A Journey Through Our Conscience

Dear Sajal,

A very well written article. Had a comment for Romair which applies here as well. . .

Rumair: I dont think it is just the responsibility of women to stand up against injustice targeted at women. Those who occupy privileged positions in society are just as responsible as those who arent and in fact occupy more leverage. It is very convenient I am sure to tell your wife if you dont do something about it first I wont either. Finger pointing is childish. I think it needs to be a joint stand - not just women.

Corina

Re: #56

The idea may be worth trying, but there`s a small problem with it. It leaves out the Pseudo Joe Hates of the world to wreak havoc outside. We must think of something to tame these buggers too.

:-)

Re: #39

Urstruly,

Salute to you sir... Alhumdulillah He has belssed you with very valuable knowledge; may He add to it for our benefit and yours, ameen. Needless to say, I thoroughly enjoy your posts.

However, I wish to offer a correction to the following:
**In Lia`an, the judge first asks accuser to decalre under oath that he is telling the truth about his or her spouse`s infidelity and if he is telling a lie then may Allah`s curse be upon him/her. The accuser has to take this oath verbally three times on Qura`n. Then judge repeats the same procedure with accused where he or she declares under oath that his accuser is telling a lie and if not then may Allah`s curse be upon him/her.**

According to An-Nur, verses 6-9, both the the accuser and the accused (in case of not-guilty plea) have to testify four times and then fifth testimony should be the invoking of Allah if they lie, thereby confirming their allegation and its rebuttal a total of five (5) times each.

Kindly correct me if I`m wrong!

Jazak-Allah-khair

I condemn temporals, romairs and ferozks for knowing the right thing in their subconcious but not taking the extra mile because it requires a lot of courage. these optimists are seekers of reconsiliation with the very thing which is the root of all the problems. yes, i am talking about the flawed concept of religion.

if you think if stars, you will get stars but if you think of an apple on a tree, well you will get an apple.

re: Urstruly

Urstruly, I have a few questions you.

Please state what is the actual status accorded to women in Islam and under Islamic law.

You and I have interacted over many issues over a long period of time on Chowk. You are aware of my position on the issue of Sharia and Islam in Pakistan. It is with this in mind, that I have to ask you a straightforward question.

Are you confident that if Sharia law is implemented in Pakistan, it will be truly an Islamic law?

My own fear is that Sharia will not be implented in Pakistan in an Islamic sense, because religion is periodically twisted for political ends in Pakistan. Therefore, any theocractic law and in its imposition in Pakistan risks a political interpretation and given the levels of acute intolerances prevailing in Pakistani society, such a law will only help in solidfying moral autuocracy of a vocal minority. Pakistan is not homgeneous society in a religious sense, because it contains both sunni and shia Muslims, Christians, Hindus and Sikhs and Parsis. In a religious sense, Pakistan is pluralistic society and no one religious law can be imposed fairly, unless Pakistan hopes to achieve a dictatorship of the majority through a religous decree.

A good law reflects justice, because it is based on the values of common sense grounded in the imperfections of the society, which it tries to clarify by being fair to all concerned parties. A theocratic law will not gurantee this idea and it will, by its very nature, seek to tilt the playing field unevenly in favor of one group over another. This would create injustice, because all the religions in Pakistan will be judged on the basis of the morality of one religion.

This then raises the issue of who is going to decide the morality of the dominant religion in Pakistan?

The nightmarish concern in Pakistan is that its clergy is woefully ignorant of religion and what they preach as a religion is nothing more than a highly skewed form of culturalism. Given the lack of religious education and understanding within the clergy of Pakistan itself about Islam and its teachings, a theocracatic law will only create injustice, resentment and resistence towards Islam and in many ways, this will only cause harm to Islam in particular and will bring no good to Pakistan in general.

Urstruly, the real problem in implementing Islamic Sharia law in Pakistan is not the Pakistani society, but it is the clergy itself which is confused on the issue of what is Islam!

Ciao

Urstruly #various: Can you point out where in the Quran, the various, Hadd punishments are adjudicated?

If today Hadood laws were removed, nothing much would happen. Maulvi brigade would make some noise, and that would be it. Maulvi brigade made a lot of noise, when Friday was removed as a holiday, and nothing happened.

It will be much more difficult to remove things like honor killings through panchayat. Because those are overseen by the landed political leadership (nearly all of who are secular (or non-theocratic)). They have real economic control over the people.

People are far too scared of the maulvi brigade. In addition, there is no real opposition to them, with any kind of credibility. There is no true urban national middle-class party in Pakistan. I though PTI would turn into one. But it never became popular.

