishment; it
specifically reserves the judgment for God. On the contrary there
are many verses that clearly prohibit compulsion in religion …
It is important and valid to oppose all the encroachments by others
on the Muslim lands and Islam, but it is suicidal to use it as an
excuse to cover the festering wound intolerance. The more grievous
fault is lies within.” [Apostasy
Laws – An Injury To Islam By Muslims]
Iman
al-Qahtani
[Saudi
journalist. She is also an author and activist in Saudi
Arabia]
"There is no basis for executing an apostate
in Islam. It is nothing more than an invention by narrow-minded men
who accuse everyone in disagreement with them of apostasy." [I
don't believe it]
Dr.
Sohirin Solihin
[Pofessor
of Qur'ranic studies, International Islamic University,
Malaysia]
... The Koran forbids Muslims to abandon their
faith, but it doesn't specify the penalties ... [Losing
Faith in Malaysia]
Imam
Kamara AbdilHaqq Muhammad
[Isaamic
Teacher and Associate Imam at ADAMS Center of Northern Va.,
USA]
"Of the many things we try to remember, we must
remember this clear fact: Allah is not in need of anyone or anything
in His creation.' Therefore it is neither a loss to Him nor a strain
to Him if any of the Children of 'Aadam turn away from His
established agenda of Al-Islaam. 'Laa 'ikraha fid Diin' means
exactly what it says: 'No compulsion in the Diin (religion). Allah
has not made it compulsory that we must worship and pray to Him,
rather He has allowed us to make that choice with our free wills
that He so kindly gave us. I have found that the less educated
people are in the Qur'aan and social life, the harder they are on
others. "The Prophet never punished those around him who
sometimes said shahaadah in the morning and change to something else
in the evening.
When any among the Children of 'Aadam
choose in their own heart to submit their will to Allah it is their
gain and blessing, likewise when any among the Children of 'Aadam
elect to reject to submit their will to Allah it is their own loss
and their loss only. Be patient in all matters and we get the best
outcome." [comments sent directly by email, while endorsing the
Statement presented in this Blog]
Asim
Siddiqui
[Chairman
of the City Circle, a network body of mainly young Muslim
professionals; UK]
"To argue for capital punishment
for apostasy goes against the very principles of Islam."
[Freedom
of conscience in Islam]
Sherazad
Hamit
[Student,
Macalester College]
“ … the sentencing to
death of apostates goes against Qur’anic decrees on apostasy,
and is therefore un-Islamic, given the context of the apostate in
question. …” [Apostasy
and the Notion of Religious Freedom in Islam]
Organization:
Sisters In Islam
[Sisters
in Islam (SIS) is an independent non-governmental organisation,
formed in 1988, which believes in an Islam that upholds the
principles of equality, justice, freedom and dignity]
“Based
on these three reasons and the Qur'anic principle of freedom of
religion, prominent ulama from the seventh to the twentieth
centuries have come out with the position that there can be no death
penalty for apostasy. According to Professor Hashim Kamali in his
award-winning book, Freedom of Expression in Islam, two leading
jurists of the generation succeeding the Companions, Ibrahim
al-Naka'I and Sufyan al-Thawri, both held that the apostate should
be re-invited to Islam, but should never be condemned to death. The
renowned Hanafi jurist, Shams al-Din al-Sarakhsi wrote that even
though renunciation of faith is the greatest of offences, it is a
matter between man and his Creator, and its punishment is postponed
to the Day of Judgement. The Maliki jurist Abul Walid al-Baji and
the renowned Hanbali jurist Ibn Taymiyyah have both held that
apostasy is a sin which carries no hadd punishment. …Those in
the vanguard of the Islamic movement that wants to turn this country
into an Islamic state must ask themselves, why would Malaysians
support the concept of an Islamic state which assert different
rights for Muslim men, Muslim women and non-Muslims and minorities,
rather than equal rights for all? Why would those whose equal status
and rights are recognised by a democratic system support the
creation of such an Islamic state? If an Islamic state means a
dictatorial theocratic political system that condemns those who
question or challenge its authority as apostates or deviants, and
then impose the death penalty on them, then why would those whose
fundamental liberties are protected by a democratic state support
such an intolerant concept of an Islamic state?” [Islam,
Apostasy and PAS]
Dr.
Mohamed Azam Mohamed Adil
[Lecturer
at the Centre for Islamic Thought and Understanding at Mara
University of Technology; Bachelor of Shari’a, University of
Malaya; PhD, University of London’s School of Oriental and
African Studies].
