Praise for

HONOR KILLING: A Professional’s Guide to Sexual Relations and Ghayra Violence from the Islamic Sources

“To understand Islam and the dictates of Shariah Law, this is an outstanding book that provides a clear and concise account of how honor killing flows from Islam’s authoritative sources. The book shows how those sources link even sexual relations to the idea of Islamic supremacy and global conquest.”

- Admiral James A. “Ace Lyons , Jr.,

former commander in chief of the U.S. Pacific Fleet

“Daniel Akbari is a certified “Number One Sharia Lawyer”—admitted to practice before Iran’s Supreme Court, and represent defendants in death penalty cases—whose training included intense religious study in Qom, Shiite Islam’s holiest city. With unique erudition, clarity, and courage, Akbari demonstrates, irrefragably, how the ugly phenomenon of Muslim “honor” killing flows naturally from Islam’s Sharia-based scheme for enforcing “sexual morality” within the Muslim community. One can only hope Akbari’s searing, authoritative analysis will penetrate the fog of Muslim dissimulation, and non-Muslim willful blindness which shrouds the Islamic origins of this pervasive human tragedy.”

- Andrew Bostom, MD, MS

author ofSharia Versus Freedom: The Legacy of Islamic Totalitarianism

“Educators, child welfare workers, medical professionals, police departments, and emergency responders who touch the lives of Muslim women and children will find this book essential.The examples make a huge contribution to our understanding of ghayra which helps us to recognize ways to appropriately intervene when women and children are in danger.”

- Karen Kruse Hall,
President, Central Texas Orphan Mission Alliance

“We often hear Muslims claim that honor killing is a cultural issue in the Middle and Far East that existed prior to the arrival of Islam. To polish Islam’s image, they do all possible to distance Islam from brutal and inhumane practices. They would have us accept the notion that honor killings are mere coincidence in nations that have increasing Muslim populations. If honor killing has no inner connection with Islam, how can they explain why it is still practiced among Muslims living in Western societies for decades, and even among second and third generation Muslims?

Those who have studied Islamic teachings know that Islam is at the core of the problem. From Islam’s inception, Mohammed was careful to adopt a carrot and stick strategy. The carrot is the promise of sexual rewards and the stick that waves it is violence.

Sex is basically viewed as a man’s privileged reward for being Muslim.Muslim men are allowed four wives in addition to unlimited numbers of slave women whether bought or captured in war. In the hereafter, Muslim men are allowed numerous beautiful virgins in Paradise. Thus, Islam reduces women to owned property.In many Islamic countries, a woman is forbidden to appear in public alone and she must cover herself to prevent men who are not immediate relatives from seeing her.

With these factors in mind, it is no wonder, that any woman suspected of breaching these rules is accused of tarnishing family’s honor.Killing her is often the prescription to reestablish a family’s loss of honor.

I am pleased to see this book published to deal with this vitally important topic. I am equally pleased to see two very well qualified writers entrusted with this task.One of them, Mr. Akbari is a Shariah Law attorney from Iran who has dealt with many cases of honor killing.”

- Abullah Al-Araby,

Director, The Pen vs. the Sword ministry

and author of The Islamization of America

HONOR
KILLING

A Professional’s Guide to Sexual Relations and Ghayra Violence from the Islamic Sources

Daniel Akbari,
a member of the Iranian Bar Association

and Number One Attorney

with

Paul J. Tetreault, Jr., Esq.

AuthorHouse™

1663 Liberty Drive

Bloomington, IN 47403

www.authorhouse.com

Phone: 1-800-839-8640

© 2014 Daniel Akbari; Paul Tetreault. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse   12/16/2014

ISBN: 978-1-4969-5703-0 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4969-5748-1 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4969-5747-4 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2014921898

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Scripture quotations marked KJV are from the Holy Bible, King James Version (Authorized Version). First published in 1611. Quoted from the KJV Classic Reference Bible, Copyright © 1983 by The Zondervan Corporation.

Contents

Acknowledgement

Foreword

Chapter 1   Introduction

Chapter 2   The Mujtahid: An Expert in the Religion and Law of Islam

Chapter 3   When a Lie is Not a Sin and Islam’s Ultimate Goal

Chapter 4   Do Muslims Really Deceive non-Muslims about Islam?

Chapter 5   What About My Muslim Neighbors?

Chapter 6   The Sunnah is the Culture

Chapter 7   Ghayra

Chapter 8   What Sharia Commands and Forbids

Chapter 9   Al-amr bi Al-Ma’ruf wa Al-nahy ‘an Al-Munkar

Chapter 10 Enculturation: How Values Are Passed

Chapter 11 Cases: The Reality of Ghayra Violence

Chapter 12 Prevention

Glossary

To the victims

Acknowledgement

This book would not have been possible without

the generous support of Dwight Lieb. Thanks!

Foreword

This book by Ghasem Daniel Akbari is must reading for understanding the underlying religious basis for “honor killing” and “ghayra” violence. Drawing from his vast real-world expertise in the Muslim world and detailed scholarship regarding the Koran and other Islamic sources of authority, Akbari persuasively ties stringent Islamic religious and legal commandments as the authority for those that practice so-called honor killing and other abuses associated with family relations. In addition, Akbari courageously lays out a well-reasoned case that Muslims who reject such barbaric practices do so in contravention of the black and white mandates of Islam.

Jeffrey F. Addicott

Lieutenant Colonel, US Army, Ret.

Professor of Law and

Director, Center for Terrorism Law

St. Mary’s University School of Law

Chapter One

Introduction

Time for a Mujtahid to Speak Out

There is a lot written about honor killing, both in books and on the internet. Information about lesser forms of honor violence in the Muslim family - such as beatings, imprisonment in the home, female genital mutilation, and acid attacks - is much more scarce, particularly for Westerners unable to read Arabic. Islam requires all Muslims to learn Arabic, and many of the concepts related to Muslim honor violence are religious “terms of art” without an accurate equivalent in other languages. What the information that is available has in common is that almost none of it is written by someone actually qualified to speak with authority about the religion of Islam or sharia, Islamic law!

The purpose of this book is three-fold. First, it is time for someone with the proper credentials in Islam and sharia to explain how and why Islam both condones and commands the types of acts Westerners label as “honor killing” and “honor violence.” I hope this might help potential victims avoid the behaviors that will make them targets. Second, the book aims to inform potential immigrants about criminal liability in the West for ghayra violence. The entire world - not just the West - is in a moral freefall in which ideas of right and wrong that have been generally observed for thousands of years across multiple cultures are being abandoned. The problem is honor violence ultimately contributes to this moral decay by serving ideas that are very wrong, more wrong than the behaviors it is intended to correct. Rather than stem the moral decay, honor violence contributes to it. Finally, I hope to help Westerners - particularly the media and professionals who interact with Muslim women or whose work relates to violence against women - to understand Islam is the root cause of honor killing and the other forms of honor-related violence we see in the Muslim family. In more technical language, Islam provides the motive and dictates the modus operandi for the acts that can be labeled honor killing or honor violence.

This is not to say Islam is the only cause of domestic violence in the Muslim family. Since Cain killed Abel, all societies have shared pathologies that lead to domestic violence. In the Muslim community, however, Islam provides an additional cause of domestic violence. Islam is, arguably, the most significant cause of domestic violence among Muslims since it turns even conduct that benefits society and is normative across virtually every other culture - such as conversation, laughter, friendship, courtship, romantic love, music, watching television, athletics, or even just taking a walk - into a reason to kill. As we shall see, the victims’ behaviors that result in honor killings - and lesser forms of violence that share the same “honor” motive - are always acts that Islam disapproves. What’s more, Islam does not merely condone honor violence, it commands it, as one of the most basic duties of following the religion, and carefully scripts the perpetrators’ actions.

For the past several decades - at least since the Muslim Brotherhood began to start front groups like the Muslim Students Association - Muslims in the West have made a cottage industry out of deceiving people about what Islam actually teaches. This deception is never more apparent than after any event that looks like an honor killing. Then, Muslim spokespeople appear out of the woodwork to assure Westerners that Islam is peaceful and nothing in Islam teaches or condones honor killing. Both sides of the political aisle in the West have been complicit in this deception, but it has only succeeded because most Westerners do not trouble themselves to study Islam’s authoritative documents and many are so prejudiced in favor of their own ideas of right and wrong they cannot imagine Islam might have rules that are very different from their ideas. This indictment applies with particular force to the mainstream Western press who have an obligation to learn - and to tell - the truth. But regardless of your job, if you have not learned the truth about Islam, believe me, Muslims are “twice laughing at you,” as it is said in the Middle East, or “fool me twice, shame on me” as it is said in the West.

Far from having no connection to honor killing, Islam actually has a word for it - it is called ghayra killing. That’s the way it is reported in police departments in Islamic countries the world over. Not that it’s a crime under Islamic law, as we’ll see, but the police usually get involved because there is often a mess to clean up and administrative details to be taken care of. In Chapter Seven, we’ll look closely at what “ghayra” means in Islam, but since ghayra killing is the term used by the people who practice it, that’s the term we’ll use instead of honor killing throughout the rest of this book. We’ll use the term “ghayra violence” to refer to both ghayra killing and lesser forms of domestic violence that don’t result in death but spring from the same ghayra root, such as home imprisonment and female genital mutilation.

The concept of ghayra works together with the moral prohibitions of sharia to provide the motive for ghayra violence, but the sharia provisions that command and script the perpetrator’s actions are known as al-amr bi al-ma’ruf wa al-nahy ‘an al-munkar. This Arabic phrase literally means “enjoining good and forbidding evil,” and we will shorten it to amr bil ma’ruf as Muslims themselves do to make it easier to talk about. Ghayra is a characteristic of Allah, himself1, and enjoining good and forbidding evil is a cornerstone of Islamic faith2, making ghayra violence a uniquely Islamic phenomenon regardless of the fact that Muslims do not have a monopoly on domestic violence. Enjoining good and forbidding evil is a characteristic that defines Muslims. It is what makes them better than any other people group on earth. In surah 3:110 the Koran states:

You are the best umma ever sent out for mankind; you enjoin Al-Ma’ruf and forbid Al-Munkar and you believe in Allah. And had the People of the Book (Jews and Christians) believed, it would have been better for them; some of them are believers in Allah, but the majority of them are sinful.3

The good that Muslims are commanded to enjoin is all of the beliefs and actions that Islam commands. The bad they are commanded to forbid is everything that Islam forbids. Since sharia is nothing more than the rules for how to practice Islam correctly, amr bil ma’ruf can be understood as the enforcement mechanism for the full content of sharia.

Figure One shows where ghayra violence fits in the overall scheme of Islam. The command to enjoin good and forbid evil - that is, to enforce sharia - is carried out both collectively by the Islamic State and individually by the actions of individual Muslims. Both the state and individuals work inside the umma - the Muslim community - and outside the umma. Outside the umma sharia commands da’wa, the call to Islam that must come before Muslims engage in jihad, and jihad itself. Both da’wa and jihad can be carried out by either the Islamic State or by individual Muslims. Inside the umma, Islamic Imams and Mullahs do amr bil ma’ruf through preaching. The Islamic State - where it exists - enforces sharia by way of the typical means for law enforcement, police forces and courts. But Islam also enshrines a right and a duty for individuals to enjoin good and forbid evil, and it is through this private right of action that ghayra violence takes place.

The principal way Koran’s command to enjoin good and forbid evil touches the daily lives of Muslims is through this private enforcement mechanism. The right and duty to engage in private enforcement is triggered by the neglect or breach of sharia. Neglect of a sharia command is remedied by enjoining the good. A breach is remedied by forbidding evil. In either case, action is taken not by the state, but by individual Muslims. Amr bil ma’ruf can be used by individuals to enforce any of sharia’s provisions. The resulting violence may only be classified as ghayra violence when it involves action by a Muslim man against a person in his namoos who violates sharia in a way that irritates the man’s ghayra. Don’t worry, we’ll define these concepts fully as we go along. In general, the types of violations that irritate a Muslim man’s ghayra concern sharia’s rules for how women should dress and behave. The box outlined with a dotted line in Figure 1 shows where the ghayra killing and violence we will be talking about fits in the overall scheme of Islam. Amr bil ma’ruf violence can also arise in a non-ghayra context when individuals use the private right of enforcement to correct the breach or neglect of other sharia rules, and this is also shown in Figure 1 with some examples.

Sharia carefully delineates the steps to be taken by an individual engaging in amr bil ma’ruf. The amount of force that may be used steadily increases as the steps progress until it reaches deadly force administered not only by the individual but also by others he has called to help him. This is the point at which other family members may become involved in ghayra violence. Since this private right of amr bil ma’ruf is itself part of sharia, it is divinely ordained and is above any man-made law. It cannot be taken away by any state, either Islamic or non-Islamic.

In the next few chapters, we’ll examine the basics of Islam you must know to understand how ghayra violence fits within the logic of Allah’s religion. This includes why Muslims deny ghayra violence is part of Islam and how Islam’s overall moral system works to achieve the goals of the religion, Allah’s goals. Islam is driven by goals, not by rules, in a way that is different from any other religious or legal system, but there is a logic to Islam’s scheme. Ghayra violence is a deeply rooted part of Allah’s religion that exists to protect the Muslim umma from certain manifestations of unbelief. In Chapter Seven we’ll define ghayra and examine it in detail. Chapter Eight will focus on the moral prohibitions of sharia that work together with ghayra to provide the motive for ghayra violence. Chapter Nine will closely examine sharia’s right of private enforcement including the modus operandi for ghayra violence, the procedure sharia sets out for individuals to follow in doing amr bil ma’ruf. Chapter Ten examines how the Islamic values that lead to ghayra violence are passed on, resulting in ghayra violence even among Muslims who know very little about their religion. Chapter Eleven demonstrates how actual cases of ghayra violence reflect the motives and modus operandi detailed in the earlier chapters, while Chapter Twelve discusses prevention of ghayra violence in the West.

Along the way, our focus will be on the authoritative Islamic sources - the Koran and hadith - so we see what Allah commands and what Muhammad said and did. We must focus on the Islamic sources because many people who have written about ghayra violence in recent decades, especially in the West, have done so from the perspective of an imaginary Islam they have invented, not from the standpoint of Islam as taught in the authoritative sources for fourteen centuries by thousands of great Muslim scholars and practiced today by more than a billion Muslims. Professionals who bear some responsibility for the welfare of Muslim women and girls can not afford to deal in fiction.

But first, why am I particularly qualified to speak with authority about Islam, and what does Islam itself say about those who deny Islam has anything to do with ghayra killing?

Chapter Two

The Mujtahid:
An Expert in the Religion and Law of Islam

Nowadays, many Muslims believe they are qualified to speak about Islam simply because they call themselves Muslim, even if they have not read the Koran, or, incredibly, even if they disagree with it. I have had conversations with university students - not just undergraduates but also graduate students in their 30s or 40s - who claim to be Muslim, but when presented with a pamphlet comparing the Bible and Koran reject Koran and say they follow the teachings of the Bible. They tell me, “we know what Koran says, but we are moderates, we have our own interpretation.”

Islam has an unequivocal response to ordinary Muslims who invent their own Islam - either the students above or the so-called “Muslim spokespeople” who purport to give a judgment about what Islam requires in a specific situation without possessing the necessary qualifications. They are, at best, criminals, and in some situations may be bringing on themselves the judgment of hellfire. This is because each situation involving an apparent ghayra killing presents a unique fact pattern. In order to give a valid judgment about what Islam requires, allows, or prohibits in any given situation a person must possess the necessary qualification of being a mujtahid capable of performing ijtihad. A mujtahid is an Islamic jurist who meets a rigorous set of requirements designed to ensure that he has comprehensive knowledge of the authoritative texts of Islam and how the requirements to practice Islam correctly - the sharia or Sacred Law -flow from those texts. Ijtihad is the process of legal reasoning the jurist follows to discover the requirements Allah has set forth in the authoritative texts.

At this point, Westerners who know something of Islam may be thinking that no new ijtihad is possible, because the details of the sharia have been fixed since the 9th century. That’s when the early mujtahids of the recognized legal schools (madhahib, plural of madhab) reached consensus (ijma), and their rulings became “an authoritative part of Sacred Law that is obligatory to obey and not lawful to disobey.”4 The existence of scholarly consensus on a detail of Islam places that detail beyond the reach of later mujtahids, because it becomes “an absolute legal ruling which does not admit of being contravened or annulled.”5 The situation is often described with the popular phrase, ‘the gates of ijtihad are closed.”

While it is true that no new ijtihad is possible on details that are already part of Sacred Law, new ijtihad is possible - and necessary - on new issues. In courtroom situations, new ijtihad is often necessary on evidentiary issues or with novel fact patterns that don’t match existing rulings. Nu Hah Mim Keller explains:

No age of history is totally lacking people who are competent in ijtihad on particular questions that are new, and this is an important aspect of Sacred Law, to provide solutions to new ethical problems by means of sound Islamic legal methodology in applying Qur’anic and hadith primary texts…. But while in this specific sense the door of ijtihad is not and cannot be closed, Islamic scholarship has not accepted anyone’s claims to absolute ijtihad [the ability to overturn rulings on issues where consensus has already been reached] since Imams Abu Hanifa, Malik, Shafi’i and Ahmad [the founders of the existing Sunni legal schools.]6

Ijtihad may be understood as legal reasoning, similar, in many respects, to the process of legal reasoning engaged in by Western lawyers. It requires the same skills of reading comprehension, logical reasoning, and analytic reasoning Western lawyers apply, but the starting point - and therefore the end result - are quite different. Nobody today would describe Western law as the way to follow the commands of a god - any god - correctly, but that is exactly what sharia law is! Obeying sharia is the way a Muslim imitates the most perfect Muslim of all time, Muhammad, to follow and obey the commands and requirements of Allah, the god of Islam.

The students who do not follow Koran and the spokespeople who deny Islam has anything to do with ghayra killing and violence are in the same situation as a Muslim who does not follow the jurisprudence (sharia) of a recognized legal school (madhab), but invents the details of Islamic practice from his own opinion about Koran and hadith. Hundreds of years ago, Imam Nawawi’s thirteenth century manual of Islamic practice, Al-Maqasid, answered those who do not possess the qualifications to be mujtahid but nevertheless want to “deduce details of Islamic practice directly from [Koran and hadith]:”7

The answer is that the term ijtihad or “striving to know a ruling”… does not mean just any person’s efforts to understand and operationalize an Islamic ruling, but rather the person with sound knowledge of everything the Prophet taught that relates to the question. Whoever makes ijtihad without this qualification is a criminal.

As authority for this ruling, Nawawi cited a hadith narrated by Jabir and recorded in Abu Dawud’s hadith collection:

We set out on a journey. One of our people was hurt by a stone that injured his head. He then had a sexual dream. He asked his fellow travelers: Do you find a concession for me to perform tayammum [dry ablution]? They said: We do not find any concession for you while you can use water. He took a bath and died. When we came to the Prophet, the incident was reported to him. He said: They killed him, may Allah kill them! Could they not ask when they did not know?8

Nawawi notes this is an authentic hadith, “and every Muslim who has any taqwa or ‘godfearingness’ should reflect on it carefully.”9 He adds the hadith contains Muhammad’s warning “in the strongest language possible - that to judge on a rule of Islam on the basis of insufficient knowledge is a crime.”10 Specifically, Muhammad explained that judges fall into three groups. The first type of judge “knows what is right and gives judgment accordingly.”11 Only this type of judge will go to paradise. The second type of judge brings hell fire on himself because he knows what is right but judges according to his own desires. The third type of judge brings hell fire on himself because he gives judgment in ignorance, without actually knowing what Allah has required in the authentic Islamic sources. “Anyone who would like to avoid the hellfire should reflect on the fate of whoever, in the words of the Prophet, ‘judges for people while ignorant.’”12

The requirement that there be specialists - mujtahids - who gain a detailed understanding of Islam in order to be able to teach it to others comes directly from Allah in the Koran:

And the believers should not go out to fight one and all. Only a group of them should go forth from each section. Those who stay behind should get understanding in their religion so that they can warn their people when they return to them that they might be on their guard (against evil).13

This detailed understanding gained by those who are left behind is nothing less than how Allah intended for Muslims to obey His commands, or, in other words, the specific details of how one practices Islam. This understanding is called “fiqh,” - a word that literally means “understanding” in Arabic. Fiqh is the understanding of the acts - physical acts, intentions of the heart, and one’s speech - that comprise following Islam.14 This understanding is set down in the sharia, or jurisprudence, the Sacred Law of Islam. Just to say it again because it bears repeating, sharia law is, in fact, the details of how one correctly practices Islam. Among Muslims, manuals of the basic principles of sharia law are called fiqh manuals. These are similar to what Western lawyers would call “black-letter law” manuals, like the study aids that are popular with Western law students. The difference is that in the West, only law students study the rules on which Western society is based, and then it is done using the case method, which encourages students to challenge the continued viability of existing rules. Among the umma, by contrast, the rules of sharia are studied in the mosque and the home and passed on by every institution and cultural practice in Muslim society because they are the rules for following Allah, and must not be disregarded. In other words, everybody is a sharia law student, even if they are not aware that they are!

It is very difficult for Westerners to comprehend the full meaning of sharia law. The use of the word “law” automatically evokes your modern, Western experience. For you, law is a narrow concept. It’s meaning is confined to areas of your life where you have to deal with the police or hire a lawyer, such as getting a ticket, or incorporating your business, making a will, or seeking a divorce. A Westerner may be aware law extends into broader contexts like admiralty law, international law, or intellectual property law, but these types of law are distant and compartmentalized from the laws that touch his business or his family. Most importantly, the West has repudiated the idea, so foundational to its classical thinkers, that legal rules can be deduced from religious rules. The repudiation makes the religious character of the obligations sharia imposes upon Muslims incomprehensible to Westerners. Lost to the West is the idea that human actions in the temporal world are connected to eternal rewards and punishments in the hereafter, and hence the moral teachings of religion should govern not only every area of law but also every area of life. But this idea is vital to Muslims. For the Muslim, the meaning of sharia law is much broader than the Westerner’s limited concept of law. Sharia law operates at every moment to limit and define every area of a Muslim’s life and actions. As has been well said, “[s]hari’a is the set of rules which govern behaviour of Muslims in all realms of life, from internal states of heart and personal affairs to social and political and global affairs.”15 Because obeying sharia is necessary to please Allah, Muslims believe that how well they follow sharia determines not only their level of blessing in the temporal world, but also their destiny to paradise or hell. For an Islamic believer who does not earn paradise by participating in jihad, how well he or she follows the judgments of sharia completely determines whether he or she will experience pleasure or torment after death.

It is impossible to overstate how much the ordinary Muslim needs the detailed rules of sharia. This knowledge cannot be gained from Koran, alone, or even from Koran and Hadith without the knowledge and training the specialist - the mujtahid - possesses. From Koran and hadith the ordinary Muslim can learn only the basic tenets of the faith (aqida) and general laws and duties he or she must obey.16 A Muslim can learn, for example, that they need to pray, to fast, to pay zakat, and to make Hajj, if they can. But the details of how to do all these things correctly so that their actions lift the obligations of Islam comes only from sharia. Without sharia a Muslim would not even know how to pray, let alone know the judgment Islam makes on every other human action.

If you’re a Westerner, you might miss the significance of what I’ve just said. For Jews and Christians, prayer is simply talking to God. It can be done any time, any where, for any reason, in any manner. But for Muslims, prayer is an intricate ritual of movement and recitation that must be done at the right time, in the right way, with the right preparation or it is simply invalid and fails to lift the obligations of Islam, leaving the Muslim guilty of serious sin. To give you an idea of how detailed the rules of sharia are, consider that there are one hundred and nineteen pages of instruction just on how to pray in a popular sharia law manual used in many U.S. mosques.17

The unique knowledge and training possessed by the mujtahid that allows him to reach an understanding of how to correctly practice Islam consists of three parts:

1. 1. Thorough knowledge of Arabic as it is used in the primary texts of Islam: Koran and hadith,

2. 2. Knowledge of the complete corpus of primary texts, particularly the hadith, which Nu Hah Mim Keller estimates includes 30,000 unique ahadith (plural of hadith)18, and

3. 3. Knowledge of the methodological tools that allow mujtahid scholars to produce a coherent body of law from the primary texts. These tools are called usul al-fiqh, an Arabic term that literally means the “principles of understanding.” The tools include both principles of interpretation used to harmonize primary texts and methods of reasoning used to extend and apply the commands found in primary texts to new situations. Each legal school has a unique usul al-fiqh as well as differences in the hadith they accept or reject. These differences cause some rulings to differ slightly between schools.

A mujtahid, then, is a scholar who possesses the knowledge of Arabic, the knowledge of the complete corpus of primary Islamic texts, and the methodology to reason directly from the primary texts to discern fiqh, the correct understanding of how to practice Islam. Because of these qualifications, he is able to give an Islamic legal ruling - a fatwa - that describes the nature of a situation, thing, or action from the standpoint of Islam.

The reason I am qualified to speak with authority about Islam is not because I was born and raised as a Muslim in Iran, the nation with the most fundamental Islamic government in the world. It is not because I lived under that government for the first 32 years of my life, with the exception of a year in Turkey and a month in Bulgaria. None of that makes me any different from an ordinary Muslim (a muqallid), like the students I talked to or the Muslim spokespeople who pretend to know nothing about Islamic ghayra violence. But an ordinary Muslim who lacks the special training and skills of the mujtahid is not excused from following all the rules of sharia. The reason there are mujtahids is to make sure that fiqh - the complete and correct understanding of how to practice Islam - is determined and set down for the ordinary Muslim to learn and follow. Ordinary Muslims are required to follow the teachings of the mujtahids. Koran says:

O you who believe! Obey Allah, and obey the Messenger, and those charged with authority among you. If you have a dispute in a thing then refer it to Allah and His Messenger, if you are believers in Allah and the Last Day: That is best, and very good in the end.19

Ordinary Muslims obey this command by following the rules of sharia given by the mujtahids of one of the recognized legal schools, a process called “taqlid.” They refer their disputes to Allah and His Messenger by following the rulings (fatawa, plural of fatwa) of the mujtahids of a legal school (the fuqaha, plural of faqih) and the judgments of the mujtahids who practice in the courts, Islamic lawyers (wokala, plural of wakil) and judges (qodhat plural of qadi). The command to follow the mujtahids is extremely serious, because the Koran threatens hell to those who refuse to follow the judgments given by mujtahids:

He who is stubborn against the Apostle after Allah’s way has been made clear to him, and then follows a way other than that of the believers, We shall assign for him what he has chosen. We will burn him in the fire of Hell: an evil destination.20

I am qualified to speak with authority about Islam because I was trained as a mujtahid, in particular a wakil. As a wakil I am what you in the West might call a “sharia lawyer.” I am admitted to practice before the Supreme Court of Iran and certified as a “Number One Lawyer” - a mujtahid qualified to represent defendants in cases that involve the death penalty. But as a mujtahid I am not just a lawyer. I studied in Qom, the holiest city in Shia Islam and the seat of Shia religious study and teaching. My expertise is not only in law, but also in religion, in how and why the rules of sharia - the rules that describe the correct way to practice Islam and govern every aspect of a Muslim’s life - flow from Koran and hadith, Islam’s holy and authoritative documents. It is this understanding that allows me to explain - with authority - how ghayra killing and ghayra violence flow from Islam.

Chapter Three

When a Lie is Not a Sin
and Islam’s Ultimate Goal

Why Muslims Lie to Non-Muslims about Ghayra Killing

As for the spokespeople who claim Islam does not condone or command ghayra killing, don’t worry about them roasting in the hellfire. That would only happen if they were speaking with sincerity but in ignorance, that is, if they thought what they were saying was true but they had just not bothered to find out what Islam actually teaches. That would make them like the second judge Muhammad described, “a man who judges for people while ignorant.” That description may apply to some, if they are not mujtahids, but the reality is most are probably lying.

From the standpoint of Islam, this lying is not a “bad” that is prohibited but a “good” that is commanded. If you are offended to learn Islam sometimes commands lying, you may be trying to superimpose your own Western values on Islam. That is prejudice, a preconception not based on actual knowledge of Islamic law. You need to be open-minded enough to accept the reality that the moral rules of Islam are very different from your Western experience. Muslims know their moral rules differ from Western, Judeo-Christian moral rules for important reasons, reasons that make Islamic rules better than Western rules because they are more pleasing to Allah. Indeed, they are commanded by Allah.

There is actually a detailed and logical process of legal reasoning - ijtihad - at work to reach the conclusion that lying to non-Muslims about Islam’s connection to ghayra violence is required. The first step of this process is that Islam’s Lawgiver - Allah - labels a non-Muslim a “kafir,” a word that means infidel or unbeliever. To be a kafir means to deny Islam, which is the ugliest and most serious of all sins and carries one beyond any hope of paradise. Koran repeatedly declares that koffar (plural of kafir) are najis, meaning unclean:

O you who believe! For sure the Mushrikun [polytheists, those who associate anything with Allah] are najis [filthy, unclean]; so let them not approach the Sacred Mosque after this year. And if you are afraid of poverty, Allah make you rich from His grace, if He wills, for Allah is All-knowing, All-wise.21

For sure, those who disbelieve from among the People of the Book and among the Mushrikin [polytheists, those who associate anything with Allah] they are in the blaze of Hell, and they will stay there forever. They are the most evil of creatures.22

For sure, the most evil of creatures in the sight of Allah are those who disbelieve: They do not believe.23

Unbelievers are unclean because they deny the truth of Islam. But their uncleanness is not merely spiritual, it is physical as well. Sharia actually classifies koffar as filth, along with such things as urine, excrement, semen, dogs, pigs, and alcoholic beverages.24 Because koffar are filth, sharia forbids them from touching the Koran, based on a command from Allah, himself.25 The ijma (consensus) of the scholars is that koffar are not allowed to possess a Koran.26 This ruling may surprise you if you’ve encountered a Koran give-away program. In recent years, Muslims have begun to operate a bit like evangelical Christians, producing translations of Koran in many languages and offering a copy to anybody who wants one. We’ll have more to say about this later, but you can be sure the concept the Koran is pure and unbelievers are filth has not changed. Islam has prohibited a kafir to possess a Koran or learn about its contents for a long time. The contract of dhima (protection) concluded by Caliph Umar when he conquered the Christians of Syria in the A.D. 630s - on which sharia’s laws for the treatment of non-Muslims are based - forbids Christians from teaching Koran to their children.27 As one of the Rashideen Caliphs (righteous or rightly-guided caliphs), Umar was a mujtahid. This evidence leads to the sharia principle that koffar have no right to know anything about Islam except the Dhimmi laws sharia commands them to obey!

