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This transcript was auto-generated using AI and may contain misspellings. Is Sharia the most barbaric form of law? Often, the only things people in the West associate with Islam are stoning and hand chopping. This illustrates how our society has profoundly misunderstood Islam and Sharia. Sharia calls for chopping off hands and stoning for cheating on someone, and even lashes. It's just cruelty disguised as law by a God who is supposed to be the most merciful. He sure is. Who are you? I'm Shibli, the Sharia scholar. So, all this stuff is part of the Sharia, right? Depends on what you mean by part of. Are you really going to say that all that isn't cruelty? The Muslim God loves punishing. Aha, that's where you're wrong. When applied correctly, Sharia is actually based on God's mercy, not God's anger. You're not serious. I am. Where on earth do you get mercy from any of that? So you want us to cruelly cut people's hands off and stone them? No, not at all. You just assumed that. Then what's merciful about any of it? For that, you need to know what Sharia actually is. I already know what it is. It's Islamic law. Not exactly. Let's start with the basics. Sharia is actually the Islamic idea of God's law. It literally means the way to the watering hole, and it governs aspects of everyday life in Islam, including religious rituals. There are five main objectives of Sharia. To preserve human life, faith, intellect, property, and family. Sharia can come from four different sources. The Quran, which is the Muslim holy book, and the Sunnah, which is the prophetic lens through which the Quran is read, are both revelations of God. The other two sources represent the human effort to channel the revelation of God through the early Muslim application of the Quran and Sunnah, and the legal reasoning by Muslim scholars. Together, these four sources make up Fiqh, which refers to the concrete, applicable rules constructed through those four sources.
Fiqh covers the detailed rules and rituals of prayer, fasting, charity, hajj, animals, marriage, divorce, property, and more. A typical comprehensive book of Fiqh can be well over a dozen volumes. Notice how thin the book on Hadud crimes and punishments is. It forms a very small part of actual law. We'll get to the Hadud in a minute. First, how does the Sharia work? To help you understand this, let's compare it to the legal system we have here in America. The basis of each is actually very similar. Impossible. Take a look for yourself. American law, as you know, is a broad legal concept that varies in application based on state or locale. It regulates violations of civil law and violations of criminal law. In the same way, Sharia is the idea of God's law that varies in application based on state or time. It regulates violations of the rights of God and the violations of the rights of God's servants, us, humans. Sharia teaches Muslims to abide by the law of the land, so long as they are able to practice their faith. This falls into one of the intentions of the Sharia, which is harmony and order. Notice that punishment doesn't show up anywhere as a purpose of Sharia. In fact, did you know that in a typical book of fiqh, less than 2% was devoted to Hadud crimes and their punishments? Wait a second. What does Hadud mean again? Hadud is the Arabic plural for the word Had, and it literally means limit or boundary. Hadud crimes are violations of the rights of God. Their punishments are specified in the Quran or Sunnah, and some Hadud crimes can also be violations of the rights of humans. So like stoning for adultery and the hand chopping off for theft? Exactly. I've heard there isn't a punishment as harsh as these for murder. Why is that? That's a good question. It's actually quite simple.
Murder is seen by the Quran and Sunnah as a private wrong committed to individuals and families, as violence, and as a disruption of public order. So in Sharia, the family brings the case to the court and gets to decide on the punishment with the judge. If there is no family to bring the case, the state oversees the disputes and carries out the punishments. And all the rest of Hadud punishments are violations of God's rights? How does stealing from someone affect God so much that he wants to amputate someone's hands? That's another good question. Why do these crimes hurt God so much, you ask? They don't. In Islam, God isn't hurt by the doings of people, but people are hurt. They suffer actual damage and loss. So if people's rights are violated, they need to be restored. God isn't actually harmed if you violate his rights. In this case, it's God's mercy that defines Islamic legal procedure. Sure, because it's possible to be merciful while having the cruelest punishments. Right. It is, through something called Shubuhat. Shubu-what? Prophet Muhammad said, If you find a way out for the person, let them go, for it is better for the authority to err in mercy than to err in punishment. This statement defines the central principle of Islamic law, maximizing mercy. There is no Islamic law without mercy. All of these legal principles shown here put concrete limits on the Hadud and call to ward off the Hadud punishments by Shubuhat. Shubuhat are ambiguities, or anything that establishes even the slightest doubt to the case, which annuls the Hadud punishments. Historically, Muslim scholars hunted for any possible ambiguity to avoid implementing the Hadud. For example, in order to cut off a hand for Sariqa, which is a specific kind of theft, the perpetrator must have met all 80 plus requirements.
If any one requirement was not met, it established enough ambiguity to make the Hadud punishment of cutting off the hand unlawful. The principle of Shubuhat made it nearly impossible to implement any of the Hadud punishments. That's it? So they were always off the hook? No. If there was sufficient evidence, the perpetrators could have still been disciplined, but under a different category of law. For example, in American law, a person could be found guilty under civil law, but innocent under criminal law, and vice versa. In the Sharia, a person could be found guilty of violating the rights of humans, but innocent of violating the Hadud. And non-Hadud offenses were dealt with according to tazir, meaning the judge set the punishment. But was all this actually historically applied? For the most part, yes. For example, in 500 years of Ottoman rule, there was only one instance of stoning for adultery, and Shubuhat were extensively applied throughout Mughal India and Egypt. Wait, wait, wait. So you're telling me the punishments were cruel, but you basically couldn't apply the punishments because the requirements were so extensive? What's the point of having such cruel punishments then? You guys would save yourselves a lot of bad press. That's another good question. Why have rules if you won't follow them? It's like Germany Bantham's theory of utilitarianism, E equals S times P. This equation means that if there is little chance of getting caught, then the law has to be harsh enough to scare anyone away from ever committing the crime. Having laws on the books that are not intended to be applied is normal in all types of law. For example, in American or British law, judges and juries used to find loopholes to reduce punishment, like purposely undervaluing stolen goods to drop the crime from a death punishment to punishment by flogging.
Just like how in the Sharia, judges and scholars would search for Shubuhat or ambiguities to reduce punishments and avoid the hudud, but still maintain order. So, you tell me now, is the Sharia barbaric? Sharia is the idea of God's law that governs every aspect of a person's life. Hudud crimes were violations of God's rights. Non-hudud crimes were punishable by tazir, or the judge's discretion. Hudud crimes punishments were almost impossible to apply because of three things. The Shubuhat, which were tough requirements needed for something to be considered a crime. The importance of presuming innocence until proven guilty. And a fair and balanced court system. I guess it's not as terrible as I thought. That's okay. Legal systems can always be a little tough to wrap our heads around. If nothing else, just remember how Ibn al-Qayyim, the Muslim theologian, describes Sharia. The Sharia is entirely justice, compassion, wisdom, and prosperity. Therefore, any ruling that replaces justice with injustice, mercy with cruelty, prosperity with harm, or wisdom with nonsense is a ruling that does not belong to the Sharia, even if it is claimed to be so according to some interpretations.
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