Surely this overarching principle cannot be transgressed by forcing a person under penalty of death to espouse Islam even after such a person professes to have renounced it. The second overlooked factor relates to the Prophet's Sunnah, which is the second source of law. In another case, the Prophet reached a different outcome. In this case, which shows the considerate and gentler face of Islam, a man was brought to the Prophet and accused of turning away from Islam.
He was seen throwing his spear into the sky and screaming, "I want to kill you God! The man said that God had killed his beloved one that he was soon to marry, and that he wanted to kill God for that. The Prophet, addressing the accusers, said, "Is it not enough for you that he believes in God enough that he wants to kill him? This period varied from one to 10 days. If all scholars agree to a period of time, and there can be no compulsion in religion, then why is it not valid to say that the person's natural life is the appropriate period of time?
After all, the applicable Koranic verse refers to those who "die as disbelievers. I've been asked over the years whether I regret leaving, and to be honest, I don't. Because the person I've become today is a strong, independent, confident person.
I'm not afraid to say what's on my mind. I do regret that leaving means that I no longer have a family support network, and it means that I am essentially alone in this big, scary world. If you're struggling, there are groups online that can help including the organisation mentioned in this article , as well as resources like Kids Helpline, which helps young people up to the age of 25 55 or Beyond Blue 22 ABC Everyday helps you navigate life's challenges and choices so you can stay on top of the things that matter to you.
We acknowledge Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the First Australians and Traditional Custodians of the lands where we live, learn and work. ABC Everyday. Print content Print with images and other media. Print text only. Print Cancel. Describe your upbringing: My mother is actually a convert. Overall, our knowledge about how the topic of apostasy has been dealt with in Islam in the close to 14 centuries of Islamic history is limited: Apart from few sources relating to the time of the Middle Ages and the Ottoman Empire, we primarily have sources at our disposal which are from the early days of Islam as well as from the 19th and 20th centuries.
The reason for the outbreak of uprisings has been disputed within research: For instance, the continued existence of pre-Islamic social structures is supposed, such that a protective relationship was linked exclusively to an influential leader Hasemann : Or was the uprising determined by the desire to avoid the collection of taxes and to cast off the rulers from Medina?
In such case one would only be able to speak conditionally about the term apostasy Hallaq : — There are only a few known individual cases of the use of the death penalty for apostates dating from the 8th century. The reason for this could be that it was first of all in the course of Abbasid rule from the end of the 8th century onwards that prosecution and the imposition of the death penalty set in.
In the Umayyad and early Abbasid periods, the defensive measures against apostates appear to have mostly remained limited to intellectual debates Cook : ; — From the 9th century onwards, a time in which the execution of apostates becomes historically tangible, complaints become vociferous that the charge of apostasy set in as a weapon against undesired opponents.
There are reports from this time about the reconversion of prior non-Muslim detainees after their release. Since one considered the inner convictions of a person to not be justiciable, legal experts at that time appear to have generally been more cautious to judge belief or unbelief Olsson : For that reason, many scholars appear to have concentrated more on the political aspect of the question, namely whether the involved individual caused revolt and rebellion.
It was believed that such occurrences were able to be more clearly judged. The Ottoman Empire offers a more easily researchable arena as to how apostasy was dealt with. A number of reports are available from the 19th century on the execution of apostates.
This was a time when there was intensive struggle between the representatives of Western powers and the Sublime Porte High Porte about the justification of these executions. Strictly speaking, however, converts were not included. What followed was a long period marked by a diplomatic tug-of-war: While the British envoy made determined attempts to move the Sublime Porte to change its laws with respect to the criminal prosecution of apostates, the Sublime Porte, for its part, sought to be as decided in not giving in to the urging and straitjacketing by the envoys of Europe.
Cases of the execution of apostates reported out of Egypt are also known from the 19th century, such as, for instance, the killing of female apostates from the years and Peters and De Vries It was not until the 20th century that the topic of apostasy developed a new dynamic: Theologians increasingly drafted tracts and papers in which the use of the death penalty for apostasy was called for while at the same time most Muslim majority states in the 20th century, in the course of nation building, formulated constitutions affirming religious freedom.
Only in the fewest of these constitutions is apostasy from Islam taken to be a criminal offense; it can, for example, be punished in Saudi Arabia with the death penalty although the country has no constitution , in Yemen, Mauretania, and in Iran. However, apostasy from Islam in the public sphere is now predominantly interpreted as a political offense, and there are more than a few position statements condemning it as an action endangering the state which has to be immediately halted.
Since Sharia law in the 20th century has been limited to family law for the majority of the states in the mena region, a legal charge on account of apostasy is only possible in those few states which have codified Sharia law into penal law. Nowadays, this classification is viewed critically by an increasing number of theologians.