"The notion of the right to
freedom of religion is one of the fundamental rights guaranteed in
Islam. ... However, most of the classical Muslim jurists’
writings, apparently, did not articulate the subject. ... The
subject of the rights of the individual especially in relation to
the right to freedom of religion seems lacking in most Islamic fiqh
books. Indeed, the majority of classical Muslim jurists think that
the right to freedom of religion is not applicable to Muslims.
Muslims who leave the Islamic faith or who have apostatised should
be condemned and put to death. In reality, punishment of apostasy
has not been prescribed by the Qur’ān and had never been
practised by the Prophet (S.A.W.). The Muslim jurists have been
confused with such punishment, considering that all apostates must
be put to death after they refused to repent. The fact was that the
Prophet (S.A.W.) had proclaimed a death penalty upon apostates
because their acts were contemptuous and hostile towards Islam.
Muslims who merely renounced the Islamic religion were only required
to undergo a process of tauba (repentance)." [Abstract:
Punishment
for Apostasy: Conflict between criminal sentence and the right to
freedom of religion,
p. 32]
Mike
Mohamed Ghouse
[Founder,
World Muslim Congress; Founder, Foundation for Pluralism; Dallas,
Texas]
"We, the Muslims request you to honor the
life given by Allah toAbdul Rahmanand grant him his freedom to
practice his faith. Lakum
Dinukum Waliya deen.To
him his faith is dear, as our faith is to us." [American
Muslims' Plea to Afghan Judges In the case of Apostate Abdul Rahman]
Haris
Aziz
[PhD
candidate and professional journalist at Warwick University]
“The
Quran talks about apostasy at least twenty times but does not
mention any worldly punishment. The only warning given is about the
consequence in the life here after. Moreover there is a good
possibility that the referred ahadith have a specific context of
hirabah [high treason], breaking away from the authority, breaking a
treaty, defying the direct commands of a living prophet in violent
times and incitement to wage war against Muslims when the very
survival of a small Muslim community was in danger. Many celebrated
jurists have alluded to this kind of takhsis [specification] to
conclude that an apostate should be re-invited to Islam but not
condemned to death. It is critical that the Ulema [scholars] address
this issue. Moreover if some Muslim country does not allow
non-Muslims to observe their religion freely, it is totally against
Islamic principles of justice and fair play and should be tackled.”
[Affirmation
of Freedom of Expression and Belief in the Quran]
Shah
Abdul Halim
[Chairman
of Islamic Information Bureau, Bangladesh]
“In fact
there is not a single instance that Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) did
treat apostasy as a prescribed offence under hudud (capital
punishment) only for leaving Islam. The Prophet (pbuh) never put
anyone to death for apostasy alone rather he let such person go
unharmed. No one was sentenced to death solely for renunciation of
faith unless accompanied by hostility and treason or was linked to
an act of political betrayal of the community. As a matter of fact
the Quran is completely silent on the question of death as a
punishment for apostasy. Apostasy does not qualify for temporal
punishment.” [Islam
& Pluralism: A Contemporary Approach]
Imam
Ahmad Sa'd
[Ex-Imam
of Calgary Muslim Community, Alberta, Canada and now Imam in
Ar-Rahma Mosque, Egypt.]
"A close study of the life
of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), which serves as an
example for all Muslims to learn how to practice Islam and carry out
its injunctions, will show us that he never killed people who
changed their religion or left Islam, for the reason of their
leaving Islam.
In incidents when the Prophet commended
the killing of some people, it was because they had committed an
offense to the Muslim community, threatening its safety, or because
they had killed someone and were killed themselves in retaliation.
Therefore, killing them had nothing to do with their apostasy.
In
fact, many Islamic scholars support the view that there is no
prescribed punishment (hadd) for apostasy. In doing this, they use
both reason and strong evidence from Qur'an and Sunnah."
[Should
an Apostate Be Killed?]
Kashif
Ahmed Shehzada
[Researcher
on the Qur'an and comparative religion; Karachi, Pakistan]
"The
question of forcing someone to believe does not arise at all,
because the Qur'an identifies 'Iman' i.e. belief as something not
just professed by the lips, but something which has entered one's
heart deeply, and that is possible only if a person analyses the
message through his reason and accepts it willingly. ... The Qur'an
proclaims that man hasthe freedom of choice to accept or reject the
permanent values of God. He CANNOT be forced to accept those values,
but has the free will to accept them, ... Had the punishment for
Apostasy been prescribed as 'Death' then the above verse (3:89)
would not have accommodated the room for amending one's conduct and
repentence, but with the inclusion of a condition ofrepentance and
amending one's conduct, the Qur'an confirms that forApostates the
punishment is not death." [Can
People be Forced to Accept Islam? A Qur’anic Perspective]
Muhammad
Ridzwan Rahmat
[Editor,
Ewadah.Com]
"Islam is a religion that has never been
forced upon. The very idea that a conversion into Islam is one way
street in which one can never turn from is a much dissipated myth.
