Digitaljez,
Thank you for a fairly reasonable argument. You are saying that reason dictates that it is wrong to kill and that people know this instinctively.
I agree. Islam confirms both that it is wrong and that people know this instinctively. The Quran says that it is wrong to kill unustly, and also that if you take one life it is as if you had killed the whole of humanity. Islam is also called deen-al-fitra which means “religion of the innate human nature”.
Now, are there any well-known exceptions to the rule “thou shalt not kill” which moral people find it acceptable to take a life? A murder or serial killer? An enemy on the battlefield? A traitor? A spy? An Adulterer? Are there others? Well, not all societies think all these things are punishable by death, but some do.
If we accept that these acts as instances where capital punishment is morally justified, then we must ask what makes these acts worthy of capital punishment? Are there common traits or a common that link these acts?
As far as I can tell, all those acts threaten the foundation of the community/society. There are other crimes for sure, but none that I can think of off-hand that threaten the foundations of a societyÂ… except if the society has a religious foundation, and that would be apostasy. An apostate can tear at the heart and fabric of heavily relational religious societies creating much discord. Afghanistan is such a society.
Indeed, capital punishment for apostasy seems to be the dominant view of Islamic scholars, but it is not the only view. And also we can see why apostasy in places like America isn’t very significant – American society is predicated on individual religious freedom without consideration of the rights of religious societies per se.
Regardless, amongst the “modern intelligent, enlightened” Islamic scholars of our day, is the view that unless the apostate is actively working against the Muslims (in essence a traitor), the apostates life should be spared.
Perhaps they should adopt that view in the Afghanistan case. Nobody said it was ever easy to take a life. If it was, that guy in Afghanistan might have been killed a long time ago. Perhaps the key question when looking at capital punishment is when do the rights of the group overrule the rights of the individual or vice-versa – that’s an interesting and somewhat difficult question.
Anyway, that is my argument. Let me know if it is not sound or the logic fails... and show me explicitly please.
I will tell you that, also, there is no vigilantism in Islam so no Muslim has authority to enforce Islamic law unless they are the ruler of the Islamic country. Muslims don't run around killing apostates. I will also tell you that Muslims must follow the laws of the land for which they live in. ThatÂ’s why all Muslims in non-Muslim countries better follow the laws of the lands they live in.
Now, if you feel that capital punishment is never justified, you are entitled to that opinion, I would suggest that if your family is threatened by someone intent on murdering them, and you have the means to kill the assailant, you may change your moral stance just in time.
Of course one could always argue that the really old document dictates God's rights over his creation and man's responsibilities, but modern enlightened people don't like that kind of talk even if it were true. Just because a document is old doesn't mean truth has become falsehood. That might even be a better approach to proving/disproving the rulings on apostasy because then we'd actually be turning to the revelation to see what it says.
Why was I asking this question to Winkle?
Winkle kept slamming Islam and not backing up his words. HeÂ’d change to a new attack and IÂ’d respond, and heÂ’s change his direction of attack again. I wanted to know if he thought capital punishment was wrong because he cited a capital punishment case. I wanted to know sincerely why he thought it was wrong. He never answered.
You gave a more reasonable answer than his. I wanted to then show him that if he was a Christian (although I didn’t know he was a Christian at the time), it seems that Christianity was based on someone being sentenced to death for, in essence, apostasy (although there are larger theological considerations for Christians in general – which I did not attack). You know… “seeing the speck in your brother, but not seeing the log in your own eye” sort of thing.
Winkle,
You saidÂ…
rmd3 i have a 6th grade education most might consider that a problem but i don't
The Prophet Muhammad (Peace be upon him) was illiterate. You might even find a reference to him in Isaiah 29:12.
As for Jesus supposed death due to envy… I think you missed the point. The Jews didn’t complain “Hey, we’re jealous of him, so put him to death Ponchus Pilot!”. They claimed he had said things against the Jewish faith. They might have done this because of envy, but that is not the means to his alleged death.
You can imply I know nothing of Christianity and should do research, but I spent my first 22 years as a Christian and did my fair share of research into the Roman winter solstice Sun-god cult wrapped in JesusÂ’s name, so donÂ’t try to blow smoke my way. So do more research yourself.
Now for your questionsÂ…
and what kind of a God needs a meer man to take vengeance as though he can't him self.
IÂ’ll let you be a witness against yourself on that one, Winkle.
i read somewhere that moslems are forbidden to touch the bible is this true
Not true at all.
this is a tackey question but which of you're children would you sacrifice to attact Israel
That depends on which of your children would you sacrifice to defend it?
SeeÂ… Winkle is attacking again. I guess you were wasting my time after all, Winkle... okay, I'll stop this converstaion with you. Digitaljez may offer me something more meaningful (although he was kind of attacking me from his originial post... we'll see)
-Randall
