Is stoning to death against islam?

Society Religion & Philosophy
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Is stoning to death against islam?

If it is, why? Please provide the proof?

If not, why not? Please provide the proof.

It is very important that we clearly understand the true islamic standpoint on this issue so that we can educate the rest of humanty as to what islam really is and what it is not.

We need to fight on two fronts a)with such people who claim to be muslims yet distort islam and b)those who do not claim to be muslims but take distorted islam as real islam and condemn all muslims for stupidity of those who interpret the quran against itself, thereby putting aside the principle of tafseer of the quran by the quran.

If we read the quran there is no mention of death by stoning for people who have sex without being married to each other. However that is exactly what taleban did in afghanistan and some also did such things in paksitan in the name of islam.

It will be interesting to see such people prove that such a punishment is islamic in quranic context.

I want to make clear that I believe all tafaseer, ahadith, sharahs, sirah and islamic history books are merely information for us to use it to help understand the quran. They are not authentic on their own rather they need to go through basic tests eg chains of reporters must be sound, the reporters themselves must be sound and what they report must also be sound in light of the self evident facts and the quran.

Just because someone tells us this is hadith etc is not acceptable merely on face value. Nor is anything acceptable right or true merely because a good person tells us about it if the message does not stand to reason.

Thanks in advance for participating regards and all the best.

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Re: Is stoning to death against islam?

Please note Mughal1 all the verses of the Qur'an are Muttawatir and many hadith are also Muttawatir. It is not always a case of text saying this or that it is often context and interpretation that is questionable.

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Re: Is stoning to death against islam?

Thank you dear psyah, no doubt the quran is foundation of islam and is beyond any reasonable doubt complete, as for ahadith, they are not on equal footing with the quran. The quran does not depend on ahadith for its authenticity but ahadith do depend on the quran for their authenticity.

Please see;

Almost all muslims agree that hadith are sencondary source on islam. They also agree that there are problems with ahadith but they can be overcome using various ideas as explained.

The point needing explaining is legitimacy of reasoning and opinions when interpreting the quran. So let me try and explain reasoning. A human only has a brain and five senses and the rest is all information one gets to the brain which is a processing unit that makes decision.

So no matter whatever the information, it is impossible for the normal human brain not to process it the same way it does under its normal functionality. It is therefore bound to make decision on the decision that it receives from some one else on the same matter. You are doing that right now ie you are judgeing whether what I am saying is right or wrong from your stand point.

Likewise when we read the quran and all that which others tell us about it we ourselves become the judge to see whehter it makes sense or not. If we think that it is ok we accept it otherwise we reject it. So ultimately you will agree that it is our own very reasoning that we follow not what other say no matter how qualified a person is in any decipline or field. We only use information by others to see whether they make sense or not. So when we try to see they make sense or not we are actually using our own brains and reasoning and reasons for accepting or rejecting something.

So personal reasoning cannot be disputed nor can be over ridden no matter what. So ultimately we believe and do what we ourselves think is right not what others tell us is right unless it is according to our own reasoning. So as far as the brain is concerned no matter what all is mere information waiting for our decisions.

So whether we make our own decision from start to finish about something or gather information about desicions made by others, it is all just information on which we base our own decision by our own reasoning. So if we ultimately rest only and only on our own reasoning to base our decision on then how can anyone say that perosnal decisin making is wrong? It is only wrong if it could be proven wrong by evidence not because it is reasoned by oneself.

So if we take a point of discussion on the quran and interpret the quran ourselves then why will it be wrong just because we are reasoning it ourselves? The only reason is other better reasons against our reasoning of which we may not be aware at the time of decision making. But then no human being is all perfect, we all fall well short of knowing a lot of things in life and therefore can make mistakes.

So you can see, it is not wrong to offer personal opinions but to hold on to wrong opinion if you become aware of better reason. So long as there is no better reason than what you think is right then holding on to that is fine even if you happen to be wrong in actual fact.

As children people are told things like tooth fairy etc and children keep believing that till they find out that it was all a funny joke and not really true. So it is ok to believe and do what suits one till one knows better. So knowing better is important not not knowing or holding onto wrong things despite knowing otherwise.

So it is clear that people who think it is wrong to try and make sense of the quran all by themselves are wrong on two basis a)because the human barin makes its own decisions based on its own reasons and b)because such a rule defeats the first principle of interpration of the quran by the quran. If you use other things to interpret the quran than your own brain and the quran then you have mixed the quranic information with other information so what is the point of having the quran? Mixing the clear information with something that may not be clear is wrong in my view because it will not let you see what the quran means by itself. Therefore using other information eg hadith etc to make sense of the quranic text is wrong because it defeats the very purpose of the quran.

So I hope you can see why reading the quran for oneself for understanding is necessary without any interference from out side ie hadith or seerah etc etc. However once the quran is understood regaridng a point then of course one is free to use other information to further clarify the same point if need be.

