Under Sharia, those who insult Muhammad or Allah are to be put to death. So are those who desecrate the Quran, or commit other acts of blasphemy. This tradition began with Muhammad, as recorded in the Hadith and by his biographers. There is also a Quranic basis for it. Quran (33:57) - Lo! those who malign Allah and His messenger, Allah hath cursed them in this world and the Hereafter, and hath prepared for them the doom of the disdained Quran (33:61) - [continues from above] Accursed, they will be seized wherever found and slain with a (fierce) slaughter. Confirmed in... Bukhari (4:241) - Those who mocked Muhammad at Mecca were killed after he had retaken the city and asserted his authority. Muslims in the West who do not want it known that their religion prescribes death for detractors often quote Quran (3:186). This is an earlier verse following a defeat in battle - when Muhammads forces were relatively weak. Though encouraging Muslims to endure insults at the time, the text goes on to say that if Muslims are patient, then a grievous penalty will befall those who mock them. Indeed, those to whom this verse specifically referred, were put to death by Muhammad just a few short years later. Perhaps the best evidence that Muhammad punished critics with death are the number of people who were murdered for this very reason shortly after he attained the power to do so. His biographers list numerous citizens who were murdered merely for mockery or criticism, particularly poets - the media artists of the time. One was a mother of five, who had her child pulled from her breast before she was run through with a sword. When author Salman Rushdie published The Satanic Verses, a 1988 novel deemed offensive to Muhammad, the Ayatollah Khomeini pronounced a death sentence that was supported by a majority of Muslims. In 2006, when a Danish newspaper published cartoons of Muhammad, an Imam (and immigrant to Denmark), traveled back to the Middle East and whipped up hatred that resulted in deadly rioting on three continents. Demonstrators in London held signs reading Massacre Those Who Insult Islam.
Posted on: Wed, 30 Oct 2013 00:04:35 +0000