Tahir Ahmed, a Norwegian dentistry student, wrote an opinion piece on how he sees the 'homosexuality debate'. This is not an issue or religious sin, he argues, but rather of law. I summarize his opinions below.
Ahmed makes two points here, which are not really related:
1. A religious person cannot decide for his faith whether it accepts something or not. A Catholic cannot claim that homosexuality is allowed by the Catholic faith.
2. Islam is not only a religious system, but also a legal system, which every Muslim has accepted upon himself.
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If members of a population go around killing people, and committing murder is a crime, won't it be against the intention of the law to demand that we accept these murderers committing these acts? And who interprets the law when a person commits a crime? Isn't it the job of the judge to make a decision when these acts are not within the bounds of defined law?
In such a case, the Norwegian laws are defined according to the constitution. The Koran is parallel to the constitution, and the sharia laws derived from it tell a Muslim how to act in practice in everyday matters.
When a Norwegian citizen breaks the law he is seen as a deviant, and his deviance is punished through the judicial system. A Muslim who breaks Muslim law is seen in exactly the same way. The question is how it should be related to in a non-Muslim country, where other values dominate.
When a person presents himself as a Muslim, he includes himself in Dar-as-Salaam, Islam's house, and it means he has agreed that the laws, as defined by Islamic scholars from a mixture of a democratic principle and basic principles in Islam, hold for him.
It is then not unreasonable for Muslims to require from other Muslims to call what is right, right and what is wrong, wrong. The issue of punishment can be left out when a person doesn't live in a Islamic state. This is just about showing respect for these laws that people have accepted upon themselves.
This holds true not just for homosexuality, but also for all other everyday issues where a Muslim breaks laws that he or she has accepted upon themselves.
The argument is that there should be a new interpretation of Muslim laws. Islam allows for new interpretation but it must happen in a way that respects the principles. In Norway, only judges are seen as competent enough to interpret Norwegian laws. That's their job, but it demands education and experience in their field. If everybody can have his own interpretation of different laws it will bring to anarchy.
Source: Dagbladet (Norwegian)
1 comment:
2. Islam is not only a religious system, but also a legal system, which every Muslim has accepted upon himself."
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Accepted? He has no choice. And it is not a legal system, it is a rule system.
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