The fact non-Muslims do not have a right to know what Islam teaches does not completely settle the question of whether the Muslim spokespeople who claim Islam has nothing to do with ghayra killing have managed to escape the hellfire. If Muslims are required to tell the truth about Islam regardless of whether people have a right to know and if, as we shall see, Islam both condones and commands ghayra killing, then the spokespeople would still be in trouble for giving a false judgment about Islam.

Unfortunately, Muslims do not have a duty to tell the truth about Islam! While it is certainly strange to think that someone would lie about what their religion teaches - and Islam does generally prohibit lying - sharia specifically permits Muslims to lie in several situations, and in certain circumstances even requires Muslims to lie. The hadith records Muhammad allowed lying in “war, settling disagreements, and a man talking with his wife or she with him,” and taught even an oath can be broken if an expiation is made. All of these dispensations are present in sharia.28 Specifically, when it comes to lying to non-Muslims, the Koran forbids Muslims to make friendships or alliances with non-Muslims unless it is for the purpose of deceiving them! A Westerner might miss this, if he could not read the Koran in Arabic and did not know sharia law, so let’s look closely at what Koran says. The relevant verse is surah (chapter) 3, ayat (verse) 28, presented below in two translations:

Let not the believers take for friends or helpers unbelievers rather than believers: if any do that, in nothing will there be help from Allah: except by way of precaution, that ye may guard yourselves from them. But Allah cautions you (To remember) Himself; for the final goal is to Allah.29

Let not believers make friends with infidels in preference to the faithful - he that does this has nothing to hope for from God - except in self-defence. God admonishes you to fear him: for to God shall all return.30

The word translated “guard” in the first translation and “self-defence” in the second is an Arabic word from which we get one of the most important doctrines in sharia regarding relations with non-Muslims and even apostate Muslims, the doctrine of taqiyya. Taqiyya allows Muslims to act or speak in a deceptive way provided they remain committed to Islam in their hearts.31 As Koran explicitly allows Muslims to deceive non-Muslims and apostate Muslims in this and other verses,32 this dispensation is allowed in the legal schools of all Islamic sects, because there can be no consensus that opposes the explicit teachings of Koran or hadith.

Since non-Muslims don’t have a right to know what Islam teaches and Muslims are allowed to “make taqiyya” by deceiving them, it looks like the Muslim spokespeople have escaped hellfire for claiming Islam has no connection to ghayra killing. Good for them! But solving the problem for the Muslim spokespeople leaves us with two questions. First, given Muslims can “make taqiyya,” why would the sharia ever require Muslims to lie about Islam? Second, and more particularly, why is lying about Islam’s connection to ghayra killing required?

First, let’s be clear sharia does require Muslims to lie - to make taqiyya - in some situations, and while we’re at it let’s eliminate the false claim - made only by a small number of people who are ignorant about true Islam - that making taqiyya is done only by Shiite Muslims and not by Sunnis. Here is the explanation for why lying is required from a manual of the Shafi’i legal school, a Sunni madhab:

If a praiseworthy aim is attainable through both telling the truth and lying, it is unlawful to accomplish through lying because there is no need for it. When it is possible to achieve such an aim by lying but not by telling the truth, it is permissible to lie if attaining the goal is permissible (N: i.e. when the purpose of lying is to circumvent someone who is preventing one from doing something permissible), and obligatory to lie if the goal is obligatory.33

In other words, any provision of sharia Muslims are obligated to perform can become a justification for lying. For example, Muslims are required to pay zakat, “a particular amount of property that must be paid to certain kinds of recipients.”34 Zakat is often referred to as “alms” or “charity,” but zakat is not like the Western concept of charity, where an individual gives voluntarily to those people or causes that are on his heart. Koran, and therefore sharia, dictate what zakat must be used to support. It is forbidden to give zakat to non-Muslims, but one of the required recipients are “those fighting for Allah, meaning people engaged in Islamic military operations.”35 To say that bluntly, Islamic charity is required to be used to fund Muslims engaged in jihad! Because of this requirement, the U.S. government has investigated, closed-down, and prosecuted Islamic “charities” for supporting terrorism. The legal pressure has simply made obtaining the required support for jihad an object of deception and driven it underground, and sometimes to criminal activity, as several prosecutions demonstrate.36

The prohibition against lying is not the only moral rule Islam does not enforce at all times between all people. Islam also does not contain the other Judeo-Christian moral absolutes that form the basis of Western morality - don’t murder, don’t commit adultery, and don’t steal. Like the provisions that command lying, in various situations Islam either commands or allows the violation of all these moral rules, by or against certain classes of human beings. For example, enjoining good and forbidding evil - from which we get ghayra violence - is just one of the situations in which Islam commands or allows murder. Islam certainly prohibits particular types of murder, particular types of adultery, and particular types of theft, but it should surprise no one that the moral rules of Islam are very different from the moral rules of other religions. Islam’s moral idiosyncrasies have led some scholars to comment that Islam’s only moral rule seems to be whatever is good for Islam is moral. This is closer to correct than they may realize, and is the key to understanding why Muslims lie about Islam’s connection to ghayra violence.

The Goal of Islam: The Maqasid

In Judaism and Christianity, the moral rules themselves define “goodness.” The earthly goal of the religion is to achieve a society in which the moral rules are obeyed. In Islam, by contrast, goodness is defined by the goals of Islam, and moral rules exist merely to facilitate the achievement of the goals. When necessary to achieve the goals, the moral rules can be set aside, as we read from sharia in the case of lying. Indeed, since the moral provisions of Koran and Hadith are not absolute - meaning they don’t apply in the same way in all circumstances between all categories of people - it is only the application of the goals of Islam, also stated in Koran and Hadith, as a primary component of usul al fiqh (the roots of understanding) that allows mujtahids (Muslim jurists) to understand the logical unity of Islamic morality and harmonize the Koran and hadith’s moral provisions. Stated simply, without understanding Islam’s goals you cannot understand its rules.

The goals of Islam are also the goals of the umma - the worldwide Islamic community 37 - and the goals of sharia. For this reason, the goals are called the al-maqasid al-sharia. “Maqasid” is an Arabic word that means “final destinations” or “ultimate goals.” The maqasid come directly from the Koran and hadith.38 The maqasid are divided into 3 levels. The top five goals are called zarurat, an Arabic word meaning “necessities.” The zarurat are the purposes Islam exists to achieve, the lower levels of maqasid exist simply to ensure these top five goals are attained. The top five necessary goals are also hierarchical, with the four lesser goals helping to achieve the most important goal. This most important goal is deen, the worship of Allah through the religion of Islam. The literal meaning of deen in the Arabic is “religion.” Listed in the order of their importance, the four lower goals that exist to establish deen are nafs (life), nasl (progeny), aql (intellect), and mawl (wealth).39

The command to establish deen, the Islamic religion, throughout the entire world comes from both the Koran and the hadith. Muslims believe the Koran to be “the very words of Allah,” the god of Islam. Surah 2 ayat 193 of Koran tells Muslims:

And fight them until there is no more Fitnah (disbelief and worshipping of others along with Allah) and (all and every kind of) worship is for Allah (Alone). But if they cease [i.e., become Muslims], let there be no transgression except against Az-Zalimun (the polytheists, and wrong-doers).40

The hadith are the purported deeds, sayings, and silences of Muhammad. The hadith give what is called in Arabic the Sunnah, the path of the prophet. To be a true Muslim one must be on the path of Muhammad. The hadith is therefore essential, because Koran describes Muhammad as the osvat-al-hasana, the excellent example, and repeatedly commands Muslims to obey and imitate Muhammad. The hadith records Muhammad - and therefore Muslims - are commanded by Allah to fight until all people become Muslims:

Narrated Ibn Umar: Allah’s Messenger [Muhammad] said, ‘I have been ordered (by Allah) to fight against the people until they testify that none has the right to be worshipped but Allah and that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah, and perform As-Salat [Islamic prayer] and give Zakat [money exacted to support Muslims and jihad], so if they perform all that then they save their lives and properties from me except for Islamic laws, and their reckoning (accounts) will be done by Allah.”41

Thus, it is Allah, himself, who commands jihad and the purpose of jihad is, ultimately, religious: to contain, subjugate, and eliminate all other religions throughout the entire world so that “all and every kind of worship is for Allah, alone.” This is the maqasid, the ultimate goal of Islam, Muslims, and sharia. Any moral rules that hinder the achievement of this goal must give way. This answers our first question, why the sharia sometimes requires Muslims to lie about Islam. Muslims are required to lie if lying will help the spread of Islam or, conversely, if telling the truth will hinder the spread of Islam.

The final component needed in our ijtihad (legal reasoning) to answer the second question - why Muslims are required to lie to non-Muslims about Islam’s connection to ghayra violence - is a principle of usul al-fiqh. This principle is a precept from Koran, specifically, the concept that Allah has not made any way for non-Muslims to be above Muslims:

Those who are waiting to see if Allah will give you a victory, then they say: “Were we not with you?” but if the victory belongs to unbelievers, they say to the unbelievers: “Did we not look after you and protect you from the believers?” For sure, Allah will judge between you on the Day of Resurrection. And Allah has not provided a way for unbelievers to be over [above, superior to, having authority over] the believers.42

This principle is called nafye al-sabil. It means Muslims and Islam must always and everywhere be supreme to non-Muslims and all that is not Islamic. It means much more than simply the truth claims of the religion of Islam must be superior to all other religions. It also means sharia law - which is, again, the rules for how to properly practice Islam - must not be contradicted or superseded by any other law. Because sharia comes from the Koran and hadith it is divine. Laws made by man’s authority are obviously inferior, whether - using the United States as an example - they are the supreme law of the nation contained in the Constitution, judicial opinions rendered by the Supreme Court, statutes passed by Congress and signed by the President, or regulations properly enacted by an agency. All of these are void ab initio if they contradict sharia, as are also laws from all authorities within the states. In particular, laws based on the moral teachings of other religions, like laws that absolutely prohibit murder, theft, bigamy, or deceit, are also obviously void since to observe them would put another religion above Islam and ignore the circumstances in which the maqasid al-sharia - the goals of Islam - allow these moral prohibitions to be set aside. Finally, it is sinful not only for Muslims to allow Islam to be insulted, but also to allow circumstances to exist that give non-Muslims a disparaging opinion of Islam.

Let’s summarize the elements of our ijtihad and see what ruling sharia gives us. The issue is whether Muslims should truthfully disclose Islam’s connection to ghayra violence or whether they should lie to conceal this connection from non-Muslims. The rules that apply to the issue are as follows:

1. 1. Koffar (unbelievers) do not have a right to know what Islam teaches.

2. 2. It is sinful for Muslims to take non-Muslims as friends or protectors unless it is for the purpose of using the non-Muslims to accomplish the goals of Islam. It is not a sin if Muslims “make taqiyya” - use deception - to protect themselves or Islam.

3. 3. Muslims must lie if it is the only way to achieve an obligatory goal of Islam, especially the maqasid al-sharia, the ultimate goal.

4. 4. The most important goal Muslims must achieve is to spread deen, the worship of Allah through Islam.

5. 5. It is sinful for Muslims to allow non-Muslims to look down on Muslims or Islam in any way.

6. 6. Finally, the purpose of ghayra violence is to al-amr bi al-ma’ruf wa al-nahy ‘an al-munkar - to enjoin good and forbid evil as defined by the moral rules of sharia.

Muslims know that non-Muslims do not follow the moral rules of sharia, they follow the moral provisions of their religion or their law. Muslims also know non-Muslims do not understand the moral provisions of sharia, because understanding sharia’s moral provisions requires understanding the maqasid al-sharia, the goals of Islam. It does not benefit Muslims to inform non-Muslims of the maqasid so they could understand sharia because the ultimate goal of Islam is to contain, subjugate and eliminate all other religions so that all people everywhere follow Islam. Revealing this goal would only increase opposition among the most wicked of all creatures, those who resist Islam. It follows it is not in the interest of Muslims to reveal Islam’s connection to ghayra violence. To reveal this connection would alert non-Muslims that Islamic morality differs in shocking and radical ways from the morality on which Western civilization is based. At best, this might cause non-Muslims to disparage Islam or Muslims and, at worst, might stimulate non-Muslims to resist Islam. The Muslims’ best course of action - the way that minimizes opposition to the spread of deen - is to deceive non-Muslims into believing Muslims follow the same moral ideas they follow. Only in that way will Islam not appear to threaten the moral and political order of koffar society.

Our conclusion is that deceiving non-Muslims about Islam’s connection to ghayra violence is obligatory, so non-Muslims will not perceive the difference between their morality and sharia and threaten the spread of deen. Good news again for our Muslim spokespeople! But, of course, they knew this all the time. Now you do, too.

Chapter Four

Do Muslims Really Deceive non-Muslims about Islam?

I have lived in the West long enough to know many Westerners hold prejudices and preconceptions about Islam that border on the delusional. No matter how many real-world cases or how much documentary evidence they are presented, they pathologically refuse to accept that in some situations Islam commands Muslims to lie or kill. To try to convince themselves - and others - to ignore the plain truth about Islam they argue “not all Muslims do it” and “other people who are not Muslims do it, too.” This is the familiar “not all Muslims are terrorists” or “not all Muslims commit honor killings” joined with a logical fallacy called tu coque or “you too” - “other people do it, too” - to reach the false conclusion that “Islam cannot be the source of the behavior.” But the observation that not everybody who claims to follow a religion obeys all of its teachings is trivial. As a logical argument it says nothing about what the teachings of that religion are, or are not. What’s more, the notion that non-Muslims commit ghayra violence is false by definition. As we have said, not all domestic violence within the Muslim family qualifies as ghayra violence. Ghayra violence has a particular motive and modus operandi. Ghayra is a quality of Allah, Himself, and the al-amr bi al-ma’ruf wa al-nahy ‘an al-munkar provisions are expressly from sharia, making ghayra violence a uniquely Islamic phenomenon. As a mujtahid, and a person who has lived most of his life in an Islamic country, I know the Westerners’ hard-hearted refusal to accept the truth about Islam means women and families will continue to suffer from ghayra violence and killing even in the West, although here steps could be taken to reduce the violence if enough people simply acknowledged the truth. The questions we should be asking are what factors cause Muslims to commit ghayra violence in accordance with the teachings of Islam and what can both society and potential victims do to limit this violence? We will take these questions up when we examine the prevention of ghayra violence in Chapter Twelve.

If you are more open-minded, I have a simple test I would like you to try to convince yourself Muslims do conceal the truth about Islam. Remember, if we want to protect women and families from the heartache of ghayra violence, we need to start by knowing the truth. The test involves asking a Muslim one simple question about jihad, which you now know is an essential element of Islam because it is the tool to contain, subjugate, and eliminate other religions until all religious worship is for Allah, alone. It should be obvious that our conclusion about deceiving non-Muslims concerning ghayra violence applies with even more force to the question of whether Muslims must conceal the true nature and purpose of jihad. We can actually gain some insight into ghayra violence by looking at jihad because ghayra violence and jihad are two sides of the same coin. The purpose of both is to keep evil away from the umma (muslim community). The sharia provisions responsible for ghayra violence are very similar to those relating to jihad, the difference being ghayra violence is internal to the umma and directed at believers while jihad is external and directed at non-believers.

It may have struck you as odd that the maqasid (ultimate goals) of Islam place deen, the spreading of Islam, above even nasl, life itself. After all, in order to believe you must be alive. But this order reflects the fact that “the interest of Din [deen] is preferred when the subject is asked to give up his life in the way of Allah, that is, for jihad.”43 Allah does not ask a Muslim to die in jihad to spread deen without offering the greatest of all rewards, of course, the certainty of going to paradise. In fact, the only way a Muslim can be sure of going to paradise is to die “fighting in the cause of Allah” - that is, to die in jihad to spread Islam:

For sure, Allah has bought from the believers their lives and their property in exchange for Paradise. They kill in the way of Allah, so they kill and are killed. This is a true promise in the Torah and the Gospel and the Qur’an. And who fulfills his promise more than Allah? So take the good news about the bargain you have concluded with Him. That is the magnificent eternal happiness.44

Allah also rewards those who fight but are not killed. They are promised booty, the spoils of war, but whether they obtain paradise depends on whether they intended to die as martyrs (shaheed) for Islam.45 The fact that dying in jihad is the only way to be certain of going to paradise is highlighted by a story from the life of Muhammad, himself, who lamented “though I am the Apostle of Allah, yet do I not know what Allah will do to me.”46 Muhammad voluntarily sacrificed the assurance of paradise he could have obtained by dying in jihad out of concern for his followers, but if it had been possible, he “would have loved to be martyred in Allah’s cause and then made alive, and then martyred and then made alive, and then again martyred in His cause.”47

Now this is truly strange, when you think about it. Allah tells Muslims to obey and imitate Muhammad ninety-one times in Koran,48 and Muslim mujtahids compiled the tens of thousands of hadith and formulated sharia specifically so Muslims could obey Allah by imitating Muhammad precisely, and yet Muhammad does not know whether he will go to paradise! The reason for Muhammad’s uncertainty is perhaps the easiest way to understand why Islam holds its own goals and the rules of sharia to be absolute and finds Judeo-Christian moral “absolutes” to be dispensable. Muhammad was uncertain about his salvation because, in Islam, Allah’s power and sovereignty are so absolute and transcendent that He is not bound by any rules. Muslims who do not earn paradise by dying in jihad face the scales, where their good deeds will be weighed against their bad deeds.49 But unlike the God of Judaism and Christianity, whose nature is defined by the moral rules He has revealed to His creation and obeys Himself,50 Allah can deal with His creation in a completely arbitrary manner, his hand is not fettered51 in any way, let alone by Judeo-Christian morality, and he cannot be questioned as to what he does.52 Allah is completely within His right to send even the best Muslim who ever lived into the Hell fire, if he so chooses, even if that person’s good deeds outweigh his bad deeds. In fact, even if that person is Muhammad himself! From the standpoint of Muslims lying to non-Muslims, Allah’s example of following His will rather than moral rules means Muslims must follow the will of Allah rather than Biblical moral rules, and sharia codifies this. Since Allah’s hand is not fettered by any rules, even Muhammad had no assurance of salvation. And because Allah can arbitrarily send anyone to hell, a Muslim’s best hope is to please Allah by achieving the maqasid of spreading Islam, not by following moral rules dictated by conscience or considered absolute by a different religion.

Presented below is the definition of jihad from the fiqh (legal) manuals of the Hanafi, Maliki, and Shafi’i madhahib, three of the four Sunni legal schools. We will omit the definition from the Hanbali school, from which the Wahhabi sect of Saudi Arabia emanates, and the definition from the Shi’a Jafari school of Iran, since even politically-correct Westerners acknowledge these two groups are belligerent. The fiqh manuals quoted below are not obscure sources known only to the mujtahids, they are popular books in English you can buy from Barnes & Noble or Amazon.com and they are used by millions of Muslims in mosques in the U.S. Together these three madhahib represent almost all Muslims who live outside of Iran and Saudi Arabia.

First is the definition of jihad from the Hanafi school, which Muslims agree is the most liberal of all legal schools. Hanafi is considered liberal because it is the only school that allows women to uncover the face completely in public. Completely uncovering the face violates the consensus of scholars from other schools - both Sunni and Shi’ite - because it ignores the Koran’s teaching that women must not excite the lust of men.53 Other schools require women to wear a niqab, which leaves only the eyes exposed. The Hanafi doctrine of jihad is also liberal because Hanafis do not simply kill polytheists who are not “People of the Book” (Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians). Hanafis offer these polytheists the same opportunity Koran gives to People of the Book, a choice to remain in their religion but surrender to the political control of Islam by becoming dhimmis.54 The Hanafi jihad doctrine violates ijma (the consensus of non-Hanafi scholars) because it violates the plain text of surah 9:73 in Koran55, but it arose when Hanafi jihadis were unable to conquer India in the face of determined Hindu resistance. The Hanafi book is called Al-Hidayah (The Guidance) and the definition of jihad falls under the section on siyar (relations with non-Muslims):

The word siyar is the plural of sirah…. In the shariah it is applied specifically to the strategy adopted by the Prophet (God bless him and grant him peace) in his military expeditions…. As for its obligation, the basis is found in the words of the Exalted [Allah], “And fight the Pagans all together as they fight you all together. But know that Allah is with those who restrain themselves,” and in the words of the Prophet… “Jihad is determined till the Day of Judgment.” He… meant thereby a definitive obligation (fard) [on Muslims] that will always remain. The reason is that it has not been made a definitive obligation for itself, as in itself it is disruptive [by bringing desolation to the lands and annihilation of humans]. It has been made a definitive obligation for strengthening the Din [deen] of Allah and for driving away evil from His servants. When the purpose is achieved through some, the obligation is removed with respect to the others…. Unless the call to arms is general, in which case it becomes a universal obligation….56

Here is the second definition of jihad, this time from Bidayat al-Mujtahid wa Nibayat al-Muqtasid of the Maliki school, known in English as The Distinguished Jurist’s Primer:

With respect to the hukm (legal order) of this activity, the jurists agreed unanimously that it is a collective and not a universal obligation…. The majority of the jurists adopted this view because of the words of the Exalted, “Warfare is ordained for you, though it is hateful unto you, but it may happen that ye hate a thing which is good for you, and it may happen that ye love a thing which is bad for you, Allah knoweth, ye know not…. The activity is obligatory on men, who are free, have attained puberty, who find the means (at their disposal) for going to war, are of sound health, and are neither ill nor suffer from a chronic disease…. The jurists agreed, with respect to the people who are to be fought, that they are all of the polytheists (mushrikun), because of the words of the Exalted, “And fight them until persecution is no more, and religion is all for Allah”…. Harm allowed to be inflicted upon the enemy can be to property, life, or personal liberty, that is enslavement and ownership. Harm that amounts to enslavement is permitted by war of consensus (ijma) for all categories of the polytheists, I mean, their men and women, old and young, and the common people and the elite with the exception of monks.57

Here is the third definition of jihad, from Umdat al-Salik, a fiqh manual of the Shafi’i legal school. It is known in English as Reliance of the Traveller. When Zaytuna College opened - the first Islamic University in the United States - the book was shown in use in classes on the university’s website:

(O: Jihad means to war against non-Muslims, and is etymologically derived from the word mujahada, signifying warfare to establish the religion…. Details concerning jihad are found in the accounts of the military expeditions of the Prophet… including his own martial forays and those on which he dispatched others. The former consist of the ones he personally attended, some twenty-seven (others say twenty-nine) of them. He fought in eight of them…. On the latter expeditions he sent others to fight, himself remaining at Medina, and these were forty-seven in number.58

It is simply undeniable from these definitions that in every Islamic legal school jihad means military operations to fight non-Muslims to spread Islam. Remember that Muslims are required to perform taqlid, to follow the teachings of a particular legal school. In the case of jihad, there is no difference between any of the legal schools, so every Muslim ought to understand the military definition of jihad.

Now, here’s the test. Politely approach a Muslim and ask, “I’m trying to learn more about Islam. Is it true that, whatever else it may mean, jihad means military operations to fight non-Muslims to spread Islam?” I encourage my non-Muslim friends to ask this question all the time to break the ice with Muslims, so I have no doubt about the response you’ll hear. The answer you will almost invariably get is, “No, no, no! You do not understand jihad. Jihad has nothing to do with fighting.” You don’t need to argue or say anything more. The point is to demonstrate that Muslims do lie to prevent non-Muslims from feeling threatened by Islam. They lie about the meaning of jihad, which is readily ascertainable not only from authoritative fiqh manuals like those we looked at but also from even a cursory knowledge of Islamic history. My own home nation, Persia, only became Muslim after a vicious and bloody conquest, and the same is true for every nation that is Islamic today, even Saudi Arabia. And for the same reasons Muslims lie about jihad, they also lie about Islam’s connection to ghayra violence.

In defense of Muslims, it must be said that those who lie to make Islam seem less threatening are not only acting to protect Islam, they also believe they are doing you a favor. Remember, those who reject Islam have no hope of paradise. To Muslims who are true believers, to hide the truth about jihad and honor killing until a non-Muslim accepts Islam and has a knowledge of Islam large enough to understand and accept these elements, seems not only logical but merciful. I have said it before and will no doubt say it again, Islamic morality is not the same as Western morality, and Muslims have reasons that are sufficient to them to believe their moral system - including jihad, particular forms of deceit, and ghayra violence - is more pleasing to Allah and therefore superior to that of the West. When they violate Western, Judeo-Christian moral prohibitions they truly believe they are doing the right thing. It is the worst form of prejudice on your part to believe Muslims adhere to Western moral notions simply because you do, or because you have not studied Koran, hadith, and sharia sufficiently to understand Islamic morality.

Now that we understand that sharia allows moral prohibitions to be set aside in order to accomplish obligatory goals like spreading Islam, we can understand why Muslims appear to break the rule that prohibits koffar (unbelievers) from possessing a Koran. Have you ever heard a Muslim say - perhaps in response to your question about jihad - “Well, you can’t really understand the Koran unless you read it in Arabic?” For Muslims, a Koran is not really a Koran unless it is printed in Arabic. This gives Muslims a technicality on which to justify printing and distributing translations of Koran. Koran giveaways make Islam seem less threatening and more like the evangelical Christianity with which the West is familiar. Think how people would react if Muslims assiduously worked to keep the Koran out of non-Muslim hands. The real Koran, printed in Arabic, is called the Mushaf. Muslims do distribute Korans that contain the Arabic text, but typically only in digital form, so koffar, whom Koran calls filth, don’t actually come in contact with the Mushaf. Of course, if necessary to serve the supreme maqasid of spreading deen, even the rules about the Mushaf would bend, and Muslims would allow non-Muslims to handle and posses Arabic Korans.

Chapter Five

What About
My Muslim Neighbors?

Mecca: Allah’s Program when Muslims are Few and Weak and Unbelievers are in Power

This brings us to a question I’m frequently asked when I speak about Islam: “What about my Muslim neighbors? They seem a little standoffish, but they don’t seem interested in fighting to spread Islam.”

There are four reasons why Muslims - particularly in the West - may not appear to be interested in using violence to spread Islam or to enforce a superior position for Islam and sharia:

1. 1. Ignorance of all that Islam teaches

2. 2. The ability to make jihad using seemingly non-violent means

3. 3. Following Muhammad’s example of delaying jihad until Islam gains adherents while deceiving59 non-Muslims about what Islam requires, and

4. 4. Making Jihad is against human nature, as even the Koran itself acknowledges.

Ignorance of All that Islam Teaches

Many young Muslims in the West do not know much of what Islam teaches. They are essentially nominal Muslims or “Muslims in name only.” Muslim parents can be classified broadly into two groups, observant and non-observant. Observant parents are those who read the Koran and Islamic sources, attend mosque, and enroll their children in fiqh classes. It would be a mistake to ascribe ignorance to the children of observant parents, they know what Islam teaches. If either they or their parents do not appear to be using violence to spread Islam it will be because of one of the other reasons listed. We cannot automatically ascribe ignorance of Islam’s teachings to non-observant parents, either. They may know what Islam requires but also appear to be non-violent for one of the other reasons listed. It is the children of non-observant parents who are likely to be ignorant of Islam’s complete teachings.

In Muslim-majority countries, even if parents do not attend the mosque or instruct their children in Islam, the requirements of Islam are reinforced by every cultural institution - government, the law, schools, the media, and the marketplace. In the West, these institutions have only just begun to transmit Islamic ideas and values. If Muslim parents are not strong in practicing their faith, Muslim kids in the West may not learn much about what Islam really teaches. Deficiencies in the knowledge and practice of Islam among both Muslim children and adults not only give Westerners false ideas about what Islam teaches, they are also important in the causation of ghayra violence, as we’ll discuss in Chapter Eleven, where we review actual cases of ghayra killing and in Chapter 12 where we discuss prevention. Children who do not know what Islam requires are more likely to become victims of ghayra violence.

The Ability to Make Jihad Using Seemingly Non-violent Means

The second reason Muslims may not appear to be using violence to spread Islam is that in modern times Muslims can make jihad in ways that seem non-violent. They can give money to Islamic “charities” that are, in fact, conduits for funding jihad. They can also pursue the agenda of spreading Islam and implementing sharia through lawsuits and politics. Machiavelli informs us men do not fight by force of arms alone, they also fight by force of law. Westerners should not be fooled, fighting by law is fighting, even if the bloodshed and property destruction is not immediate. George Washington is reputed to have said, “Government is not reason; it is not eloquence; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.” Whether the force of government is used to hurt you directly or is used to prevent you from being protected from those who want to hurt you, the result is the same. If you are killed because the law prevented a wiretap or surveillance, or a policy stopped the police from learning what Islam truly teaches, you are just as dead as if the lawyer who procured that law or policy had shot you himself. Whoever commands the coercive power of the state has conquered a nation just as surely as if he had won a war with an army.

In this age of cheap global travel and democracy, it is no longer necessary to land an armed force on the shores of a nation in order to conquer it. The group whose size and commitment trumps competing ideologies will win elections and see their policies enacted, in both the legislatures and the courts. The United States has been at “lawfare” - warfare by and through law - for decades. At first the battle was fought by Liberals to eliminate Judeo-Christian moral principles like private property, freedom to pray and teach the Bible, and the prohibition of murder and adultery. Nature abhors a vacuum, and Muslims have already begun to work to replace the licentiousness of Western Liberalism with the moral provisions of sharia. Incredibly, Western Liberals even support their efforts. For example, as this book is being written, there is a global effort by Muslim groups to eliminate free speech and shut down scholarly discussion and criticism of Islam. Allah forbids questioning Islam, so Muslims do not want to hear scholarly debate about Islam’s origins or teachings. Western Leftists support this effort to silence Islam’s competition in the marketplace of ideas.60

It is not obvious that Muslim advocacy groups like the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) are engaged in fighting to spread Islam, but when you understand influencing public opinion is key to influencing the law, it is undeniable they are. And these groups do not stop at just influencing public opinion, they are also actively engaged in strategies to replace existing U.S. law with sharia. It is not surprising, therefore, CAIR was named an unindicted co-conspirator in the prosecution of the Holy Land Foundation, an Islamic charity that was secretly funding the terrorist group Hamas. Documents introduced in that trial showed CAIR and many other Muslim groups, including the Islamic Society of North America, the North American Islamic Trust, and the Muslim Students’ Association‘ were either founded by, or are related to, the Muslim Brotherhood. They also showed the Muslim Brotherhood’s goal inside the United States is:

[A] kind of grand jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and “sabotaging” its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and God’s religion is made victorious over all other religions.61

The trial exhibit in which this goal is stated is readily available on the internet. As we have seen, this goal is exactly what Koran commands. What’s more, the goal is being pursued for the exact purpose Koran identifies - fighting to eliminate all other religions. Thus, while it may not be immediately obvious, CAIR and similar groups are engaged in jihad, exactly as Islam defines it. To implement a law aimed at “combating terrorist crimes” in 2014 the United Arab Emirates designated CAIR and the Muslim American Society as terrorist organizations.62

Following Muhammad’s Example of Delaying Jihad Until Islam Gains Adherents While Deceiving non-Muslims About What Islam Requires

The third reason some Muslims in the West may not appear to be interested in fighting to spread Islam is they are following the example of Muhammad. They present Islam as consisting of only the Five Pillars, while concealing the rest of the religion which Allah did not reveal to Muhammad until he gained a faithful army ready to kill and be killed. To understand this, we need to briefly examine Islamic history.

