Epigraph: “Those who believe, then disbelieve, then again believe, then disbelieve, and then increase in disbelief, Allah will never forgive them nor will He guide them to the way.” (Al Quran 4:138)
The PEW Forum on Religion & Public Life has issued a very detailed poll of the Muslim countries
Chapter 1: Beliefs About Sharia
Navigate this page:
- Sharia as Divine Revelation
- Interpreting Sharia
- Sharia as the Official Law of the Land
- Should Sharia Apply to All Citizens?
- How Should Sharia Be Applied?
- Views on Current Laws and Their Relation to Sharia
Pakistan’s record in Islamomania and fundamentalism is the worst among the Muslim countries as regards the stoning of those guilty of adultery and second only to a few countries on the issue of killing the apostates.
I believe, Pakistan is in this sorry state, for refusing to learn from the Muhammadan Messiah, the Founder of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community, who was sent by God to reform the sorry state of Islam, according to the predictions of the Holy Prophet Muhammad, may peace be on him.
Let me quote from Pew Forum on the two issues of adultery and apostasy and then towards the end, I will link reading materials and a video from the perspective of Ahmadiyya Muslim Community, to show the true teachings of Islam on these subjects.
Penalty for Adultery
In 10 of 20 countries where there are adequate samples for analysis, at least half of Muslims who favor making sharia the law of the land also favor stoning unfaithful spouses.18
Some of the highest support for stoning is found in South Asia and the Middle East-North Africa region. In Pakistan (89%) and Afghanistan (85%), more than eight-in-ten Muslims who want Islamic law as their country’s official law say adulterers should be stoned, while nearly as many say the same in the Palestinian territories (84%) and Egypt (81%). A majority also support stoning as a penalty for the unfaithful in Jordan (67%), Iraq (58%). However, support is significantly lower in Lebanon (46%) and Tunisia (44%), where less than half of those who support sharia as the official law of the land believe that adulterers should be stoned.
In Southeast Asia, six-in-ten Muslims in Malaysia consider stoning an appropriate penalty for adultery. About half hold this view in Thailand (51%) and Indonesia (48%).
Muslims in Central Asia as well as Southern and Eastern Europe are generally less likely to support stoning adulterers. Among those who favor Islamic law as the official law of the land, only in Tajikistan do about half (51%) support this form of punishment. Elsewhere in the two regions, fewer than four-in-ten favor this type of punishment, including roughly a quarter or fewer across the countries surveyed in Southern and Eastern Europe.
Penalty for Converting to Another Faith
Compared with attitudes toward applying sharia in the domestic or criminal spheres, Muslims in the countries surveyed are significantly less supportive of the death penalty for converts.19 Nevertheless, in six of the 20 countries where there are adequate samples for analysis, at least half of those who favor making Islamic law the official law also support executing apostates.
Taking the life of those who abandon Islam is most widely supported in Egypt (86%) and Jordan (82%). Roughly two-thirds who want sharia to be the law of the land also back this penalty in the Palestinian territories (66%). In the other countries surveyed in the Middle East-North Africa region, fewer than half take this view.
In the South Asian countries of Afghanistan and Pakistan, strong majorities of those who favor making Islamic law the official law of the land also approve of executing apostates (79% and 76%, respectively). However, in Bangladesh far fewer (44%) share this view.
A majority of Malaysian Muslims (62%) who want to see sharia as their country’s official law also support taking the lives of those who convert to other faiths. But fewer take this position in neighboring Thailand (27%) and Indonesia (18%).
In Central Asia as well as Southern and Eastern Europe, only in Tajikistan (22%) do more than a fifth of Muslims who want sharia as the official law of the land also condone the execution of apostates. Support for killing converts to other faiths falls below one-in-ten in Albania (8%) and Kazakhstan (4%).
Ahmadiyya Muslim Community’s understanding has always been that there is no worldly punishment of apostasy in Islam. It is a matter of basic human rights and religious freedoms. Read three small books on the subject of apostasy:
Punishment of Apostasy in Islam
The Truth About The Alleged Punishment for Apostasy in Islam
Q2 @ 09:45 Is there any punishment for blasphemy? Salman Taseer governor of Punjab province of Pakistan was killed for raising voice against blasphemy law.
Q3 @ 16:15 What is your comment on Pakistan’s Blasphemy law 295-C?
Q4 @ 23:40 What is the punishment for apostasy?
Q5 @ 28:45 Can Muslims (public) take law into their own hands to implement any punishments?
Q6 @ 34:05 What is the Islamic teachings regarding human rights of non-Muslims under an Islamic state?
Book Review @ 37:30 Murder in the name of Allah
Q7 @ 41:35 Was any Muslim punished by stoning to death according to law of Torah / Judaic law (before the Holy Quran)? What is Islamic punishment? Was any amputation of hands were carried out in the time of Holy Prophet(saw)?
