http://www.arabnews.com/?page=7§ion=0&article=104539&d=12&m=12&y=2007&pix=opinion.jpg&category=Opinion
The Middle East's Leading English Language Daily
Wednesday 12 December 2007 (03 Dhul Hijjah 1428)
On the Flogging of a Female Rape Victim
Aiyah Saihati, Arab News -
As some of you might know, something happened in Saudi Arabia
sometime ago that captured much attention. A Saudi woman went out to meet a
person she knew, who happened to be male. She found herself in a situation
where seven men abducted her and her male companion and then proceeded to
gang-rape the two abductees. Instead of only having her persecutors brought to
justice, this woman, a victim of brutal rape, was treated like a criminal and
sentenced.
Initially, the woman was sentenced to 90 lashes. When her
lawyer appealed the sentence and spoke about the injustice of the situation to
the media, her sentence was increased to six months in jail and 200 lashes.
I, as a Saudi woman, committed to my government and its equal
treatment of all its citizens, refuse to accept that this will be the fate of
this woman.
It is our collective responsibility, as concerned citizens of
this great nation, and of the world, to eradicate the mindset and flaws in the
system that allow such a miscarriage of justice to stand and cause a woman to
be punished for an action of which she was the victim.
There is no legal or Islamic basis for such sentencing.
Although it is true that according to Qur'anic teaching, a woman may not meet a
man in privacy, no punishment was decreed for taking such action.
In addition, when placed in context, it is clear that the
restrictive statement was meant to be purely instructional, and no language in
the relevant verse itself, nor in the following verses, can be used to deduce
punishment.
Regardless of whether or not the woman met her male companion
in secret, which is the justification cited by the judges for imposing the
flogging, nothing she has done could be classified as a crime. Flogging is one
of the punishment of a person who committed zena, a term used for both
fornication and adultery alike.
Punishment in the case of zena only applies if four witnesses
testify to the actual penetration. In practical terms, unless the participating
man and woman were engaging in lewd exhibitionist behavior, it is nearly
impossible to incriminate them.
There is wisdom and protection behind such a condition. From
this, it follows that there is absolutely no ground according to the Shariah
for the woman in this case to be flogged. Her sentence is, from every angle,
un-Islamic, as is evidenced from even the most basic reading of the texts.
What saddens me even more greatly is that this case has shown
how little Muslims have come to rely on one of the most progressive and just
aspects of our religion - the requirement that each and every Muslim use
his/her own critical faculties to think and assess each aspect of the religion
himself/herself.
Islam was promoted by the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon
him) as a religion of simplicity and moderation. The Qur'an is a book of
teaching that is easy for the layman to understand. Islamic belief is founded
on a central idea that there is no mediator between the individual and God. We
need not saints, popes or even imams for that matter to act as mediators to
God.
In other words, each and every person is empowered and
encouraged to read the Qur'an and assert his or her own understanding of the
universal teachings of Islam. A cleric is meant only to help in that individual
thought process.
To succumb without question to the decrees of others, clerics
or otherwise, is to me an indication of the death of the moral consciousness of
an individual. It would be hard to rescue the collective moral consciousness if
on an individual level so many people are in deep slumber. I encourage
everybody to promote Islamic awareness and engage at every possible chance in
debating this and similar issues so that our rights as individuals can be
preserved.
- Aiyah Saihati is a research fellow at the Cato Institute.
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