For the first 13 years of his 23 year prophetic career, Muhammad did not engage in, or even teach, fighting to spread Islam. These were the years from 610, when he began receiving the revelations that would eventually make up the Koran, to 622. During these years Muhammad lived in his hometown, Mecca, among his own tribe, the Quraysh. The Quraysh were the wealthiest of the Arab tribes63, thanks not only to a profitable caravan trade, but also to their control of the principal center of Arab pagan worship, the Ka’ba. Three hundred sixty gods filled the Ka’ba - many the gods of particular tribes - and these tribes made regular pilgrimage to Mecca. Muhammad’s pacifism was not due to his own political genius or peaceful character. During his thirteen years in Mecca he probably gained no more than 100 followers.64 These first Muslims were mostly young and poor. They experienced verbal, physical, and economic persecution from the keepers of the Ka’ba because Muhammad’s Islamic monotheism threatened the profits from idol worship. The frequently heard Islamic refrain “Allah-u-akbar” does not actually mean “God is great” but “God is greater,” meaning Allah is greater than the idols of the Ka’ba and is, alone, deserving of worship. Muhammad was keenly aware that his small band needed protection from a larger, more powerful force. He tried to gain that protection by a delegation sent to Christian Abyssinia - modern day Ethiopia - and a personal appeal to a neighboring tribe,65 but both attempts failed. Allah did not intend for Muhammad to find strength from Christians or unbelieving Arabs, but from Arabs who would become Muslims.

Muhammad did not command Muslims to use violence while the Muslims lived in Mecca because Allah forbad it in the surahs sent down at that time! Muslims know the Meccan surahs form the model for how Islam should be presented to non-Muslims when Muslims are relatively few, weak, and live under the authority of non-Muslims. The picture of Islam painted by the Meccan surahs is designed to deceive non-Muslims about Islam’s goal to contain, subjugate, and ultimately eliminate all other religions so that “all and every kind of worship is for Allah, alone” throughout the entire world. This strategic deception is the product of Allah’s craftiness, not Muhammad’s. While Muhammad lived in Mecca, Allah repeatedly instructed him that his response to rejection by the pagan Arabs was simply to say he was sent to warn them of punishment in this world and the next for worshipping others besides Allah. Ayats 1 through 3 of surah 18 are typical of these verses:

Praise be to Allah, the One who sent down to His slave [abd] the Book and has not provided in that any way to go in the wrong direction. Most upright, to warn of painful punishment from Him, and to give good news to believers who do good works for which their is a good reward in which they will remain forever.66

The response Allah gave Muhammad for Jews and Christians was similar, even going so far as to claim, for a time, that Muslims, Jews, and Christians worshipped the same god. The claim of worshipping the same god was also a deception, which was done away with once the Muslims gained strength:

Do not argue with the People of the Book (Jews and Christians) except by the better way of bringing strong evidence, but exclude those of them who act unjustly. Say to them “We believe in that which has been revealed to us and revealed to you. Our God and your God is the same and is only one [meaning there are no partners associated with Allah], and we have submitted to Him.”67

Despite the deception, even in Mecca Allah made it clear to Muhammad that there could be no compromise between Islamic monotheism and the worship of gods other than Allah or in addition to Allah. Even while Allah was deceiving Jews and Christians by telling Muhammad to say Muslims worshipped the same god, there was always a hint Jews and Christians followed a different set of beliefs that would ultimately be incompatible with Islam:

And to warn those (Jews and Christians) who say, “Allah has gotten a son.”68

Many of the People of the Book (Jews and Christians) wish they could turn you back to unbelief after you have believed. They are jealous, even after the truth has become clear to them. But forgive and forbear, until Allah brings His command. For sure, Allah is omnipotent over everything.69

It did not take long for Allah to “bring His command.” Over the course of two years, Allah moved Muhammad from being under the oppression and control of the disbelievers to a position of leadership among strong followers who pledged themselves to make war for Allah and His Messenger. In 620, six Arabs from the city of Yahtrib, 375 miles to the north of Mecca, heard Muhammad preach while on pilgrimage. The following year, twelve more men from Yahtrib met Muhammad at Aqaba. Allah was still concealing the true nature and purpose of Islam, so these men gave only the “pledge of women” to Muhammad. This meeting has become known in Islamic history as “First Aqaba”. Finally, a year later in 622, Allah began to reveal that Islam’s ultimate goal was war when Muhammad again met with men from Yahtrib who had come to Mecca on pilgrimage:

The apostle spoke and recited the Quran and invited men to God and commended Islam and then said: ‘I invite your allegiance on the basis that you protect me as you would your women and children. ‘Al-Bara took his hand and said ‘By Him Who sent you with the truth we will protect you as we protect our women. We give our allegiance and we are men of war possessing arms which have been passed on from father to son.‘70

This second meeting has become known as “Second Aqaba.” The pledge was given by seventy-three men and two women,71 including twelve elders,72 from the Arab tribes of Aus and Khazraj who lived in the city of Yahtrib. Yahtrib would later be renamed “Medinat Al-Nabi” meaning the “City of the Prophet.” Today it is commonly known simply as Medina.

One of the leaders of the men from Yahtrib wanted to make certain that his people knew that they were promising to go to war on behalf of Allah and Muhammad. He asked:

O men of Khazraj, do you realize to what you are committing yourselves in pledging your support to this man? It is to war against all and sundry. If you think that if you lose your property and your nobles are killed you will give him up, then do so now, for it would bring you shame in this world and the next (if you did so later); but if you think that you will be loyal to your undertaking if you lose your property and your nobles are killed, then take him, for by God it will profit you in this world and the next.’ They said that they would accept the apostle on these conditions. But they asked what they would get in return for their loyalty and the apostle promised them paradise.73

This was the beginning of the idea that Muslims have to participate in jihad to be sure of going to paradise. The Koran commands Muslims to make jihad with both their lives74 and their property. The only guarantee of paradise occurs in surah 9:111, which promises Muslims who slay and are slain in jihad that they will go to paradise.75 Many surahs, such as 9:20 and 9:41, promise Muslims that they will earn good deeds if they support jihad with their property. In Islam, those who are not guaranteed paradise must face “the scales” when they die, meaning they will be judged by having their good deeds weighed against their bad deeds.76 If their good deeds outweigh their bad deeds Muslims can hope to gain paradise, but this is not assured because Allah’s hand is not fettered - he is not bound by any rules and can decide arbitrarily to send a Muslim to hell even if his good deeds outweigh his bad deeds.77 This lack of assurance of paradise is a powerful inducement for Muslims who believe Koran to engage in jihad.

The earnest new Muslims at the Second Aqaba were anxious to begin to bring Allah’s punishment on the polytheists of Mecca, but Muhammad, like Muslim leaders in the West today, knew Allah had not yet created circumstances that were right for fighting. The Sira says:

The apostle then told them to disperse back to their caravan, and [one of the men] said, ‘By God, if you wish it we will fall on the people of Mina tomorrow with our swords.’ [Mina is a suburb of Mecca where the tribes had come for pilgrimage.] He [Muhammad] replied, ‘We have not been commanded to do that; but go back to your caravan.’78

What was Muhammad waiting for? What circumstances did Allah need to create before Muhammad could begin to lead the Muslims in jihad? The Sira explains that Muhammad needed a geographic location in which Muslims would be in the majority and able to exercise political control. In Mecca, the Muslims were a minority, and were not in political control. To make violent jihad in this situation would be dangerous for the Muslim community. It would not be effective to eliminate the political control of the non-Muslims and it would alert the non-Muslims that Islam’s goal had changed from simply criticizing their worship of gods besides Allah to violent conquest. Allah first needed to consolidate the believers in Medina, then jihad could begin.

Allah revealed His plan for jihad in stages. Jihad was commanded, first, against the people of Mecca who had rejected Muhammad and persecuted his followers. The first verse Allah sent down to initiate jihad appears at surah 22:39-40 in Koran, but fighting against the unbelievers who mistreated the Muslims in Mecca was just the start of jihad:

Permission (to fight) is given to those upon whom war is made because they are oppressed, and most surely Allah is well able to assist them; Those who have been expelled from their homes without a just cause except that they say: Our Lord is Allah. And had there not been Allah’s repelling some people by others, certainly there would have been pulled down cloisters and churches and synagogues and mosques in which Allah’s name is much remembered; and surely Allah will help him who helps His cause; most surely Allah is Strong, Mighty.79

Notice that the verse still maintains the deception that Allah is the same as the God of the Christians. This verse does not reveal either the scope of combat Allah would ultimately command - which is worldwide jihad - or Allah’s purpose in commanding Muslims to fight - which is to contain, subjugate, and eliminate all other religions. The scope and purpose were ultimately revealed in surah 2:193, after Muhammad immigrated to Medina, but 2:193’s full import was not obvious until all of surah 9 was revealed. Surah 9 is chronologically the very last surah of Koran to be revealed.

Surah 2:193 commands:

And fight them until there is no more Fitnah (disbelief and worshipping of others along with Allah) and (all and every kind of) worship is for Allah (Alone). But if they cease [i.e. become Muslims], let there be no transgression except against Az-Zalimun (the polytheists, and wrongdoers).80

This verse explicitly contradicts surah 22:39-40, the first verses sent down about jihad, because the reason for fighting - and therefore who Muslims are to fight against - has changed. In the earlier verse, the reason for fighting is because Muslims “have been expelled from their homes without a just cause except that they say: Our Lord is Allah”81 In 2:193, the reason for fighting is to make all religious worship for Allah alone. In the earlier verse, the people to be fought are the Meccans. In 2:193, the people to be fought are all people throughout the entire world who have not accepted Islam. The identity of who is to be fought is made clear in the second part of the verse, which states “But if they cease [i.e. become Muslims], let there be no transgression except against Az-Zalimun (the polytheists, and wrongdoers).” Muslims are to stop fighting those who stop worshipping gods other than Allah. They are to continue to fight against “Az-Zalimun.” Az-Zalimun is the plural form of Al-Zalim, those who commit iniquity.

People who commit iniquity fall into two classes. The first class are Muslims who are therefore inside the umma, the community of Muslims, but nevertheless commit iniquity. The second class are those who reject Islam, whose iniquity has the effect of placing them outside the community of Muslims. In other words, we have external Zalimun, people who are wrong-doers because they do not worship Allah, and internal Zalimun, people who do worship Allah but violate the moral prohibitions of sharia. Figure 2 depicts external and internal wrongdoers, and the provisions of Koran or sharia that apply to them. In Islam, jihad is the method of dealing with external Zalimun. Internal Zalimun are subject to the Koranic provisions of al-amr bi al-mar’uf wa al-nahy ‘an al-munkar, intended to correct or stop wrongdoers, as well as Islamic punishments derived from the authoritative Islamic sources. The amr bil ma’ruf provisions apply to many types of internal wrongdoing, most importantly to the violations that motivate ghayra violence and honor killing. We will look at the sharia provisions that motivate ghayra violence in detail in Chapter Eight.

When Allah sent surah 9 down to Muhammad, the distinction between internal and external classifications of wrongdoers became sharply drawn, because the topic of surah 9 is jihad, and the targets of jihad are all those who are considered to be external wrongdoers. Verse 29 of surah 9 applies to external wrongdoers who are Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians. Zoroastrianism is the indigenous religion of Persia. They are wrongdoers because they do not accept Islam. In Arabic, Koran calls all these people al-lazina ootul kitab, literally, “those who have been given a book,” because it considers the Jews were given the Torah, the Christians the Injeel or gospel, and the Zoroastrians the Avesta. In English translations this phrase is usually rendered “the people of Scripture” or “people of the book.” Zoroastrians came to be included as the people of the book through the sunnah. Muslims believe these people changed what their books said, because the Koran says Allah gave the same revelation to Muhammad as was given to earlier religions.82 Because these people were given a revelation by Allah they are not simply killed as are other wrongdoers. But because they changed what was revealed to them, they must be humiliated, not be allowed to proselytize their corrupted beliefs, and be kept underneath the Muslims in every way. Surah 9:29 provides:

Kill those who (1) believe not in Allah, (2) nor in the Last Day, (3) nor forbid that which has been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger, (4) and do not believe in the religion of truth (Islam) from the People of the Book (Jews and Christians [and Zoroastrians]), until they pay the jizya on their hands with humiliation.83

The Arabic term Jizya literally means “tribute.” It is often referred to as a tax, but that misses the true meaning. In Muslim lands, non-Muslims have no rights - including the right to life - unless they pay the jizya. Surah 9:29 essentially gives Jews, Christians and Zoroastrians three choices: (1) they can fight against the Muslims and the Muslims will continue to fight until they have slaughtered all who resist, (2) they can become Muslims and save their lives and property, or (3) they can surrender to the political control of Islam, pay the jizya, and become an inferior class of citizen called a Dhimmi. Dhimmis are subject to a special and different set of laws than those that apply to Muslims. The Arabic word Dhimmi literally means “under obligation.” The words, actions, property, family members, and even lives of non-Muslims who become Dhimmis are literally under obligation to the Muslims. The obligation is to observe the Dhimmi law provisions of sharia. A Dhimmi who violates any of the provisions of the Dhimmi laws instantly loses any protection he had and becomes the same as a person who fights the Muslims. In other words, he becomes a person who deserves death, and any Muslim may kill him with impunity, although usually the Dhimmi is executed by the Islamic government. Likewise, just as if he was conquered in jihad, his marriage is instantly dissolved, his wife and children are sold as slaves, and his property is confiscated for the benefit of the Islamic government.

Here we see a principle in action that has become part of usul al fiqh - the rules of Islamic legal reasoning - and applies to all wrongdoers, inside and outside the umma. That principle is a person outside Islam deserves death. The people outside Islam are the external wrongdoers and they deserve death through a form of jihad. As shown in Figure 2, there are three classes of people who are considered to be outside Islam. The first class are infidels, people who never accepted Islam. The Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians who refuse to become Dhimmis and continue to fight against the Muslims fall into this class. The members of all other non-Islamic religions and atheists also fall into this class, but Islam does not offer them the opportunity to become Dhimmis. The second and third classes of people who are considered to be wrongdoers outside of Islam - external wrongdoers - are people who appear - or may even claim - to be Muslims, but who commit actions that demonstrate an intent to be outside of Islam. These second and third classes include what Koran calls hypocrites and apostates.

Hypocrites fall under the jurisdiction of surah 9:73, which also applies to atheists and members of non-islamic religions other than Judaism, Christianity, and Zoroastrianism. Surah 9:73 explicitly directs Muslims to fight - make jihad - against these two classes of wrongdoers:

O Prophet, make jihad against the unbelievers [koffar] and the hypocrites [munafiqin], and be harsh against them, their dwelling is Hell, a miserable destination.84

Apostates, the third class of external wrongdoers, are subject to surah 5:54. Like the hypocrites, apostates may physically appear to be inside Islam, but the intent of their hearts is outside of Islam, so they deserve death by jihad. Surah 5:54 provides:

O you who have believed! Whoever of you rejects his religion Allah will bring a group of people He loves and who love Him who are humble towards the believers but look down on the unbelievers. This group makes jihad in the Way of Allah and are not afraid of the rebuke of those who rebuke. That is the grace of Allah, which He bestows on whom He will. And Allah encompasses all and knows all.85

This verse expressly says Allah will bring jihadis to fight those who become apostate by rejecting Islam. From the moment the intent of their heart rejects Islam, the person is outside of Islam and deserves to die. Hypocrites and apostates are subject to the Law of Ridda, the law of apostasy. Like irtidad, which means “to reject” and murtad which means “the one who rejects,” ridda comes from the same Arabic root, rad, which literally means “to spurn or rebuff.”

By contrast with these three classes of external wrongdoers, internal wrongdoers are not considered to be outside of Islam. Although they do not deserve death for being outside of Islam, internal wrongdoers may commit actions which are so egregious that they become subject to the death penalty under sharia. Women who become subject to sharia’s amr bil ma’ruf provisions and legitimately become the targets of ghayra violence - including ghayra killing - fall into this group. They are internal wrongdoers - essentially sinners - but they are not outside of Islam.

Deceiving non-Muslims about What Islam Requires - the Five Pillars

Today, Muslims in the West face the same situation as the Muslims in Mecca faced in Muhammad’s time. They are in the minority, and their numbers are not yet sufficient to make jihad an effective strategy to overthrow Western governments and implement sharia law. Recognizing this, Muslims and Muslim leaders in the West do not completely reveal the goals and teachings of Islam. They only reveal the parts of Islam Allah revealed to Muhammad while he lived in Mecca. And what is that? It is the Five Pillars of Islam.

Almost everybody who has heard of Islam has heard of the Five Pillars, but to speak about Islam solely in terms of the Five Pillars, or to claim the Five Pillars somehow represent the heart of Islamic practice and belief, is to display the grossest ignorance of Islam, if not a desire to be purposefully deceptive. The Five Pillars consist of the confession “There is no god but Allah and Muhammad is His messenger,” and the idea that Muslims should make salat (a ritual form of washing, movement, and recitation of Koranic surahs considered to be prayer), pay zakat (an exaction of money or property to support certain Muslims and jihad), fast at certain times, and make pilgrimage to Mecca if they are able.

The strongest reason why the Five Pillars do not give a complete and accurate picture of Islamic belief and practice is that they omit the parts of the religion revealed once Allah moved Muhammad to the safety of Medina and gave him followers who were willing to kill and be killed. For example, the Five Pillars omit the true goal and purpose of Islam, which is to make all religious worship for Allah alone. Allah did not reveal this goal until Muhammad was in a position to begin achieving it. The Five Pillars also omit the most important pillar of Islam, jihad, the means Allah commands to spread Islam by containing, subjugating, and eliminating other religions. We have already looked at surahs 2:193, 9:5, 9:29 and 9:73 from the Koran that explicitly command jihad, and these are just some of many surahs that make jihad mandatory for those who would be true believers in Islam.

Muhammad’s own life, which is the perfect example for Muslims, establishes beyond a doubt that jihad is the most important element of both belief and practice for a Muslim believer. Ibn Taymiyya, one of Islam’s most respected scholars, in his book, Kitab al-Iman (the Book of Faith), reports the following hadith about the time the Angel Gabriel, disguised as an Arab man, interrogated Muhammad about Islam:

‘[Muhamad answered] Islam is submitting to Allah from your tongue and your hands. [Gabriel asked] ‘What is the best in Islam?’ And he [Muhammad] said ‘Iman [i.e. faith].’ And the person [Gabriel] asked ‘What is iman?’ And Muhammad said ‘Believing in Allah, and angels, His book [the Koran], His Messenger, and the resurrection after death.’ [Gabriel then asked] ‘Which belief is the best?’ [Muhammd said] ‘Jihad.’ The person [Gabriel] said ‘And what is jihad?’ Muhamad said ‘fighting and killing infidels without cheating in booty and without fear.’86

The Gabriel Hadith places jihad, an action, within the province of iman, the essential faith of the true Muslim believer. The meaning of this placement is unmistakeable, one proves his faith by participating in the action of jihad87, and the idea is confirmed by a hadtih from Sahih Muslim: “He who dies without having fought (in the way of Allah) or without having thought of doing so, will die upon a branch of hypocrisy.”88 The idea that jihad is an essential pillar of Islam is also confirmed in Sahih Al-Bukhari - the collection of ahadith compiled by Al-Bukhari and considered to be second in authority only to the Koran itself as an Islamic source - which reports Muhammad said jihad is the deed with the highest reward in Islam:

Narrated Abu Huraira: A man came to Allah’s Apostle and said, ‘Instruct me as to such a deed as equals jihad in reward.’ Muhammad replied, ‘I do not find such a deed.’ Then he added, ‘Can you, while the Muslim fighter is in the battlefield, enter your mosque to perform prayers without cease and fast and never break your fast?’ The man said, ‘But who can do that?’ Abu Huraira added, ‘The Mujahid (i.e. Muslim fighter) is rewarded even for the footsteps of his horse while it wanders about (for grazing) tied in a long rope.’89

The central importance of jihad to Islam is not an anachronism. Muhammad Muhsin Khan, a Twentieth Century translator of Koran, includes the following footnote in his Koran translation, at surah 2:190, the beginning of the passage commanding world-wide jihad. Kahn’s translation is in current publication at the King Fahd Complex for the Printing of the Holy Qur’an in Saudi Arabia and is widely distributed for free (in digital form) on the internet:

Al-Jihad (holy fighting) in Allah’s Cause (with full force of numbers and weaponry) is given the utmost importance in Islam and is one of its pillars (on which it stands). By Jihad Islam is established, Allah’s Word is made superior, (His Word being La ilaha illallah which means none has the right to be worshipped but Allah), and His Religion (Islam) is propagated. By abandoning Jihad (may Allah protect us from that) Islam is destroyed and the Muslims fall into an inferior position; their honour is lost, their lands are stolen, their rule and authority vanish. Jihad is an obligatory duty in Islam on every Muslim, and he who tries to escape from this duty, or does not in his innermost heart wish to fulfill this duty, dies with one of the qualities of a hypocrite.90

Believers in Islam know the Five Pillars do not completely represent Islam because the Koran is explicit that performing the Five Pillars makes one a Muslim, but not a believer. This is a subtle but crucial difference, because people who are only Muslims - those who believe and perform only the Five Pillars - are in darkness and will not go to paradise. In order to be an Islamic believer - and therefore have a chance to go to paradise if your good deeds outweigh your bad deeds and if Allah does not arbitrarily send you to Hell - one must have all the elements of Iman, not just the Five Pillars. Iman is the Arabic word for faith, and the elements of Iman are listed in surah 4:136:

O you who believe! Believe in Allah, and His Messenger (Muhammad) and the Book (the Quran) which He has sent down to His Messenger, and the Scripture which He sent down to those before (him); and whosoever disbelieves in Allah, His Angels, His Books, His Messengers, and the Last Day, then indeed he has strayed far away.91

The Five Pillars include only the very first element listed in this surah. The requirement to believe in angels, the other prophets, their books, and the Last Day does not even appear in the Five Pillars, but the Koran says without belief in these elements, one has “strayed far away.” The Arabic translated “strayed far away” is the same as the term applied to Christians in surah 1, Al-Fatiha. In other words, Muslims who have only the Five Pillars are the same as Christians in respect of going to paradise. Five Pillar Muslims are safe from jihad, but in terms of going to paradise they are still unbelievers.

Finally, the concept of Islam being represented by the Five Pillars is deceptive because, besides jihad, there are other essential concepts and practices that Koran requires and says are as important as prayer. Without an understanding of these concepts and practices it is impossible to understand the motivation behind ghayra violence and honor killing. These concepts include the al amr bi al ma’ruf wa’l nahy an al-munkar - enjoining good and forbidding evil - provisions of sharia and the ideas of tawalla and tabarra, turning towards Islamic believers and away from koffar. These concepts form the sharia foundation for ghayra violence and ghayra killing. We will look more closely at tawalla and tabarra in Chapter 10.

To sum up, many Muslims do not appear to be interested in engaging in violence to spread Islam because they are following the example of Muhammad in Mecca by deceiving non-Muslims about what Islam actually commands. They represent Islam as consisting of only the Five Pillars, the elements of Islam revealed in Mecca, and conceal the more important and threatening elements of Islam revealed later.

Making Jihad is Against Human Nature, as even the Koran Itself Acknowledges.

The fourth reason why Muslims may not appear to be interested in using violence to spread Islam or to enforce a superior position for Islam and sharia is that the violence Islam commands to contain, subjugate, and eliminate other religions so that all worship is for Allah alone is against human nature. All people appear to have an innate understanding of certain ideas of right and wrong that we may call “conscience” or “natural law.” Many of these natural laws are recognized and supported by Islam, such as the commands not to kill or steal from other Muslim believers. But in surah 2:216 Koran, itself, recognizes that jihad violence may shock the conscience of even true believers in Islam:

Fighting and killing has been written [ordained, prescribed] for you and that order is bitter for you. Perhaps you dislike something which is good for you and perhaps you love something that is evil for you. And Allah knows and you do not know.92

Chapter Six

The Sunnah is the Culture

Abrogation

We noted previously that surah 2:193, the command to Muslims to fight until all religious worship is for Allah alone, explicitly contradicts surahs 22:39-40, the first surahs concerning jihad, which gave Muslims permission to fight only against the non-Muslims of Mecca. This is an example of abrogation, the idea Allah can change what Koran commands. Abrogation is such a well-established, essential concept to Islam that one cannot understand the Koran without also understanding abrogation. Al-Suyuti, who lived in the 1400s and is one of the most respected Islamic scholars, relates that Muhammad’s cousin, Ali, the first man to accept Islam, asked someone, “Do you know abrogation?” The person said, “no.” Ali said, “You are destroyed, and you are destructive to the Umma.”93

The doctrine of abrogation comes directly from three ayats in Koran, surahs 2:106, 13:39, and 16:101. Surah 2:106 says:

Whatever ayah [verse] We abrogate or cause to be forgotten, We bring one better or one similar to it. Don’t you know Allah is able to do all things?94

The Arabic word translated “abrogate” in this verse is naskh. Throughout the centuries, Muslim scholars have interpreted naskh to mean ezalah, an Arabic word that literally means “to remove” or “to void.” Surah 13:39 says:

Allah wipes off or establishes whatever He wants. And before Him is the Mother of the Book. 95

Islamic doctrine teaches that Allah preserves His Word in Koran. The “Mother of the Book” is the real, uncreated Koran that is present with Allah. Surah 16:101 says:

And when We substitute one ayah [verse] with another ayah - and Allah knows best about what He has sent down - they say: “You [Muhammad] are a Muftar!” The majority of them do not know.96

The Arabic word translated “substitute” in this verse is badal, which has the connotation of “to supersede one thing by another.” What the disbelievers say about Muhammad is literally that he libels Allah by claiming Allah has changed Koran, because the Arabic Muftar is a legal term of art that means one who commits a libel. Allah defends Muhammad by stating the disbelievers “do not know.”

What is it the disbelievers don’t know? Or to put the question a different way, why did Allah need to change what He had initially sent down in the Koran? The answer - the thing that made the doctrine of abrogation necessary - is the maqassid al-sharia, the goal or purpose of Islam. The maqassid al-sharia is to make all religious worship for Allah alone, but as we have shown, this goal was not revealed until Allah moved Muhammad out of Mecca and gave him an army of followers willing to kill and be killed in Allah’s cause.

Abrogation is usually explained simply as meaning that a command given later in time abrogates a command that came earlier in time. For example, say I command you to get up and walk toward the door. Then, before you get to the door, I tell you to stop. The command to stop abrogates the earlier command to walk toward the door.

As it relates to Islam, the simplest meaning of abrogation is a question of time and contradiction. A verse given later in time abrogates an earlier verse if the later verse contradicts the earlier verse. Since the maqassid was not revealed until Muhammad moved to Medina, the simple understanding of abrogation is that Medinan verses abrogate Meccan verses to the extent they contradict.

As a technical matter of Islamic law, abrogation is more complex. Surahs 22:39-40 are not the only verses that are abrogated. Islamic scholars differ on the exact number of verses they consider to be abrogated, but there is consensus over abrogation in general. The number of verses scholars consider to be abrogated ranges from 29 to 114. The difficulty of deciding which verses are abrogated arises because many abrogated verses are still in Koran, although their legal effect has been nullified. This fact is what allows Muslims to falsely claim that Islam is peaceful, by pointing to verses sent down while Muhammad was weak and living in Mecca, although these verses were abrogated once the command to spread Islam to the whole world was revealed. In other cases, a legal requirement is in place although the words relating to the requirement do not appear in a verse in Koran. The various forms of abrogation fall into the three classes described in the following table:

The hukm is sharia’s legal ruling about the action described in a particular verse. Sharia applies to every possible human action and interaction, and provides a hukm that classifies the action or interaction along a scale from required, encouraged, neutral, discouraged, to, finally, prohibited.

An example of the first type of abrogation, where the words describing the action are not in Koran but the hukm concerning the action is still in effect, is the sharia requirement to stone married men and women who commit adultery. The authority that stoning is required comes from the hadith where Umar, the second caliph, said stoning was required because Muhammad did it:

Narrated Ibn ‘Abbas:

Umar said, ‘I am afraid that after a long time has passed, people may say, ‘We do not find the Verses of the Rajam (stoning to death) in the Holy Book,’ and consequently they may go astray by leaving an obligation that Allah has revealed. Lo! I confirm that the penalty of Rajam be inflicted on him who commits illegal sexual intercourse, if he is already married and the crime is proved by witnesses or pregnancy or confession.’ Sufyan added, ‘I have memorized this narration in this way.’ ‘Umar added, ‘Surely Allah’s Apostle carried out the penalty of Rajam, and so did we after him.’97

In this hadith, Sufyan’s comment that he had memorized the narration to include the verse about stoning means the stoning verse was included in the oral Koran. The verse was not reduced to writing because Allah told Muhammad the Umma would not be able to bear having the verse in writing. If the verse was written down, the Muslims might take peoples’ lives based only on suspicion without waiting for the proof required by Islam for adultery, the testimony of four male witnesses.98 This explanation for why the stoning verse was not included in the written Koran appears in the book Kitab Al-Funun (the Book of Techniques), written by Islamic scholar Ibn Aqil al-Baghdadi al-Hanbali who lived from A.D. 1040 to 1119.