Up to the present day, the legal imposition of the death penalty for apostasy is possible where Sharia law has been codified in penal law. However, in Muslim majority countries or states characterised by Islam, public apostasy from Islam has social as well as legal consequences: Apostasy is frequently viewed socially as a disgrace, treason, and a scandal. There are essentially three main positions within Islamic theology today when it comes to the question of religious freedom.
There is a liberal or progressive position, which advocates complete religious freedom, including the right of being allowed to leave Islam. There is a restrictive position, which basically rejects religious freedom for Muslims and which seeks to penalise criticism of Islam or its progressive interpretation with the death penalty.
Finally, there is a centrist or moderate position, which a majority of theologians might be considered to support today. Since over the course of the history of theology the call for the death penalty for apostasy formulated in the early days of Islam has not been declared to be invalid, and since the principle justification of punishment of renegades had essentially never been placed into question by influential committees of scholars using a historical hermeneutical approach, recourse to texts from the early days of Islam have remained an acknowledged instrument for abstracting guidelines for dealing with apostates in the 20th century.
Nowadays, representatives of the liberal position likewise refer to texts from the early days in order to justify complete religious freedom. Indeed, according to the opinion of the majority of representatives of this position, it is also neither desirable nor is it meaningless with respect to the assessment of the individual in the Last Judgment. Nevertheless, it is not to be subject to punishment. Punishment, they hold, would contradict what is for them the intrinsic principle of free will.
Since it is held that the Islamic community is not threatened by what is in total a low number of apostates, the prosecution of individual apostates in the early days of Islam cannot be taken as a guideline for dealing with those who change religions in the present day. In contrast, the centrist or moderate position advocates freedom of belief for Muslims, which exclusively means internal thoughts.
At the same time, freedom to openly confess adherence to another religion or to no religion is rejected. On the one hand, there is a warning against premature allegations and calls for execution of those whose apostasy is not unambiguously provable. On the other hand, however, it advocates execution as an obligatory action according to Sharia law in the case of proven apostates who make their turning away from Islam public.
In the same way as representatives of the restrictive position, they condemn turning away from Islam as a political offense that brings unrest into the state and society and causes revolt. The following three contemporary examples illustrate that it is often difficult, if not dangerous, to leave Islam in Muslim majority societies around the world. The first example of Yousef Nadarkhani demonstrates that in Iran the charge of apostasy, punishment, and incarceration also applies while there is no written law in the constitution which forbids converting to another religion.
The pastor Yousef Nadarkhani, a convert to the Christian faith and the pastor of an underground Protestant Iranian church, was initially imprisoned in and then again in and on account of apostasy.
In September , Yousef Nadarkhani was surprisingly set free, supposedly not least because of numerous international press reports and political advocacy in that same year. However, a short time later, he was again arrested, allegedly on account of some sort of irregularity. After being released again, Yousef Nadarkhani continued to work as a pastor but was permanently harassed by the Iranian authorities and eventually incarcerated again.
In July , he was sentenced to ten years of imprisonment and subsequently two years of exile 1, miles away from his hometown and family. He was then abducted in the middle of the street and later found dead Sanasarian : f. On the contrary, Iran, by signing the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, has taken on the obligation of guaranteeing freedom of thought, freedom of conscience, and freedom of religion.
Another significant incident was the author and intellectual Farag Foda. This occurred after he had already been openly accused of apostasy and unbelief for some time by various individuals. He had also been challenged by renowned representatives of Islamism in rebuttal of his viewpoints, which had a secular orientation Soage : The freedom of opinion, democracy, an improved legal position for the Coptic minority as well as the separation of religion and politics were some additional items he called for.
However, that does not resolve the question of peaceable change of religious belief. Furthermore Allah does not mandate the death penalty even for active treason.
In the Quran, verse 5. The Quran in verses 4. Believe in Allah and His Messenger, and the scripture which He hath sent to His Messenger and the scripture which He sent to those before him. Those who believe, then reject faith, then believe again and again reject faith, and go on increasing in unbelief,- Allah will not forgive them nor guide them nor guide them on the way.
Many people quote various Hadith in favour of the death penalty. However they fail to look at the full body of Hadith, or to subject the Hadith to the critical scrutiny practiced by Islamic scholars.
Those links should be read in detail to understand the issues properly. According to the principles established by hadith scholars, only mutawatir narrations [hadiths that have been narrated in exact words through so many different chains that any possibility of forgery or manipulation is precluded] yield certainty of knowledge.
Any non-mutawatir hadith is known as ahad [solitary] , and such solitary narration yields only probabilistic or speculative knowledge. For detail, please refer to my aforementioned essay.
The relevance of this mutawatir or ahad distinction is that none of the hadiths pertaining to apostasy is mutawatir and thus does not yield any certainty of knowledge. Also, it is generally agreed that no hadd punishment can be established on the basis of such ahad hadith.
The Apostasy and Islam blog contains quotes on apostasy from Islamic scholars over the centuries. It is clear that the Quran prescribes no earthly penalty for simply leaving Islam. It does prescribe four alternative penalties for active treason.
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