The Quran prohibits Muslims to force Islam onto an individual.
Muslims past and present have largely converted into Islam out of
their own free will. ... Again, no authority has been granted to
Muslims to specifically kill the apostates of Islam should they mean
no harm. Apostates are to be treated fairly as non-Muslims.
Compulsion will not make sense in Islam." [Why
Do Muslims Kill Apostates? A Muslim Explains]
Professor
Shahul Hameed
[Consultant
of the Discover Islam Section, Islamonline.net; former Head of the
Department of English, Farook College, Calicut University, India;
President of Kerala Islamic Mission, Jama'at-e- Islami, Hind, Kerala
Zone) Calicut, Indi]
"the Noble Qur'an does not
prescribe death penalty for deserters of Islam, but rather states
that they would be in Hell in the hereafter (2:217) ... the ruling
was with reference to certain specific cases of miscreants who
wished to undermine Islam, by joining Islam first and then deserting
it. ... the killing of apostates would undermine the freedom of will
Allah has bestowed on each human, as is made clear in the verses
..." [Apostasy,
Polygamy, and Adultery]
Riaz
Hasan
[former
director of Outreach for the Tracy Islamic Center, California,
USA]
"Muslims have direct relationship with God. It
is required that you inform others about your way of life (your
faith); not pus(, not force. What a person does with the information
is between the person and God. He or she will be answerable to God.
It is not our job to judge, just to provide information and share
with others what good we have." [Perceiving
the Afghan Christian role]
Ibrahim
Abusharif
[Editor,
Starlatch Press]
“It's important to note that
apostasy rulings have rarely been used in the heyday of Islamic
civilization, a ranging world conglomerate stretching from the
western frontiers of China, [to] the Indian subcontinent, to North
and Sub-Saharan Africa, Eastern Europe, and the western shores of
Spain. There's absolutely nothing in the élan or sacred
paradigms of Islam that makes a religious choice an anathema to
Muslims. Not one reference in the Qur’an that refers to people
leaving the realm of faith suggests the penalty of death.”
[The
Legal Tradition of Islamic Apostasy]
Anwaar
Hussain
[Columnist,
PakTribune]
“In a screaming instance of a heart
rending paradox in the Muslim world, an Afghan convert to
Christianity is to be tried in a Kabul court for apostasy, a 'crime'
that is punishable by death in that country. Despite clear
injunctions in the Quran that "there is no compulsion in
religion" and "to you your own religion and to me, mine",
an innocent man may be executed while we stand by and watch this
gruesome charade in the name of God. … Fortunately, some
highly distinguished contemporary Islamic scholars based on renewed
ijtihad, hold absolutely differing views on the subject of apostasy.
… The historic fact remains that the Prophet (PBUH) never put
anyone to death for apostasy alone. No one was sentenced to death
solely for repudiation of faith unless accompanied by certain other
crimes. Those other crimes would have been punishable by death in
any contemporary state of the time. As a matter of fact the Quran is
completely silent on the question of death as a punishment for
apostasy. Apostasy simply does not qualify for temporal punishment.”
[In
the Name of God]
Organization:
The Iraqi Women Leaders Conference
[A
joint-project of the American Islamic Congress, the Foundation for
the Defense of
Democracies and the Independent Women’s
Forum]
"It is important to note that wine-drinking
(shrub) and apostasy (riddah) are not
hudud crimes and the
Qur’an specifies no punishment for these two offences. Yet,
Fiqh manuals have, erroneously, included shrub and riddah in the
category of hudud." [Building
and Planning]
Inayat
Bunglawala
[Media
secretary at the Muslim Council of Britain. He is also a
co-presenter of the weekly 'Politics and Media Show' on the Islam
Channel (SKY 813)]
"To force someone to remain in a
faith they do not believe seems rather absurd as it negates the
whole basis of sincere belief and seems closer to officially
endorsing hypocrisy.
There is a famous remark attributed
to the 19th century Egyptian Muslim activist and scholar Muhammad
Abduh who visited various European countries and said 'I have been
to many Muslim countries and found many Muslims there, but little
Islam. I have also been to some European countries and found few
Muslims there, but a lot of Islam'." [Apostasy
and Islam]
Dr.
Taj Hashmi
[Professor,
Security Studies at the Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies,
Honolulu, Hawaii]
" ... the Islamic scripture or the
Quran spells out: "Let there be no compulsion in religion"
[2:256] and does not prescribe any death penalty for apostasy
either: "Surely (as for) those who believe then disbelieve,
again believe and again disbelieve, then increase in disbelief,
Allah will not forgive them nor guide them in the (right) path"
[4:137].