This is, however, the best time to get things like Hadood Ordinances removed. Musharraf`s govt. has been more pro-women than any since Ayub Khan. Someone needs to give the political push, however. Perhaps the women, who are in large numbers in the legislature now, could do the trick.

If the push is not given now, then when the real political govts. do take over, it will be very difficult. Because they are generally discredited amongst the populace and are, thus, quite afraid of the maulvi brigade`s street power. If someone like MQM could spread nationally, it could take on the maulvi brigade.

In any case, it will be the women, themselves, who will have to demand and literally rip these rights away for themselves. As long as the women`s seats in the local and federal assemblies are maintained, I think it might happen.................

let`s suppose the following 2 scinarios:

1:

a man and a woman commit adultary and three men see them.

some days go by and they do it again and the same three men see them again.

they see them doing the sin yet another time.

2:

another pair of a man and a woman commit adultary for the first time but to their bad luck, four people see them. they are stonned to death.

i ask, where is justice ?

Re: # 70
urstruly,
The hadud cannot apply to a rapist who was not seen by four witnesses and taazir would be applied to them.In the above case, can hadud be applied against the woman for adultery? What are the requirement of witnesses for that? Would that be contingent on the decision of the court case for rape?

Re: # 63

Were the culprits penalized? Did they receive 99 or whatever number of lashes you are referring to? By the way, who penalized the culprits? Which decade was that?

If the culprits were not penalized then please do not quote rubbish on things that are not in practice and have been hammered to death in some legal thesis somewhere to make a mockery out of human life!

Your posts are damn annoying!

Re: # 70 Further to my #70

As a matter of heavy fine+corporal punishment+incarceration AND EXILE for certain period of time are prescribed under jusriprudence in standard for hudd is not applicable.

Re: # 64 sajal

Please calm down and think logically. The basic premise of your post is wrong when you start with the opening sentence ``SO NOW, we should hope that every girl is gangraped infront of a lot of witnesses to have our four male witnesses. otherwise she is not raped . `` Please read my post number 39 and try to figure out why your premise is wrong. You are a student of law, in the law jargon such a statement is called a ``circular logic``; in this logic the presenter presents a statement as truth and then itis followed by a statement that contradicts itself. Lawyers and judges are are trained to detect, avoid and examine such things. A classical example is the ststement ``If God is all powerful and absolute then can he make stone which even He cannot lift``. Sajal you can do better than that.

malik# 67

Oh now you are supporting Hadud punishment and trying to figure out ways, as to how to subject as many people to it?

Anyway, let us assume that your inquiry is based on the spirit of enquiry and debate, then a short answer to your question is that; the minimum standard of witness for subjecting the culprits to hadd punishment of ``stonning to death`` or ``100 leashes in public place`` is four adult males of sound character or three adult males and two adult female witnesses. If this standard is not met the hadd punishment cannot be imposed. In that case the rapists are convicted for rape and subjected to Ta`azir punishment. Ta`azir punishment is an arbitrary punishment chosen by the society and in principle it is less sever than hadd for rape. For example if a rapist is single he can be beaten with 99 leashes ( any number fewer than 100 leashes); fined and incarcerated at the same time or a combination thereof. In case rapist is married he may be subjected to the above combination but may be punished even severer but he cannot be given a death penalty thru stonning. Hadd applies only when two conditions in my post#39 are met.

kaalchakra,

abdul-hatism is a contagious. its a very slow poison. its major cause is the moral advantage of the abdul-hates over normals. it flourishes under political corruption and economic backwardness. you live your life in pakistan wiritng posts on chowk condemning abdul-hates but you will find out that your own sons will turn into abdul-hates. blunt attempts of the general will only make abdul-hatism stronger.

Re: # 53
ntsyed sahib,
1. If you believe in Allah, then you must believe in everything He says.
Why?

Re: # 63 URSTRULY,

Will hadd not apply if the bus was a women college trip going to mangla dam and the only men onboard were a driver, an assitant driver and an assistant to the assistant driver. Will there be no hadd if some 30 women see two of them gang raped in addition to those three men?

you mean women are near to nothing? what do you really mean?

okay, if hadd is not about rape, what does the shariyah has to say about rape`s law? don`t tell me that there was no rape in the times of prophet mo (peace be upon me).

Re: # 55

kaalchakra,

.......... you are right - the destructive power of the lunatic fringe in every religion far exceeds its numbers because, when it comes to matters of faith, the so-called moderate majority defers to the lunatic fringe ......... it is particularly true in islam which blurs the line between personal faith, law, politics and everything else - this plays into the hands of the rabid mullahs who claim they are only enforcing al-lah`s will .........