The second type of abrogation, where Allah left the words in the Koran but invalidated the effect of the words, is exemplified by surah 29:46. This is the verse we quoted earlier that commanded Muhammad - while he was still weak and living in Mecca - to tell Jews and Christians that Muslims worshipped the same God as they. Surah 29:46 is explicitly abrogated by surah 9:29, which identifies Jews and Christians as people who do not believe in Allah, the god of Islam:

Kill those who (1) believe not in Allah, (2) nor in the Last Day, (3) nor forbid that which has been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger, (4) and do not believe in the religion of truth (Islam) from the People of the Book (Jews and Christians [and Zoroastrians]), until they pay the jizya on their hands with humiliation.99

The vast majority of abrogated verses fall into this second category of still being in Koran although they have become like dead bodies, with no life in them, and no legal obligation for the conduct of Muslims. Most of them are verses from Muhammad’s Meccan period, when he did not have political or military power and therefore could not go forward with Allah’s goal of eliminating all non-Islamic religious worship. In fact, because Allah progressively revealed his program, some later Medinan verses abrogate earlier Medinan verses or even Muhammad’s actions. In this latter case we say the Koran abrogates the Sunnah - the sayings, deeds, and silences of Muhammad. By ijma - the consensus of Islamic scholars - the Koran can abrogate the Sunnah, but it is not permitted for the Sunnah to abrogate the Koran.100

The Islamic authorities that fall into the third class of abrogation, where the words are not in Koran and carry no legal obligation, are the books of the prophets that came before Muhammad and material from the hadith and Sira. For example, Muslim scholars believe Abraham’s book Sohof has been abrogated. Also, verses 18:1-3 of Koran, which also appear in the Sira, in which Allah commanded Muhammad simply to warn the Meccans of judgment in this world and the next, are obviously abrogated by Allah’s later commands to make jihad against Mecca.

In practice, the subject of abrogation is not confusing. Test everything anybody says about Islam against surahs 2:193 - the command to fight to make all religious worship for Allah alone - and surah 9:5, the command to kill non-Muslims anywhere you find them. If what you hear does not agree with those two surahs, what you are hearing is ignorance or deception.

The Sunnah IS the Culture

When ghayra violence or an honor killing occurs in the West, Muslim apologists are quick to claim that it “violates Islam’s tenets.”101 In the West, the press, academia, and even law enforcement usually blame ghayra violence and honor killing on “culture” rather than Islam. There is no more bizarre example of this phenomenon than the case of “Miriam Muhammad” a supposedly devout Muslim girl who grew up in Afghanistan and Pakistan but moved to the U.S. with her family in 2002. Miriam’s case was part of FOX News’ 2008 special “Murder in the Family: Honor Killing in America.” Miriam survived “what sheriffs in Rochester, New York called an attempted honor killing” by her brother, Waheed.102 Despite Miriam’s description of herself as “a devoted Muslim girl,” FOX stated that within a few years of moving to America, Miriam was “more American than a product of her native Afghan culture. And that’s what her brother Waheed discovered when he rejoined the family in 2005 near Rochester, New York.”103

Lauren Green, the FOX reporter interviewing Miriam, asked “Did you feel any tension with your family because you were adapting to American culture?”104

“Well, definitely, yeah, definitely.” Miriam responded.

Miriam won a full scholarship to college including room and board on campus but her family was not happy about this. “I thought that everybody was going to be really happy for me. I’m just so excited, everybody came home from work, I showed it to them, there was no smile on his [her brother’s] face, he just looked at me, he goes, ‘Like, so, that doesn’t mean anything.’”105

“And…you had a full scholarship?” Lauren Green asked.

“Exactly. If it was just a typical American teenage, (sic) the parents would have been like so proud of them, but, when it came to my family and my brother it was a shame instead of them being proud of me.”106

“Why would it be a shame? You’ve got a full scholarship…”

“Because, he thought, that if I moved on campus, people, Afghani community, would talk about our family, how, oh my gosh, it’s totally going to become like Americanized, you’re going to forget about Afghani culture, you’re going to be a different person, and one, she’s going to bring shame to the family, you know.”107

Against her family’s wishes, Miriam left home to go to school. FOX reports, “And though she wasn’t too far from home, she was coming home less and less, and also feeling less and less comfortable when she was there.”108

“When I was at home, like, oh my God, I have to be careful that my leg doesn’t show, I have to be careful that I don’t have low neck. You know, like stuff like that.”109

Miriam hoped to work at the UN and began visiting friends in New York city.110 At that point, Miriam’s mother asked Miriam’s brother Waheed to stop her from going to New York.111 Waheed did so, by stabbing Miriam multiple times outside of the family home in the presence of other family members.

Sheriff’s investigator Patrick Crowe said that Waheed intended to kill Miriam.112 Miriam only survived because neighbors called the police.113 According to Crowe, Waheed did not express remorse, but was concerned that he would have to stand trial in an American court, not in his homeland.114

Waheed described his sister to police “as a bad Muslim girl” and said “he did not approve of her clothing.”115

Fox reports, “But whatever Waheed told investigators, Miriam, a devoted Muslim, believes what happened to her had nothing to do with Islam.”116

Lauren Green questioned Miriam, “This is from a police report. The reason he’s giving is that you were a bad Muslim girl.”117

Miriam responded, “First of all, he does not know what Islam is all about. So, to cover his…back…he used Islam as an excuse. Everybody has twisted religion with culture.”118

Lauren Green concludes, “She’s making a point you’ve heard this hour, that although honor killings throughout the world are almost exclusively committed by Muslims, Islam has nothing to do with it.”119

In fact, Miriam’s case is an almost textbook example of the actions scripted in sharia’s provisions for al amr bi al ma’ruf wa’l nahy an al-munkar - enjoining good and forbidding evil. It is clear Miriam understood the bounds Islam set for her dress and behavior and knew she was transgressing those bounds. It is also clear she was warned about her behavior by her family. The commands for enjoining good and forbidding evil come directly from Koran and we will explain them in detail in Chapter Nine.

Miriam’s brother did not confuse Islam with culture and, indeed, it is not possible for culture to trump Islam for the simple reason that Islam would not tolerate a contradictory culture. This is a basic principle of Islam that comes directly from surah 4:141’s statement, “And Allah has not provided a way for unbelievers to be over [above, superior to, having authority over] the believers.”120 If there was was a culture that contradicted Islam, Islam would eliminate it.

Culture may be defined as the set of rules that define what is right or wrong in human action or interaction. Within the Muslim community - whether in a Muslim majority nation, a Muslim enclave in a Western nation, or just within a Muslim family’s home - the Sunnah, the rules of right and wrong of Islam, are the foundation of culture. These rules are dictated in Koran, exemplified in the life of Muhammad through the hadith and Sira, and codified in the sharia. These rules govern every human action and interaction. They set the bounds for what is permissible and what is not. They are learned by example, even among Muslims who know little of the Koran. In Chapter Ten we will discuss more fully how Islam’s principles of separation from, and supremacy over, non-Islamic ideas and behaviors impact the minds of Muslims and why ghayra violence exists even among Muslims who may know little about Islam’s formal teachings.

Miriam’s case - and ghayra violence in general - can be understood as Islam acting to eliminate non-Islamic cultural practices which, from the perspective of Islam, are harmful to the community and the religion. This principle also comes from Koran, specifically the last part of surah 5:44, which states unequivocally whoever does not judge by sharia is a kafir, an infidel:

For sure We sent down the Torah to Moses in which was guidance and light, by which the prophets who surrendered themselves to the One who guided them [Allah] judged the Jews. And the rabbis and scholars also judged the Jews by the Torah and they were entrusted with the protection of Allah’s Book, and they were witnesses to it. Therefore don’t fear men but fear Me, and don’t look down on My verses by buying them for a small price. And whoever does not judge by what Allah has sent down, they are the kafirun [unbelievers].121

Chapter Seven

Ghayra

The concept of ghayra works together with the moral prohibitions of sharia to provide the motive for ghayra violence, so to understand ghayra violence - of which honor killing is just a part - it is essential to understand the Islamic concept of ghayra.

Ghayra is an Arabic word that literally means “other,” as in “other people.” As an Islamic idiom it has the connotation of jealousy or excluding others. Specifically, ghayra is the sense of jealousy that a Muslim male has about his right of authority over his family members with respect to their contact with other people, especially contact that may lead to a sexual relationship.122 In that context, the word “ghayra” can be used to refer to both the sense of jealousy and the response of “fury with great anger” when the object of one’s jealousy is violated.”123 The degree of violence and outrage with which a man responds serves to indicate the strength of his sense of ghayra. This is why honor killings are often overly brutal, much more brutal than necessary simply to kill the victim. The extreme degree of brutality shows the perpetrator has a very strong sense of ghayra. Ghayra usually relates to female family members, however it also applies to male family members who take the female role in homosexual sex. Recent incidents suggest the sense of ghayra is being extended to apply to lesbian sexual conduct as well.124

As a concept of Islamic law, ghayra has three elements: 1) control by the Muslim male 2) over his “namoos,” 3) to preserve Islamic concepts of morality. The Islamic concepts of morality that are enforced by ghayra are sharia’s rules for a woman’s dress and the rules for her conduct that relate to sexuality. Namoos is an Arabic word that literally means “law.” As an Islamic idiom it means the thing the man controls. Specifically, the “thing” is the private parts - the sexual organs - of his female family members. Among Muslims, the concept of family is much stronger than among Westerners and includes extended family members. So, for example, an uncle or cousin may feel a sense of ghayra for a niece or female cousin. In practice, the concept of ghayra can expand beyond even the extended family and cause the male to feel a need to control and protect women in the Muslim community (umma) in general.

Ghayra is just one facet of the broader Islamic concepts of Ezzat and Sharaf. In contemporary Islamic societies these words are used interchangeably, but as a matter of strict Islamic interpretation they are different concepts. Ezzat comes from the Arabic root Ezz which has several literal meanings, such as: might, power, standing, weight, strength, force, honor, glory, high, rank, fame, celebrity and also a sense of honor, self-respect, and self esteem. Koran uses ezzat as both a noun, “honor”, and a verb “to honor.”125 For example, in surah 4:139, ezzat is used as a noun to suggest that taking non-Muslims for protectors, helpers, or friends is dishonorable:

Those who take unbelievers for Auliya (protectors, helpers, or friends) instead of believers, do they seek honor [ezzat] from them? So, for sure, honor [ezzat] is for Allah, alone.126

In surah 5:12 ezzat is used as a verb with the suggestion that disbelievers do not honor Muhammad and Allah’s other messengers:

For sure Allah made a covenant with the sons of Israel and We appointed twelve leaders among them. And Allah said: ‘I am with you if you perform As-Salat and pay Zakat and believe in My Messengers and give them honor [ezzat] and lend to Allah a good loan. For sure I will pay the price for your sins and admit you to gardens beneath which there are rivers. But if any of you disbelieve after such a thing, so for sure he has gone astray from the divided road [divided between Islam and others].’127

By contrast, the word sharaf does not appear in Koran, but it is found in hadith where it refers to good character. For example, this hadith shows that having high sharaf does not necessarily depend on following Islamic rules:

Verily, the worshipper will ascend the higher ranks and superior grades of the Hereafter through his good character [sharaf], even though he is weak in acts of worship.128

As an Arabic word, sharaf, like ezzat, can be used as both a noun and a verb. As a noun it means high rank, nobility, distinction, eminence, dignity, honor, or glory. As a verb it means to elevate, exalt, raise to distinction, or confer honor upon.

Although Muslims often use ezzat and sharaf interchangeably, ezzat primarily refers to one’s social status or rank in the community while sharaf relates more to one’s personal character. Ezzat also relates more to honor in the eyes of Allah, which is increased by piety and meeting the requirements of Islam, while sharaf relates more to honor in the eyes of other Muslims. As the quoted hadith makes clear, the actions that increase and decrease sharaf do not necessarily overlap with Islam’s judgment on different actions.

A few examples may help illustrate the differences. Islam makes a judgment about every possible human action, categorizing it along the following spectrum:

1. 1. Al-wajeb - required actions, the neglect of which brings punishment

2. 2. Al-mandub or al-mustahab - actions which bring reward if they are performed but which do not result in punishment if they are neglected

3. 3. Al-mubah - actions on which Islam is neutral, there is no punishment or reward for doing them or not doing them

4. 4. Al-makruh - actions which it is better to not do, but for which there is no punishment

5. 5. Al-haram - actions which are forbidden and which bring punishment if they are performed

Praying is wajeb, required, and to pray regularly as Islam requires will increase one’s ezzat, but failing to pray will not necessarily decrease one’s sharaf. Begging is mubah - Islam is neutral on the act of begging129 - but begging will definitely decrease both one’s standing in the community - ezzat - and one’s reputation for being a person of good character - sharaf. This shows that Allah’s standard, which is given by sharia’s classification on an action, can sometimes be different from the judgment of ordinary Muslims. In one case that is relevant to ghayra, muta (temporary) marriage, a whole sect of Muslims holds a different view than Allah. Allah initially allowed muta marriage, but then abrogated the permission. The Shia, however, do not recognize the hadith that takes away permission for muta marriage. We should not make too much of this Shia unorthodoxy, however, because a Shia man whose daughter participates in muta marriage will often feel that his ghayra has been violated just as if his daughter had become a prostitute. In the same way, actions that are prohibited do not necessarily reduce one’s ezzat or sharaf. In the hadith, Muhammad says that he is not a Muslim who hears his brother Muslim calling for help and does not go to his aid.130 Failing to help another Muslim is haram (forbidden), but will not necessarily reduce either one’s ezzat - standing in the community - or sharaf - personal reputation. To use another example, it is haram to kill a non-Muslim dhimmi who has paid the jizya and not violated the dhimmi law provisions of sharia. Regardless, killing such a dhimmi will not decrease a Muslim’s ezzat or sharaf.

Persians have an an even more general category of honor above both ezzat and sharaf called Aberu. Aberu is a Farsi word that literally means “water on my face,” communicating the idea that something that is dishonorable makes sweat break out on one’s face. In Iran, the Arabic word ird is often used in conjunction with aberu, so one might hear a Persian say “my ird and aberu are gone.” To Persians, the words ird and aberu mean the same thing, but Arabs, on the other hand, use ird as an equivalent to namoos. To the extent there is a difference, namoos is the thing protected - the woman and her sex organs - and ird is the condition of the thing, whether it is chaste and above suspicion or not. Sometimes Arabs use ird when they really mean ghayra, but ghayra is the term used in authentic Islamic sources, like Sahih Al-Bukari, and is an Islamic legal term of art understood by scholars throughout the Muslim world. Likewise, the term namoos is much more widely used than ird to refer to the object of men’s ghayra. While even Westerners who know a great deal about Islam might find ghayra and namoos to be new concepts, they are deeply understood and frequently talked about among Muslims. Because of their connection to romance, violence, and sex, ghayra and namoos have been popular subjects for filmmakers in countries under Islamic control going all the way back to silent movie days.131

There is a concept related to notions of honor like ezzat, sharaf, ird, and ghayra that is used to describe women who carefully observe Islam’s prohibitions on a woman’s dress and conduct. That concept is haya, an Arabic word that literally means shyness. The term shyness is appropriate, because sharia rules for women work to block women from being visible or identifiable in society and prevent them from interacting with others except in very carefully defined ways. In Iran, the term haya is always accompanied by the Arabic word hujb, when they mean haya people say “hujb wa haya.” Hujb literally means “blocking” and is the root word from which hijab is derived. The hijab is the loose outer garment that covers a woman from head to toe. The purpose of the hijab in Islamic law is to hide, i.e. block, even the woman’s shape from being seen by others.

Koran only uses the term haya to apply to women.132 To the extent a man is careful not to reveal the things Islam requires to remain covered or secret, however, it is not technically incorrect to say he shows haya. Haya is an element of the faith of Islam,133 but the hadith that relates haya to Muhammad makes it clear that the correct usage of haya is to describe how a woman follows sharia rules for her dress and conduct:

Narrated Abu Sa’id: The Prophet was more shy (from Haya: pious shyness from committing religious indiscretions) than a veiled virgin girl.134

A woman reduces her haya whenever she fails to follow sharia rules for a woman’s dress and conduct. Most Muslim women are intensely aware of their haya because the Islamic rules for a woman’s dress and conduct are passed on to them by all members of their family and every institution in Islamic society, government, and culture. This sometimes leads to restrictions that might seem absurd to Westerners. For example. fathers are usually careful to prohibit their daughters from activities - sometimes as simple as jumping on a couch - that might tear the hymen and lead to allegations the daughter is not a virgin when she marries. Family members’ discipline about haya can be so strict that it leads to tragic results. In Iran about twenty years ago, there was a case in which a young bride hung herself on her wedding night. She assumed the act of consummating her marriage had irreparably violated her haya. As incredible as that may sound, it shows how important the concept of haya is in Islamic society. To preserve her haya, a woman might even commit suicide to prevent being raped.

Whatever reduces a woman’s haya will violate a Muslim man’s ghayra. Ghayra and haya are components of both ezzat and sharaf for men and women. Ghayra applies to men and haya to women. To the extent the Muslim man’s control over his namoos is violated, he will feel both his standing in the community and his personal character have been ruined. Likewise, a woman who feels her haya has been violated - like the bride who hung herself - will feel her ezzat and sharaf have been ruined. One of the greatest insults one can offer to a Muslim man is to say he does not have ghayra. In the same way, nothing worse can be said about a Muslim woman than that she does not have haya. Unlike ezzat and sharaf, which do not always conform strictly to sharia, ghayra and haya overlap completely with Islamic rules for the dress and conduct of women. Whatever violates sharia’s rules for women will violate the Muslim man’s ghayra and reduce the Muslim woman’s haya.

While men throughout the world may exhibit different degrees of jealousy over the women in their lives, ghayra is a uniquely Islamic concept. First, it is explicitly described as a characteristic of Allah, Muhammad, and Muhammad’s most respected successors. Second, ghayra exists to protect concepts of propriety in women’s dress and behavior found only in sharia. The most extreme of these is Sharia’s requirement that the woman’s clitoris be surgically removed, which Muslims call female circumcision and Westerners consider to be female genital mutilation.135 Removing the clitoris reduces the likelihood the Muslim man’s ghayra will be violated by the woman’s sexual activity. Third, Allah actually sent down some verses of Koran and established some sharia prohibitions specifically to acknowledge and appease Muhammad’s sense of ghayra.

Bukhari’s hadith states explicitly that nobody has a greater sense of ghayra - jealousy over the sexual organs of believers - than Allah, Himself, and He has given the rules of sharia to keep Muslims from sin:

Narrated Abdullah bin Mas’ud: Allah’s Apostle said, ‘None has more sense of ghayra than Allah, and for this reason He has forbidden shameful sins whether committed openly or secretly, and none loves to be praised more than Allah does, and this is why He Praises Himself.136

Muhammad’s favorite wife, Aisha, made it clear that the “shameful sins” from which Allah’s ghayra protects believers include sexual sins:

Narrated Aisha….The Prophet said, ‘O followers of Muhammad! By Allah! There is none who has more ghayra (self-repect) [sense of jealousy] than Allah as He has forbidden that His slaves, male or female commit adultery (illegal sexual intercourse).’ O followers of Muhammad! By Allah! If you knew that which I know you would laugh little and weep much.137

The Arabic word translated “adultery” in this hadith is zina, which means adultery in its broadest sense, including both fornication by unmarried people and adultery by married people. The translator has inserted the gloss “self-respect” after ghayra to indicate that a person whose ghayra is violated feels his ezzat and sharaf have been destroyed. Sharia states “there is no good in a man without jealousy for his rights [ghayra].”138

As the perfect example for Muslims, Muhammad, of course, had the greatest sense of ghayra:

Narrated Al-Mughira: Sa’d bin Ubada said, ‘If I saw a man with my wife, I would strike him (behead him) with the blade of my sword.’ This news reached Allah’s Apostle who then said, ‘You people are astonished at Sa’d’s ghayra. By Allah, I have more ghayra than he, and Allah has more ghayra than I, and because of Allah’s ghayra, He has made unlawful Shameful deeds and sins (illegal sexual intercourse, etc.) done in open and in secret….139

Sa’d was not the only companion whose ghayra Muhammad recognized with praise. Muhammad also singled out the sense of ghayra felt by Umar, who became the second Caliph (successor) of Muhammad:

Narrated Jabir bin `Abdullah:

The Prophet said, “I saw myself (in a dream) entering Paradise, and behold! I saw Ar-Rumaisa’, Abu Talha’s wife. I heard footsteps. I asked, Who is it? Somebody said, ‘It is Bilal’ Then I saw a palace and a lady sitting in its courtyard. I asked, ‘For whom is this palace?’ Somebody replied, ‘It is for `Umar.’ I intended to enter it and see it, but I thought of your (`Umar’s) ghayra (and gave up the attempt).” `Umar said, “Let my parents be sacrificed for you, O Allah’s Messenger! How dare I think of my ghayra (self-respect) being offended by you?140

Umar’s ghayra was also recognized by the female members of the Islamic community in Muhammad’s time. Umar’s presence prompted them to put on their veils, in obedience to Allah’s rules:

Umar bin Al-Khattab asked the permission of Allah’s Messenger to see him while some Quraishi women [women from Muhammad’s tribe in Mecca] were sitting with him, talking to him and asking him for more expenses, raising their voices above the voice of Allah’s Messenger. When Umar asked for the permission to enter, the women quickly put on their veils. Allah’s Apostle allowed him to enter and Umar came in while Allah’s Messenger was smiling, Umar said, ‘O Allah’s Apostle! May Allah always keep you smiling.’ The Prophet said, ‘These women who have been here, roused my wonder, for as soon as they heard your voice, they quickly put on their veils.’ Umar said, ‘O Allah’s Messenger! You have more right to be feared by them than I.’ Then Umar addressed the women saying, ‘O enemies of yourselves! You fear me more than you do Allah’s Messenger?’ They said, ‘Yes, for you are harsher and sterner than Allah’s Messenger.’ Then Allah’s Messenger said, ‘O Ibn Al-Khattab! By Him in Whose Hands my life is! Never does Satan find you going on a way, but he takes another way other than yours.’141

This hadith illustrates that a Muslim man’s ghayra can extend beyond family members to touch all the women in the Islamic community.

If you’ve been reading carefully, you may be wondering two things. First, in the hadith where Muhammad sees Umar’s palace in paradise, why would Umar’s ghayra keep Muhammad from entering the palace? In the second hadith, why did the women who were talking to Muhammad not put their veils on until Umar came in? Did they respect Umar’s ghayra more than Muhammad’s?

The answer to these questions, of course, can be found in Koran and hadith and will help us to understand ghayra better. Surah 33:6 in the English translation says “the Prophet is closer to the believers than their ownselves.” The phrase translated “closer to the believers” here is the Arabic expression aula bil mu’minin which literally means “the first of the believers.” The concept is that Muhammad has more rights over the Muslims than Muslims have over themselves. Specifically, when it comes to ghayra - the Muslim man’s jealousy over his namoos - Muhammad is not an “other.” None of the sharia provisions which serve to block Muslim women from interacting with or even being recognized by other men apply to Muhammad. Muslim women may legally appear uncovered to Muhammad, talk to him, or even ride with him on the back of his camel. This understanding is confirmed in the following hadith, which illustrates how ezzat, ghayra, and haya are interrelated:

Narrated Asma’ bint Abu Bakr:

When Az-Zubair married me, he had no real property or any slave or anything else except a camel which drew water from the well, and his horse. I used to feed his horse with fodder and drew water and sew the bucket for drawing it, and prepare the dough, but I did not know how to bake bread. So our Ansari neighbors used to bake bread for me, and they were honorable ladies. I used to carry the date stones on my head from Zubair’s land given to him by Allah’s Messenger and this land was two third Farsakh (about two miles) from my house. One day, while I was coming with the date stones on my head, I met Allah’s Messenger along with some Ansari people. He called me and then, (directing his camel to kneel down) said, “Ikh! Ikh!” so as to make me ride behind him (on his camel). I felt shy to travel with the men and remembered Az-Zubair and his sense of ghayra, as he was one of those people who had the greatest sense of ghayra. Allah’s Messenger noticed that I felt shy, so he proceeded. I came to Az-Zubair and said, “I met Allah’s Messenger while I was carrying a load of date stones on my head, and he had some companions with him. He made his camel kneel down so that I might ride, but I felt shy in his presence and remembered your sense of ghayra. On that Az-Zubair said, “By Allah, your carrying the date stones (and you being seen by the Prophet in such a state) is more shameful to me than your riding with him.” (I continued serving in this way) till Abu Bakr sent me a servant to look after the horse, whereupon I felt as if he had set me free.142

The first thing to notice in this hadith is that Az-Zubair, the husband, did not own property or a slave so his ezzat - standing in the community - would have been low. Because Az-Zubair was poor, his wife had to walk when she carried her dates to her neighbors. The word translated “honorable” to describe the neighbor women is not important to the story. In Arabic, the word translated “honorable” to describe the neighbors actually means “honest.” When Muhammad offered Asma, the lady narrating this hadith who is the wife of Az-Zubair, a ride on his camel she felt shy, and here the Arabic word is literally “haya.” This is the shyness a Muslim woman guards by observing Islamic rules for dress and conduct thereby preventing the male family member’s ghayra from being violated. The reason Muhammad offered her a ride on his camel was he knew he was an exception to the rules about haya and ghayra. No other Muslim man would offer another Muslim’s wife a ride on a camel. Nevertheless, Asma remembered her husband’s ghayra and refused Muhammad’s offer. Even though Muhammad was an exception and riding with him would not have violated Az-Zubair’s ghayra, because ghayra and haya are so strongly emphasized in Islamic society Asma preferred not to ride with him. Asma’s husband, Az-Zubair, felt his ezzat had been reduced not by Asma refusing to ride with Muhammad but by Muhammad seeing that he was poor and his wife had to walk.

In the ahadith about the palace and the women not veiling until Umar entered, Muhammad did not forget that he was an exception to the ghayra rules when he thought better of entering Umar’s palace in paradise or when he allowed women to appear uncovered in his presence. By suggesting that Umar’s ghayra might have been violated if Muhammad had entered his home, Muhammad was just complimenting Umar on having strong ghayra. The compliment was well deserved, as illustrated by the women who admitted they feared Umar’s ghayra more than Muhammad’s.

The factor that demonstrates beyond question ghayra is a uniquely Islamic concept is the fact Allah actually sent down some verses of Koran because he recognized Muhammad’s ghayra had been irritated. These verses shaped some of the sharia prohibitions for women that are most critical to ghayra violence and honor killing today. The verse that most directly came to satisfy Muhammad’s sense of jealousy is surah 33:53. The last part of this verse made it illegal for anybody to marry Muhammad’s wives after Muhammad died:

O you who have faith! Do not enter the Prophet’s homes unless you are given permission to come for food, but don’t come so early you have to wait for it to be prepared. But come in when you are invited and when you have had your meal, disperse, and don’t feel free to sit and socialize. For sure that would be annoying to the Prophet, and he would feel shy [haya] of telling you, but Allah is not shy of the truth. And when you ask [his wives] for whatever you ask, ask them from behind a curtain [hijab], that is purer for your hearts and for their hearts. You should not annoy Allah’s Messenger, and you should never marry his wives after him. For sure! That would be an enormity before Allah.143

The circumstances in which the prohibition on marrying Muhammad’s wives was sent down are revealed in a tafsir - commentary - on Koran written by one of Islam’s greatest scholars, Ibn Kathir. The circumstances show clearly Muhammad’s sense of jealousy was excited by a young man who said he wanted to marry Muhammad’s favorite wife, Aisha, after Muhammad died:

This was revealed concerning a man who wanted to marry one of the wives of the Prophet after he died. A man said to Sufyan, `Was it `A’ishah’ He said, `That is what they said.’’’ This was also stated by Muqatil bin Hayyan and `Abdur-Rahman bin Zayd bin Aslam. He also reported with his chain of narration from As-Suddi that the one who wanted to do this was Talhah bin `Ubaydullah, may Allah be pleased with him, until this Ayah was revealed forbidding that. Hence the scholars were unanimous in stating that it was forbidden for anyone to marry any of the women who were married to the Messenger of Allah at the time when he died, because they are his wives in this world and in the Hereafter, and they are the Mothers of the believers, as stated previously.144

By making Muhammad’s wives the mothers of believers in both this world and the hereafter, Allah showed ghayra is not just ordinary jealousy or a cultural phenomenon, but is a part of Islam as a religious system. Allah’s designation of Muhammad’s wives as the mothers of believers is made explicitly in surah 33:4-6.

Besides its supernatural consequences for Muhammad’s wives, surah 33:53 had an incredibly important earthly impact for all Muslim women, because it is the beginning of Islam’s prohibitions on their dress and behavior. Surah 33:53 is known as the “ayat (verse) of hijab.” In the verse, Allah commands Muhammad’s wives to stay behind a screen when they have any contact with Muslim men. The word translated “screen” is, in fact, “hijab,” showing hijab’s connection to its root word, hujb, which means “blocking.”

In the same year surah 33:53 was sent down - 626-627, the fifth year of Hijra - Allah extended his “blocking” prohibitions to apply to all Muslim women. Allah’s command was motivated by Muhammad’s concern for his wives who had to leave the home to go to the bathroom.145 In Muhammad’s time, there were no sanitary facilities in the tents or homes of believers. The women could not only be observed by men socializing in the street, but also were sometimes harassed by the more vulgar men. To protect them, Allah gave Muhammad surah 33:59, the single most important verse relating to women’s dress in the entire Koran:

O Prophet! Tell your wives and your daughters and the women of the believers to bring close their outer garments on them [cover themselves completely except one eye to see the way]. That is closer to [Islam] that they should be known [as believing women] and not be bothered. And Allah is forgiving and merciful.146

Authentic Islamic sources demonstrate that the purpose of hijab - covering women - is to prevent women from being recognized:

Narrated Aisha: Allah’s Messenger used to offer the Fajr prayer and some believing women covered with their veiling sheets used to attend the Fajr prayer with him and they they would return to their homes unrecognized.147

Ibn Kathir reports Umar was pleased when the ayat of hijab was sent down, because he had already suggested to Muhammad women should be screened.148 The fact the purpose of the hijab was to prevent women from being recognized is also evident from the following hadith:

Narrated `Aisha:

The wives of the Prophet used to go to Al-Manasi, a vast open place (near Baqi` at Medina) to answer the call of nature at night. `Umar used to say to the Prophet ‘Let your wives be veiled,’ but Allah’s Apostle did not do so. One night Sauda bint Zam`a the wife of the Prophet went out at `Isha’ time and she was a tall lady. `Umar addressed her and said, “I have recognized you, O Sauda.” He said so, as he desired eagerly that the verses of Al-Hijab (the observing of veils by the Muslim women) may be revealed. So Allah revealed the verses of “Al-Hijab” (A complete body cover excluding the eyes).149

The word translated “veil” in this hadith is the Arabic “hijab.”

