Murder in the Name of Allah — Page 58
Murder in the Name of Allah. Islam can never tolerate that false religions should spread in the world. How can the missionaries of false religions be given a licence to spread falsehood and attract others to the fire towards which they themselves are advancing?27. Maududi himself accepts that Jews and Christians are Ahl-i Kitab (people of the Book). But if they wish to convert idol worshippers, fire worshippers or polytheists to the worship of one God - the God of. Mosesas and Jesusas - thus bringing them nearer to Islam, they would be forbidden. . In short, the Maulana concedes only that a born kafir cannot be kiiled if he does not accept Islam. But if this is so, why kill a new kafir who has recanted? If a new kafir is to be punished at all, why the death penalty?. Why not exile, or life imprisonment, so that Muslim society may not be disrupted? Here Maulana Maududi, true to St Augustinian logic, explains that the apostate is executed in his own interests. He says:. There are only two methods of dealing with an apostate. Either make him an outlaw by depriving him of his citizenship and allowing him mere existence, or end his life. The first method is definitely more severe than the second, because he exists in a state in which 'he neither lives nor dies'. 28 Killing him is preferable. That way both his agony and the agony of society are ended simultaneously. 29. But the punishment to which the Maulana is sentencing apostates is not actually St Augustine's 'spirit of love' persecution. There is a life after death and by killing an apostate, the Maulana is directly consigning him to the fires of hell. By saving an apostate from the temporary agonies of an outcast's life, the Maulana is sending him to the far greater agonies of hell. Above all, the Maulana is depriving the tragic apostate of the opportunity of repentance and therefore salvation. While a kafir has the opportunity of repenting at any stage in his life, the apostate cannot return to Islam and benefit from the compassion of the Great Forgiver (AlGhaffar) and the Acceptor of Repentance (Al-Tawwab). . Reducing the Maulana's logic to its absurd conclusion, one might as well ask: 'Since the death penalty is meant to discourage people who take change of faith lightly from entering our society, how do you propose to stop such wavering people from being born into Muslim homes?'. This draconian policy of force and brutal intolerance is not restricted to the Maududian state. Its foreign policy is also based on force and intolerance. The Maulana says:. Islam does not want to bring about this revolution in one country or a few countries. It wants to spread it to the entire world. Although it 58