The Quran sanctions death penalty for murder and
other horrendous crimes, not apostasy." [Death
for apostasy and Shariah]
Ahmed
Bedier
[an
expert on Islam, media relations, civil rights, hate crimes and the
mideast; Tampa, FL, USA]
"A couple of days ago I
joined CAIR and others calling for his release. Alhamdulilla the
Afghan authorities did the right thing by dropping this case, that
should never have been one in the first place. For over a week now
news outlets reported that Abdul Rahman is facing the death penalty
under Islamic Law for leaving Islam, however they failed to point
out that this is not a unanimous opinion among all Muslim scholars.
Also that there is not a single verse in the Quran that commands the
killing of an apostate (a person leaving his faith)." [Afghan
Court Drops Case Against Christian Convert]
Dr.
S. M. Ghazanfar
[Ph.D.
in Economics, 1968 (Wash. State University), University of Idaho
faculty, 1968-2002]
"Arguments favoring death
penalty for apostasy being a pre-modern Islamic law, based on
dubious interpretations and weak hadith references, the subject has
made international headlines recently. And such issues further feed
the prevailing Western Islamophobia hysteria. Freedom of religion is
fundamental to Islam, mentioned in several verses of the Holy Qur'an
("Unto your religion, and unto me my religion," "Whosoever
will, let him believe," "There is no compulsion in
religion," etc.), clearly, the law of apostasy violates that
fundamental principle (which, of course, accords with UN Universal
Human Rights). It is about time the Islamic world formulates a fresh
school of thought that reconciles Islam with the contemporary,
modern world. Islamic intellectuals, indeed, facilitated European
exit out of Dark Ages, and sometimes it appears the Islamic world is
now reverting in that direction." [comments sent directly to
this site]
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
As
a Muslim, do you believe in the freedom of faith, i.e., Islam is by
choice?
To
add your voice to this affirmation/statement, please send an email to
islambychoice@gmail.com
with your name, affiliation/occupation, highest degree/field, and
country of residence.
Does
the Imam or the leader of your community believe in the freedom of
faith?
Ask
him and encourage him to let the world know that Islam is by choice,
not by coercion, by being a signatory to the Statement.
Wednesday, December 21, 2011, 3:27:33 AM | noreply@blogger.com (MuslimUniverse)
100+ Signatories to the Statement
We the undersigned Muslims from diverse backgrounds affirm:
The freedom of faith and the freedom of changing one's faith.
In light of the Qur'anic guidance and the Prophetic legacy,
the principle of freedom of faith does not lend itself
to impose in this world any punishment or retribution solely for apostasy;
thus there ought not to be any punishment
in the name of Islam or fatwa calling for the same.
=====================================================
Disclaimer:
The
endorsement of the signatories listed here does not
necessarily
represent the institution they are affiliated with.
=====================================================
Dr.
Omar Afzal
[retired
from South Asian Collection, Cornell University; USA]
Dr.
Ahrar Ahmad
[Professor
of Political Science, Black Hills State University; USA]
Dr.
Mohammad Fadel
[Faculty
of Law, University of Toronto; Canada]
Dr.
Mohammad Omar Farooq
[Associate
Professor of Economics and Finance, Upper Iowa University; USA]
Dr.
Layla al-Marayati
[Muslim
Women's League; USA]
Dr.
Abdulaziz Sachedina
[Professor,
University of Virginia; USA]
Mike
Mohamed Ghouse
[President,
World Muslim Congress; USA]
Dawn
Ross
[New
Product Launch Planning Manager in the Orthopedic Industry; USA]
Dr.
Mohammed Fahmy
[Professor,
University of Northern Iowa; and Islamic Center, Waterloo, Iowa;
USA]
Dr.
Khaleel Mohammed
[Professor,
Religious Studies, San Diego State University; USA]
Dr.
Badrul Haque
[Economist,
and Chair, Board of Trustees The Bangladeshi-American Foundation;
USA]
Dr.
Salim Rashid
[Professor
of Economics, University of Illinois, Urbana Champaign; USA]
Nurjahan
Ruby Amatulla
[CEO,
GNL-USA]
Syed
Abdul Hamid
[Head
Of Information Technology, an Islamic Bank; Pakistan]
Ris
Rizqullah
[Indonesian
Society for Islamic Economy; Indonesia]
Mirza
A. Beg
[Geologist
and columnist; USA]
M.
Basheer Ahmed
[M.D.,
Former Professor of Psychiatry, Southwestern Medical School, Dallas,
Texas; USA]
Haseeb
Muhammad
[Operations
Officer (CAD) at a local Bank and graduate Student at International
Islamic University, Islamabad; PAKISTAN]
Ghulam
Yusuf
[Retired
Director General of Govt. of Pakistan; CANADA]
Dr.
