Sunday 9 December 2007

Teddies, Shariah law and civil society

The early release of Ms Gibbons and 'pardoning' of her 'crime' by Sudanese president Omer el-Bashir has been welcomed by all. This was after the hard work of the two Muslim peers Lord Nazir Ahmed and Lady Warsi.

Lord Nazir issued a statement, saying that the misunderstanding is over. Gordon Brown said that she never should have been arrested. The Sudanese ambassador said the pardon meant that the initial error had not been 'forgotten', rather it was 'forgiven', whilst maintaining the original 'mistake' - and the conviction therefore - still 'stood'.

This, however does not really address a number of fundamental questions; amongst them: Muslims may well belie such an incident as being alien to Islam, but how does it take place in the name of Islam? What if she was guilty? Do Muslims advocate flogging and imprisonment in that case? It seems in some circles, they go even further. "Moderate" Islamist movement leaders such as el-Sheikh el-Nur of the Muslim Brotherhood went further and said, "If she intended the prophet by naming the teddy bear, she should be killed".

In the same vain are punishments such as amputation of limbs, stoning of adulterers, and lashing/imprisoning/killing those that dare name a bear Muhammad. Are these really aspects of Islam, and the "shariah" that are essential aspect of divine wisdom, as understood by Muslims?

Muslims and Muslim scholars have attempted to address this and many other issues that pertain to Muslims, Islam and modernity and civil society, but the question still arises amongst Muslims and mainly propounded by Islamists. Muslim scholars have traditionally viewed the Shariah as seeking to preserve certain fundamental goals (maqasid) as vital necessities, upon which the whole of the shariah is built and in fact the rest of the rules are just means (wasail) to realize them.

These would be the preservation of religion, intellect, family/lineage, life and property. Muslim theologians also believe that these are universal values. Muslim scholars have explained that these aims are fundamental interests (masalih) that societies seek. And the rest of the rules were means to do so.

So Muhammad (saw) organised his community, alongside the Jewish tribes, and polytheists by negotiating an agreement in Mithaq ul-Madinah 'The document of Madinah'. This was in his time, and situation, how best to realize these aims. He described the Muslims, Jews and Polytheists who were signatories to this document as 'one Ummah, separate from the rest of mankind' and a plurality of legal traditions, Jewish and Polytheistic local tradition e.g. blood money (see Ibn Hisham).

The Prophet made other agreements; He agreed with the tribe of Thaqeef that they would have their own leader for prayer from amongst themselves, they would not join the congregation of Madinah, they would not pay the Zakat (alms) nor would they take part in the Jihad (armed conflict) alongside the Muslims (Sunan Abu Dawud).

Muslims maintained this political tradition. They asked Abu Bakr to appoint the next leader to prevent the discord that occurred after the appointment of Abu Bakr. Umar separated the power of judging from the governors to ensure justice. The Muslims appointed Uthman, after Umar had restricted the nominees, on condition that he follows the rules and laws of Abu Bakr and Umar (See Bukhari). The court of mathalim was established by the Abbasids (Mawardi the Qadi and writer notes this was an imitation of the Persian system present at the time) to bring about justice and account the governors.

Mawardi, the Judge and scholar from the Abbasid era describes in his work both the functioning of polity in his time, and dictates some rules pertaining to them. He gives an incident where Qadi Abu Yusuf was adjudicating in a case with competing interests. The Qadi informed the Caliph, Harun al-Rashid who advised discretion and not imposing the old traditions in a manner that would create political discord as it was completely out of sink with the views of Society. Imam Mawardi states that Abu Yusuf did so, and is perfectly permissible as it was seeking the maslaha (see Ahkam al-Sultaniyah). In the same context Imam Ahmed al-Hadawi al-Murtada explains that the 'Hudood' ("prescribed punishments") should be dropped when there is an interest (Maslaha) in doing so (See 'al-Azhar').

In today's day and age, we can have various means to ascertain lineage and parental responsibility, maintenance measures; DNA testing involved in detecting crimes and various means of rehabilitation; a developed and developing understanding (there is still huge disparity in the West between salaries across gender) of the social value of women in the work place and their understanding of socio-economic-political matters - we can seek to redress any imbalances and outdated or outmoded expressions of the means by which the these important goals (Maqasid) are realized. All of this away from the influences of the medieval mindset. We can relieve ourselves of ancient and outmoded punishments, such as 'flogging' and 'stoning' as not being consistent with the actualizing of the Maqasid (Something that the Ottomans had abandoned for the last 300 hundred years in its imperial life).

Professor Imran Khan Nyazee in his work 'Theories of Islamic Law', explains that today we should re-evaluate the disparity between female testimony, their apparent economic value as being equal to that of men, and more importantly, the most appropriate political system as a democratic political system which would facilitate the best means of Muslims realizing the above aims in a just political order.

It should also be clear that the Prophet and the early Muslims were able to establish a 'social contract' that facilitated harmony in their own societies, allowing the political means to develop pragmatically, as necessitated. Where are we in this respect? How close are we to developing our own 'home-grown' organic conception of civil society and develop a discourse where we can replicate the same notion of 'Ummah', that the Prophet (saw) managed to create in multi-faith Madinah, whilst maintaining social cohesion? This for me is the question of our age.


Rashad Ali is a former lecturer at Jami Taybah University, Madinah and King Adul Aziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. He is a former member of Hizb ut-Tahrir, Britain and previously a member of its Wilayah (leadership) committee.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Rashad Zaman Ali has never been a lecturar. The truth is he has no qualification (not even A levels or a bachlors), he owes hundreds of thousands of pounds to people, he is homeless, he is on the police wanted list for dealing in stolen vehicles.
He has been totally abandoned by his family and has absoloutly no credibility any community at all (may be some net community may see him differently)

Soon you will see a full detailed list with evidence on most public sites and bloggs to illustrate what Mr Rashad Zaman Ali really is. This truth will soon bring the light.

