|
|
| Line 556: |
Line 556: |
|
| |
|
| Mohammed successfully demanded that his followers abstain from pleasurable and/or beneficial things such as eating pork, drinking alcohol, interest in debt, the public display of women’s faces, instrumental music, and art that depicts the human form, the easy mixing and socialisation of men and women – how much more willingly would his followers have abandoned a practice that is harmful, and that must be distressing for loving parents to perform and witness? | | Mohammed successfully demanded that his followers abstain from pleasurable and/or beneficial things such as eating pork, drinking alcohol, interest in debt, the public display of women’s faces, instrumental music, and art that depicts the human form, the easy mixing and socialisation of men and women – how much more willingly would his followers have abandoned a practice that is harmful, and that must be distressing for loving parents to perform and witness? |
|
| |
| ==='Halal' vs 'Responsibility'===
| |
| Debates concerning FGM and Islam are generally conducted in terms of whether FGM is 'Islamic'. Much therefore depends on what definition one use of Islam
| |
|
| |
| Religions keen to take 'credit' for any good that can be attributed to themselves, but are less keen on the opposite side of the coin, the acknowledging of responsibility for any ills they may give rise to.
| |
|
| |
| as should be quite clear from the hadith and the scholars - FGM is Islamic
| |
|
| |
| But asking if FGM is 'Islamic' is to ask as the wrong question: it is, in effect, to ask whether FGM conforms to Islam's best conception of itself.
| |
|
| |
| <s>But this is not how we hold each other accountable, nor is it how we judge ideologies – both Communism and Nazism would be 'not guilty' of the millions they have killed if they were judged according to their best conceptions of themselves. And Catholicism would exonerate itself of the inquisition.</s>
| |
|
| |
| <s>Religions judging themselves by this criteria results in them systematically claiming credit for any good they can associate themselves with, whilst refusing the other side of the coin – taking responsibility for those ills they may have caused or facilitated, even when caught red-handed.</s>
| |
|
| |
| <s>We are all angels in our best, imagined versions of ourselves.</s>
| |
|
| |
| <s>We are responsible for much more than those of our actions that are in conformity with the best conception of ourselves.</s>
| |
|
| |
| <s>So the question we must ask is not whether FGM is Islamic, but to what extent Islam is ''responsible'' for the existence of FGM.</s>
| |
|
| |
| <s>Asking about responsibility shifts us from the narrow focus of what Islam makes obligatory to what it encourages and discourages, and what it allows, what it facilitates and hinders, what is has perpetuated, for unintended consequences as well as intended ones, and for where it has been negligent and allowed bad practices to persist and fest.</s>
| |
|
| |
| <s>Remember, the first fatwa at all critical of FGM dates from 1982, and there are countless earlier fatwas which praise and recommend FGM. If FGM is not Islamic then why has Islam done nothing over the past 1400 years to eliminate or discourage it? Why is the Islamic world still rife with FGM? After all doesn't Islam ''aspire to eliminate e''verything that is 'unislamic'?</s>
| |
|
| |
| <s>How would things be different if Mohammed had forbidden or criticised FGM in the Quran or in the Hadith? Instead Mohammed deemed himself as perfect and exemplary for all time and for all humanity + then approvedof FGM in the Hadith – and by doing so he sacralised FGM and has guaranteed that it will exist and flourish for as long as Islam exists.</s>
| |
|
| |
| <s>I believe that if islam had not been invented there would be no FGM in the world today.</s>
| |
|
| |
| It is an axiom of Islamic epistemology that Islam and Muhammad are perfect. This means that anything 'imperfect' is automatically exuded from Islam's conception of itself. Courts don't judge the accused according to the best conception they have of themselves: everyone would be innocent if only the very best of ourselves was admitted as evidence. Nor does the fact that the crime is 'out of character', or resulted from negligence, discharge the accused of responsibility for his actions (or inaction). To evaluate the relationship of Islam's and FGM solely in terms of whether FGM is Islamic or not, is to conduct the investigation constrained by axioms and rules determined by the accused.
| |
|
| |
| It is wrong to assume that, because an authority or ideology does not ''require'' a particular practice, it is therefore not morally responsible for any incidence of that practice that occurs under its aegis: few 19<sup>th</sup> century industrialists ''intended'' their factories to be polluting. But their factories ''did'' pollute, and did so reliably and predictably (i.e. not by accident). Pollution was an inherent consequence of 19<sup>th</sup> Century industrialism, despite it being an unintended consequence and 19th Century industrialism was responsible for that pollution; likewise a mother does not need to ''compel'' her toddler to play with a loaded gun for her to be considered responsible for any harm that results from it doing so. She merely has to ''allow'' it to play with the loaded gun, or fail to take reasonable measures to prevent it from doing so.
| |
|
| |
| Moral agents (which can be individuals, collectivities or ideologies) are responsible not just for the consequences (intended and unintended) of what they mandate (i.e. those that are in accordance with its best conception of itself) but, also for the consequences (intended and uninitended) of what they allow, and what they fail to forbid or discourage. not only responsible for the intended consequences of its actions but all its acts and all the consequences of its doctrine and its implementation – including those that are unintended, those which clash with the best conception the ideology has of itself, and which many of its followers are ashamed of, or wish to repudiate.
| |
|
| |
| The more useful question is therefore:
| |
|
| |
| {{Quote-text||''''how and to what extent is Islam responsible for the existence of FGM in the world today, and for much of the past 1400 years.''''}}
| |
|
| |
| Islam appears to be responsible for the sacralisation of FGM, its spread, and the hindering of its eradication – whether FGM is 'Islamic' or not has no bearing on this responsibility.
| |
| ==See Also== | | ==See Also== |
|
| |
|