Fahim Quadir
[Associate
Professor of the Division of Social Science and Graduate Program
Director in Development Studies, York University, Toronto; CANADA]
Dr.
Thomas Hamza Mohammed Haidon
[International
Qur'anic Center, Free Muslim Coalition, Jurisdoctorate,
International Law; NEW ZEALAND]
Dr.
Najah Kadhim
[Executive
Director, International Forum for Islam Dialogue (IFID), London, and
a Senior Lecturer-University of Hertfordshire; UK]
Walid
Zafar
[Student,
International Political Economy, University of Puget Sound; USA]
Sheila
Musaji
[Editor,
The American Muslim; USA]
Omar
Ali, M.D.
[Assistant
Professor of Pediatric Endocrinology, Medical College of Wisconsin;
USA]
Dr.
Radwan Masmoudi
[Founder,
member of the Board, and President of the Center of the Study of
Islam & Democracy (CSID)]
Dr.
Fatima Zohra
[Obstetrician/Gynaecologist;
AUSTRALIA]
Dr.
M. A. Muqtedar Khan
[Assistant
Professor, University of Delaware; Senior Nonresident Fellow,
Brookings Institution; Fellow, Alwaleed center, Georgetown
University; http://www.ijtihad.orgl/
USA]
Kamal
Yassin, M.D.
[Physician;
Islamic foundation of Greater St. Louis; USA]
Bahar
Bastani, M.D.
[Professor
of Medicine - Nephrology, Saint Louis University; USA]
Maqsud
Sobhani
[Manager,
Customer Service, Paxar; BANGLADESH]
Levent
Akbarut
[Aerospace
Software Engineering Manager; Islamic Congregation of La Cañada
Flintridge, Los Angeles County, California; USA]
Dr.
Miah Muhammad Adel
[Professor,
Space Physics, Environmental Physics, Water Sciences, University of
Arkansas at Pine Bluff; USA]
Dr.
A. Rashied Omar
[Research
Scholar of Islamic Ethics and Peacebuilding, Joan B. Kroc Institute
for International Peace Studies, University of Notre Dame; USA]
Na'eem
Jeenah
[Coordinator,
Masjidul Islam, Johannesburg, South Africa; Ex-President, Muslim
Youth Movement of South Africa; MA (Religious Studies); University
of the Witwatersrand; SOUTH AFRICA]
Dr.
Stephen N. Connolly
[Lecturer
in organic chemistry, School of Science & Technology, University
of Teesside; UK]
Dr.
Mohammad Yusuf Siddiq
[Professor,
Dept. of History & Islamic Civilization, Sharjah University;
UAE]
Hesham
A. Hassaballa,
M.D.
[Physician,
Author, and Columnist, God, Faith, and a Pen; USA]
Dr.
Javed Jamil
[Executive
Chairman, International Centre for Applied Islamics, Saharanpur;
INDIA]
Dr.
Abusaleh Shariff
[Ph.
D., Development Economics and Demography, National Council of
Applied Economic Research, New Delhi, INDIA]
Dr.
Syed Nawab Haider Naqvi
[M.A.
(Yale); PhD (Princeton); HEC Distinguished National Professor and
Director General, Federal Urdu University of Arts, Science and
Technology, Islamabad, PAKASITAN]
Dr.
Ashraf M. Abbasi
[Chairman,
Pakistani American Congress-Council of Presidents; Houston, USA]
Dr.
Shafique Pathan
[MBBS,
FRSH (England), DCCP; Obesity, Diet Consultant; Bandar West, Mumbai;
INDIA]
Zaid
Shakur
[Staff
Writer, InFocus News; USA]
Dr.
Hasan Zillur Rahim
[Freelance
writer on Islamic issues, blog: http://reachforsky.blogspot.com/;
former Editor of IQRA, magazine of South Bay Islamic Association of
San Jose, California; USA]
Faroque
Khan,
M.B., M.A.C.P
[Chair,
Board of Trustees. Islamic Cenmter of Long Island, New York;
ex-President, Islamic Medical Association of North America (IMANA):
1986-1988; USA]
T.
O. Shanavas, MD
[Pediatrician;
Author, "Creation And/Or Evolution: An Islamic Perspective",
Xlibris Corporation; USA]
Shahed
Amanullah
[MBA,
Technology Consulting; Editor-in-chief, altmuslim.com;
USA]
Dr.
Mohammed Nazrul Islam Khan
[Chemist;
Vice-President and Director, FRC Chemical Technology, Inc.; Islamic
Society of Cerro Gordo, Mason City, Iowa; USA]
Dr.