The purpose of preventing women from being recognized - even by their shape - is to prevent them from being sexually attractive. Allah stated His purpose expressly in surahs addressed both to Muhammad’s wives and to all believing women in general. The verses addressed to Muhammad’s wives are 33:32-33:

O wives of the Prophet! You are not like any other women. If you are pious, then don’t speak softly in a way that brings temptation to somebody who has a disease in his heart, but speak in a way that is proper [maruf] in Islam. And remain in your houses and do not display yourselves like a tower as women displayed themselves in the time of ignorance, and perform As-Salat, and pay Zakat and obey Allah and His Messenger. For sure, Allah wants to take away blemishes from you, the members of the Prophet’s house, and to purify you with such a purification.150

Surah 24:31 broadens the command to include all Muslim women:

And tell the believing women to lower their gaze and protect their private parts and not to show their adornment [every part of a woman’s body is considered to be adornment] except what appears when they are properly dressed and to cast their head coverings over their bosoms and not to show their adornment except to their husbands, their fathers, their husband’s fathers, their sons, their husband’s sons, their brothers or their brother’s sons, or their sister’s sons, or other Muslim women, or the female slaves whom their right hands possess, or old male servants who do not have sexual urges, or children who do not know about women’s private parts. And let them not stamp their feet to reveal what they have hidden of their adornment [do not wiggle or jiggle]. And you believers should all repent toward Allah so that you may be successful.151

As time went by, Allah revealed many more rules for women’s dress and conduct recorded in Koran and hadith. Like the provisions related to hijab, these rules have an element in common, they all serve to restrain a woman’s sexuality, both in conduct and in dress. The rules work by restricting a woman’s access to other human beings and making all of her physical and personal characteristics imperceptible. These rules have become part of sharia and we will review them in depth in Chapter Eight.

Likewise, ghayra and haya are also part of sharia. We have already quoted sharia’s statement that there is no good in a man who does not have ghayra. With respect to haya, sharia states: “Whatever contains vulgarity is made ugly by it, and whatever contains haya is made beautiful by it.”152

Ghayra is 1) control by the Muslim male 2) over his namoos, 3) to preserve Islamic concepts of morality. Because ghayra relates to sharia rules, sharia also provides the means for enforcing these rules, that is, the mechanism by which the Muslim man enforces and maintains his control. This mechanism is the section of sharia that delineates the rules relating to enjoining good and forbidding evil - al amr bi al ma’ruf wa’l nahy an al-munkar.

Remember that sharia is not just some specialized branch of law, it is the rules for how one practices the religion of Islam. To have a hope of going to paradise, Muslim men and women must meticulously observe sharia rules. Any part of life for which sharia rules have been formulated is part of the religion and worship of Islam:

For good actions to be acceptable and rewarded, they must incorporate two attributes: to be intended solely for Allah’s Pleasure, and to be in accordance with the Shari’ah. This condition applies to words and deeds, in matters of religious science and practical worship.153

Sharia’s rules for women’s dress and conduct as well as haya and ghayra, and the rules for enjoining good and forbidding evil are part of Islamic culture because they are part of Islam. The source of all sharia rules is Allah, which means sharia is divine law. As such, it is higher than any man-made rules, including state law, federal law, and Constitutional law. It goes without saying that Allah’s moral rules are above the moral rules of any other God.

Because the rules for women’s dress and conduct, haya, ghayra, and enjoining good and forbidding evil are part of sharia, they are communicated to Muslims by every institution in society in Muslim-majority countries - the family, the mosque, peers, school, the media, and government. This means you do not need to be religiously observant to know about these concepts or exercise them. In fact, especially in the West, it is probably the case that immigrants who are less religiously observant are more likely to become perpetrators of ghayra violence. This is because, being less observant, they are less likely to teach their children to follow all the prohibitions of sharia and more likely to send confusing signals about Islamic morality. As their daughters enter puberty and begin to do what teenagers do, they are likely to cross a limit the father failed to communicate well. The end result is an incident of ghayra violence, whether it is only restriction to the home or goes all the way to wounding or murder.

In all cultures, people look at and talk about one another. Islam harnesses the natural human tendency to be gossips and busybodies to create a community policing mechanism for sharia morality. Surah 9:71 commands Muslim men and women to be “guardians of one another,” that is, to monitor the behavior of others to report and correct any violation of Islamic rules:

The believing men and women are guardians of each other. They enjoin good and forbid evil and stand up for prayer and pay zakat and obey Allah and His Messenger. They are the ones upon whom Allah will shower blessing. For sure Allah has honor [ezzat] and is wise. 154

The ultimate authority for enjoining good and forbidding evil to enforce ghayra - to enforce Islamic rules for women’s dress and conduct - is the male head of the family. This authority begins with fathers and husbands and extends to other male family members both laterally, such as brothers and cousins, and vertically, such as grandfathers, sons, and nephews. Within Muslim-majority countries, because the government condones ghayra violence, extended family members are likely to initiate enjoining good and forbidding evil. In the West, because ghayra violence is less tolerated, extended family members are more likely to simply report a woman’s misbehavior to a more closely related male.

It is extremely unfortunate that the word ghayra has been mistranslated as “honor.” Because ghayra is an Islamic legal concept based on ideas of morality which are foreign to the West, calling ghayra violence honor killing is a bit like calling soccer football. When you say “football” to Americans, they get a picture that has nothing in common with the sport of soccer. In the same way, ghayra has nothing in common with Western notions of honor, because the moral rules that ghayra serves to protect are very different from traditional Western ideas of morality. The extreme moral decay of Western society in recent years has only exacerbated these differences. At least in the past, the West shared concepts like chastity, modesty, and heterosexuality with Islam and its culture.

Confusing ghayra with Western notions of honor prevents officials at every level of the government and judicial system from understanding the reasons for ghayra violence and the motives of those who perpetrate it. If you don’t understand what is causing a problem, it is unlikely you will figure out how to solve the problem.

For example, in 2009, Iraqi immigrant Faleh Al-Maleki killed his daughter, Noor, and seriously injured another woman by running them over with his SUV. In high school, the moral values of Noor’s Islamic heritage came into conflict with the dress and behavior of American teenagers. In a quotation published in her high school yearbook that proved to be prophetic, Noor said:

My family is Middle Eastern. My parents are very religious, but only about some things. I think we’re a very lenient family. Middle Eastern’s have certain rules to live by, and we can’t do some things. It’s very different from Americans. Since I grew up here, I have American ways but I still have to follow traditional rules.155

At trial, County Judge Roland J. Steinle, III said:

To say this is an honor killing is deeply, deeply, deeply wrong. This has nothing to do with honor. This has to do with one man driven out of hatred to kill his own daughter because it suited his purpose.156

More recently, in 2014, a pregnant 30 year-old Pakistani woman, Farzana Pareen, was stoned to death by her father and twenty members of her family. Farzana was actually outside the Lahore High Court, where she was about “to contest her father’s allegations that she had been kidnapped by her husband and that their marriage was invalid.”157 In commenting on the murder, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, said “I do not even wish to use the phrase ‘honour (sic) killing’: there is not the faintest vestige of honour in killing a woman this way.”158

Sadly, both the county judge and the UN commissioner are right, Western notions of honor had nothing to do with these murders. But the Islamic legal concept of ghayra certainly did.

Chapter Eight

What Sharia
Commands and Forbids

From the moment Allah began to send down verses of the Koran, they became part of sharia. Verses that established explicit requirements for conduct became part of sharia expressly. Verses that established principles became part of the roots of understanding - usul al-fiqh - which Muslim scholars apply when they do Islamic legal reasoning - ijtihad - to derive rules from authentic Islamic sources. Islam requires that every human action or interaction be judged by the sharia - not by manmade rules or by the rules of any other God - along the spectrum we defined earlier from al-wajeb (required) to al-haram (forbidden). This requirement appears in four verses of surah 5:

And We prescribed for them: ‘Life for life, eye for eye, nose for nose, ear for ear, tooth for tooth, and retaliation in kind for wounds.’ So whoever gives up his right of retaliation as a form of charity, that will be an atonement for him. And whoever does not judge by that which Allah has sent down, they are Zalimun [unjust].159

Let the people of the Gospel [Injeel] judge by what Allah has sent down therein. And whoever does not judge by what Allah has sent down, they are the Fasiqun [those who make great sins].160

And We have sent down to you [Muhammad] the Book with the truth, confirming the Scripture that came before it and overriding the previous Scripture. So judge between them by what Allah has sent down, and do not follow their temptations to diverge from the truth that has come to you. For all, We have placed among you a law and a way. If Allah willed, He would have made you a single community, but [He did not] in order to test you in what He has brought you. So compete [like a runner in a race] in good deeds. To return to Allah is the destination for all of you. Then He will reveal the truth of that in which you differ.161

And so [Muhammad] judge between them by what Allah has sent down and do not follow their temptations and be cautious of them lest they entice you away from a part of that which Allah has sent down to you. And if they turn away, then know that Allah wants to smite them for some of their sins. And for sure, most of the people are Fasiqun [those who make great sins]162

These verses do not grant license for Jews and Christians to judge on the basis of the Bible. What Allah is telling Muhammad here is that Jews and Christians were originally given the same revelation as he received in Koran. Elsewhere, Koran explicitly says Jews and Christians rejected the revelation they had received to commit what Islam considers the unforgivable sin, shirk. Shirk is associating partners with Allah. They also changed their revelation to please their desires, without regard for what Allah had allowed or prohibited:

And the Jews have said Ezra is the son of Allah, and the Christians have said Messiah is the son of Allah. That is what they say with their mouths. They imitate the saying of the unbelievers of old. Allah kill them [an imprecatory figure of speech] How they are deluded away from the truth.163

They [Jews and Christians] have taken their rabbis and their monks as lords in place of Allah, and also Messiah [Jesus], son of Maryam [Mary], but they were not commanded to worship any god except one Allah. There is no God but Him. Praise and glory be to Him. He is far from having the partners they associate with Him.164

Over the 1400 year history of Islam, Islamic scholars have followed the Koran’s command to “judge by what Allah has revealed.” They have applied the rules and principles of Koran and hadith to reach Islam’s judgment about virtually all human actions and interactions. The process is ongoing. When new fact situations arise, Muslim scholars make ijtihad to judge the consequences of an action based on Islamic sources. Unlike morality in the West, Islamic morality is not evolving or degenerating. The scholars have never - and will never - change the consensus they have reached in the past on issues that are now considered settled elements of sharia. The occasional “reformers” who suggest changing Islamic morality typically wind up dead. Islamic morality is simply growing to regulate the conduct of Muslims in response to change in all forms of human activities.

In Chapter Seven we learned that ghayra is 1) control by the Muslim male 2) over his namoos, 3) to preserve Islamic concepts of morality. The Islamic concepts of morality that are relevant to ghayra are those that concern women’s dress and conduct related to sexuality, but these provisions do not exist in a vacuum. Women are subject to all the sharia provisions that apply to Muslims generally. A woman who violates any sharia provision may trigger a violent response against her under sharia’s provisions for enjoining good and forbidding evil. Only sharia violations that relate to sexuality, however, will irritate a man’s ghayra and lead to violence against the woman that can properly be labeled ghayra or “honor” violence. Like non-sexually related violence, ghayra violence is also sanctioned and scripted by sharia’s rules for enjoining good and forbidding evil. Both types of violence - non-sexually related and sexually related - flow from sharia’s provisions for enjoining good and forbidding evil. The link to sexuality in a behavior that irritates ghayra can be direct, such as dressing immodestly, or indirect, such as laughing provocatively, speaking with a soft voice, or listening to music. Since we are talking about the response of individual fathers, there is also a degree of subjectivity involved - what would trigger an immediate response from some males may not upset others. The situation is also dynamic. A male may tolerate a violation for a period of time, then decide to take action.

Behaviors that Violate Ghayra

Sharia violations that irritate ghayra fall into two classes. The first class are violations of affirmative duties or negative prohibitions stated explicitly in Islamic sources like the Koran and hadith. For example, surah 33:59 requires women cover “themselves completely except one eye to see the way.”165 A woman who violates this requirement by failing to cover herself as Islam requires would violate a Muslim male’s ghayra. To enforce this provision Saudi Arabia recently passed a law which states “women with alluring eyes will be forced to wear a full veil.”166 The law will be enforced by the Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice, the amr bil ma’ruf police. The second class of violations that irritate ghayra come from sharia provisions that reflect judgments made by Islamic scholars on the basis of principles stated explicitly in the sources. For example, surah 33:33 adds the principle that women should not display themselves in a way that attracts attention to the basic rule of surah 33:59 that women must cover themselves:

And remain in your houses and do not display yourselves like a tower as women displayed themselves in the time of ignorance, and perform As-Salat, and pay Zakat and obey Allah and His Messenger. For sure, Allah wants to take away blemishes from you, the members of the Prophet’s house, and to purify you with such a purification.167

In the Arabic, the phrase translated “do not display yourselves like that of the times of ignorance” literally says “do not make yourselves like a tower of the times of ignorance.” A tower is something that stands out, that is easily noticed, so Islamic scholars have developed the principle that an action that makes a woman stand out or be noticed for her sexuality is prohibited. A woman who makes herself stand out is said to be practicing tabar’roj. This principle adds a limitation to the requirement the woman be covered. The limitation is her covering cannot be something that stands out or draws attention to her. This is the reason Muslim women are usually seen wearing black outer garments. Wearing bright colored or patterned clothing would violate sharia and, consequently, irritate a Muslim male’s ghayra.

In the balance of this chapter we’ll look, on a topic by topic basis, at various sharia requirements that, if violated, could irritate a Muslim man’s ghayra.

1. Clothing, in general - All Islamic legal schools with the exception of the Hanafi school require that, outside of the home, a woman’s full body and face be covered with the exception of the eyes and hands. This is the classic form of Islamic female dress known in the West as “wearing the veil,” where a woman covers her face completely with a burqa or covers all but her eyes with a mask-type piece of clothing called a “niqab.” Niqab literally means veil, and a niqab looks like the veil Westerners would associate with a belly dancer, except it is not transparent, or the bandana pulled over the lower part of the face by bandits in Old West days. Because it is is an item of clothing for women, the niqab can be an exquisitely fine piece of fabric. It seems impossible to remove the element of fashion and beauty from things intended for women! The niqab covers the mouth and nose and leaves only the eyes showing. Besides the face, the entire body must be covered. The Hanafi school does not require the lower part of the face to be veiled and allows women to show their full face and hands. The permissiveness of the Hanafi school contradicts authentic hadiths and the consensus of the scholars of all other Islamic legal schools.168

Within the home, in the presence of men who are unmarriageable kin, a woman may expose her full face and hair, but must continue to be covered from her ankles to her neck. In the Arabic, the word for unmarriagable kin is maharim, the plural of mahram and includes both males and females - the concept of unmarriageable kin applies to men as well as to women. Even in the home, a woman may not show any skin between the ankles and the neck except to her husband. If any male who is not unmarriageable kin enters the home, the woman must cover just as if she was in public.

The clothing sharia requires for women must cover the body from head to toe. As we discussed in Chapter Seven with the example of Umar, who recognized Muhammad’s wife Sauda by her shape, the clothing must not only make the woman unrecognizable, it must also not allow her feminine shape to be perceived. Muhammad expressly criticized women who wear clothing that allows their feminine shape to be perceived, saying they are effectively naked even when they are fully dressed:

Abu Huraira reported Allah’s Messenger having said this: Two are the types of the denizens of Hell whom I did not see: people having flogs like the tails of the ox with them and they would be beating people, and the women who would be dressed but appear to be naked, who would be inclined (to evil) and make their husbands incline towards it. Their heads would be like the humps of the bukht camel inclined to one side. They will not enter Paradise and they would not smell its odour whereas its odour would be smelt from such and such distance.169

2. Pants - Pants are only allowed to be worn inside the outer garment that covers the body from head to toe, and they may not show. Pants are not a substitute for the outer garment and women may never wear only pants without an outer garment. Recently, Muslim women athletes have begun to appear in public in leggings, sweatshirts that cover the whole upper body except for the hands, and with their heads covered except for the face. This style of dress violates sharia’s requirement that the woman’s shape not be perceptible. People who want to encourage Muslim women to participate in athletics may see this form of dress as acceptable, but it contradicts the plain text requirements of Koran and hadith. It may, therefore, irritate a Muslim man’s ghayra.

Westerners have a picture of Muslim women typified by the “Jeannie” character of the 1960s sitcom “I Dream of Jeannie.” Jeannie’s dress included loose, transparent silk pants, exposed midriff, form-fitting vest, and an exposed face with hair half covered by a transparent silk scarf. This is not, in any way, an Islamic image. It is a style that represents the pre-Islamic times of jahilyya - ignorance - in Arabia that Muhammad criticized in surah 33:33. Images of Muslims and Islamic society that look like “Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves” are not Islamic, and will offend people seeking to bring in authentic Islam.

3. Cross-dressing - female clothing and mannerisms are forbidden for men and male clothing and mannerisms are forbidden for women:

Narrated Ibn `Abbas:

Allah’s Messenger cursed those men who are in the similitude (assume the manners) of women and those women who are in the similitude (assume the manners) of men.170

A Muslim man’s ghayra would be irritated by either a woman who adopted male dress or mannerisms or a man who dressed and acted like a woman. These restrictions go hand in hand with Islam’s death penalty for homosexual conduct. A father who learns his son - or other male relative - has become homosexual will not be as concerned if the son is the doer, rather than the receiver. Acting like a female is much more of an attack on a male’s ghayra. Western Liberals sometimes like to point to the rate of homosexuality in Islamic countries, but the existence of homosexuality does not mean Islam condones it. Being homosexual is absolutely not tolerated in any way by Islam.171 A man who is penetrated, by definition, has completely lost his ghayra.

4. Veiling - While women must generally be veiled in the presence of men who are not unmarriageable kin, it is permissible for a man to look at a woman’s face before marrying her:

Narrated `Aisha:

Allah’s Messenger said (to me), “You were shown to me in a dream. An angel brought you to me, wrapped in a piece of silken cloth, and said to me, ‘This is your wife.’ I removed the piece of cloth from your face, and there you were. I said to myself. ‘If it is from Allah, then it will surely be.’ 172

The man also has the right to look at his prospective bride’s hands. Sharia considers that the face shows the woman’s beauty and the hands show the body.

5. Makeup - A woman can use makeup without limitation only in front of her husband. In public, no makeup is allowed, even with the permission of her husband, on the basis of the following hadith, which forbids any artificial change in a woman’s features:

Narrated `Abdullah:

Allah has cursed those women who practice tattooing and those who get themselves tattooed, and those who remove their face hairs, and those who create a space between their teeth artificially to look beautiful, and such women as change the features created by Allah. Why then should I not curse those whom the Prophet has cursed? And that is in Allah’s Book. i.e. His Saying: ‘And what the Apostle gives you take it and what he forbids you abstain (from it).’173

6. Perfume - Like makeup, perfume is allowed inside the home but is forbidden outside the home:

It was narrated that Al-Ash’ari said:

“The Messenger of Allah said: ‘Any woman who puts on perfume then passes by people so that they can smell her fragrance then she is an adulteress.’”174

7. Hair and wigs - Wigs and other forms of false hair are forbidden, but red or black hair dye from henna is allowed for women. Men are not allowed to dye their hair except when they are going to war so that they will look younger and more threatening. Al-Bukhari records:

Narrated Humaid bin `Abdur-Rahman bin `Auf:

that in the year he performed Hajj. he heard Mu’awiya bin Abi Sufyan, who was on the pulpit and was taking a tuft of hair from one of his guards, saying, “Where are your religious learned men? I heard Allah’s Messenger forbidding this (false hair) and saying, ‘The children of Israel were destroyed when their women started using this.’”175

The prohibition against false hair is not relaxed even in the event of sickness. This is logical since women are required to completely cover their heads, anyway:

Narrated `Aisha:

An Ansari girl was married and she became sick and all her hair fell out [so people intended] to provide her with false hair. They asked the Prophet who said, “Allah has cursed the lady who artificially lengthens (her or someone else’s) hair and also the one who gets her hair lengthened.”176

8. Facial hair - women are not allowed to pluck their eyebrows or trim their mustache or beard:

Narrated Ibn Mas’ud:

Allah has cursed those women who practice tattooing or get it done for themselves, and those who remove hair from their faces, and those who create spaces between their teeth artificially to look beautiful, such ladies as change the features created by Allah. Why then shall I not curse those whom Allah’s Messenger has cursed and who are cursed in Allah’s Book too?177

9. Courting/Dating - After the age of nine, Islam simply does not allow unmarried men and women to socialize. This prohibition applies with even more force to Muslim women socializing with non-Muslim men. The coeducational nature of Western schools, therefore, will violate the requirements of sharia when the girl is nine years old or older. The age of nine is significant for women because a girl may be married at that age, following the practice of Muhammad:

Narrated `Aisha:

that the Prophet married her when she was six years old and he consummated his marriage when she was nine years old, and then she remained with him for nine years (i.e., till his death).178

10. Marriage - Islam has no concept of an “age of consent” because the wali - usually the father or grandfather - may give a female in marriage without her knowledge or consent. There are many examples from Islamic history that illustrate the authority of this principle, including Muhammad’s marriage to Aisha. Aisha narrated a hadith that showed she did not know about or consent to her marriage:

Narrated Aisha:

The Prophet engaged me when I was a girl of six (years). We went to Medina and stayed at the home of Bani-al-Harith bin Khazraj. Then I got ill and my hair fell down. Later on my hair grew (again) and my mother, Um Ruman, came to me while I was playing in a swing with some of my girl friends. She called me, and I went to her, not knowing what she wanted to do to me. She caught me by the hand and made me stand at the door of the house. I was breathless then, and when my breathing became Allright, (sic) she took some water and rubbed my face and head with it. Then she took me into the house. There in the house I saw some Ansari women who said, “Best wishes and Allah’s Blessing and a good luck.” Then she entrusted me to them and they prepared me (for the marriage). Unexpectedly Allah’s Apostle came to me in the forenoon and my mother handed me over to him, and at that time I was a girl of nine years of age.179

In Islamic law, even if Aisha had known about her marriage she would not have been able to consent to it at age six, since minors lack the capacity to make valid contracts under sharia. A minor’s contract is void ab initio.

The concept of the wali is difficult to translate into English. The word literally means “protector,” but the concept of the wali is not the same as the legal concept of guardianship. Guardianship - hezanah in the Arabic - is a separate topic in sharia. The wali is the owner of the blood of the children under his protection. This is why sharia has no penalty for a father or grandfather who kills his child. As mentioned, after the age of nine, the only premarital interaction between the bride and groom Islam allows is for the groom to briefly see his prospective bride’s face and hands.

The legal process of marriage in Islam is surprising, not only to Westerners but also to ordinary Muslims who are not mujtahids. Islam follows the two-step process of betrothal, or wedlock, followed by the actual ceremony of joining, which may come years after the wedlock is arranged. The joining ceremony is traditional, but not required. From the time the wedlock is agreed to, the woman is considered to be married under sharia law. This wedlock is called al-nikah, which literally means “marriage” as well as “sexual intercourse.” The fact the woman is married from the time the wali makes an offer that is accepted by the groom has been important in ghayra - “honor” - killing in the United States. The sharia marriage process is similar to the process followed by the Jews in Bible times, but there is a difference. The groom does not ask for the hand of the woman in marriage. The wali, who represents the bride, initiates the betrothal process by offering the woman’s hand in marriage to the prospective groom. The moment the groom accepts the wali’s offer, the wedlock is in effect. The offer and acceptance must be spoken in Arabic by an official with authority from the caliph or Islamic government to make marriage agreements. Historically this official has been the imam or mullah of the local mosque.

Even ordinary Muslims are surprised it is the wali of the woman who initiates the betrothal process. In modern times, it is not unusual for prospective grooms to communicate their willingness to marry to the bride’s wali, but their communication has no legal effect. The legal effect starts from the time the offer by the bride’s wali is spoken in Arabic by an authorized official and agreed to by the groom.

It is worthwhile to walk through an example of how this process plays out, both historically and in modern times.

1. Historically, the first step was that the bride’s wali chose a prospective groom who would provide benefits to the bride’s family. The classic example of this is Umar, who offered his daughter Hafsa in marriage when she became a widow:

Narrated `Abdullah bin `Umar:

`Umar bin Al-Khattab said, “When (my daughter) Hafsa bint `Umar lost her husband Khunais bin Hudhaifa As-Sahrni who was one of the companions of Allah’s Messenger and had fought in the battle of Badr and had died in Medina, I met `Uthman bin `Affan and suggested that he should marry Hafsa saying, “If you wish, I will marry Hafsa bint `Umar to you,’ on that, he said, ‘I will think it over.’ I waited for a few days and then he said to me. ‘I am of the opinion that I shall not marry at present.’ Then I met Abu Bakr and said, ‘if you wish, I will marry you, Hafsa bint `Umar.’ He kept quiet and did not give me any reply and I became more angry with him than I was with `Uthman. Some days later, Allah’s Messenger demanded her hand in marriage and I married her to him. Later on Abu Bakr met me and said, ‘Perhaps you were angry with me when you offered me Hafsa for marriage and I gave no reply to you?’ I said, ‘Yes.’ Abu Bakr said, ‘Nothing prevented me from accepting your offer except that I learnt that Allah’s Messenger had referred to the issue of Hafsa and I did not want to disclose the secret of Allah’s Messenger, but had he (i.e. the Prophet) given her up I would surely have accepted her.’180

In modern times, a boy’s mother or father or even the boy himself may discover a girl who would make a desirable wife.

2. The second step in modern practice is for the boy’s father or mother to requests permission from the girl’s parents to discuss the possibility of marriage. In Arabic, the appointment for the parents to meet is called Wesatat Al-Zewaj and in Farsi Khawstigari.

3. When the parents meet, they work out the details of the marriage, such as the date and the dower or bride price.

4. Next, one set of parents - typically the boy’s parents - will make an appointment with the official authorized to make marriage agreements. Even today, this official is usually an imam or mullah.

5. At the appointed time, the wali of the girl, the wali of the boy, and two witnesses appear before the marriage official. It is customary nowadays, but not legally required, for the boy and girl to also appear. Because it is not legally required for the girl to appear, a girl can be married without her consent or even her knowledge. The official announces the bride’s offer in Arabic and then also announces the groom’s acceptance in Arabic. The things that are spoken are called khotba, a word that literally means “speeches,” “sermon,” and “betrothal.” At that moment, the boy and girl are married and may appropriately be called husband and wife. All legal consequences of marriage come into effect. From this point, any time the man desires sex the woman must consent. If she refuses, she is called nashizah - a legal term of art - and the husband’s duty to pay for her food and clothing is suspended. When a woman is nashizah, the husband’s right under surah 4:34 to physically force her submission - tamkeen - to his demand for sex by beating her becomes indisputable.

This al-nikah process is absolutely required for Muslims. A Muslim girl who gets married outside of this process, even if she marries the man selected by her wali, risks exciting the ghayra of her male family members. Aisha narrated the following hadith which is graded sahih, authentic, the highest grade of authenticity for a hadith:

Narrated Aisha:

Muhammad said, ‘Al-nikah is my path. Whoever does not follow my path is not from me.’181

The principle that a woman can be married in Islam without her consent or even her knowledge was significant in the ghayra - “honor” - killing of Noor Al-Maleki, a high school senior in Phoenix, Arizona in 2009. Noor’s case was reported by FOX News in the special, “A Question of Honor.”182 During her senior year, Noor’s father, Faleh, became upset by her neglect of sharia rules for women in favor of Western culture. Faleh took Noor to Iraq, his home country, for an arranged marriage. When Noor returned home, her friends asked her, “Are you technically married?”183 Noor answered, “No, not really. I never agreed to any of it and they had the ceremony without me.”184 Noor failed to realize that, from the perspective of Islam, her father was her wali and had the right to marry her without her knowledge or consent. Disregarding her marriage in Iraq, she moved in with an older woman and began to date the woman’s son. In July, 2009, Faleh Al-Maleki ran over both Noor and the woman, fatally injuring Noor.

Sharia dictates the order of priority of male relatives who can be the woman’s wali: first, the father, if no father then the grandfather, then the brother, brother’s son, father’s brother, father’s brother’s son.185 If a woman has no such male relatives then an Islamic magistrate may act as her wali. The wali must meet the following characteristics, he must be: 1) male 2) legally responsible 3) Muslim 4) upright, and 5) of sound judgment.186 The wali cannot be: 1) a woman 2) a child or insane person 3) non-Muslim 4) a corrupt person, or 5) someone whose judgment is unsound because of old age or “weak mindedness.”187

Muhammad laid down a clear rule that a Muslim woman who has not been married before may not arrange her own marriage:

It was narrated from Abu Hurairah that:

the Messenger of Allah said: ‘No woman should arrange the marriage of another woman, and no woman should arrange her own marriage. The adulteress is the one who arranges her own marriage.’188

A Muslim woman who arranges her own marriage becomes an adulteress in the eyes of Islam because sharia requires the consent of the wali in order for a marriage to exist. Without the wali’s consent, there is no marriage. A woman who arranges her own marriage is very likely to excite the ghayra of her male family members and fall victim to ghayra violence.

A woman who was legally married but has been properly divorced or become a widow does not need the permission of a wali to remarry. Under sharia, such a woman is called thayyibah. A divorced or widowed woman is still subject, however, to all the sharia rules for a woman’s dress and conduct. Because she has been married before, she faces an even higher level of scrutiny from her family and the Muslim community. To avoid exciting her male family member’s ghayra she must be even more cautious about her conduct than a woman who has never been married.

11. Divorce - Islam primarily, but not exclusively, gives the right to divorce to the husband. A woman may seek a divorce before the Islamic court, but it is rare for the court to issue a divorce to a woman. When the sharia court does issue a divorce based on a woman’s petition, it is issued on the man’s behalf, because, in Islam, it is really the man who divorces. Some of the circumstances which would enable the court to grant a woman’s petition for divorce include when the husband fails to pay the expenses Islam considers necessary for the upkeep of the woman - provided she has not failed to perform her duty of tamkeen by meeting her husband’s sexual demands - or when the woman’s life is threatened or endangered by the husband. This type of divorce is called a khul divorce. A woman may also procure a divorce by paying money to her husband to give his consent to the divorce. This type of divorce is called a mubarat divorce. For the man, divorce traditionally was affected simply by saying “I divorce you, I divorce you, I divorce you” before two male witnesses. Nowadays, Islamic governments frequently enforce the requirement the divorce be proclaimed before the Islamic court. The subject of divorce in sharia is extremely broad and beyond the scope of this book.

