Following are excerpts from a religious program featuring Egyptian cleric Mas'oud Anwar, which aired on Al-Rahma TV on February 23, 2011.
Lashings, Chopping Off Hands, and Stonings are Like Removing Cancer from a Society
Mas'oud Anwar: "I have with me statistics on crime in the West and in Arab countries, including Egypt. These figures are alarming. Why is there a rise in crime? Why is there an increasing number of prisons and prisoners? It is because the shari'a is not implemented.
"The punishment decreed by the shari'a serve as deterrents. If someone contemplates fornication, but then he sees that on Friday, at Al-Tahrir Square, the police caught an unmarried fornicator, gave him 100 lashings and the entire thing was broadcast live on TV… Would he dare to commit fornication? He would say to himself: 'Oh my God, I don't need this.' He'd say: 'I'd better fast, like the Prophet Muhammad instructed.' That's it.
"If the Islamic punishment is implemented, the alcoholics will go to jail. Take a highway robber, a criminal, or a drug dealer – the haraba punishment on him [an Islamic punishment: to be put to death, or crucified, or have an arm and a leg chopped off on alternative sides, or to be banished]. That way, the world will be clean and more organized. […]
"My Muslim brothers, the compassion about which the secular speak, when they say that there is no compassion in Islamic law and that its punishments are barbaric, is nothing but ludicrous compassion.
"Wisdom and compassion require that a killer be put to death, that a married adulterer be stoned, and that the hand of a thief be chopped off. That is true compassion. Chopping off the treacherous hand of a thief, to protect the entire nation, is compassion, mercy, and wisdom.
"Brothers, may God bless all the Muslims with good health. Take somebody who is told that he has cancer in his arm, and when he goes to the doctor, the doctor tells him that the only way to prevent his death is to amputate his arm. What is left for him to do? He holds his arm out to the doctor, and the doctor amputates it. When the patient awakens from the anesthesia, he says to the doctor: 'May Allah reward you, you saved my life.' The amputation is an act of mercy, and the patient thanks the doctor for it.
"The thief is a cancer in society, and so are all the sinners. Their treatment is to be punished in accordance with the strict, judicious, and merciful law of Allah. The chopping off of a single treacherous hand guarantees the safety of the country and society in its entirety – it guarantees its security, its blood, its money, and its honor. That is what compassion means." […]
Lashings Must be Administered in a Moderate Way
"Take somebody who commits fornication. According to the shari'a, if he is unmarried, he should receive 100 lashings and a year in exile. What if the judge decrees a lashing, but the guy is sick – with heart problems, liver problems, and so on? A lashing would kill him.
"Pay close attention. How should the lashing be performed? People misunderstand this. First of all, who carries out the lashing? It is carried out by somebody of moderate build. Don't bring me some [Mike] Tyson or Muhammad Ali Clay, God bless him, who would kill the guy with the first lash of the whip. But don't bring me an anemic weakling, who needs an infusion, to whip him. Get me a man of medium build. This punishment is meant to discipline, not to torture or kill.
"That's one thing. Second, the whip used for the lashing must not be a new one that slashes the skin nor a worn-out one that causes no pain. It must be a medium one.
"Third, the lashing must not take place when it is extremely hot or extremely cold.
"Fourth, the man who receives the lashing must be standing, and the clothes must be removed from his back. The woman receives the lashing fully dressed and sitting down.
"Very well. Fifth, how should the man carrying out the lashing do it? Several Islamic scholars have said that something should be placed under his armpit. He should place something under the arm holding the whip. If I put my hand under my armpit, like this, and I wield the whip, can I stretch my arm out like this? The thing will fall. So I have to perform the lashing like this. It hurts, but does not kill.
"Brother, let me tell you – worse things go on at police stations. A single blow to the head with the bamboo rod of the security forces sends your head spinning. It's like 100 lashes. What are you talking about? It's like 1,000 lashes.
"Allah give us good health… The guy performs the lashing like this… Some teachers beat the children at school in a way that is worse than the lashes administered to a fornicator. The teacher says to the pupil: 'Place your pen between your fingers.' Then he smacks him with a ruler, like this.
"There is a tradition in workshops that when an apprentice makes a mistake, they put him on the grill. By Allah, I saw somebody electrocuting a boy.
"And you tell me that Islamic law is barbaric? What barbarism? It is full of compassion. Even though is a criminal, when they give him a lashing, they do it this way…" […]
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