The times they are a changing (UPDATED with Chinese Translation)

ARCHIVES 2010

By MT Webmaster On Apr 9, 2010

The issue here should not be what religion allows and therefore must be defended to the death. If that were the issue then 90% of Jews, Christians and Muslims would have to die because 90% are ‘deviants’ according to some interpretations. But then whose interpretation do we go by, yours or mine?

NO HOLDS BARRED

Raja Petra Kamarudin

Child marriage fair in Islam, foul by law says The Malaysian Insider (read here: http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/index.php/malaysia/59268-child-marriage-fair-in-islam-foul-by-law)

My parents died of heart problems in their mid-40s, both of them. Alexander the Great died at the age of 33, as did Richard III of England, also at the age of 33. Julius Caesar died an ‘old man’ — he died at the age of 56 — as did Saladin who died at the age of 55. William the Conqueror died even ‘older’ at the age of 59. Richard the Lion Heart died at the age of 42. Nicholas II of Russia died at the age of 55. Prophet Muhammad died at the age of 63. Cleopatra died at the age of 33. Marcus Antonius (Mark Antony) died at the age of 53. And so on and so forth.

The life expectancy in those days was very low. You would not be expected to touch 70. At 50 or 60, you were considered old and most would have died long before that. By the age of 13, girls would get married and boys would join the army. By 18, girls were ‘old women’ who would have given birth to a few children. Many died giving birth and never lived to see their grandchildren. By 18, boys were already war ‘veterans’ who had seen many wars and were considered lucky to still be alive to be declared ‘veterans’.

It was quite understandable, therefore, that girls and boys ‘entered life’ long before they were 18. By 18, they would have had families and established careers, mostly in the army. So, to see girls getting married at 13 and boys going to war at that same age was not only acceptable but also the norm 2,000 or 1,000 years ago.

But times have changed since then. 18 is no longer the age you would have done and seen everything. 18 is when you begin life, so to speak. Many do not ‘start life’ till they are past 21. And age 40 is when you ‘peak’, not when you prepare for death.

Islam (all religions, in fact) is a ‘product’ of the era when you are not expected to live beyond 50. So you start life early, at 13 or so. And marriage for girls and boys is when you reach puberty, which could be 11 for girls and 13 to 15 for boys.

In that sense, getting married at 13 or younger is not wrong in Islam. It is only wrong as far as ‘modern society’ is concerned because, nowadays, at 21 we are still ‘at school’ and completing our education. But then which standards do we apply, Islamic standards or the standards of modern society?

This just demonstrates that Islam needs to rethink the ‘old ways’ and come out with ‘new standards’ for Muslims to live by. If we argue that since Islam allows it then it is wrong to ban such practices, then many other acceptable practices of Islam too need to be defended even though in modern times these practices may be frowned upon.

Take wars, as an example. In the old days, you would attract teenagers into the army — not only in the Muslim world but in the West as well — with promises of riches. This was also how the Roman army worked. The only choice of a career in those days was farming or robbing and plundering. But if you joined the army you would get rich if your army won the war.

So teenagers joined the army and went to war. And if their army won the war they could plunder the homes of the vanquished and take the survivors as prisoners and sell them off as slaves.

The generals would stand by and just watch while the victorious soldiers stripped the bodies of dead soldiers of anything that could be sold. They then plundered the homes of fallen cities and burned them to the ground after that. Women and children would be taken prisoner and after a session of raping and orgies — both the women and young boys would be raped — they would be sold to the slave traders and the soldiers would go home rich.

These were the perks or fringe benefits of joining the army and it was perfectly legal. Even during the time of Prophet Muhammad this was the practice — even though the raping part was shunned, especially the raping of young boys, although there were times when it was not always possible to control the victorious and jubilant soldiers, much to the chagrin of the Prophet who would take his generals to task on the indiscipline of their soldiers.

Nevertheless, the spoils of war were the reward for victorious soldiers, even in the Muslim world. And this was totally acceptable. In fact, in one war in Medina, the Prophet’s army lost because the soldiers came down from the hill to strip the dead soldiers of their valuables (against orders because they had been told to stay on the hill and not abandon their position for anything). This enabled the Mekah army to counter-attack and they sent the Medina forces running.

So what do we do about this? Can we allow the victorious army to put to death all wounded soldiers so that their dead bodies can be stripped naked? And do we allow all captured soldiers, plus their women and children, to be sold as slaves? We must remember, slavery is legal in Islam and has never been outlawed. So how can we ban this practice?

Yes, this is not 100BC. Neither is it 500AD. Today, we live in the new Millennium, 2010. So many things that were legal back in the old days, although never declared illegal since then, would have to be reviewed.

Combatant soldiers are still fair game today. You kill them — kill or be killed. Soldiers who surrender are taken as prisoners of war. Prisoners of War (POWs) and injured soldiers are not massacred in cold blood like in the old days. The injured, even the enemy, are given medical treatment. And non-combatants (not only women and children but the men as well) are not victimised even though they are from the ‘other side’. And non-combatants are not sold off to the slave traders, like in the old days.

But why not? In Islam there is nothing wrong with selling off the vanquished as slaves, as it is not wrong in taking the 13-year old girls as one of your many wives. Islam allows this. So how can we ban this practice?

Even as recent as 100 years ago, Muslims were allowed to put to death ‘deviant Muslims’. The Salafi Muslims considered all non-Salafi Muslims as deviants and they were put to death. In one incident, Taif was attacked and the entire population was massacred. The citizens of Taif were beheaded and their heads displayed on poles ringing the town. Jews and Christians, however, were spared. Only non-Salafi Muslims were killed.

Yes, what was acceptable 100 years ago is no longer tolerated, what more what was considered the norm 1,000 years ago. And this is why I always write that Islam must ‘reinvent’ itself.

I am not criticising Islam or saying that Islam is wrong. My argument is that what was considered acceptable hundreds of years ago or more than 1,000 years ago needs to be re-looked. The non-Muslim Western world was no different. Islam, then, was compatible with the practices of the ‘old world’. The strong dominating the weak and the taking of slaves and marrying off girls at the age 13 or younger were also a Western practice, as was the putting to death ‘deviant’ Jews and Christians (deviant only because they practiced Judaism or Christianity slightly different from you).

The times have changed. And the times are still changing. It is time we also changed the rules of the game. In the old days, whether in the Muslim or Western world, if you disobeyed the Ruler, you would be put to death. Many scholars, doctors, scientists, thinkers, philosophers, writers, and whatnot, suffered this fate. If you disagreed that the world is flat and not round or that the sun revolved round the earth, and not the other way around, you would die at the hands of the religious authorities.

And that would be yet another of the issues to ponder upon. One man’s correctness would be another’s deviance. So, do I have to die because Saddam or Osama says my version of Islam is deviant?

Translated into Chinese at: http://ccliew.blogspot.com/2010/04/blog-post_5940.html