12. Tone of voice and manner of speaking - Koran prohibits a woman from speaking in a soft and seductive tone (Koran 33:32).

O wives of the Prophet! You are not like any other women. If you are pious, then don’t speak softly in a way that brings temptation to somebody who has a disease in his heart, but speak in a way that is proper [maruf] in Islam.189

In practice, Islamic society seems to put much more blame on women than men for sexual misconduct. The Koran, however, requires men to exercise self-control, regardless of whether women behave and dress modestly:

Tell the believing men to lower their gaze and protect their private parts. That is purer for them. For sure Allah knows all that they do.190

13. Going out of the house without permission - Sharia allows the man to forbid the woman from leaving the home for any purpose, even to visit her own family:

And remain in your houses and do not display yourselves like a tower as women displayed themselves in the time of ignorance, and perform As-Salat, and pay Zakat and obey Allah and His Messenger. For sure, Allah wants to take away blemishes from you, the members of the Prophet’s house, and to purify you with such a purification.191

There are two exceptions to the prohibition on leaving the house. A woman must be allowed out to attend the mosque or to go to the bathroom if there are no inside sanitary facilities:

Narrated Ibn `Umar:

One of the wives of `Umar (bin Al-Khattab) used to offer the Fajr and the `Isha’ prayer in congregation in the Mosque. She was asked why she had come out for the prayer as she knew that `Umar disliked it, and he has great ghaira (self-respect). She replied, ‘What prevents him from stopping me from this act?” The other replied, “The statement of Allah’s Messenger: ‘Do not stop Allah’s women-slave from going to Allah s Mosques’ prevents him.’192

Narrated `Aisha:

Once Sa`da bint Zam`a went out at night for some need, and `Umar saw her, and recognizing her, he said (to her), ‘By Allah, O Sa`da! You cannot hide yourself from us.’ So she returned to the Prophet and mentioned that to him while he was sitting in my dwelling taking his supper and holding a bone covered with meat in his hand. Then the Divine Inspiration was revealed to him and when that state was over, he (the Prophet was saying: ‘O women! You have been allowed by Allah to go out for your needs.’193

The sharia restriction that prevents women from leaving the home is not an anachronism, it applies to the daily lives of Muslim women today. This fact was most prominently illustrated by recent stories in the press about Saudi princesses who were being held prisoner in a compound in Jeddah.194

The command that women should stay in their houses leads to the principle that, when women are out, they should not sit in public or be among men while walking in the street, even if they are not communicating with the men in any way. Unless it is absolutely unavoidable, women should not sit next to men on public transportation. In many places in the Muslim world, public transport is segregated to help prevent men and women from coming into contact with each other. The concern is that just being in the presence of a woman will cause a man to fall into sexual temptation.

Sharia’s command that women should stay in their houses has led to ijma (consensus) by scholars in all legal schools that women are required to have a male escort who is either her husband or of her maharim (unmarriageable kin) in certain situations. The schools differ on when, exactly, an escort is required. Some allow the woman to travel alone within her city or on mandatory trips like the hajj, others do not.195

14. Having guests in the house without permission - A woman may not be alone with a male who is not unmarriageable kin under any circumstances.196 A woman may not permit anybody to enter her husband’s or father’s home unless he agrees, even if the potential visitor is unmarriageable kin to the woman. This rule derives from surah 33:53, which prohibited people to annoy Muhammad by entering his house and surah 33:58 which extends the prohibition on entering homes without permission to all Muslims:

O you who have faith! Do not enter the Prophet’s homes unless you are given permission to come for food, but don’t come so early you have to wait for it to be prepared. But come in when you are invited and when you have had your meal, disperse, and don’t feel free to sit and socialize. For sure that would be annoying to the Prophet, and he would feel shy [haya] of telling you, but Allah is not shy of the truth. And when you ask [his wives] for whatever you ask, ask them from behind a curtain [hijab], that is purer for your hearts and for their hearts. You should not annoy Allah’s Messenger, and you should never marry his wives after him. For sure! That would be an enormity before Allah.197

And those who annoy believing men and women undeservedly, bear on themselves the crime of slander and plain sin.198

15. Using the Internet, Cel phones, Email, etc. - Since a woman is not allowed to physically leave the house or receive physical guests without permission, she is not allowed to virtually leave or have virtual guests through the use of electronic means without permission.

16. Shyness - As discussed in Chapter Seven, the Islamic concept of shyness for women is, effectively, their reputation for following sharia’s rules of dress and conduct. A woman who carefully follows these rules displays haya, Islamic shyness. If a woman has a large degree of haya, nothing about her physical appearance or personality should be able to be detected when she is in public. A common expression in Muslim countries to describe a woman with high haya is “Even the sun has not seen her face.”

Having high haya means the woman is anonymous. This can be hard for Westerners to grasp, but a story may help. About four hundred years ago, in the times of the Safavid Dynasty, a young man who would grow to be the great Muslim scholar Sheikh Bahai was walking by the wall of a lush garden. A small stream ran along the wall, and one branch of an apple tree in the garden stretched out over the wall and the stream. The sheikh noticed an apple that had fallen into the stream and, without thinking, picked it up and took a bite. Then he remembered he was not the owner of the garden and so had no right to eat the fruit. Determined to right any possible wrong, the young sheikh set out in search of the owner of the garden. It turned out the garden was jointly owned by three people. The sheikh quickly found the first two, who agreed to make the apple halal for him. But the third owner refused to make the apple halal unless Sheikh Bahai agreed to marry the owner’s daughter. There was a catch, however. The owner said his daughter was blind, bald, and lame. Sheikh Bahai was determined to do the right thing, so he consented to marry the girl and the owner took him home to meet his new wife. When Sheikh Bahai saw the girl she looked back at him with perfect eyes. She had flowing, silky hair, and walked on long, healthy legs. Rejoicing in his good fortune, he asked the owner, “Why did you say she was blind, bald, and lame?” The owner replied, “When I saw your great piety about the apple, I knew you were the perfect husband for my daughter who has great haya. I said she was blind because she has never seen another man. I said she was bald because nobody has ever seen her hair. I said she was lame because she has never been out of the house.”

17. Becoming famous in any way causes a woman disgrace - Women are forbidden from becoming famous on the basis of surah 33:33 which prohibits women from becoming a tower. Being noticed in anyway contradicts sharia’s requirement that a woman display haya, or shyness. A woman who achieves fame in any way does not become simply a celebrity, she becomes infamous, notorious, and this idea is reflected in the very language of Arabic. In Arabic, the words that mean famous for men are mashoor or maroof. These words are modified to apply to women simply by adding the suffix “eh”, which yields mashooreh and maroofeh. But changing the word to apply to women also changes its meaning. Mashooreh and maroofeh both mean prostitute.

The requirement that women be anonymous explains the Arabic custom of changing a woman’s name to simply “mother of” one of her children. So, for example, a woman whose name might have been Fatima before she had a child named Salema would be called “Ummu Salema” after the child was born. A woman who does not have children might be called by the name of her father, for example Zaynab bint Jahsh, where “bint” means “daughter of” and “Jahsh” is her father’s name.

Around the world, there are millions of Muslim women who are well-known for every aspect of human achievement. The point is, their fame is un-Islamic. To the extent their fame irritates the ghayra of the Muslim men in their lives, their lives are at risk.

18. Not Marrying Non-Muslims - Muslim men are explicitly forbidden from marrying non-Muslim women,

And do not marry Al-Mushrikat [women who associate partners with Allah] until they believe. And surely a believing slave woman is better than a Mushrikah even though she impresses you. And do not give your daughters in marriage to Al-Mushrikun [men who associate partners with Allah] until they believe. And surely, a believing slave is better than a Mushrik even though he impresses you. The people who associate partners with Allah invite you to the fire, but Allah invites you to paradise and forgiveness by His permission, and makes His verses clear to mankind so that they would be mindful.199

but Muslim men can have sex with non-Muslim slave girls:

For sure the believers have succeeded. They are humble in their prayers. And they turn away from idle conversation. And they pay Zakat. And they guard their private parts except from their wives or the captives [slave women] that their right hands possess, because in that way they are free from blame. But those whose desires exceed these limits are transgressors.200

Sunni Muslim men do often marry non-Muslim women nowadays, but it is haram (forbidden) for them. Shia men are allowed to marry women of the “people of Scripture” - Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians - temporarily. The temporary marriage is known in Arabic as a muta marriage. It may last from minutes to years, the point is the parties do not consider it to last until death. At one point Muhammad allowed his soldiers to fulfill their sexual needs through temporary marriage, but at the Battle of Khaibar he abrogated permission for temporary marriage according to an hadith.201 Shia Muslims do not follow this hadith and still practice temporary marriages.

One of the most important principles in Islam is that Allah has not made any way for non-Muslims to be above Muslims. This principle is stated expressly in the last part of surah 4:141:

Those who are waiting to see if Allah will give you a victory, then they say: “Were we not with you?” but if the victory belongs to unbelievers, they say to the unbelievers: “Did we not look after you and protect you from the believers?” For sure, Allah will judge between you on the Day of Resurrection. And Allah has not provided a way for unbelievers to be over [above, superior to, having authority over] the believers.202

Surah 4:34 contains a similar principle relating to the relationship of men and women. Women may never have authority over men:

Men are the custodians and sustainers over women because Allah has given priority to some over others and because they spend of their property to pay for women. So the righteous women are constantly obedient and protect in the husband’s absence what Allah orders them to protect [their chastity and husband’s property]. And for those women from whom you fear disobedience [to their duty to provide sexual relations], admonish them, keep away from their beds, and beat them, but if they obey, don’t seek a way against them. For sure Allah is exalted and great.203

The principles in these two surahs work together to establish the rule that Muslim women may not marry non-Muslim men. A Muslim woman who marries a non-Muslim man places herself under the authority of a non-Muslim, violating the Koran’s rule that Allah has not made any way for a non-Muslim to have authority over a Muslim. This prohibition against marrying non-Muslim men adds an additional concern to the Muslim man’s ghayra in the West. Muslim marriages are sometimes arranged by the parents, so a girl who does not marry the Muslim man her family selects runs the risk of exciting the ghayra of her male family members. If the Muslim girl marries a non-Muslim man she creates an even greater ghayra problem. She not only violates the male’s ghayra by marrying someone they did not select, but because the husband has authority over the wife, by marrying a non-Muslim man she violates the cardinal principle that a non-Muslim may not be superior to a Muslim.

19. Tattoos - Tattoos are forbidden for both men and women. However, the use of henna to die the hands on ceremonial occasions is allowed and the practice is widespread. In the Middle East, you can see both men and women with black or brown dye on their hands, feet, and nails. In modern times, perhaps owing to the increasing popularity of tattoos, body art done with henna, which is only temporary, is allowed. It matters what is drawn on the body. Islam forbids pictures of any type, so the only henna body art allowed are geometric designs.

Narrated Abu Huraira:

A woman who used to practise tattooing was brought to `Umar. `Umar got up and said, “I beseech you by Allah, which of you heard the Prophet saying something about tattooing?” l got up and said, “O chief of the Believers! l heard something.” He said, “What did you hear?” I said, “I heard the Prophet (addressing the ladies), saying, ‘Do not practise tattooing and do not get yourselves tattooed.’”204

Narrated Muslim:

We were with Masruq at the house of Yasar bin Numair. Masruq saw pictures on his terrace and said, “I heard `Abdullah saying that he heard the Prophet saying, ‘The people who will receive the severest punishment from Allah will be the picture makers.’205

20. Music and dancing - Westerners probably do not know it, but Islam forbids music - all music - even traditional music. The only musical instrument that is allowed is the daf drum, a large thin drum, about 2 inches thick and 20 inches in diameter. The daf has metal chains around the rim that are just long enough to strike the head when the player moves the drum the right way. Muhammad allowed the daf to be played after a marriage:

Narrated Ar-Rabi`:

(the daughter of Muawwidh bin Afra) After the consummation of my marriage, the Prophet came and sat on my bed as far from me as you are sitting now, and our little girls started beating the tambourines and reciting elegiac verses mourning my father who had been killed in the battle of Badr. One of them said, “Among us is a Prophet who knows what will happen tomorrow.” On that the Prophet said, “Leave this (saying) and keep on saying the verses which you had been saying before.206

The word translated “tambourines” in this hadith is actually “daf” in the Arabic. It is strange that Muhammad prohibited all music but allowed the daf to be played because, in the hands of a talented player, the daf is a remarkably expressive instrument. With just one skin, a good player can sound like he’s playing an entire Western drum kit. For an example of the daf handled by a great player, Pejman Hadadi, watch http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ML3x8lEGUUc.

Music is considered to be part of the pre-Islamic time of ignorance - jahiliyya - before people turned to worship Allah with piety. When Allah sent the Koran, He forbade idle pursuits that turn people away from hearing the Koran:

There are, among men, people who buy [value] idle talk [such as music and signing] to mislead from the way of Allah without knowledge and they adopt mockery. These shall have an agonizing punishment.207

In the Arabic, the words translated “idle talks” are literally “Lahw Al-Hadith” which means “foreplay talks,” activities that lead to sexual relations. As is obvious from the parenthetical gloss the translator has provided in this ayat, Muslim scholars consider singing and music to be prohibited by this verse because they lead to sex and, ultimately, unbelief and damnation. In his tafsir, Ibn Kathir recites the opinions of many scholars:

He [Allah] connect[s] that with mention of the doomed, those who turn away from the Qur’an and do not benefit from hearing the Words of Allah. Instead, they turn to listening to flutes and singing accompanied by musical instruments. As Ibn Mas`ud commented about the Ayah: (And of mankind is he who purchases Lahu Al-Hadith to mislead (men) from the path of Allah), he said, ‘This -- by Allah -- refers to singing.’ (And of mankind is he who purchases Lahw Al-Hadith to mislead (men) from the path of Allah without knowledge,) Qatadah said: ‘By Allah, he may not spend money on it, but his purchasing it means he likes it, and the more misguided he is, the more he likes it and the more he prefers falsehood to the truth and harmful things over beneficial things.’ It was said that what is meant by the words (purchases idle talks) is buying singing servant girls. Ibn Jarir said that it means all speech that hinders people from seeing the signs of Allah and following His path. His saying: (to mislead (men) from the path of Allah) means, he does this to oppose Islam and its followers. (and takes it by way of mockery.) Mujahid said, ‘This means mocking the path of Allah and making fun of it.’ (For such there will be a humiliating torment.) Just as they showed no respect to the signs and path of Allah, so they will be shown no respect on the Day of Resurrection, and they will be subjected to a painful, ongoing torment.208

Islam is unequivocal that Allah will punish those who listen to music and singing:

It was narrated from Abu Malik Ash’ari that the Messenger of Allah said:

People among my nation will drink wine, calling it by another name, and musical instruments will be played for them and singing girls (will sing for them). Allah will cause the earth to swallow them up, and will turn them into monkeys and pigs.209

Islam links music to sexual activity very strongly, so a girl or woman’s desire to play or listen to music or to sing is very likely to irritate a Muslim male’s ghayra. Especially today, Westerners can understand the linkage between some types of music and sex, but what may be surprising is that Islam makes this connection with all types of music, including classical and even marching band music. A daughter who wants to play in her Western high school’s marching band runs the risk of exciting her father’s ghayra. It isn’t just playing music that is forbidden, it is listening to music as well.

Islam does except one type of singing from the blanket prohibition of music and song, that is Koran singing. The most well-known example of this exception is the Egyptian Abdul Basit, who is usually considered to be the greatest Koran singer of all time. He is unofficially credited with bringing over a million people into Islam by his voice. You can listen to examples of Abdul Basit from this page on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=abdul+basit.

Muslims have tried to bypass Islam’s restrictions by making music without the use of instruments. An outstanding example of this is the extremely talented and creative a cappella and video artist Alaa Wardi, who is extremely popular in the Muslim world. You can listen - and watch - Alaa Wardi on this page: http://funoon.co.uk/alaa-wardi-saudi-arabias-youtube-star-does-bollywood/. Whether made with instruments or not, music is still haram in Islam.

The factor that makes music lead to sexual activity is that it prompts one to move the body rhythmically. This is dancing. As much as music is considered to be forbidden, dance is also forbidden and can excite a Muslim man’s ghayra.

21. Shaking Hands

In Western society there are two practices that are common forms of greeting, shaking hands and hugging. Since sharia prohibits men and women of marriageable age from interacting in any way, these practices are obviously haram, yet we see many Muslims engaging in them. There are three possible reasons why we see this. First, these Muslims may be ignorant about Islamic rules. This is particularly likely among Muslims who were born or grew up in the West. The second reason is that they may not care about violating Islamic rules, or think the rules do not apply today. The third reason is that they are making taqiyya - they know the behaviors are prohibited, but they also know that under surah 3:28 they have license to deceive non-Muslims to further Islam’s agenda.

22. Female Circumcision

Muhammad stated expressly that circumcision is required:

Narrated Abu Huraira:

Allah’s Messenger said, ‘Five practices are characteristics of the Fitra: circumcision, shaving the pubic region, clipping the nails and cutting [the hair under the armpits and] the mustaches short.’210

The Arabic word fitra used here literally means instinct, as in what one instinctively knows is right or wrong. The idea is it is self-evident to all individuals that these five acts are required. The word translated circumcision is al-khitan, the plural of khatna, the Arabic word that literally means circumcision. The use of the plural form shows circumcision is required for both men and women and this is confirmed by a sahih (authentic) hadith that makes a ghusl bath necessary after circumcised male and female sexual organs touch:

Aishah narrated that:

the Prophet said: ‘When the circumcised meets the circumcised then Ghusl is required.’211

The circumcision Islam requires for girls is radically different from circumcision performed on boys. For boys, circumcision simply means cutting the foreskin around the head of the penis. Islamic circumcision for boys copies the ritual performed by the Jews and, indeed, its origin dates back to when Abraham circumcised Ishmael in Genesis 17:23. Male circumcision is usually performed shortly after birth, however all Muslim males are required to be circumcised so uncircumcised male converts to Islam must also undergo the procedure regardless of their age.

For girls, circumcision means the complete removal of the woman’s clitoris. The purpose of female circumcision is to serve the male’s ghayra by reducing the likelihood a woman will engage in illicit sexual relations. The idea is that removing the clitoris will reduce the woman’s desire for sex.

Female circumcision strikes Westerners as cruel and unusual, so it is often the object of taqiyya212 by Muslim leaders in the West. In many Islamic countries, there is no such taqiyya, and the requirement for female circumcision is asserted unabashedly. An obvious example of such taqiyya may be found in Nuh Ha Mim Keller’s translation of Reliance of the Traveller, a six hundred year old manual for laymen on sharia law as practiced by the Shafi legal school. Keller’s translation presents the English side by side with the original Arabic. Here is what Keller’s English translation says about circumcision:

Circumcision is obligatory (O: for both men and women. For men it consists of removing the prepuce from the penis, and for women, removing the prepuce (Ar. bazr) of the clitoris (n: not the clitoris itself, as some mistakenly assert). (A: Hanbalis hold that circumcision of women is not obligatory but sunna, while Hanafis consider it a mere courtesy to the husband.)213

Here is what the Arabic actually says:

It is required on every man and woman, al khitan (plural form of circumcision). And that is cutting the skin that is over the head of the penis. But about woman’s circumcision, that is cutting the clitoris.

You will only discover Keller’s deception if you know Arabic. Although he claims the requirement is to remove the prepuce of the clitoris, the word he translates as “prepuce” in the Arabic passage is actually - bazr [bathr] - which is, in fact, the Arabic word for clitoris. It is the clitoris which must be removed. If the passage had said “prepuce of the clitoris” it would have used the Arabic term gholfat al-bathr. It is common sense that what would be required is the removal of the clitoris because removing just the prepuce would not serve Islam’s purpose of protecting the man’s ghayra.

Treatment of Slave Girls Under Sharia

Because of the maqasid al-sharia - the goal of Islam - that Muslims must fight until the religion of Allah reigns supreme, the world is divided into two houses. The House of Islam (Dar al-Islam) consists of the people and territory Islam has subjugated. The House of War (Dar al Harb) or House of Unbelief (Dar al Kufr) is everybody and everywhere else. When Islam conquers a non-Islamic territory, Islam divides the people into two groups based on their beliefs, the “people of the book” and everybody else. When the people of the book who refuse to submit to the political control of Islam by becoming dhimmis and paying jizya and the “everybody else” who are not people of the book are captured, their marriages are immediately and automatically dissolved, their women and children become slaves, and their property is confiscated as booty. The men are usually killed, but even before they are killed their wives can be used for sex.

Normally, having sex with a married woman would be forbidden for Muslim men. This prohibition is contained in surah 4:24, which also allows Muslim men to have sex with non-Muslim married women who have been captured in a war:

Also (forbidden are) women already married, except those (captives and slaves) whom your right hands possess….214

The Arabic translated “captives and slaves whom your right hands possess” is malakat aymanukum. “Those whom your right hands possess” is an Islamic legal term of art used to refer to slave women.

When a non-Muslim male is captured he becomes a mamluk, an Arabic word that literally means “owned by.” The Muslim who is the owner of the mamluk is the malik. This relationship is like a man owning a horse. The non-Muslim captive becomes the animal of the Muslim owner. Like an animal, the non-Muslim captive has no power to own anything himself, just as a horse is not the owner of its saddle. Because the Muslim malik is the owner of both the non-Muslim man and woman, he does not need to get permission from the non-Muslim man before using the non-Muslim woman for sex.

Conclusion

Traditional Western concepts of morality for the dress and conduct of women share a common purpose with the rules of Islam. Both regulate a woman’s sexual attractiveness and conduct. Both consider following the rules is an important part of demonstrating piety. There are differences, however. For example, Western rules recognize that courting behaviors are, in effect, “search costs” and serve the important social function of identifying an optimal mate for a productive relationship, measured along many more dimensions than just procreation. Western rules therefore want the personality of the woman to be displayed but not her body. Islamic rules go further, considering the woman’s personality and even her voice to be part of her physical attractiveness. Where Western rules aim at modesty, Islamic rules therefore aim at anonymity.

The sharia rules for women illustrate the general principle that Muslim men - fathers, husbands, and other male family members - control women’s appearance, attractiveness, behavior towards the opposite sex, and even attitudes towards sex. These rules are followed very strictly in Islamic society. Because these rules are so extensive and strict, when Muslim families come to the West, almost every aspect of daily living presents a challenge to the Muslim man who needs to protect his ghayra.

Chapter Nine

Al-amr bi Al-Ma’ruf wa Al-nahy ‘an Al-Munkar

Ghayra is 1) control by the Muslim male 2) over his namoos 3) to preserve Islamic concepts of morality. The Islamic concepts of morality that are relevant to ghayra violence are the rules and principles of sharia relating to dress and sexuality that women must obey. When women violate these rules and principles, they irritate the Muslim male’s ghayra. The Muslim male’s response to an affront to his ghayra is also provided by sharia, it is scripted in provisions known in Arabic as “al-amr bi al-ma’ruf wa al-nahy ‘an al-munkar.” This phrase literally means “enjoining good and forbidding evil.” Henceforth we’ll refer to these provisions as the “amr bil ma’ruf” provisions for short, as Muslims themselves do. Throughout the Muslim world, the phrase “amr bil ma’ruf” is well known.

The amr bil ma’ruf provisions are not intended to punish, they are designed to protect the umma from evil. They are a series of steps that first warn, then discipline, and finally, if necessary, eliminate a threat to the umma posed by people who violate sharia. The purpose of amr bil ma’ruf is correction, not punishment. Just as jihad is intended to contain, subjugate, and eliminate unbelief outside the umma, amr bil ma’ruf is designed to contain and eliminate non-Islamic acts inside the umma. The amr bil ma’ruf provisions thus rest on a larger theological idea, the idea that sin - violation of sharia - ultimately comes from unbelief. What the West calls “honor killing” is just the final step in the amr bil ma’ruf provisions when they are exercised to eliminate a specific type of threat, the violation of sharia’s sexual provisions by a woman who is a Muslim man’s namoos. Understood in this way, it is clear that ghayra is not just ordinary male jealousy, “machismo,” or a tribal or cultural phenomenon. It is an essential and deeply rooted concept in the religion of Islam designed to stop certain types of behaviors that reflect unbelief in the will of Allah as revealed in his divine law. This is why we see ghayra violence, up to and including “honor killing,” wherever there are Muslims - in the West, in the Middle East, and from Morocco to Indonesia.

Koranic Verses on Amr Bil Ma’ruf

The Koran commands Muslims to enjoin good and forbid evil in many verses. Together, these verses define not only the substantive requirements of the duty but also who is responsible for executing amr bil ma’ruf. Like jihad, enjoining good and forbidding evil is an activity that may require the action of Muslims at many different levels within the umma. The scope of the duty depends on the magnitude and scope of the evil:

In the event of jihad, all those who are able to fight, according to the scholars, are to take part in it as an obligatory duty. If they are too weak or negligent, it is the duty of their neighbors to come to their rescue. Should they also be unable to resist the enemy, it becomes incumbent, in turn, on the Muslims in more outlying areas to help. It is thus possible that at a given stage, it may even become incumbent on all Muslims.215

Muslim scholars have written a great deal about who is required to do amr bil ma’ruf, but the practical reality is that the duty falls on all Muslims, because the problem of amr bil ma’ruf is a problem of distributed information. Those who have the greatest knowledge of Islam are not always the ones who know about an evil happening somewhere. Every Muslim must enjoin good and forbid evil to the extent that he has the knowledge and ability to do so:

[B]oth the efforts of scholars and the efforts of laypersons are included in the call to enjoin what is good and right and forbid what is wrong. Both work toward the same end. Both the scholar and the lay person can preach and invite to the call in their respective ways. The learned scholar has a thorough knowledge of the Koran and Hadith. Lay Muslims have a familiarity with the basic teachings of Islam, and this is sufficient, too. The learned can tackle the complex and delicate issues, but even a lay Muslim can persuasively deliver the fundamental teachings of Islam. In summary, even those Muslims who do not possess a thorough knowledge of Islamic science cannot and should not be exonerated from the performance of this duty.216

The notion that every Muslim must engage in amr bil ma’ruf is supported by surah 9:71, which makes every Muslim believer responsible for the behavior and conduct of other Muslims. The verse is also a call to lift oneself above the status of being simply a Muslim to become a believer, a member of the Mu’minun:

The believing men and women are guardians of each other. They enjoin good and forbid evil and stand up for prayer and pay zakat and obey Allah and His Messenger. They are the ones upon whom Allah will shower blessing. For sure Allah has honor [ezzat] and is wise.217

The Arabic word translated “believing” in surah 9:71 does not mean Muslims, it is “mu’minun, which means “believers.” The idea is that enforcing sharia, which embodies all that Islamic monotheism requires, is what distinguishes a believer from someone who is just a Muslim.

The primary verse dealing with amr bil ma’ruf is surah 3:104, which commands:

Let there arise out of you a group of people inviting to all that is good (Islam), enjoining Al-Ma’ruf [all that sharia commands] and forbidding Al-Munkar [all that sharia forbids]. And they are the successful.218

The word translated “successful” at the end of surah 3:104 is “al-Muflihun,” which literally means those who have salvation. This is not a promise of paradise to those who engage in amr bil ma’ruf. The only way to be sure of going to paradise in Islam is to kill and be killed in the cause of Allah, as stated in surah 9:111:

For sure, Allah has bought from the believers their lives and their property in exchange for Paradise. They kill in the way of Allah, so they kill and are killed. This is a true promise in the Torah and the Gospel and the Qur’an. And who fulfills his promise more than Allah? So take the good news about the bargain you have concluded with Him. That is the magnificent eternal happiness.219

Surah 3:104 simply means that enjoining good and forbidding evil is one of the characteristics of those who have Islamic faith, and only those who have Islamic faith have the chance to have salvation and go to paradise.

In Chapter Five we pointed out that describing Islam simply in terms of the Five Pillars is either ignorant or deceptive, because there are things one must believe and do in order to have a chance of going to paradise that are not included in the Five Pillars.220 A person who follows only the Five Pillars is just a Muslim, they are part of what the Koran calls al-Muslimun, but they are not part of al-Mu’minun. Al-Mu’minun are believers, those who have faith. The mu’minun, and those whose faith exceeds them, are the only groups that Koran says have a chance of going to paradise. Jihadists, of course, are guaranteed paradise. Muslims who follow only the Five Pillars save their earthly lives and property from being taken by the Islamic army, but they have no chance of going to paradise. They do not go to paradise because their faith is not complete. The good works of those who are just Five-Pillar Muslims don’t even get counted in the scales.

In Chapter Five we quoted Koran surah 4:136 for the list of things one must believe in order to be one of the mu’minun.221 As we noted then, only the very first element in this surah - the shahada, “there is no God but Allah and Muhammad is His Messenger” - is included in the Five Pillars:

O you who believe! Believe in Allah, and His Messenger (Muhammad) and the Book (the Quran) which He has sent down to His Messenger, and the Scripture which He sent down to those before (him); and whosoever disbelieves in Allah, His Angels, His Books, His Messengers, and the Last Day, then indeed he has strayed far away.222

Some of the practices that are necessary to be counted among the Mu’minun are listed in surah 9:112:

(The believers whose lives Allah has purchased are) those who repent to Allah (from polytheism and hypocrisy, etc.), who worship Him, who praise Him, who fast (or go out in Allah’s Cause), who bow down (in prayer), who prostrate themselves (in prayer), who enjoin (people) for Al-Ma’ruf (i.e. Islamic Monotheism and all that Islam has ordained) and forbid (people) from Al-Munkar (i.e. disbelief, polytheism of all kinds and all that Islam has forbidden), and who observe the limits set by Allah (do all that Allah has ordained and abstain from all kinds of sins and evil deeds which Allah has forbidden). And give glad tidings to the believers.223

While this list includes the elements of fasting and prayer from the Five Pillars, it should be obvious that it goes far beyond the Five Pillars. It explicitly includes the requirement that one engage in amr bil ma’ruf. It also contains the sweeping requirement that one “observe the limits set by Allah,” which means following all of sharia law.