I must make clear that to understand the quran one must know the various meanings of the words and phrases so that if any particular meaning causes contradictions within the quran then alternative meaning could be applied that solve the contradictions. The quranic interpretation is true if it removes the contradictions between different verse on the same topic or point or issue.

You can see why explanation becomes necessary when we discuss a point. As we try and explain the posts get longer and longer but without these explanations, things do not make sense as to why someone is saying something in the first place.

So that the rule of tafseer of the quran by the quran makes better sense, I also need to explain the structure of the quran which makes this principle absolutely necessary.

The structure of the quran is 114 lectures or surahs. The shortest is al kausar 108 ie 3 verses and longest is al baqarah 2 ie 286 verses.

Why is the quran structured like this? Because different situations and different circumstances faced the prophet so he some time only had to list a few things without any detail and at other times he had to just detail a few things and sometimes he had to list more things and detail more things and so on and so forth. Since doing things this way causes loads of repetitions and also contradictions because one is dealing with opposite kind of things or actions or situations or circumstances eg peace and war situations. This gives rise to need of rule, tafseer of the quran by the quran. Using anything else to explain quran will most definitley muddle it up. So the first thing one needs to do is sort out the quran itself porperly issue by issue, point by point or topic by topic once that has been done then use the resultant as basis for further explanation if need be through other sources of information like hadith, seerah, history etc. etc.

This is why if we want to know whether stoning to death is islamic or against islam we must gather all the related verses and see if they tell us to stone people to death or not.

As for detailing the quran too much is not a good thing because the more you expand something the more possibilites of more differences eg see the story of cow in time of moses. Had peole sacrificed any cow that would have fulfilled their obligation but the more the detail they wanted the more difficult things became.

Anyway what is your view on stoning if you do not mind me asking?

regards and all the best

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Re: Is stoning to death against islam?

I don't know about Ahl al-Sunnah but Ahl al-Tashayyu don't believe in stoning until death, but it's rather used as a form of embarrassment. So the Iranian government is religiously wrong for stoning until death..

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Re: Is stoning to death against islam?

Thank you dear jafri, the sunny side does believe in stoning till death. I am of brelavi background. I don’t like some of the stuff they say is islam. When I ask questions they go silent and tell me to go silent as well. The problem is I don’t like these like people give bad name to our religion. I also don’t like people being cruel to each other. Islam is not cruel or barbaric as such muslims make it look. This is why I am raising these issues to show people very clearly that these things have nothing to do with islam as it is in the quran in its own context.

http://www.usc.edu/schools/college/crcc/engagement/resources/texts/muslim/quran/

If we read the related verses in the quran, it tells us the following;

*004.025 * YUSUFALI: If any of you have not the means wherewith to wed free believing women, they may wed believing girls from among those whom your right hands possess: And Allah hath full knowledge about your faith. Ye are one from another: Wed them with the leave of their owners, and give them their dowers, according to what is reasonable: They should be chaste, not lustful, nor taking paramours: when they are taken in wedlock, if they fall into shame, their punishment is half that for free women. This (permission) is for those among you who fear sin; but it is better for you that ye practise self-restraint. And Allah is Oft-forgiving, Most Merciful.

*033.030 * YUSUFALI: O Consorts of the Prophet! If any of you were guilty of evident unseemly conduct, the Punishment would be doubled to her, and that is easy for Allah.

  • 024.002 * YUSUFALI: The woman and the man guilty of adultery or fornication,- flog each of them with a hundred stripes: Let not compassion move you in their case, in a matter prescribed by Allah, if ye believe in Allah and the Last Day: and let a party of the Believers witness their punishment.

  • 005.045 * YUSUFALI: We ordained therein for them: “Life for life, eye for eye, nose or nose, ear for ear, tooth for tooth, and wounds equal for equal.” But if any one remits the retaliation by way of charity, it is an act of atonement for himself. And if any fail to judge by (the light of) what Allah hath revealed, they are (No better than) wrong-doers.

These verses very clearly state that punishing people (if they are found guilty) with stoning to death is against the quran. Because there cannot be half or double of stoning to death and those who say that lahses are for single unmarried person and stoning for married are creating false division because the quran is clear about that as well. It is talking about married people ie the wives of the prophet are told that if any of you were guilty of any such conduct then punishment will be twice as much. This is to show that as leading household of the prophet people in this household are required to be top most in their conduct.

This also shows that any reports against the quran are invented by people for their own reasons eg some mullahs may have invented them on directions of their rulers to make their hold on their people stronger by putting a lot more fear in peoples’ minds.

This proves beyond a shadow of doubt that taleban who killed so many people this way in the name of islam have something big to answer for. How can they look at themselves in the mirror and feel comfortable?

I also want to clarify lashing. It is not a cruel punishment as advised in the quran in the quranic context.