Q8 @ 46:35 There are Ahadith (sayings of the Holy Prophet(saw)) to kill apostates and stone those who commit adultery?
Q9 @ 53:50 If Hadith says something that is against the teachings of the Holy Quran?
Categories: Ahmadiyyat: True Islam, Asia, Law and Religion
There is no punishment for apostasy in Islam. It is not mentioned in the Quran. Death is a capital punishment and all capital punishments must be found in the Quran.
No serious punishment can be given on the basis of the Hadith alone. Proof must come from the Quran. Also, there is NO compulsion in (any) religion.
Punishing any one for change of religion will be sort of compulsion which is not allowed.
The maulvis who are interested in punishing any one who leaves Islam, they do not like to punish any one who joins Islam. So there seems to be a one sided traffic.
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Same goes for adultery for which punishment is mentioned in chapter 24 of Quran in the first few verses of the Chapter. That punishment is flogging with 100 stripes.
The maulvis try to differentiate between adultery and fornication. They say that punishment for fornication i.e. for unmarried sinners is 100 lashes. But punishmenr for adulterer (married persons) is stoning to death. That is not correct at all for few reasons that I will mention soon.
It is true that the sin of adultery is grave and must be checked with severe punishment. But we are not to devise any punishment ourselves. We are nobody to decide about life and death matters. We are nobody to decide about Haraam and Halaal. It is all given in the book (Quran).
It is true that punishment for adultery in Torah is stoning to death. But we are not Jews. We are Muslims. It is also true that the prophet Muhammad s.a.w.s. did order stoning to death of adulterers in the early Madinah period. There were a few cases who were stoned.
That was all before the verses of Surah Noor (chapter 24) were revealed, before 05 Hijrah. He was bound to follow the law of the Torah as long as new law was not revealed. It is similar to the case of facing toward Jerusalem for the five daily prayers. The prophet did that for fourteen years. But when new command came, he never faced Jerusalem for daily prayers.
Now I give an important hint about the mistake of the maulvis who suggest stoning to death for the adulterers. The maulvis say that the punishment mentioned in chapter 24 (100 lashes) is for unmarried sinners (fornicators). They say that there is a secret meaning in those verses. The verse applies to unmarried persons only.
That is not correct. If any Hadith suggests anything against the Quran, it will not be valid. And there is no Hadith which says that punishment for the adulterers is stoning to death. There is no such Hadith.
Hadith can only help and serve the Quran. It cannot overtake the Quran.
Now about secret meaning. There is no secret meaning. Please read the first few verses of chapter 24. It will tell you that commands therein are open and very clear (Mubeen). I will now present those verses:
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[24:1] In the name of Allah, the Gracious, the Merciful.
[24:2] This is a Surah which We have revealed and which We have made obligatory; and We have revealed therein CLEAR COMMANDS, that you may take heed.
[24:3] The adulteress and the adulterer (or the fornicatress and the fornicator) — flog each one of them with a hundred stripes. And let not pity for the twain take hold of you in executing the judgment of Allah, if you believe in Allah and the Last Day. And let a party of the believers witness their punishment.
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I have given only the English translation. It was difficult to present the Arabic words. But the matter is clear. Allah says that He has revealed that chapter and He has made it obligatory (fardh) to be obeyed and He has made clear commands (Ayaat, signs ) in that chapter.
So we know that there is no secret meaning in those verses. That is what was required to be proved. The maulvis insist that there is a secret meaning in the verse about Zaniah and Zani. That is not true.
There is no other punishment for illegal sex in the Quran. It means that the word Zani applies to adulterer as well as fornicator and punishment in Islam is 100 lashes only.
In our bangladesh a team named Hefajat-e- Islam is demanding death-sentence for athiest. i think if we can send this message to them, some of them may be understand.
death penalty for atheists? Do they want to execute half of Europe next?
1)The great majority of Muslim Fuqaha have opined on the matter of punishment of Apostacy in Islam. Imam-e-Azam Abu Hanifa, Imam Malik, Imam Hanbal and Imam Shafi, all four great Sunni Imam of Fiqha have prescribed death punishment for the Apostate. Similarly all three Shia imams of Fiqha have the same view. Muslims have given death penalty to apostates for more than 1400 years. Where there is smoke there is fire!
2) The punishment of adultery in Islam is a fact. Hadhrat Khalifatul Massih the II has written in his tafseer that Hadhrat Omar during his Khilafat gave punishment of stoning to death to some. Once again where there is smoke, there is fire.
Let us understand that hundreds of years of practices in the Muslim world are not without any basis. So let us not pretend that they are all ignorant and we have suddenly discovered a new Islam.
Do we really not believe in punishments on the basis of religion? I would submit that we do. Our practice is very clear.