Asma Afsaruddin
[Associate
Professor, Arabic & Islamic Studies, University of Notre Dame,
Indiana; USA]
Dr.
Aslam Abdullah
[Ph.D,
Islamic Studies and Communiations; Director, Islamic Society of
Nevada and Editor, Muslim Observer; USA]
Imam
Kamara AbdilHaqq Muhammad
[Islamic
Teacher and Associate Imam at ADAMS Center of Northern Va.; USA]
Nayyer
Zaman Ali, MD
[also,
Columnist, Pakistan Link Newspaper; USA]
Dr.
Sulayman Nyang
[Professor,
African Studies Department, Howard University; USA]
Mrs.
Sarwat Husain
[Publisher
and Editor-in-Chief, Al-Ittihaad News, San Antonio, Texas; USA]
Dr.
Samer Kantakji
PhD
in Islamic Accountancy; http://www.kantakji.com/;
SYRIA]
Dr.
Anisa Abd el Fattah
[Founder
and Chairwoman, National Association of Muslim American Women
(NAMAW)]
Shaheryar
Azhar
[M.B.A;
Retired banker (Senior Vice President) from a major bank in New
York; Moderator, The Forum, an e-discussion forum; USA]
Aijaz
Husain
[Retired
civil servant (Specialized field: Economics & social welfare);
M.A. (Economics); M.S.W. (McGill); CANADA]
Shah
Abdul Hannan
[Chairman,
Islamic Economic Research Bureau; former Chairman, Islami Bank
Bangladesh Ltd., former deputy governor, Bangladesh Bank;
Author/Scholar; BANGLADESH]
Aderemi
Taofiq Adeseun
[Nasfat
(Nasrullahi faith society); Pharmacist, Retired Country Manager of
Janssen-Cilag in Nigeria; NIGERIA]
Farzana
Hassan
[President:
Muslim Canadian Congress; Author of "Islam, women and the
challenges of Today"; Master from the University of
Massachusetts; Currently enrolled in a doctoral program in
Educational Leadership; CANADA]
Dr.
Imad-ad-Dean Ahmad
[President/Director,
Minaret of Freedom Institute, Bethesda, Maryland; USA]
M.
Saiful Islam
[Senior
Programmer Analyst, DST Systems; MBA; Kansas City; USA]
Robert
Salaam
[Government
Contractor; Host, The
American Muslim
Blog Radio Show; USA]
Dr.
Farid Islam
[Associate
Professor, Department of Finance & Economics, Utah Valley State
College, Orem, Utah; USA]
Ahmed
M. Rehab
[Executive
Director, Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-Chicago); M.S.
Software Engineering; USA]
Dr.
Fawzia Afzal-Khan
[Dept
of English, Montclair State University, Upper Montclair, NJ; Phd.
English Literature, Tufts University, Medford, Mass; USA]
Dr.
Jeffrey Lang
[Mathematics
Department, University of Kansas; Ph.D. in Mathematics, Purdue
University; USA]
Ahmed
Bedier
[Executive
Director, Tampa Chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations
and President of the Tampa/Hillsborough Human Rights Council; USA]
Dr.
Mohammad A. Auwal
[Professor,
Dept. of Communication Studies, California State University, Los
Angeles; USA]
Dr.
A. F. M. Anwar
[Dean,
School of Engineering, University of Connecticut; Electrical
Engineering; USA]
Mohammed
Abdul Aleem
[CEO,
IslamiCity.com; MBA/Management Information Systems; Culver City, CA;
USA]
Dr.
Amir Hussain
[Department
of Theological Studies, Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles;
PhD in Religious Studies from the University of Toronto; Los
Angeles, California, USA]
Dr.
Laury Silvers
[Assistant
Professor of Religious Studies, Skidmore College, USA]
Dr.
M. Kabir Hassan
[Professor
of Finance, University of New Orleans; USA]
Dr.
Mahdi Tourage
[Book
Review Editor, American
Journal of Islamic Social Scinces (AJISS);
Visiting Assistant Prof. of Islam, Department of Religion, Colgate
University, Hamilton, NY; USA]
Professor
Mehnaz M. Afridi
[ABD,
Antioch University, specialty - Judaism and Islam; Interfaith
Activist, Los Angeles, California; USA]
Dr.
Ahmet T. Karamustafa
[Professor
of History and Religious Studies, Washington University in St.
Louis; PhD in Islamic Studies; USA]
Prof.
Seval Yildirim
[Assistant
Professor, Whittier Law School, California; USA]
Dr.
