“An approach to law which simply said – there’s one law for everybody – I think that’s a bit of a danger,” says Rowan Williams. Rowan Williams has utterly forgotten, if he ever knew, that the idea of “one law for everybody” was one of the great achievements of Judeo-Christian civilization, and is rooted in the idea of the dignity of all human beings as created in the image of God. Once you discard the principle of “one law for everybody,” you create protected classes, privileged classes, and end up inevitably with a tyranny in which some groups are denied basic rights. And so we have in this case: I wonder if Rowan Williams is aware that if Muslims ever came to power in Britain, they themselves would enforce one law for everybody — a law that would reduce him to dhimmitude. Of course, by that time he may have converted.
“Sharia law in UK is ‘unavoidable,'” from the BBC (thanks to all who sent this in):
The Archbishop of Canterbury says the adoption of Islamic Sharia law in the UK seems “unavoidable”.
Dr Rowan Williams told Radio 4’s World at One that the UK has to “face up to the fact” that some of its citizens do not relate to the British legal system.
Dr Williams argues that adopting some aspects of Sharia law would help maintain social cohesion.
For example, Muslims could choose to have marital disputes or financial matters dealt with in a Sharia court.
He says Muslims should not have to choose between “the stark alternatives of cultural loyalty or state loyalty”.
In an exclusive interview with BBC correspondent Christopher Landau, ahead of a lecture to lawyers in London later on Monday, Dr Williams argues this relies on Sharia law being better understood. At the moment, he says “sensational reporting of opinion polls” clouds the issue.
He stresses that “nobody in their right mind would want to see in this country the kind of inhumanity that’s sometimes been associated with the practice of the law in some Islamic states; states; the extreme punishments, the attitudes to women as well”.
But Dr Williams says the argument that “there’s one law for everybody… I think that’s a bit of a danger”.
“There’s a place for finding what would be a constructive accommodation with some aspects of Muslim law, as we already do with some other aspects of religious law.”