One must realise that in a normal situaion under normal circumstances for a normal person a government can lash guilty person with upto 100 lashes as maximum. If situation or circumstances or person is not upto that standard then punishment in such cases is up to 50 lashes maximum. This punishment is just advisory and for deterrent if there is no other alternative that people themselves may want to implement.

The quranic punishemnt are set out as limits ie no more than that under any circunstances or situations. It is up to the government to see how it controls its crime rate eg by adjusting required evidence level, by rate of convictions, by rate of crime detection, by weight of punishments. Many people who talk about the laws of the land have no idea what they are talking about. They just look at the quran as robots and read instructions and carry them out. They do not try to relate various aspects of law and mechanisms of justice etc.

So it is up to muslims themselves to form laws sensibly within the given quranic context ie the quran gives us some directive as boundries. It is like we have field with fence around it so that we can do as we please within that field.

Stoning to death is also wrong because the punishment for murder is not as cruel. There is compensation as alternative to life for life. The quran states that killing one person without proper justification is like killing the whole human race. The human contains all the porphets and men of god. Then we are also told that causing trouble in the land is worse than slaughter. Yet punishment for causing trouble in the lands is banishment from the land. The cutting off of hand and feet or death is ultimate punishment if all else does not work, just like war is ultimate thing after all else fails to resolve the problem.

These like points are very difficult to answer for anyone who wants to prove islam is cruel beyond belief. For the same reasons mullahs cannot justify their conclusions from the quran in quranic context therefore their interpretations of the quran are incorrect. They did not reach the state of knowledge the quran requires for its proper understanding. Just knowing a language does not make one a doctor or an engineer. The interpreters of the quran when they interpret verses related to the legal matters must know how legal structures, systems and practices may work so that they could balance various things against each other to make sure they work for the good of the public at large.

For example, you cannot control crime rate merely by more and more cruel punishments. The more and more cruel punishments after a while lose their effect because people mentally become used to them as norm in a sociey. You cannot frighten a hungry person from stealing or even armed robbery. If it comes down to survival then all is ok. It is therefore necessary that so called a society is really a society where people have reasonable lives so that they are not forced into crime by their situaions or circunmstances. So all these like things need to be paid attention to and taken care of properly before the law is brought in and enforced.

The purpose of law is to regulate a society for what it stands for and it must stand for the good of all its people so that the law has the full support of its people. Governments that make laws against the wishes of their people fail because they want to control people not the crime rate in society and people instead of helping the law enforcement agencies find ways of breaking the laws.

I shall leave this here otherwise post will become far too long. But please do keep sharing ideas because ideas breed ideas and thereby we all learn of eachj other.

regards and all the best.

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Re: Is stoning to death against islam?

As far as i am aware, there are no verses of Rajam (stoning to death) in the Qur'an. It's an immoral and inhumane practice adopted from the Jews.

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Re: Is stoning to death against islam?

Peace Mughal1

You are indeed wasting our time re-posting all of that wordage because I made a short statement that should have been carefully considered by an eager scholar as yourself. What you have written has neither added nor taken away what I wrote about some hadith being muttawatir and the verses of the Qur'an being muttawatir. I am focussing on mechanism of delivery i.e. narration to us and you should too. I also presented a caveat to what I wrote that most often than not hadith are misunderstood it is more a matter of interpretation and context of them than them being wrong. Hadith should not be expelled because you view them as being contradictory to the Qur'an.

I have made no mention of rajm - to date you have no idea what I view or anyone else on this forum views about rajm. You are assuming with wasted effort that we are taking a position that will somehow be "confronted" by your position, this may not be the case. The one who talks too much can't stop to listen to others ... I can see this is true also for those who write too much. These are my words of sincerity and kindness so we can talk at a level of mutual respect and understanding. Take it slow, we should be given a chance to take your 'data', arguments and conclusion for a cross-examination. Thanks.

By the way I have read your reply in your main article and I am already preparing questions for you on the idea that you present about "decision-making" and what about it is right or wrong. So please bear with me.

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Re: Is stoning to death against islam?

Thank you dear psyah, it is very kind of you to participate in the discussion and yes, I shall waite for your comments on my ideas.

Of course we agree that ahadith are needed here are there to explain to us things in the quran that need further explanantion. I also agree with you that ahadith must not be rejected out of hand just because of their appearant contradictions with the quran or between themselves. So long as ahadith can be interpreted within the quranic context they should not be rejected if they are found to be sound otherwise.

In fact you need a good reason to put aside any of the ahadith. I might not understand one but you may be able to explain it away and resolve my problem. This is how it always worked.

As for my explanation, this is not necessarily for you but it is generally the case that we see a lot of people who have little idea of thing that you and I may know. We always assume thing as per our own experiences. The purpose is to take along everybody who may be interested in having a look at the thread. If one knows well and good and if one does not then this could be of help to such people.

My regards and best wishes.