The death penalty for apostasy is part of Islamic law. It’s based on the Qur’an: “They wish you would disbelieve as they disbelieved so you would be alike. So do not take from among them allies until they emigrate for the cause of Allah. But if they turn away, then seize them and kill them wherever you find them and take not from among them any ally or helper.” (Qur’an 4:89)
A hadith depicts Muhammad saying: “Whoever changed his Islamic religion, then kill him” (Bukhari 9.84.57). The death penalty for apostasy is part of Islamic law according to all the schools of Islamic jurisprudence.
This is still the position of all the schools of Islamic jurisprudence, both Sunni and Shi’ite. Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the most renowned and prominent Muslim cleric in the world, has stated: “The Muslim jurists are unanimous that apostates must be punished, yet they differ as to determining the kind of punishment to be inflicted upon them. The majority of them, including the four main schools of jurisprudence (Hanafi, Maliki, Shafi’i, and Hanbali) as well as the other four schools of jurisprudence (the four Shiite schools of Az-Zaidiyyah, Al-Ithna-‘ashriyyah, Al-Ja’fariyyah, and Az-Zaheriyyah) agree that apostates must be executed.”
Qaradawi also once famously said: “If they had gotten rid of the apostasy punishment, Islam wouldn’t exist today.”
“Muslim Father Beats, Poisons Daughter for Turning to Christ,” Morning Star News, July 2, 2021:
NAIROBI, Kenya (Morning Star News) – A woman in eastern Uganda is struggling to recover after her Muslim father beat her and forced her to swallow a toxic substance for leaving Islam, sources said.
Hajat Habiiba Namuwaya, a 38-year-old mother of three, said she fled her home in Namakoko village, Nangonde Sub-County last month after Muslim relatives threatened her. She had put her faith in Christ in February after what she called a miraculous healing.
“My mother warned me that the family was planning to kill me,” Namuwaya told Morning Star News from her hospital bed. “I shared my fears with the pastor, and the pastor together with his family accepted to host me, and freely I openly shared my new life in Christ with friends on WhatsApp, which landed me in trouble.”
A text message about taking refuge at the home of her pastor, whose name is withheld for security reasons, reached her father, who mobilized other relatives to track her down, she said. Namuwaya said that on the morning of June 20, relatives arrived at the pastor’s home and began beating her.
“My father, Al-Hajji Mansuru Kiita, recited many Koranic verses cursing and denouncing me as no longer one of the family members,” she told Morning Star News. “He started beating and torturing me with a blunt object, inflicting bruises on my back, chest and legs, and finally forced me to drink poison, which I tried to resist but swallowed a little of it.”
When neighbors arrived in response to her cries for help, the Muslim relatives hurried away, leaving behind a letter denouncing her and the pastor, she said.
“The pastor was not around when the attackers arrived, but a neighbor telephoned him,” Namuwaya said. “He feared to come immediately but later came and found me fighting for my life. I was rushed to the nearby clinic for first aid, and later I was taken to another place for treatment and prayers.”
Besides the anguish of being separated from her children, ages 5, 7 and 12, who are with their father, Namuwaya needs further specialized treatment.
“I am restless with continuous pain in my stomach,” she said.
Her pastor reported the attack to a local official who granted her permission to stay with the church leader, but due to the dangers of her returning there, Namuwaya found shelter at an undisclosed site.
She has not notified police, fearing retaliation from relatives, including the possibility of them inventing false charges against her or the church.
“It is a very delicate situation,” a church leader said.
Formerly an Islamic teacher, Namuwaya put her faith in Christ on Feb. 24 after receiving healing from breast cancer when the pastor prayed for her, she said. Her family found out about her conversion after she sent text messages about it.
The assault was the latest of many instances of persecution of Christians in Uganda that Morning Star News has documented.
Uganda’s constitution and other laws provide for religious freedom, including the right to propagate one’s faith and convert from one faith to another. Muslims make up no more than 12 percent of Uganda’s population, with high concentrations in eastern areas of the country.
Wellington says
All right, as an “intellectual exercise,” imagine the opposite: “Christian beats his daughter and makes her swallow poison for converting to Islam.”
I say again to all adult Muslims that your religion is sick to its core in sundry ways as no other major religion remotely is. Shame on all of you, including all of you who are not ready to implement all the sick dictates of Islam, such as death for apostasy (Sura 4:89) and the sanctioning of rape (as to be found in Suras 4, 23, 33 and 70), never mind 60% of the Koran being about eternal hatred for all non-Muslims (e.g., Sura 8:60). Your “hesitancy” here does not redeem you and you know this or should know this.
I appeal to all Muslims with any kind of conscience. Your religion was the one awful major religion which slipped through the cracks of history. It is a burden to mankind such as no other major faith is. You must give it up completely because there is no reforming rot.
gravenimage says
+1
Michael Copeland says
Quiz II: Can You Guess? Not Difficult.
https://gatesofvienna.net/2021/03/quiz-ii-can-you-guess-not-difficult/
Wellington says
Thanks for quoting me, Michael Copeland. Yes indeed, Islam is the turd in the punch bowl of world religions.
gravenimage says
Fine and apt quotes, Michael.
CogitoErgoSum says
My initial reaction would have been to have my daughter checked by a doctor to see if she really had been healed of cancer. If she had been healed I certainly would not have blamed her for changing her religion. If she had not been healed I would have tried to get her more help for treatment of her cancer. Beating her and making her swallow poison would have been the last thing on my mind – if I loved my daughter, that is. Not only does Islam define “evil” differently than I do but it obviously defines “love” differently also.
gravenimage says
There is little love in Islam.
James Lincoln says
CogitoErgoSum,
Your reaction would have been a normal reaction from a loving parent.
Muslims, many times, do not have normal reactions…
gravenimage says
Spot on.
gravenimage says
Uganda: Muslim beats his daughter and makes her swallow poison for converting to Christianity
………………
Just horrifying–*this poor woman*.
And note that it was not just her father–just about her whole Muslim family was out to kill her.
James Lincoln says
So, according to the feature article:
“My father, Al-Hajji Mansuru Kiita, recited many Koranic verses cursing and denouncing me as no longer one of the family members…”
So if it was determined that she was no longer “part of the family”, why did they still try to kill her?
gravenimage says
Because expulsion and shunning is seldom enough in Islam.
Walter Sieruk says
There’s a great outstanding difference between how a Christian father would react of his daughter would ,let’s say converts to Buddhism, and how a Muslim father reacts if daughter converts to another religion . let’s say Christianity.
In the case of a Christian father in such a situation, he will pray for her.
In the cause of a Muslims father, as in the above news report , that Muslim father murders her.
Jesus taught ‘By their fruit you will recognize them.” Matthew 7:20 . [N.I.V.]
gravenimage says
+1
Walter Sieruk says
In spite of all the facts of reality there are still some people who continue to say that “Islam is a not a violent and deadly religion.” Those poor people who make that false and fool claim must be in religious denial because they must have their Islamic blinders on .
Goofy says
How can a religion which cannot survive without death penalty for apostasy be of God?
gravenimage says
Not for normal, decent people. For the followers of Islam, yes.
OLD GUY says
Under the islamic religion God is a violent dictator, not a loving God.
Or are the Islamic religious leaders trying to use Islam as a means of creating a powerful dictatorship world wide with them in charge. If you look at the countries that are under Islamic rule, they are not a place most of us wants to live. Islam justifies its use of violence through the insane writings of their prophet Muhammad who was basically a war lord.
gravenimage says
These aspects of Islam go together, OLD GUY–and have since the “Prophet” Muhammed.