Vernon James Schubel
[Professor,
Department of Religious Studies, Kenyon College; Ph.D. History of
Religions; USA]
Aslam
Rana
[degree
in Architecture; Director, Building Inspection Services, City of
Dothan, Alabama; USA]
Azhar
Azeez
[Member
of ISNA executive council; MBA in Marketing; USA]
Jean-Mathieu
Potvin
[Lawyer,
Doctoral candidate, McGill Institute of Islamic Studies, Montreal;
Master of Laws (Islamic Law), SOAS, University of London; CANADA]
Asmaa
Ibnouzahir
[Member
of Presence Musulmane Montreal; Masters in Nutrition; CANADA]
Enamul
Hoque
[Engineer;
Master of Science in Electrical Engineering; USA]
Huma
Dar
[PhD
Candidate, Department of South & South East Asian Studies,
University of California at Berkeley; USA]
Dr.
Shifa Naeem
[Psychiatrist;
FCPS in Psychiatry; Karachi, PAKISTAN]
Dr.
Shahjahan Khan
[University
of Southern Queensland, PhD in Statistics from Canada; Chief Editor:
Journal of Applied Probabiliy and Statistics (USA), and President:
Islamic Countries Society of Statistical Sciences (ISOSS),
AUSTRALIA]
Dr.
Amin U. Sarkar
[Dean
& Professor of Economics, College of Business & Technolgy,
Black Hills State University, South Dakota, USA; Ph.D. Resource
Economics; USA]
Mohammed
Ahsan Rial
[CEO,
Dishari
Management International;
BS Engineering, MBA; CANADA]
Dr.
Habib Siddiqui
[PhD;
Anti-war and peace activist; Columnist and author of books "Islamic
Wisdom", "Book of Devotional Stories"; Chairman of
the Board of Directors, Bangladesh Expatriate Council, USA]
Dr.
Abdullah al-Ahsan
[Professor,
Department of History and Civilization, International Islamic
University Malaysia; Vice President, JUST; MALAYSIA]
Dr.
Mahmood Ahmed
[Ph.D.
in Economics; Senior Vice President, Research Planning and
Development Division, Islami Bank Bangladesh Limited; BANGLADESH]
Dr.
Aslam H. Chowdhury
[PhD
in Physics; University of Arkansas, Pine Bluff; Muslim Association
of Arkansas; USA]
Garba
I. Malumfashi
[Research
Student, LL.B., B.L. PhD (on-going), University of Dundee, Scotland,
UK]
Dr.
Chandra Muzaffar
[Professor
of Global Studies, Universiti Sains Malaysia and President,
International Movement for a Just World (JUST); PhD in Political
Science; MALAYSIA]
Dr.
Muhammad Hashim Kamali
[International
Institute of Islamic Thought and Civilisation, International Islamic
University Malaysia; PhD in Islamic and Middle Eastern Law,
currently Professorof Islamic law and jurisprudence at IIUM;
MALAYSIA]
Dr.
Mustafa Kamal Sherwani
[LL.M.
(Alig.) LL.D. (Lucknow); Dean, Faculty of Law and Shariah, Zanzibar
University,
Mohamed
M. Karim
[Sales
& Marketing, D.R. Components, an Independent Distributor for
Electronic Components for BAE Systems, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon,
Honeywell; BBA/Sales & Marketing; Florida, USA]
Jibril
Abdullah
[Laborer/musician;
USA]
Lisa
Newlin
[DHom
(UK), BA (USA - Indiana University), Diploma in Biochemic Therapy
(Germany) Homeopath; United Arab Emirates]
Dr.
Mohja Kahf
[Associate
Professor of Comparative Literature, University of Arkansas,
Fayetteville, Arkansas ; USA]
Dr.
Salahuddin Ayyub
[PhD,
Economics; Research Executive, New Concept Information System Pvt
Ltd, Sarita Vihar, New Delhi]
Dr.
S.M. Ghazanfar
[PhD,
Economics (Washington State University), University of Idaho
faculty, 1968-2002]
Carl
Julien
[B.A.
Graphic Designer, Muslim, USA]
Dr.
Sayyid M. Syeed
[PhD,
Sociolinguistics (Indiana University, Bloomington), National
Director, Office for Interfaith & Community Alliances, Islamic
Society of North America]
Khaula
Khan
[Student,
English Literature; Canada]
Jamal
Shariq
[Entrepreneur,
Masters in English Literature; India]
Sumbul
Ali-Karamali
[J.D.