Surah 3:110 states the Islamic umma are the best of all mankind. Because they are the best, they enjoin good and forbid evil and “believe in Allah.” The Arabic word used here to refer to those who “believe in Allah” is mu’minun, not muslimun. Thus, this surah also highlights the distinction between mu’minun, who engage in amr bil ma’ruf, and those who are just Muslims:

You are the best umma ever sent out for mankind; you enjoin Al-Ma’ruf and forbid Al-Munkar and you believe in Allah. And had the People of the Book (Jews and Christians) believed, it would have been better for them; some of them are believers in Allah, but the majority of them are sinful.224

Koran’s requirements create a hierarchy among Muslims reflected in the following chart. The importance of amr bil ma’ruf - enjoining good and forbidding evil - is it is one of the characteristics that shows one is a mu’min and has a chance of going to paradise. The categories in the hierarchy are transitive above the level of being one of the Muslimun, that is, above the level of being a Muslim, every one in a higher category is also a member of the lower categories. For example, everyone who is one of the Muttaqun is also one of the Mu’minun, and is also one of the Muslimun. One can only move up to a higher category by achieving a higher level of faith and practice. Jihad is an exception. One who is martyred in jihad obtains paradise without regard to his previous level of faith and practice.

What is Good or Evil?

The good that is supposed to be enjoined is “Islamic Monotheism and all that Islam has ordained” and the bad that is to be forbidden is “polytheism and disbelief and all that Islam has forbidden.” Stated more completely:

The ultimate good is the religion of Allah as revealed and practiced by the Prophet Muhammad. Good in its wider context embraces the whole Islamic value-system; its beliefs and ideas; and its political, ethical, and liturgical principles. It is the duty of Muslims to invite humankind to this goodness. All that has been prescribed by Islam is good and what has been forbidden by Islam is evil.

For Muslims, the Islamic way should be the only ideal way of life, for all other systems or ways of life are imperfect and sinful. Muslims should devote themselves to establishing the Islamic way of life and rooting out all other systems.225

The objects upon whom enjoining good and forbidding evil is practiced are other Muslims. Amr bil Ma’ruf is directed inside the umma. As we discussed in Chapter One, outside the umma the tools for enjoining good and forbidding evil are da’wa, the call to Islam that must precede jihad, and jihad.

The Steps for Amr Bil Ma’ruf

Sharia law contains an exact procedure to fulfill Islam’s command to enjoin good and forbid evil. This is the script that virtually all perpetrators follow to reach the point at which they commit ghayra violence. Perpetrators don’t necessarily follow all the steps or take them in order, but they generally move from gentler correction to more severe measures. Not every act of amr bil ma’ruf ends in a fatality. If a gentler corrective measure is effective to end the behavior that violates sharia and irritates ghayra then harsher steps should not be taken.

Sharia’s steps for amr bil ma’ruf are as follows:

1. Knowledge of the wrong act - This step consists of two obligations. The first is an obligation on the person who will do amr bil ma’ruf - the amer - to know those acts that are forbidden in Islam. The second is to be observant - within one’s family, on the street, at work - to notice when a violation of sharia occurs. The Koran forbids Muslims from being cynically inquisitive - they may not purposefully ask questions, eavesdrop, or spy in order to find fault.226 In relation to ghayra, the duty means to understand the sharia requirements for women’s dress and conduct that relate to sexuality. It is not required that one be a Muslim scholar or expert in sharia. The general knowledge of Islam Muslims acquire by enculturation is sufficient to enable them to perform amr bil ma’ruf. Every institution of Islamic society helps to transmit sharia’s requirements and values to Muslims of all ages. Within Muslim families, the requirements that relate to ghayra are so important they are ingrained in children from a young age. The reality is Muslim parents may not even realize the values they pass on to their children come from sharia, they just know they are the requirements they were taught to observe when they were young. The Muslim’s duty is simply to act to enforce those things he knows. Even a Muslim who is illiterate can perform amr bil ma’ruf to the extent he has some knowledge.

2. Explaining something is wrong - once again, the “wrong” here refers to a violation of sharia’s rules, which can be very different from what conscience generally dictates in the West. The duty in this step is essentially a duty to teach. It should be carried out politely, not in a way that is offensive or overbearing. An example within the family might be the father explaining to the daughter that Islam requires a woman to wear hijab rather than Western clothing or that listening to music is forbidden. The step does not require the use of words. Often a father will indicate a behavior is disapproved with a scowl or glare. This is a gesture used by parents everywhere, the difference is in amr bil ma’ruf the offending behavior is a violation of sharia.

3. Forbidding the act verbally - In this step, the person doing amr bil ma’ruf attempts to stop a violation “by admonition, advice, and making the other fear Allah, mentioning the hadiths of divine punishment for it [the violation] and reminding the person how the early Muslims behaved, all of which should be done with sympathy and kindness, not harshness or anger.”227

4. Censuring with harsh words - This degree of severity in doing amr bil ma’ruf “consists of reviling the person and bearing down on him with sharp, harsh words.”228 Harsh words does not mean vulgarity or swearing, it means words intended to show the ignorance and foolishness of continuing to violate sharia, such as “shame on you!” or “don’t you fear Allah?”

5. Righting the wrong by hand - This is the first level of amr bil ma’ruf where physical violence is allowed. In this step violence is allowed against property but not against the person of someone who is violating sharia. In addition, the amount of force used must be only so much as is reasonably calculated to accomplish the objective. For example, since all musical instruments are haram except for the daf drum, if a girl continues to possess a musical instrument after being told they are forbidden, her father could break the instrument under the authority of this step. No compensation need be paid to the owner of the instrument since “in Islam, items forbidden by Islamic law have no worth.”229 By the same rationale, the father could destroy Western clothing. An interesting situation arises with regards to items that are halal in themselves but may be used for forbidden purposes, such as an iPod used to listen to music. The iPod is halal, but listening to music is haram, so a person doing amr bil ma’ruf in the correct way would delete the music files from the iPod or confiscate the iPod, but not destroy it.

6. Intimidation - this step involves threatening the wrong doer with violence, it is the equivalent of assault in Western law. There are two rules that apply to this step. First, one should not make threats one is not capable of carrying out. To do so makes the person doing amr bil ma’ruf - the amer - look like he is not serious. The second is the amer may not threaten persons other than the person needing correction. The amer may not threaten the wrong doer’s friends or family.

7. Battery - directly hitting or kicking the person, or “similar measures that do not involve weapons.”230 Such similar methods could include imprisonment. This step is allowed to private individuals with no requirement to obtain permission from any religious or governmental authority. Once again, however, the amount of force used should be only what is reasonably required to stop the violation. Unfortunately, once someone begins to use violence, he may find pleasure in beating somebody up, so in practice it is difficult to limit the amount of force used. In the context of vindicating ghayra, the Muslim male typically takes action himself, however sharia does not prevent people from asking others to assist them or from hiring others to carry out this step for them.

8. Force of arms - this step allows the use of weapons and deadly force, including assembling an armed group for assistance. In the context of vindicating ghayra, the group that assists the person doing amr bil ma’ruf often consists of other family members. Neither Koran nor hadith contain a requirement that the amer obtain any sort of permission before taking this step and killing the person violating sharia. Hundreds of years ago, caliphs might have required permission to be obtained in the interest of preventing riot, and this requirement can still be found in some older sharia law books. Today, however, the requirement to obtain permission before using deadly force when doing amr bil ma’ruf is moot.

It is worth noting that the use of acid solely to disfigure a woman is not allowed by this step. The rationale for amr bil ma’ruf is to protect the umma by correcting a breach or neglect of a sharia commandment. Amr bil ma’ruf is not a form of punishment. The source of the breach or neglect is, ultimately, unbelief, so the real goal of amr bil ma’ruf is to change the heart. The use of acid to disfigure someone will not accomplish this purpose. The use of acid solely to disfigure is therefore un-Islamic. Under sharia, anyone who uses acid to disfigure a victim is subject to qisas, retaliation under the principle “that a punishment inflicted should correspond in degree and kind to the offense of the wrongdoer, as an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.”231

Non-Ghayra Amr Bil Ma’ruf

The Anglo-American philosophy of law and government recognizes the power to enforce moral rules is given initially to individuals. This means that in a state of nature - where no government exists - the individual has the power to enforce moral rules like don’t murder, commit adultery, steal, or lie. The individual has the right to use the amount of force reasonably necessary to prevent the violation, up to and including deadly force. For example, if a knife-wielding attacker attempts to rob you, you have the right to pull out a gun and shoot him dead. The only powers a government can justly exercise are those it receives by delegation from the citizens it serves. Thus, while a government might justly obtain a limited monopoly on the right to use force, it cannot legitimately bar citizens from using force to protect themselves when government cannot fulfill its obligation. There is a popular phrase used to emphasize the importance of citizens bearing arms, “when seconds count, the police are only minutes away.”

Islam has a similar notion that preserves an even larger scope of action for individual citizens. Under sharia, the government does not receive even a limited monopoly on the right to use force. Rather, the citizens’ right to enforce sharia by doing amr bil ma’ruf continues in parallel at all times with the Islamic government’s obligation to enforce sharia. The right - and duty - to enjoin good and forbid evil is part of Islam, so the Islamic government may not legitimately take it away from Muslim citizens.

This means individuals may employ the procedures for amr bil ma’ruf for any violation of sharia, not just to enforce sharia’s sexually-related rules for the women in a Muslim man’s namoos. Amr bil ma’ruf extends far beyond just the context of satisfying ghayra. For example, in July of 2014, twenty women alleged to be prostitutes in Baghdad were slaughtered in an attack carried out by Muslim men.232 The men scrawled “this is the fate of any prostitution” on a door in one of the apartments where the women were killed. Nine men in the apartments were also murdered by the attackers. If this attack was carried out to punish prostitutes then it exceeded sharia, because four male witnesses to the act of penetration are required to prove adultery before an Islamic court. If the attack was carried out to prevent the women from engaging in non-Islamic acts - like not being covered or wearing makeup in the presence of men who are not unmarriageable kin - it would still exceed sharia. To use deadly force legitimately, the men who carried out the attack would have had to satisfy two requirements. First, the men would have to have used a less severe method of correction first, deadly force cannot be the first step taken to do amr bil ma’ruf. Second, the men would have to have found the women in public. An amer is not allowed to enter the home of unrelated Muslims to do amr bil ma’ruf. If the perpetrators had approached the women in public and used less severe measures - like beating the women or imprisoning them - their actions would have been in accordance with sharia. Notice that although the situation is undeniably related to the sexual rules for women, there is nothing in the facts of the case to indicate the men were acting to pacify their ghayra, so the attack cannot properly be called an honor killing or ghayra violence. If the women who were killed were part of the namoos of the perpetrators, then the attack would properly be classified as ghayra killing. The point is that amr bil ma’ruf can be used to enforce any sharia commandment. Amr bil ma’ruf is not limited to the ghayra context.

Excessive Force in Amr Bil Ma’ruf

The attack against the prostitutes is an example of the situation where people engaged in violence often find it difficult to control themselves and limit the amount of force they use. The use of excessive force is a very real problem created because sharia authorizes individuals to do amr bil ma’ruf. The use of amr bil ma’ruf to vindicate ghayra makes the likelihood of the use of excessive force even greater. Because the severity of the man’s response serves to indicate the strength of his sense of ghayra, men often overreact and skip the steps that involve less severe measures. In practice, they frequently go directly to battery or even killing. For example, Noor Al-Maleki’s father, Faleh, apparently skipped steps like threatening or battery and went directly from arranging her marriage to killing her. Ghayra is so deeply ingrained in Muslim men and they value it so highly they cannot be expected to act rationally and go through the amr bil ma’ruf procedure step by step.

Another factor that makes it more likely excessive force will be used in a ghayra context are the provisions of sharia relating to when punishment is required for injurious crimes. Western commentators often quote the following provision from Umdat al-Salik, a popular Shafi school legal manual for laymen:

o1.2 The following are not subject to retaliation:

(4) a father or mother (or their fathers or mothers) for killing their offspring, or offspring’s offspring.233

In other words, this provision claims parents or grandparents can kill their children or grandchildren with impunity. Obviously, if someone can kill with impunity, he is more likely to use excessive force. Sharia is not quite as lenient as Umdat al-Salik makes it seem, however. Sharia does not grant impunity to mothers or grandmothers, Umdat al-Salik is wrong. Sharia only grants impunity for killing a child to the father or grandfather. Imam Shafi’i, the actual founder of the Shafi school, states in his book Al-Umm, “do not kill a father for a son.”234 The source for this principle are several ahadith which state the same thing exactly, for example:

Narrated ‘Umar bin Al-Khattab:

that the Messenger of Allah said: ‘The father does not suffer retaliation for [killing] the son.’235

It was narrated from Ibn ‘Abbas that the Messenger of Allah said:

‘A father should not be killed for his son.’236

The reason the father is not subject to retaliation is that he is considered to be the walid, the one who gives life to the child. Consequently, the father owns the blood of the child. The term walid is identical to the term wali we encountered in Chapter Eight when we looked at the sharia provisions that apply to the dress and conduct of women. The term wali is generally used in civil law contexts - divorce, custody, etc. - and walid is usually used in the criminal law context. The depth of meaning of wali and walid is reflected in the Arabic word for birthday - wiladat - which comes from the same root. The father, not the mother, is considered to be the parent who gives life because he provides the sperm. Consequently, only a male can be the walid and the owner of the blood of the child, so it is only the father or grandfather who can kill the child with impunity.

Amr Bil Ma’ruf and Government

Even though amr bil ma’ruf is part of Islam, the right and duty to carry it out is not universally respected in Muslim majority countries. Governments in Muslim majority nations can be classified into three groups, depending on the extent to which they enforce sharia. The first category is secular, those nations whose law is predominantly based on sources other than sharia. Pakistan, Turkey, Jordan, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Egypt, except for the time the Muslim Brotherhood was in power, are examples of secular governments in the Islamic world. Even though the law is secular in these nations and may not respect the right to perform amr bil ma’ruf, this often does not stop Muslims from doing amr bil ma’ruf.

The next category is observant, nations whose law is predominantly based on sharia but who recognize exceptions to sharia law to further their financial or diplomatic interests. Nations in this category include Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States.

The final category is religious, nations who attempt to completely enforce sharia law. The only states that fall into this category at present are Afghanistan and Iran. The Islamic State - the caliphate founded by the group known in the West as the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (Syria) - also falls into the category of attempting to completely enforce sharia although it has not yet been officially recognized as a state.

The closer a government is to enforcing sharia the more likely the state will maintain a dedicated police force whose purpose is to enforce sharia by doing amr bil ma’ruf. These forces are actually called the amr bil ma’ruf police by the citizens they control. Years ago they were called Mohtasib, an Arabic term that means “the auditors.”

What demonstrates amr bil ma’ruf is part of sharia - the rules for how to correctly practice Islam - and not simply the interpretation of one sect or group of Muslims is that sects who are otherwise mortal enemies all engage in amr bil ma’ruf in the same way. For example, the Iranian Islamic government is composed of Muslims who follow Twelver Shia Islam. ISIS, by contrast, are Sunni Muslims. ISIS brands Shiite Muslims as apostates, a crime deserving the death penalty under Islam. Nevertheless, ISIS and the Iranian Islamic government both maintain amr bil ma’ruf police forces that enforce sharia in the same way. This shows that while different sects of Muslims may dispute aspects of Islam, they all agree Koran expressly and unequivocally commands them to do amr bil ma’ruf.

At least one of ISIS’s amr bil ma’ruf police brigades is composed entirely of women. The website Syria Deeply (syriadeeply.org) reports:

Shortly after the Sunni militant group the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) retook control of Raqqa earlier this year, it created the al-Khansaa’ Brigade, an all-female unit operating in the city. Its purpose is to apprehend civilian women in Raqqa who do not follow the organization’s strict brand of Sharia law, including a mandate that all women be fully covered in public and that they be accompanied by a male chaperone.237

As should be clear from the provisions of sharia discussed in Chapter Eight, ISIS has not come up with a unique interpretation of sharia, they are simply enforcing what sharia commands. ISIS established an all female brigade of amr bil ma’ruf police specifically to avoid the dangers that would be presented by male police having to deal with female wrongdoers:

‘We have established the brigade to raise awareness of our religion among women, and to punish women who do not abide by the law,’ says Abu Ahmad, an ISIS official in Raqqa. ‘There are only women in this brigade, and we have given them their own facilities to prevent the mixture of men and women.’238

The part of the brigade’s operations that are amr bil ma’ruf are its actions to inform women of what is required and the steps up to and including apprehending the women who violate sharia. Once the violators are arrested, they are brought before a sharia court. In sharia, it is the court that both prosecutes the offenders and issues sentence. In Islam, there is no position of prosecuting attorney. The process of carrying out punishment is part of the operation of the sharia court, not part of amr bil ma’ruf.

The duty to enforce sharia is a parallel duty incumbent on both the Islamic government and the members of the umma. The fact some Islamic states enforce amr bil ma’ruf collectively through amr bil ma’ruf police forces does not take away the right of individual Muslims to perform amr bil ma’ruf. As this CBS video shows, Muslims in the UK have taken it upon themselves to begin amr bil ma’ruf patrols: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KaVXXQsAOjM. Amr bil ma’ruf only applies within the umma but these patrols also correct non-Muslims, leading to the conclusion that, in relation to non-Muslim Britons, the patrols are the da’wa that must precede jihad.

Chapter Ten

Enculturation:
How Values Are Passed

In Chapters Three through Six we saw Islam’s authoritative scripture commands violence both to spread and to protect Islam. In Chapter Seven we learned Islam has a unique tool called ghayra that exists to protect sharia concepts of sexual morality within the umma. In Chapter Eight we delineated the substantive content of sharia’s provisions relating to sexual morality. In Chapter Nine we saw how sharia scripts the Muslim man’s use of violence in response to a violation of sharia that irritates his ghayra. The scripted response are the steps sharia prescribes for carrying out amr bil ma’ruf, sharia’s private enforcement mechanism. Ghayra killing and lesser forms of ghayra violence all flow from following Islam’s scheme for protecting sexual morality within the umma.

But the fact ghayra killing and ghayra violence are both condoned and scripted in sharia law begs the question of why these practices exist among nominal Muslims, who are ignorant of the exact teachings of Koran, hadith, and sharia, and may even be illiterate. As we noted in Chapter One, whenever an honor killing occurs there is no shortage of Muslim apologists who will hurry to reassure an ignorant public there is no connection between Islam and honor killing. Perhaps even more surprisingly, sometimes victims themselves do not know they were attacked specifically because of ideas commanded by Islam’s god and law. For example, in one of the FOX News specials about honor killing we discussed earlier, we met Miriam, a young Muslim woman who survived being stabbed by her brother. Miriam told her interviewer her brother could not have been motivated by Islam because he was not a practicing Muslim.239 Could this young woman be correct? If she is correct, what could possibly have motivated her brother to try to kill her?

Unfortunately, she is not correct, Islam can and does provide the motivation for ghayra killing and ghayra violence, even among people who are not practicing Muslims and who do not know Islamic teaching and law. The reason for this is surprisingly simple if you think about it, it is because Islamic culture is Islam. Nothing persists in Islamic culture that does not come from Islam as commanded in Koran, hadith, and sharia, because Islam destroys anything that contradicts it. Any culture or values that go against Koran, hadith, and sharia are ultimately hunted down and eliminated, along with the people who practice them. The battle against non-Islamic cultures is perpetual, indeed, this is the function of amr bil ma’ruf, to cleanse Islamic culture of any non-Islamic values or behaviors that might infect the umma. Remember, amr bil ma’ruf may be exercised to correct any violation of sharia, it is not limited solely to the context of violations that irritate ghayra. To protect the umma, those who will not be corrected may be killed.

One example of the battle against non-Islamic cultures is the way Islam destroyed the culture of Persia. For more than a thousand years before there was Islam Persia had an empire and a rich culture. Persians valued many things Islam considers haram, in particular, music. For the past 1400 years, Islam has worked to eliminate all forms of music in Iran, and it has been largely successful. Even though the Shah’s government allowed music, people knew in their hearts that music was un-Islamic. Consequently, parents went so far as to disown or even kill children who sang or played musical instruments. Sometimes the community even prevented their bodies from being buried in Islamic cemeteries.

In Chapter Eight we explained the rules of sharia apply to every aspect of Islamic life, touching even such mundane and, one would think, non-religious behaviors as going to the bathroom (a specific reason sharia allows women to leave the house) or what color of clothing women are allowed to wear (they should not wear clothing that causes them to be noticed). Because sharia controls every aspect of a Muslims’ life, it influences everyone who grows up in Islamic culture, whether it be in a Muslim-majority country or an Islamic enclave in the West, and regardless of whether the person attends mosque. The critical factor that determines whether someone will engage in Islamic-motivated ghayra violence is the same as the factor that determines whether someone will engage in Islamic-motivated jihad violence. I identified this factor in my first book, New Jihadists and Islam. The critical factor is not whether they are observant, practicing Muslims, the critical factor is the strength of the connection that links them to Islam. If they have grown up in a family where the parents identify themselves as Muslims - whether or not the parents practice Islam - and in a community that identifies itself as Muslim - whether or not the majority of the members of the community practice Islam - their behaviors will reflect fundamental Islamic values. These fundamental values include the supremacy of Muslims over non-Muslims and men over women. The people involved may or may not recognize these values come from Islamic sources, what matters is the values control how they behave. In other words, people can learn and adopt attitudes and values simply by association, without the need to study religious texts or perform all of the requirements imposed by those texts. The process is also dynamic, the strength of an individual’s connection to Islam and the degree to which his behavior reflects Islam’s values and requirements can change over time. Because the values and behaviors are learned indirectly, rather than by studying Islamic texts, individuals can mistake their source, thinking “these are my family’s values” or “these are my heritage.” As we noted in Chapter Two, most Muslims are not Islamic experts - they are not mujtahids - able to attribute every attitude or behavior to its source in the Koran, hadith, and sharia.

If you have not experienced living in Islamic culture, you may doubt the values that lead to ghayra violence can be planted in the heart simply by living in an Islamic environment, but those who have lived in it know these values are instilled simply by association. This indirect method of transmitting values can sometimes lead to incongruous situations. For example, in Iran, it is not unusual to see a father who grew up in the 60s and 70s wearing bellbottoms and listening to the Beatles who nevertheless today requires his daughter to wear hijab and forbids her to date or even talk to men. Fathers do not perceive any inconsistencies in their attitudes, and daughters do not question this inconsistent treatment, because everybody knows Islam gives much more freedom to men than it does to women. The daughter thinks this situation is normal because everywhere she goes in the community she sees other women treated and behaving the same way. In Islam, there is no means of redress for the disparate treatment, and nothing for a woman to do but curse her fate for having been born a woman.

The case of Noor Al-Maleki, the young woman murdered by her father in 2009, demonstrates that while she grew up in the U.S., she also learned the Islamic ideas that limit a woman’s dress and conduct, even though she did not identify the source of these ideas as Islam. Noor said:

My family is Middle Eastern. My parents are very religious, but only about some things. I think we’re a very lenient family. Middle Easterns (sic) have certain rules to live by, and we can’t do some things. It’s very different from Americans. Since I grew up here, I have American ways but I still have to follow traditional rules.240

Noor said she faced limits because “Middle Easterns have certain rules to live by.” If she had been Pakistani, she would probably have identified the source of the rules as Pakistani culture, or if she had been Tunisian she might have said “North African culture,” but the real source is Islam. Islamic culture - Islam - is what all these countries have in common. Notice also that Noor, a person who has experienced both Western culture and Islamic culture, recognized these values are “very different.” Indeed, they are completely incompatible.

The problems that lead to ghayra violence come when women attempt to assert the right to adopt non-Islamic values for dress or behavior. In Muslim countries, this confrontation is usually less direct because the community does not support the woman’s rights. When women are likely to be observed by family members or people they know - who might enforce enjoining good and forbidding evil - they follow Islam’s requirements, but out of sight of family members they might misbehave. The situation is similar to what young women did when the miniskirt came into fashion in the 1960s. Girls left the house in school attire their parents considered proper, but changed into miniskirts once they were out of the house. The difference, of course, was Western girls donning mini-skirts never risked death for the sake of fashion. When Muslim families immigrate to the West, the confrontation can become more direct, with women more likely to abandon Islamic values in sight of their parents. To the extent the reinforcement of Islamic cultural values is reduced in the West, Muslim girls can misunderstand their position and think their family will accept their falling into Western modes of dress or social activity.

The Process of How Islam Motivates Violence Studied Scientifically

The process of how Islam motivates violence even among non-practicing Muslims has recently begun to be documented and confirmed scientifically. Social scientists have confirmed the transmission of Islamic attitudes and behaviors even among nominal Muslims who do not actively practice Islam. A 1987 study by Yvonne Yazbeck Haddad and Adair T. Lummis showed that prejudices against Muslim women marrying non-Muslim men and Muslim men being allowed to date exist even among “Eid Muslims” - Muslims who do not attend mosque or believe that Islam should be strictly observed:

Muslims who attend the mosque fairly often are more likely than those who are Eid Muslims or attend infrequently to disapprove of the marriage of Muslim women to non-Muslim men and dating for young unmarried persons. This seems to hold true even when other predictors are taken into consideration, such as whether the person is an immigrant or first- or second-generation American-born Muslim, and whether he or she believes that Islam should be observed strictly, moderately, or adjusted to fit life in the United States. Muslims who never or infrequently attend the mosque are more likely to feel that women should marry outside their faith if they want and that young men eighteen and over should be allowed to date. However, the Muslim respondents’ personal beliefs about how strictly Islam should be observed were somewhat more important than the number of times they attend the mosque; the more strictly Muslims believe Islam should be observed, not surprisingly, the more likely they are to agree that women should not marry outside the faith and disagree that young men should be allowed to date.241

The study shows that those who do not attend mosque frequently are more likely to approve marrying outside the faith than those who attend more frequently. This suggests that the problem of ghayra violence may actually be worse among men who do not attend mosque frequently and who do not believe Islam should be strictly observed, because they are more likely to marry women who do not know Islam’s requirements for women’s dress and behavior. As time goes by in the relationship, these men are more likely to find their ghayra irritated by the violation of a sharia value they may not have realized they held, such as the absolute authority of the Muslim man over women or how teenage daughters should behave.

Haddad and Lummis also found that the degree of cultural connection to other Muslims was an important factor in how strictly an individual followed Islam:

The degree to which Muslims socialize with non-Muslim Americans has a significant effect on how strongly they adhere to the Islamic position on dating and freedom of intermarriage with Christians and Jews for Muslim women as well as for Muslim men. Whether Muslims eat with non-Muslim Americans at all appears to have a greater effect on their attitudes than whether they also eat with Muslims (not family members) fairly frequently. At the same time… Muslims who eat frequently with other Muslims outside of their own families tend to be more rigorous in observance of Islamic regulations and duties than those who eat only with family members.242

Danish psychologist Nicolai Sennels has actually identified psychological factors that demonstrate Islamic values are transmitted by culture, even among non-practicing Muslims. Sennels was the psychologist at Copenhagen’s Sonderbro youth prison, where he engaged in individual and group therapy with more than a hundred Muslim youths. In his book, Among Criminal Muslims: A Psychologist’s Experiences from the Copenhagen Municipality, Sennels identified four psychological factors that distinguish Muslims from non-Muslims: aggression, insecurity, failure to take responsibility for their lives, and intolerance.243 Sennels explains his work does not stereotype Muslims, or fail to recognize that, in any culture, individuals will display a range of attitudes and behaviors:

One does not have to be an experienced and licensed psychologist to know that there are, of course, individual differences within any culture. But we have to accept the fact that different cultures influence people differently. There is one thing that is more dangerous and naive than generalizing [about] all people within an ethnic group, and that is to think that we are all the same and that Muslims and non-Muslims therefore can live in harmony. Islam sees itself as an enemy of non-Muslims.244

Sennels explains the meaning of each of the factors he uncovered in detail. For aggression he explains:

Westerners are brought up to think of anger as a sign of weakness, powerlessness, and lack of self-control. “Big dogs don’t have to bark,” as we say in Denmark. In Muslim culture, anger is seen as a sign of strength. To Muslims, being aggressive is, in itself, an argument and a way of gaining respect.245

On the factor of insecurity, Sennels explains it is related to how a Muslim sees himself as a member of a community, and how his standing in the community depends on how well his behavior reflects the values of that community. Insecurity is therefore directly related to the concept of honor as embodied in ezzat and sharaf. By contrast, ghayra primarily depends on how well the behavior of the Muslim man’s namoos reflects the values of the Muslim community. A Muslim man can hurt his own ghayra, for example, by allowing himself to be penetrated or allowing his female family members to engage in prostitution. Ghayra is a tool Islam uses to enforce sharia’s requirements, putting the man in the position of enforcer. Anything that reduces ghayra will also reduce ezzat and sharaf and can lead to insecurity:

The concept of honor in the Muslim culture is – just like in the case with anger – opposite of our Western view. It is common in the Muslim culture to be exceedingly aware of one’s status in the group, other peoples’ view of oneself, and any signs of any kind of criticism. The aggressive response to anything that can make one insecure is seen as an expression of honorable behaviour. But what is honorable about that? What kind of honor needs to be defended by all means necessary – including the abolishment of women’s human rights, such as the right to pick their own sexual partners, clothes, husband and life style? What is honorable about anger and the lack of ability to ignore provocations and handle criticism constructively?

After listening to more than a hundred Muslim teenagers telling their stories about their feelings, thoughts, reactions, families, religion, culture, the life in their Muslim ghettos and their home countries, it became clear to me that, to a Muslim, such behavior is the very core of keeping one’s honor. But seen through the eyes of Western psychology, it is all an expression of a lack of self-confidence. According to our view, the base of being authentic and honorable is to know one’s strengths and weakness – and accepting them. The ability to think “your opinion about me, not mine – and mine counts to me” when provoked, and being mature enough to handle criticism constructively is a source of social status in the Western world.

Unfortunately, the Muslim concept of honor transforms especially their men into fragile glass-like personalities that need to protect themselves by scarring their surroundings with their aggressive attitude. The show of so-called narcissistic rage is very common among Muslims. The fear of criticism is, in many cases, not far from paranoia. It is not without reason that self-irony and self-criticism is completely absent in the Muslim societies. Seen from a psychological perspective – whose aim is to produce self-confident, happy, free, loving and productive individuals; and not to please a hateful God or culture traditions – Muslim culture is in many ways psychologically unhealthy to grow up in.246

Sennels explains the third factor that characterizes the psychological effects of being raised in Muslim culture, failure to take responsibility for the quality of one’s life, relates to how Muslims see their lives as outside of their control:

To discuss individual responsibility, I need to first introduce the readers to the psychological term “locus of control.” Locus of control concerns if people see their life mainly influenced by inner or outer factors. In our Western culture, we see inner factors as more important than outer ones. Our point of view, our way of handling our emotions, our way of thinking, our way of reflecting, our way of reacting are all seen as ways that we decide our own lives. We may not always be aware of the way we think etc. and a whole industry has appeared because of that fact. Indeed, psychologists, therapists, psychiatrists, coaches, plus countless self-help books and magazines are overflowing in our societies and are all aiming at helping us to become aware of how we decide our own lives.