As for the time being just please store and save all that you read about this 'thing' and we will advise you when he even changes his name. As for now he has no home address unlike Mr Majid Nawaz and Ed Hussain (Mahboob real name.

Life is about to take an even better change for Mr Rashad, just keeep watching this space when he thinks he has gained some credibility based upon lies and deciet, the truth will be OPEN!!!.

Anonymous said...

An excellent refutation of your article is at:

http://traditionalislamism.blogspot.com/2007/12/shatibi-najm-deen-tufi-and-regressive.html

Please respond to it if you are capable of doing so!

Anonymous said...

I thought I would share this information as something related to it has been mentioned.

Rashad Ali was only a member of the Wilayah Committee of HT in UK for approximately 2 weeks and was then asked to leave due to his incompetence in fulfilling tasks.

Anonymous said...

By the way - Rashad Ali did not even get any A-levels, he dropped out of college, you can verify this from the college he went to in Sheffield.

There is evidence that he only got into other institutes by providing fake references and even fake qualifications

Anonymous said...

Ya shiekh al shieukh of blaggers could you kindly provide the reference for the Zaydi Imam's ruling on masaleh and Huduud in his book

عيون الأزهار فى فقه الأئمة الأطهار

Oh yeah, could you also provide the reference for this wonderful "interpretation" of Abu Yusuf's interaction with Haroon al Rashid? Any Isnad? in the Ahkam al Sultaniya

I wonder, are you lying again and twisting the views of the scholars?

Do you now consider the Zaydi school part and parcel of the orthodoxy including the notion of a "created Quran"?

What happened to the views that are ghair mu3tabaar ya Jahil?

Must not forget this strange crazy reference to a 300 year period were flogging was banned in the Ottoman state. lool! Be careful what you write for we will chase you and your references and expose you for the liar that you are!

Anonymous said...

salams,

Rash was an english teacher in Saudi not an lecturer which would indicate an position of intellect.

From the article, there are misquotes, misunderstanding of texts esp Banu Thaqif and also misunderstanding of Islamic history. I think this article is going down well with the citycircle cohorts but with traditional scholarship it has no value whatsoever and one doesnot need to be an scholar to realise this. As the arguments by rashad touch at the aqeedah of muslims, therefore i am pleases to say this is a lost battle for the secularists/modernisers, seen it in the past with the likes of taha hussein and ali abdal raziq- whats the difference between these guys and rash et al? nothing in essence, are thier views dominant in the muslims? no, alhamdulilah, the haq will prevail over the falsehood and destroy it (al baqarah)

Anonymous said...

I note that in a previous article Rashad you wrote the following:

Imam Shatibi (ra) said in his al Muwaffaqaat fee Usul al Ahkam volume page 25, "The objective behind the Shariah is to liberate the individual from his desires in order to be a true slave of Allah and that is the legitimate Maslaha (Benefit)…Violating the Shariah under the pretext of following the basic objectives or values (maqasid) of the Shariah is like the one who cares about the spirit without the body, and since the body without the spirit is useless, therefore the spirit without the body is useless too."

I think the quote says it all.

Anonymous said...

Arguably, shar'iah (as well as the sunnah/system of hadith) is a political construct that emerged in the Umayyad era, quite sometime after the death of the Holy Prophet (s). There is nothing sacred or immutable about shar'iah. Nor, can it be seen as indispensable or linked to aqeeda. If anything, shar’iah was a secular production bolted on to ‘Islam’.

However, in a final analysis both Rashad Ali and his detractors who have posted in response to his article, supply somewhat uncritical meta-narratives about what Islam is and isn't, can and cannot be. Rashad Ali, does it in many ways, for example in his presentation or use of the concept, ‘Ummah’ and statements such as ‘early Muslims were able to establish a 'social contract' that facilitated harmony in their own societies’ (the latter is a highly debatable, if not spurious statement). As a result Rashad Ali, whilst in a worthwhile effort, pre-emptively calls for the development of ‘a discourse where we can replicate the same notion of 'Ummah'’ without calling for a discourse that examines, if not de-constructs, the concept of the ‘Ummah’ first and foremost. But, it should not only be limited to this. I would argue that we need to go further and examine the structure that frames the discourse of the ummah (in fact, one could argue that, from certain perspectives, structure and discourse elide into another and are effectively the same).

Lastly, I think both people who approve and disapprove of Rashid Ali’s sentiments have to remember this (and you may not like this fact): There isn't a single locatable Islam. There never has been. Rather, there exist multiple, divergent Islams. Islam can be viewed as an interpretative practice or as a text that lends itself to multiple readings (spatially and temporally), possibly even inter-textual readings.

Anonymous said...

If the argument is we create a brand of Islam that is consistent with the values of the host nations, then would these people accept Homosexuality? It is a norm for people in this country and, as someone keeps on banging on about it here, is seen as someone's 'human-right? If so where does it end??? If we were in some hick-town in the US would it mean that we would need to foster a brand of Islam that allows us to marry our own siblings???

Hudood laws outdated???? As I understand you can get punished for sins in this life or the hereafter. So hudood laws facilitate the expiation of sin in this life. If you believe in that doctrine, it can never be outdated!!!

The Prophet (saw) did wear a thoub, rode a camel and lived in a hut but it nowehere does it say that it’s is compulsory on people!! Even so! As the prophetic saying goes, there will be many people who claim to be Muslim but the one that does as the Prophet (saw) does will be the only group to enter heaven. So in that sense maybe we should do all the above, because staying as close to his actions is more of a guarantee than any intellectual rationalisation!! Keep it simple peeps and don’t get brainwashed by stooges with agendas.