(University of California-Davis), LLM in Islamic Law (SOAS), Author
of "The Muslim Next Door: the Qur'an, the Media, and that Veil
Thing" and Bronze Medal Winner of the 2009 Independent
Publisher's Awards; USA]
Nuraini
Nuzaihan Mohamed Arsad
[MSc,
Marine Environment; Environment Consultant; Malaysia]
Mohammed
Amin
[LLB,
Cambridge University; Islamic Finance Consultant, Previously UK Head
of Islamic Finance with Pricewaterhouse; UK]
Your
name is not on the above list of signatories?
To
add your name, please send an email - explicitly specifying that you
want to add yourself to the list of signatories - to
islambychoice@gmail.com
with your name, affiliation/occupation, highest degree/field, and
country of residence.
Is
the name of the Imam or the Leader
of
your community not on the above list?
Ask
them if they unequivocally affirm the freedom of faith in Islam, and
if they do, encourage/urge them to add their voices by sending an
email to islambychoice@gmail.com
with their name, affiliation/occupation, highest degree/field, and
country of residence.
Wednesday, May 02, 2007, 10:40:38 PM | noreply@blogger.com (MuslimUniverse)
Muslim
Academics/Scholars/Imams/Professionals
uphold
the Freedom of Faith
and
the Freedom to Change one's Faith
Apostasy
(riddah)
is a major issue that affects the understanding of, and perception
about, Islam. Historically, Muslim scholars have not factored in the
distinction between apostasy (changing one's faith, which is strictly
a sin against God) and treason (strictly a civil offense against an
established public order) when it is stated that Islam mandates
capital punishment for riddah. That unnuanced perspective about
apostasy has fueled negative propaganda against Islam and a negative
image of Muslims. In recent years in some notable and well known
cases, a fatwa (legal, non-binding opinion) was issued against
alleged apostates and, at times, even a bounty was announced on their
head.
Many Muslim scholars and academics have argued
against the stated historical position as inconsistent with the
Qur'an and on the grounds that killing someone for making a
considered choice negates the very Islamic value and principle of
freedom of choice, affecting Islam's position on universal human
rights.
Freedom of choice in faith is central to Islam.
This has been exemplified in the Qur'anic narrative regarding the
choice made by Satan in contrast with Adam and Eve, and the broad
agreement of Muslim scholars that only faith freely adopted is
meritorious before God. Throughout history prophets and the
communities of their believers have struggled to secure freedom of
faith for themselves. Indeed it is a principle quintessential to both
Islam and humanity.
Choosing a path in line with our
beliefs about salvation has significant consequences in terms of our
afterlife. In this world that freedom is bestowed upon us by God,
which, by implication, must include the possibility of changing one's
faith. Freedom of religion is meaningless without the freedom to
change one’s religion. Denial of such reciprocal rights is also
inconsistent with the principle of justice (adl/qist),
as clearly enunciated in the Qur'an [4/an-Nisa/135].
The
Qur'an does not specify any worldly punishment or retribution solely
for apostasy. Similarly, there is no clear prophetic judgment on
apostasy, nor examples that such punishment was meted out (during the
time of the Prophet or in the period of the Righteous Caliphate) to
someone solely for abandoning Islam as a creed, in contrast with
apostasy-cum-treason, involving taking up arms against the Muslim
community or the state.
Islam upholds the fundamental
principle pertaining to freedom of faith ["Let
there be no compulsion in Deen"
2/al-Baqara/256;
also see 39/al-Zumar/41].
Thus:
--------------------------------------------------------------------
We
the undersigned Muslims from diverse backgrounds affirm:
The
freedom of faith and the freedom of changing one's faith.
In
light of the Qur'anic guidance and the Prophetic legacy,
the
principle of freedom of faith does not lend itself
to impose in
this world any punishment or retribution solely for apostasy;
thus
there ought not to be any punishment
in the name of Islam or
fatwa calling for the
same.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
In addiiton, we call upon:
our esteemed scholars (ulama) and jurists (fuqaha), to address this inconsistency between the Islamic principle of freedom of faith and the position mandating punishment for apostasy, and to bring our legacy of Islamic jurisprudence and general Islamic discourse up-to-date for the times with reference to indisputable and categorical Islamic principles.
our fellow Muslims, to be informed of Islam's position on apostasy and to uphold the principle of choice so that we may exercise tolerance towards those who have left the "straight path" and deal with their subsequent views and actions (even when they are against Islam) within the conext of human rights and civil liberties allowed by law.
Imams and religious leaders, to educate and sensitize Muslim masses about notions of fairness and justice inherent in Islam and respond to apostasy in a dignified, constructive and patient manner.
governments of Muslim-majority countries, to address this matter constitutionally as well as legally, and actively engage in a process that eventually discards any law entailing punishment for apostasy.
Islamic organizations, to uphold universal human rights (not inconsistent with Islam) and to defend the rights of ex-Muslims in regard to apostasy.