Punishment of Apostacy in Islam — Page 36
36 comprise change of religion. It is characteristic of the Holy Quran that whenever it propounds a principle it also sets forth the reason on which it is based. The portion of the verse here cited comprises both a direction and the reason for the direction. It may be interpreted as: There shall be no compulsion in matters of faith, inasmuch as faith is a matter of conscience and by its very nature conscience cannot be compelled. It may be possible to force a person to say that he believes but no one can be forced to believe. Therefore an attempt to force a person to believe is futile. If a person yielding to force, or a threat of force, or some kind of temptation, says he believes, while his mind is not convinced of the truth of that which he is compelled to acknowledge as true, he would not be a believer but only a hypocrite. The verse just cited does not leave the matter merely at the stage of an implied reason as the basis of the directive set out in the verse. It goes further and affirms that guidance having been clearly distinguished from error, sane reason would naturally be inclined to accept the guidance and to reject the error. This is a grand principle which has been set out imperatively in the Holy Quran, and is not set out with such emphasis in the scriptures of any other faith. Yet unfortunately a body of Muslim divines continues to adhere to the utterly false notion that a Muslim who abjures Islam must be put to death. Human nature revolts against such a doctrine and there is no support whatsoever for it either in the Holy Quran or in the practice of the Holy Prophet or of his immediate successors.