A prominent Muslim writer has criticized non-Muslim critics of Sharia and dhimmitude for claiming that “apostasy from Islam was universally punished by death.” And of course, he’s right. No law in the history of the world has ever been universally enforced. But what’s really disturbing about Islamic apostasy law is that some would like to see it enforced today: including the famous Sheikh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi, who has been hailed as a “reformist” by no less a luminosity than John Esposito.
From “Accusing Muslim Intellectuals of Apostasy,” in MEMRI, with thanks to Ali Dashti:
Sheikh Al-Qaradhawi Advocates Implementing the Ridda Death Penalty
In an interview with the Egyptian weekly Al-Ahram Al-Arabi, Sheikh Yousef Al-Qaradhawi, one of the most prominent clerics in Sunni Islam and among Islamist circles and a spiritual leader for the Muslim Brotherhood movement, discussed the view of modern religious law on carrying out the punishment for ridda, and permitted the murder of free Muslim intellectuals whose views differ from those of Islamist clerics.
Asked, “In Muslim society, has an individual the right to change his religion as he wishes?” Al-Qaradhawi drew a distinction between two types of ridda: “One of the freedoms that Islam does not accept is the freedom of ridda that expands [from the realm of the individual to that of the group] and threatens the social fabric and its foundations. [On the one hand,] there is limited ridda, and [on the other,] there is ridda that expands [from the individual to the group].
“Limited ridda is the ridda of the individual who switches religion and is not interested in others. According to Islam, the punishment for this individual is [Hell] in the world to come”¦
“But [the other] ridda, which expands [from the individual to the group], is a ridda in which the individual who abandons Islam calls [upon others] to do likewise, [thus creating] a group whose path is not the path of society and whose goal is not the goal of the [Muslim] nation, and whose allegiance is not to the Islamic nation. Such [individuals] endanger the social fabric, and they are like the murtaddoon [apostates], who were fought by [the first Caliph] Abu Bakr together with the Companions of the Prophet [the Sahaba]. Those murtaddoon falsely claimed that they were prophets with the same inspiration as was given to the Prophet Muhammad”¦”
Asked what the view of the modern Muslim sage should be about the danger of ridda, Al-Qaradhawi replied: “The gravest danger facing the Muslim is the one that threatens his spiritual existence — i.e., that threatens his belief. Therefore, apostasy, or unbelief after having been Muslim, is the gravest danger to society”¦
“In our generation, Muslim society has been subject to violent invasions and severe attacks aimed at uprooting it, and these were manifested by the invasion of Christian missionaries that began with Western colonialism and is continuing in the Islamic world and among the Islamic communities and minorities [outside the Muslim world] “¦ [and by] the Communist invasion that destroyed entire Muslim countries in Asia and Europe and made every effort to eliminate Islam and remove it ultimately from people’s lives “¦ and by the third and worst invasion, the secular invasion that is continuing to this day in the heart of the Islamic world, sometimes openly and sometimes covertly, and which persecutes the true Islam”¦
“For Muslim society to preserve its existence, it must struggle against ridda from every source and in all forms, and it must not let it spread like wildfire in a field of thorns. This is what Abu Bakr and the companions did when they fought the people of ridda who followed the false prophets”¦ There is no escape from struggling against and restricting the individual ridda so that it will not worsen and its sparks scatter, becoming group ridda”¦ Thus, the Muslim sages agreed that the punishment for the murtadd [who commits ridda ] “¦ is execution”¦”(3)
In his book ‘Islam and Secularism,’ Al-Qaradhawi explains: “The Muslim sages agreed unanimously that anyone who denies something that is known in the religion “¦ is an apostate who abandons his religion. The Imam must demand of him to repent, and recant his deviation from the righteous path, or the laws regarding the murtadd will apply to him.”