The Metaphor of Apostasy and Protesting Against God, Hossein Dabbagh

It is difficult to find a Muslim jurist who believes that, according to what is stated in the Quran, the punishment for apostasy is death. Wael Hallaq, a specialist in Islamic law at Columbia University, has ably demonstrated that no such worldly punishment (the death penalty) for apostates is found in the Quran (see, for example, the entry on apostasy in the Encyclopaedia of the Quran). However, many Muslim jurists, outside the Quran and by resorting to and citing the well-known narration "Man badala dīnahu faqtulūhu" (Whoever changes his religion, kill him) attributed to the Prophet of Islam, consider the punishment for apostates to be death. Nevertheless, some Shia jurists, such as Ayatollah Khansari, suspend the implementation of such a ruling during the Occultation, or a jurist like Ayatollah Montazeri, in concert with religious intellectuals, defends the right to life for apostates by appealing to the foundations of human rights. According to these views, jurists must abandon the death penalty for apostasy and leave it to God in the other world.

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The Metaphor of Apostasy and Protesting Against God

It is difficult to find a Muslim jurist who believes that, according to what is stated in the Quran, the punishment for apostasy is death. Wael Hallaq, a specialist in Islamic law at Columbia University, has ably demonstrated that no such worldly punishment (the death penalty) for apostates is found in the Quran (see, for example, the entry on apostasy in the Encyclopaedia of the Quran). However, many Muslim jurists, outside the Quran and by resorting to and citing the well-known narration "Man badala dīnahu faqtulūhu" (Whoever changes his religion, kill him) attributed to the Prophet of Islam, consider the punishment for apostates to be death. Nevertheless, some Shia jurists, such as Ayatollah Khansari, suspend the implementation of such a ruling during the Occultation, or a jurist like Ayatollah Montazeri, in concert with religious intellectuals, defends the right to life for apostates by appealing to the foundations of human rights. According to these views, jurists must abandon the death penalty for apostasy and leave it to God in the other world.

In this short piece, however, I will not address this type of argumentation. Although one can remain silent regarding the ruling on apostasy on the grounds that it is not in the Quran, I actually intend here to take the doubt at its strongest! That is, suppose that in the Quran, God (the Prophet) has explicitly and unequivocally stated that the punishment for apostasy in this world is death. My point here is to protest against God (the Prophet). If the angels can object to God (Surah Al-Baqarah, 30), why can we not do the same?

The majority of Muslim theologians and jurists (such as Imam al-Haramayn al-Juwayni, Imam al-Shatibi, and Imam al-Ghazali) have resorted to the consequentialist argument of the "Objectives of Sharia" (Maqāṣid al-Sharīʿa) for the "preservation of religion" to explain the matter of apostasy. It is as if the apostate, like a virus, can corrupt the rest of society and turn them away from their religion. For this reason, killing him is obligatory so that the community remains safe. With this premise, suppose a person born a Muslim in an Islamic society, through research or an incident, doubts his religion and intends to leave it. According to the above argument, such a person, if he declares and confesses, must be eliminated. But such an argument is hardly compatible with the golden rule of ethics, which is also endorsed by the Abrahamic religions. If every religious person considers that they might one day, by chance, become an apostate and would "naturally" not want to be treated according to this argument, they should not treat others in this way either. Moreover, at the heart of this argument lies a metaphor that can be questioned: the metaphor of the apostate as a virus! Why should a person who has researched his religion and honestly reached a conclusion be considered a virus? Why can such a person not be seen as a medical thermometer that can signal a fever and infection within the religion, so that reforms can be made accordingly?

In contrast to Muslim jurists and theologians, some Christian (and perhaps Jewish) theologians resort to a deontological argument to explain the matter of apostasy. These theologians regard religious faith as a metaphor for a covenant and pact with God, and for this reason, consider its violation deserving of punishment (for example, see Thomas Aquinas's argument in the Summa Theologica, where he deems the violator of the pact with God deserving of death).[1] If religious faith is considered a kind of covenant, pact, and contract, it is natural that a moral matter comes into play, and a moral matter finds meaning where an act has been committed voluntarily by someone. With this premise, imagine a person born into a Christian family, upon whom the seal of Christianity is placed from the moment of their entry into this world. That is, whether they want it or not, a covenant and pact has been made with them without their volition. Now the question is: how can the violation of a covenant and pact that was not entered into voluntarily warrant punishment? Can one involve someone in a covenant without their consent and then punish them for violating it? This is not only irrational but morally unjust, and such an unjust demand from a God who is supremely good is unacceptable.

But suppose someone turns to a religion with knowledge and will, and after a period of research and investigation, is drawn to another religion or even adopts irreligion. Is such a person deserving of punishment because they have voluntarily violated the pact? The answer is still no; for the reason that someone can be deserving of punishment only if, in religious terms, they have turned their back on the truth (for example, see Surah Muhammad, 25), not someone who sincerely pursues the truth and even occasionally stumbles and errs. Did not the prophets themselves despair and stumble (Surah Yusuf, 110): Where the lightning of disobedience struck Adam the Chosen / How then can we claim innocence?

It is interesting that even within the heart of discussions about apostasy in Christianity, a metaphor surges that is questionable, namely that religious faith is a kind of covenant and pact. It suffices for such a metaphor to be removed, and you will see many of the theologians' arguments about the punishment for breach of covenant collapse.

Finally, it seems that most philosophers and theologians (whether Muslim or Christian) have assumed that religious faith is of the genus of belief and conviction. But it suffices to imagine that religious faith is of the genus of an emotional phenomenon; undoubtedly, many matters will change. To explain, jurists, theologians, and even philosophers often consider religious faith solely a mental state with a representational status, which is of the genus of conviction and belief, and for this reason, they assume turning away from it is voluntary and conscious. But imagine (as I have previously argued in the article "The Experience of Religious Experience") that faith is not of the genus of belief and conviction, but is considered a mental state with a presentational status; something akin to desire and hope. In this case, the phenomenon of faith will not necessarily conquer the territory of one's heart voluntarily, and one's consciousness does not necessarily have a complete and total involvement in the occurrence of their faith. In this case, if religious faith is not of the genus of belief and conviction, it is difficult to argue that an individual has voluntarily and consciously changed their faith and turned away from it, and is therefore deserving of punishment and penalty. Religious faith may assail a person unconsciously or slip away involuntarily.

[1] Although the expression of God taking a covenant from the prophets and those given the Book appears repeatedly in the Quran as well (for example, Surah Al-Imran, 81 and 187), the matter seems very different from Christianity.

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The Metaphor of Apostasy and Protesting Against God

A note by Dr. Hossein Dabbagh, at Sedanet's request | September 2016

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