None of these things exists in the Muslim world. The few psychiatrists they have are often educated in the West and whatever psychology and pedagogy that exists in Muslim countries does not have root in the Muslim culture but are ideas imported from the West.

Thus, when a Westerner experiences problems he asks himself: “What can I change in myself/my life to become happier?” This mentality showed itself clearly among my Danish clients. It was deeply rooted in them that talking about oneself can be a way of finding better ways of handling one’s own life. When having Muslim clients on my couch it was, in most cases, like having someone from another planet visiting me. Under normal conditions, Westerners and Muslims can communicate relatively easily – as long as it does not involve criticism. But in a setting where the whole concept is centered about that the Muslim client has to talk about his own feelings and thoughts because the psychologist thinks that it will help him to become more happy and able to live constructively, the “chain falls off the bike” as we say in Denmark. They shake their heads: in which way can they become happier if they expose the weaknesses that they have been taught since birth to hide in order to retain their honor? No way, José. I finally managed to develop a therapeutic method that, to a certain extent, could address these cultural difficulties, but therapy and Muslim mentality will probably never become real friends.

An important aspect of this difference concerning locus of control is that people who see their own lives mainly guided by outer factors – a fearsome God, a powerful father, influential imams, ancient but strong cultural traditions – very easily develop a victim mentality. It is thus not without reason that conspiracies and blaming the non-Muslims are so central in Muslim leaders’ rhetoric and politics. This victim mentality also dominates the mentality of Muslim immigrants, who often have a long row of demands for economic support and Islamization of our societies to satisfy their personal needs.247

The fourth psychological factor Sennels identified as distinguishing those who grow up in Muslim culture is intolerance:

While Western societies in general define a good person as being open and tolerant, Muslims are told that they are superior to non-Muslims, destined to dominate non-Muslims, and that they must distance themselves socially and emotionally from non-Muslims. The many hateful and dehumanizing verses in the Quran and the Hadiths against non-Muslims closely resemble the psychological propaganda that leaders use against their own people in order to prepare them mentally for fighting and killing the enemy. Killing another person is easier if you hate him and do not perceive him as fully human.248

How Islam Instills the Psychological Factors

Each of the factors identified by Sennels results from specific aspects of the teachings of Koran, hadith, and sharia. People choose to behave in accordance with their perception of the costs and benefits of the different conduct choices available to them. Their perception of costs and benefits is determined by what they believe to be good or bad, or right or wrong. For this reason, the direction of causation of conduct is from moral beliefs to actions. It does not matter how one acquires his moral beliefs, whether by careful study of religious texts or enculturation, living among people who accept and follow a given set of moral beliefs. The number of citations that could be given to Koranic verses, particular hadiths, and sections of sharia that have a role in forming the psychological factors Sennels observed is vast, so we will focus on those Islamic sources that most closely relate to ghayra violence directed against women.

Considering aggression, the first psychological factor identified by Sennels, the Koran specifically condones violence against women in surah 4:34. As we previously discussed, this verse contains a script of actions a man may use to confront a woman’s failure to satisfy her husband’s sexual desires. The script effectively restates the sequence of steps from one to seven (battery) outlined in sharia for enjoining good and forbidding evil. Surah 4:34, however, stops short of the last response, which allows the use of deadly force:

Men are the custodians and sustainers over women because Allah has given priority to some over others and because they spend of their property to pay for women. So the righteous women are constantly obedient and protect in the husband’s absence what Allah orders them to protect [their chastity and husband’s property]. And for those women from whom you fear disobedience [to their duty to provide sexual relations], admonish them, keep away from their beds, and beat them, but if they obey, don’t seek a way against them. For sure Allah is exalted and great.249

Although surah 4:34 describes men as the custodians of women this provides no grounds for mercy. The mercy exists in the steady increase in severity of punishments. Men are instructed to begin with kind admonishments, but ultimately Muslim men can go “from telling them to beating them,” as we described earlier. Although 4:34‘s express provisions stop at beating a woman, a woman’s failure to follow sharia’s requirements for her dress and conduct presents a threat to Islam itself that can trigger the provisions for enjoining good and forbidding evil, which do allow the use of deadly force. The relation between a woman’s obedience to her husband and obedience to Islam’s god can be clearly seen in an hadith related by Ibn Majah:

It was narrated that:

Abdullah bin Abu Awfa said “When Muadh bin Jabal came from Sham, he prostrated to the Prophet who said: ‘What is this, O Muadh?’ He said: ‘I went to Sham and saw them prostrating their bishops and patricians and I wanted to do that for you.’ The messenger of Allah said: ‘Do not do that. If I were to command anyone to prostrate to anyone other than Allah, I would have commanded women to prostrate to their husbands. By the one in whose hand is the soul of Muhammad! No woman can fulfill her duty towards Allah until she fulfills her duty towards her husband. If he asks her (for intimacy) even if she is on her camel saddle, she should not refuse.’”250

The provisions in surah 4:34 are limited to a woman’s duty to satisfy her husband’s sexual desire, while the amr bil ma’ruf provisions effectively apply to all of sharia. The amr bil ma’ruf provisions prescribe a response all the way up to death. The man’s aggressive response is justified because of the belief that Islam’s rules for women are good for them, good for men, and good for all Islamic society. A man who failed to respond aggressively to a woman’s disobedience would himself be guilty of not having ghayra and consequently, having low ezzat (standing in the community) and sharaf (personal character), i.e. he would be dishonored if he failed to follow Islam’s commands.

The second factor Sennels identified was insecurity. The fact a woman’s behavior reflects not only on the men who are supreme over her but also on Islam itself serves to create insecurity in Muslim men. They know the Islamic community is observing the behavior of the women who are their namoos - their private parts - day in and day out. The Islamic duty of enjoining good and forbidding evil gives Muslim men the duty of protecting not just their own ghayra, but also the welfare of the Islamic community from women who transgress their Islamic duties. Disobedient women are like a hole in a dam that can rapidly grow and destroy both the dam and the low-lying countryside. The dam, in this allegory, are the provisions of Islam which protect the Islamic community, the low-lying countryside. The men know they need to act, both urgently and decisively. The men are not inhuman, they are not insensitive to the pain of doing violence to their namoos, but in the situation where a man’s ghayra is violated “doing the right thing” in relation to the values of the Islamic community becomes the most important psychological need, even more important than the family relationship. When a man’s ghayra is violated, the feeling he has is as if he has sinned before God and the Muslim community. He feels unclean and in need of doing something to wash away his filthy spot. Muslims actually call it “washing a filthy spot from my skirt” - where the reference to “skirt” refers to the white garment - the “thob” - worn by Arab men. When the woman who has violated the man’s ghayra is his daughter, Muslims say, “even though she is my liver,” meaning a woman in the namoos is like part of his own body. If he didn’t satisfy his ghayra “his meat would become haram,” meaning he would be worthless, like an animal slaughtered in a non-Islamic way whose meat cannot be consumed.

In the Middle East, the man’s fear a woman’s misbehavior will destroy community values and erode his standing in the eyes of others - making an angry response justified and necessary - can be traced back to the times of Queens Vashti and Esther of Persia, as recorded in the Tanach of the Jews, the Old Testament of the Bible:

On the seventh day, when the heart of the king was merry with wine, he commanded Mehuman, Biztha, Harbona, Bigtha, and Abagtha, Zethar, and Carcas, the seven chamberlains that served in the presence of Ahasuerus the king, to bring Vashti the queen before the king with the crown royal, to shew the people and the princes her beauty: for she was fair to look on. But the queen Vashti refused to come at the king’s commandment by his chamberlains: therefore was the king very wroth, and his anger burned in him.

Then the king said to the wise men, which knew the times, (for so was the king’s manner toward all that knew law and judgment: and the next unto him was Carshena, Shethar, Admatha, Tarshish, Meres, Marsena, and Memucan, the seven princes of Persia and Media, which saw the king’s face, and which sat the first in the kingdom;) “What shall we do unto the queen Vashti according to law, because she hath not performed the commandment of the king Ahasuerus by the chamberlains?”

And Memucan answered before the king and the princes, “Vashti the queen hath not done wrong to the king only, but also to all the princes, and to all the people that are in all the provinces of the king Ahasuerus. For this deed of the queen shall come abroad unto all women, so that they shall despise their husbands in their eyes, when it shall be reported, the king Ahasuerus commanded Vashti the queen to be brought in before him, but she came not. Likewise shall the ladies of Persia and Media say this day unto all the king’s princes, which have heard of the deed of the queen. Thus shall there arise too much contempt and wrath. If it please the king, let there go a royal commandment from him, and let it be written among the laws of the Persians and the Medes, that it be not altered, That Vashti come no more before king Ahasuerus; and let the king give her royal estate unto another that is better than she. And when the king’s decree which he shall make shall be published throughout all his empire, (for it is great,) all the wives shall give to their husbands honour, both to great and small.”251

This event took place over a thousand years before Islam conquered Persia. It is worth noting that in these pre-Islamic times, Queen Vashti was not killed, she lost her position as queen and was probably divorced. If Islam had been in effect in this situation, Vashti might also have been beaten for her disobedience, following the provisions of amr bil ma’ruf, but not for a violation of ghayra. Vashti’s situation involves a man’s supremacy over a woman, but it does not involve ghayra, as we defined ghayra in Chapter Seven. Ghayra is specifically the man’s honor in relation to his control of the sexual organs of his household and is a uniquely Islamic concept since it is attributed to Allah himself. Vashti did not stimulate the King’s sexual jealousy because there is no suggestion that her refusal to come when summoned was the result of her having any form of communication with other men.

Insecurity also arises because Islam’s rules are detailed and apply minutely and subtly to every action in life, but ordinary Muslims are not mujtahids - they are not expert in Islam’s requirements. Situations can arise that appear to be in gray areas, where men have the sense that they need to act but are not certain what to do. In these situations, Muslims will naturally seek guidance from a mujtahid - typically the local imam but sometimes also from wakils (sharia lawyers). Ordinarily, as Sennels discovered, Islamic culture would absolutely prevent Muslim men from revealing any type of weakness to another person, but mujtahids are an exception. Islamic culture actually conditions Muslims to seek guidance from their mujtahids. The situation is not very different from Catholics who take advantage of the priest-penitent relationship in the confessional.

To give a concrete example, a worker from Afghanistan was employed on a ranch in Iran where the ranch owner provided a house for the Afghani man and his wife to live. Circumstances arose that required the worker to return to Afghanistan for a year, but his wife remained behind in the house on the ranch. While the worker was away, the ranch owner used undue influence to force the woman to have sex with him. The situation was not a violent rape, but it was also not consensual. When the worker returned, the wife confided what had happened. The worker’s first concern was that perhaps he needed to kill his wife. Unsure, he went to a local mujtahid. The mujtahid explained that because the woman had not consented to adultery she was innocent under sharia. The blood of the ranch owner, however, had become halal! Ghayra demanded that the worker avenge the actions of the ranch owner against the worker’s wife. Ordinarily in Koran, spilling the blood of other Muslims who are not apostate is haram, but the owner’s actions justified vengeance. The worker shot the ranch owner 8 times, but then was tried for murder. He was found guilty and executed because of the difficulty of proving adultery under sharia. The worker could not produce four male witnesses who could testify to the whole process of penetration by the ranch owner!

The third factor Sennels identified as being produced in the Muslim mindset by Islamic teachings and culture is irresponsibility. Sennels says Muslims “see their own lives mainly guided by outer factors - a fearsome God, a powerful father, influential imams, ancient but strong cultural traditions” and this can lead them to develop a victim mentality. When it comes to ghayra violence, however, Muslim men really are victims, since what triggers ghayra violence is a suspicion or certainty that a woman has violated Islam’s stringent rules for the woman’s dress and conduct. Ghayra violence is a response to an outside factor for the Muslim man. To the extent Muslim men do suffer from a “victim mentality,” they are more likely to believe a woman has misbehaved and engage in ghayra violence with less provocation or need for proof. The provisions for enjoining good and forbidding evil actually serve to slow the man’s actions since they provide a script of responses to a woman’s misconduct that steadily increases to physical violence. As we explained, physical violence is not the first step, so men who engage in ghayra violence following the provisions for enjoining good and forbidding evil are not acting on mere suspicion, they have observed objectionable conduct and warned their daughters or wives about it - perhaps even imprisoning the female in the home - before they take violent action.

Intolerance is the fourth factor Sennels observed in Muslim males. It is easy to see how intolerance flows from Islamic teachings and is related to ghayra violence. As we saw when we examined ghayra, sharia’s requirements for the dress and conduct of women, and the amr bil ma’ruf private enforcement mechanism, the rules that support a man’s sexual jealousy for his control of the private parts of the women come, undeniably, from the authoritative sources of the religion of Islam. Islam, in turn, forbids Muslims to tolerate other religions, which might provide a basis for different rules for women’s dress and conduct. The Koran, Islam’s highest source, is explicit:

And whoever seeks any religion other than Islam, it will never be accepted of him, and in the hereafter he will be among the losers.252

The result is sharia absolutely forbids Muslims to tolerate any other religion, since to do so is to deny Muhammad’s message is for all people for all times. Practicing religious tolerance makes a Muslim apostate, and subject to the death penalty:

Among the things that entail apostasy from Islam (may Allah protect us from them) are: ... (20) or to deny that Allah intended the Prophet’s message (Allah bless him and give him peace) to be the religion followed by the entire world.253

Since it is forbidden to follow other religions, it is obviously also forbidden to follow the norms or practices of other cultures. Surah 5:44 states unequivocally whoever does not judge by sharia is a kafir, an infidel. Muslims are commanded to fight against all non-Islamic systems, since the maqasid al-sharia is to make all religious worship for Allah, alone. Muslim women who act in disregard of Islamic rules for women’s dress and conduct effectively put Islam below the religion or culture of non-Muslims. This action not only insults the man’s ghayra, it triggers the provisions for enjoining good and forbidding evil that exist to protect Islam and its values.

Islam’s intolerance is very deeply engrained in its culture, in the form of two concepts which are considered foundations of Islam based on the Koran. These concepts are tawalla and tabarra and they are acted out daily by Muslims everywhere they live. Tawalla is an Arabic noun that means support, help, or protection. The Koran states emphatically that Muslims should only support, help, or have fellowship with other faithful, practicing Muslims. The idea is developed in many surahs, particularly 49:10, 5:55, 5:51, and 3:28. A literal translation of surah 49:10 tells Muslims, “it is certain that believers are the brothers of one another.” The implication is that nominal Muslims are not truly brothers of believing Muslims. This is the ayat from which the Muslim Brotherhood takes its name. Tawalla - helping and protecting faithful Muslims - is the ideological foundation and raison d’être for the organization. In the Middle East - among both Muslims and Jews - the concept of being a brother means being a helper, supporter, and protector. Among the Jews, the concept is expressed as the kinsman redeemer and avenger.

Surah 5:55 tells Muslims that their only supporters, helpers and protectors are Allah, Muhammad, and faithful, practicing Muslims - the mu’minun - as opposed to nominal Muslims. The surah uses the Arabic noun wali we have encountered before which means the actual person who supports, helps, or protects:

For sure your Wali are Allah, His Messenger, and the believers, - those who stand up for As-Salat, and pay Zakat, and they are Raki’un [those who bow down to Allah in prayer].254

Surah 5:51 begins to develop the idea of tabarra, the companion concept to tawalla. Where tawalla requires Muslims to be supporters, helpers, and protectors to other faithful, practicing Muslims, tabarra prohibits good Muslims from providing or accepting support, help, or protection from non-Muslims:

O you who believe! Do not take the Jews and Christians as Auliya [friends, protectors, helpers], they are Auliya of each other. And whoever takes them as Auliya, for sure he is one of them. For sure Allah does not guide the group of wrongdoers255

The Arabic word Auliya is simply the plural form of wali which we saw in 5:51 meaning supporter, helper, or protector. All non-Muslims are Zalimun because they reject Islam. Surah 3:28 extends the prohibition against acting like a brother to non-Muslims by adding a tactic Muslims can use when they are in a situation like Muhammad found himself in while he was in Mecca under the power of non-Muslims. As we discussed in Chapter Three, Surah 3:28 allows a Muslim to protect himself and Islam against non-Muslims by “making taqiyya” - using deception:

The believers do not take unbelievers as Auliya [friends, protectors, helpers] in place of believers, and whoever does that is not from Allah in anything, except if you fear a threat from them and guard yourself against them. And Allah cautions you against Himself, to Allah is your final destination.256

Surah 3:28 warns Muslims that the punishment for becoming the protector of non-Muslims is hell. The concepts of tawalla and tabarra explain why the Ft. Hood Shooter - Nadil Malik Hassan - fired on other American soldiers. Facing deployment, he found himself facing the certainty of becoming a protector of non-Muslims against his fellow Muslims. These concepts also explain why those who planned and carried out the 9/11 attack did not care about killing several hundred Muslim Americans. These Muslims had made themselves the auliya of non-Muslims.

The concept of tabarra - rejecting fellowship with non-Muslims - can be seen in the very name of Koran’s final and most violent surah, surah Nine. In the Arabic, this surah’s name is Al-Taubah or Bara’ah. Literally, Al-Taubah means “the turning away” and is therefore often translated “the repentance.” Verses 1 through 4 of this surah make it clear that Allah is turning away from the disbelievers - the non-Muslims:

This is a declaration of] disassociation, from Allah and His Messenger, to those with whom you had made a treaty among the polytheists. So travel freely, [O disbelievers], throughout the land [during] four months but know that you cannot cause failure to Allah and that Allah will disgrace the disbelievers. And [it is] an announcement from Allah and His Messenger to the people on the day of the greater pilgrimage that Allah is disassociated from the disbelievers, and [so is] His Messenger. So if you repent, that is best for you; but if you turn away - then know that you will not cause failure to Allah. And give tidings to those who disbelieve of a painful punishment. Excepted are those with whom you made a treaty among the polytheists and then they have not been deficient toward you in anything or supported anyone against you; so complete for them their treaty until their term [has ended]. Indeed, Allah loves the righteous [who fear Him].257

Bara’ah literally means “avoidance,” and it is clear from the opening verses that from the time this surah was revealed, Allah would avoid the non-Muslims, therefore faithful Muslims are also required to practice tabarra and avoid non-Muslims. The verse that most clearly shows the attitude of true Muslims to non-Muslims is the opening clause of surah 48:29, which might be called Islam’s “Golden Rule”:

Muhammad (SAW) is the Messenger of Allah, and those who are with him are severe against disbelievers, and merciful among themselves.258

This analysis from the Islamic sources shows the root of intolerance in Islamic teaching. But Muslims do not need to know these sources to pick up mindset of intolerance and the practice of tawalla and tabarra. Tawalla and Tabarra manifest themselves in a myriad of ways in Muslim culture. Tawalla and tabarra are expressly connected to women and ghayra violence perpetrated against women who exceed the bounds of Islam through surah 2:221 which forbids marriage to non-Muslims:

And do not marry Al-Mushrikat (idolatresses, etc.) till they believe (worship Allah Alone). And indeed a slave woman who believes is better than a (free) Mushrikah (idolatress), even though she pleases you. And give not (your daughters) in marriage to Al-Mushrikun till they believe (in Allah Alone) and verily, a believing slave is better than a)free) Mushrik (idolater), even though he pleases you. Those (Al-Mushrikun) invite you to the Fire, but Allah invites (you) to Paradise and Forgiveness by His Leave, and makes His Ayat (proofs, evidences, verses, lessons, signs, revelations, etc.) clear to mankind that they may remember.259

Since Muslims do not tolerate people of other religions, it is not surprising that they do not tolerate the idea of marrying people from other religions. The idea of not marrying people of other religions flows directly from this surah.

To summarize, people who live in Islamic society receive Islamic values through the process of enculturation. These values include the supremacy of Muslims over non-Muslims, the supremacy of men over women, the requirement for women to obey particular rules for their dress and conduct, and the need to turn away from non-Muslims and only be friendly toward other Muslims. These teachings lead to the psychological factors Sennels observed: aggression, insecurity, failure to take responsibility, and intolerance. Besides affecting Muslims psychologically, Islamic values also lead to certain behaviors, in particular ghayra killing.

Chapter Eleven

Cases: The Reality
of Ghayra Violence

Not every incidence of domestic violence in Muslim families is an incidence of ghayra violence. There are two reasons why this is so. First, all the motives for domestic violence that exist in non-Islamic families also exist in Muslim families, ghayra is simply an additional motive for violence. Second, amr bil ma’ruf, the thing that allows individuals to enforce sharia rules, can be applied to enforce any sharia requirement, not just the sharia rules for women’s dress and conduct that concern ghayra. The amr bil ma’ruf provisions can lead to domestic violence that has nothing to do with ghayra. For example, sharia forbids Muslims to drink wine, play cards, eat pork, have dogs, or have pictures of people or animals. These are all extra motivations for domestic violence that simply don’t exist in the West. A Muslim man who sees his female family members engaging in any of these behaviors might ultimately be led to use violence against them following amr bil ma’ruf, but since these sharia rules do not relate to a woman’s sexual conduct, the violence is not ghayra violence. In Western terms, it is not “honor” violence.

Just to review, ghayra is 1) control by the Muslim male 2) over his namoos 3) to preserve Islamic concepts of morality. The Islamic concepts of morality that are enforced by ghayra are sharia’s rules for a woman’s dress and the rules for her conduct that relate to sexuality. When a woman in the Muslim male’s namoos violates one of these sharia rules, she irritates the Muslim man’s ghayra. The Muslim man responds by following sharia’s provisions for amr bil ma’ruf - enjoining good and forbidding evil. The amr bil ma’ruf provisions provide a hierarchy of actions that individuals may take to correct a violation of sharia rules. Sometimes when ghayra violence does take place, the Muslim male, or the perpetrator acting on his behalf, may not go step by step through all the actions authorized in the amr bil ma’ruf provisions. What people in the West call “honor killing” is the result of the last step in the amr bil ma’ruf provisions, which authorizes the use of deadly force.

So, how can a Western counselor, cop, lawyer, judge, or journalist recognize when a woman is in danger of becoming - or has become - a victim of ghayra violence? To recognize ghayra violence, you must 1) recognize the relationship of the wali, the perpetrator, and the victim 2) recognize the actions of the victim that violate sharia and irritate ghayra, and 3) recognize how the steps taken by the perpetrator and/or the wali fit into the amr bil ma’ruf hierarchy. Because a perpetrator shows how strong his sense of ghayra is by how much violence he uses against his victim, the perpetrators almost always skip some of the steps specified by amr bil ma’ruf and, ultimately, kill their victims with excessive force. As long as the victim is a part of the perpetrator’s namoos or the wali has engaged the perpetrator to act against someone in the wali’s namoos, and the motivation for taking action is a sharia violation that irritates ghayra, the case can properly be classified as ghayra violence. If the motive is not ghayra, the case may involve criminal violence but it is not a case of ghayra violence.

For example, in Chapter Nine we examined the case of a group of Muslim men in Baghdad who killed a number of prostitutes and their johns inside two apartments. There was nothing in the facts of the case to indicate that the women who were killed were part of the namoos of any of the perpetrators, and certainly the murdered men were not part of their namoos, so the case, while obviously criminal and involving sexual conduct, was not a case of ghayra violence.

A 2014 case from Turkey illustrates the situation where there is no violation of sharia, let alone a violation that would irritate ghayra. A 29 year-old Turkish man called the police while in the act of electrocuting his wife to make sure the killing was authorized under sharia. A Turkish newspaper published a transcript of the phone call:

“I killed someone,” the man told the police operator, according to the transcript.

“Who did you kill?” asked the officer on the other end.

“I am killing my wife right now,” said the man.

“Did you kill her or are you killing her?” the officer asked.

“Well, she isn’t dead yet. But I am killing her if the murder is halal (permissible in Islam),” the man replied.

The officer then asked if the suspect had a problem with his wife.

“I am telling you that I killed my wife but you are asking what the problem was,” the man replied.

“I closed her mouth as she is in the throes of death,” he then said.

At that point the police operator snapped into action, “OK, wait. I am sending a unit.”

A defense lawyer told the court at a hearing Wednesday that his client killed his wife because she gave birth to “a girl once again”.

The suspect, a waiter at a local restaurant in the Kurdish-majority region, also has a four-year-old daughter.260

In this case the woman did not violate sharia because sharia does not prohibit a woman from having, one, two, or ten daughters. The hadith reports that Muhammad was particularly fond of his daughter, Fatima:

Narrated Al-Miswar bin Makhrama:

Allah’s Messenger said, “Fatima is a part of me, and he who makes her angry, makes me angry.”261

More importantly, the Koran rebukes those who are sorry for the birth of a daughter and condemns those who kill their female infants:

And when one of them is given news about the birth of a female his face becomes a dark black and he is filled with sorrow. He hides himself out of sight because of the bad news that’s been brought to him. Shall he keep her with shame or bury her in the dirt? For sure they are condemned.262

Since the wife did not violate sharia, the Turkish man’s murder of his wife, while certainly criminal domestic violence, is not ghayra violence. In fact, it is condemned by Islam.

The question arises, if Islam condemns his act of killing his wife for having a second daughter, why would the man be so disappointed by the birth of a second daughter that he would think Islam would allow him to kill his wife? Since the husband was clearly ignorant of what Islam teaches, a superficial - and incorrect - answer might be that his prejudice against daughters has nothing to do with Islam, it is simply cultural. It is certainly true that many Muslims are reluctant to hear the news of the birth of a daughter. Under sharia the woman cannot leave the house, she cannot be actively involved in the community to work and earn an income. The birth of a daughter represents extra expenses to the family with no possibility of extra income. What’s more, a daughter means an extra member of the namoos, so something more to worry about. A father knows he will face monitoring costs to avoid ghayra violations that might involve the need for violence and break the spine of the family. These costs will have to be paid, not in money, but in terms of time and emotional stress. It is also undeniable that fathers love their daughters, but they know that their daughters’ future is dark. When a daughter grows up and marries, she is completely subject to her husband. If he mistreats her emotionally, she is barred from even seeking a divorce as long as he continues to pay her expenses and does not threaten her life. This is just the tip of the iceberg. Islam creates thousands of situations that make a woman’s life miserable, and the Muslim man knows this. He knows his precious daughter might be killed by her husband simply for giving birth to a daughter. So the birth of a girl is equal to disaster for a Muslim man. There is a saying, when a little girl is born she says to her father, “If you don’t kill me for three days, you will fall in love with me.”

The situation where the perpetrator skips steps specified in the amr bil ma’ruf hierarchy is exemplified by the murder of 15 year-old Anusha Zafar by her parents in 2012. Anusha lived in the part of Kashmir controlled by Pakistan and subject to Pakistani law. Anusha’s father Muhammad described what happened:

There was a boy who came by on a motorcycle. She (Anusha) turned to look at him twice. I told her before not to do that, it’s wrong. People talk about us because our older daughter was the same way.263

To correct Anusha, Muhammad took her inside their house and beat her. Since Muhammad had previously warned Anusha not to look at boys, beating her would be a permissible next step under sharia’s amr bil ma’ruf procedures. But then Anusha’s mother Zaheen threw acid on her. Zaheen described what happened:

She (Anusha) said, ‘I didn’t do it on purpose, I won’t do it again,’ By then I had thrown the acid. It was her destiny to die this way.264

But Anusha did not die right away. Although she sustained acid burns over 70% of her body, Muhammad and Zaheen did not take her to get medical care for two days. The doctor who attempted to save Anusha’s life said:

There were third-degree burns on her scalp, face, eyes, nostrils, both arms, chest, foot and lower part of legs. Even her scalp bone was exposed.265

The doctor added that Zaheen, Anusha’s mother, at first tried to claim Anusha had attempted to commit suicide before finally confessing she threw acid on her daughter. The acid burns on Zaheen’s own arm from throwing the acid showed she was lying.266

As we have previously mentioned, the use of acid solely to disfigure is not authorized under sharia’s amr bil ma’ruf provisions. The purpose of amr bil ma’ruf is to correct, specifically, to turn the heart of the person who needs correction back to following Allah’s divine law. Deadly force is only authorized when the person refuses to be corrected by the less severe measures specified in the amr bil ma’ruf hierarchy. Sharia does authorize the use of deadly force, however, and deadly force is a general term, so it is logical to conclude that any means capable of causing death, including acid, is allowed. But in this specific case, Anusha appeared to have been corrected when she was beaten. She told her parents, “I didn’t do it on purpose. I won’t do it again.” Zaheen, Anusha’s mother, did not wait to see the result of this step of amr bil ma’ruf. What’s more, since the use of acid is typically to disfigure, Zaheen was probably not intending to follow the requirements of amr bil ma’ruf. What killed Anusha was not the initial acid attack, it was failing to take her to get medical care for two days. Since the motive for Anusha’s killing was ghayra, this is a case of ghayra violence, even though Zaheen failed to follow the steps required by amr bil ma’ruf. When a perpetrator skips steps specified by amr bil ma’ruf or uses excessive force, Western apologists for Islam sometimes try to say the case had nothing to do with Islam. In reality, the motive for using violence and the legal authorization to use violence come directly from Islam. Skipping some amr bil ma’ruf steps cannot relieve Islam of the blame for the woman’s death.

Under sharia, Anusha’s father, Muhammad, could kill his daughter with impunity, but Anusha’s mother, Zaheen, should have been subject to qisas, retaliation under the principle of “an eye for an eye.” The only way Zaheen could escape punishment would be if Muhammad, Anusha’s father and therefore the owner of Anusha’s blood, forgave her. What actually happened is bizarre, and shows that Pakistani law does not follow sharia. The Pakistani authorities freed both Muhammad and Zaheen on the basis that their minor children, Anusha’s siblings, forgave their parents. This result has no basis in sharia.

Recognizing Ghayra Violence: A Guide for Teachers, Counsellors, Journalists, Cops, Doctors, Lawyers, Judges and Anyone Concerned with Violence Against Women

Westerners need a tool to recognize whether any given case of domestic violence in the Muslim family is, in fact, ghayra violence. Each case of domestic violence presents a unique fact pattern. Analyzing the facts can reveal insights to help an investigator determine whether the case involves ghayra violence. Figure 3 presents a form to use when collecting the facts of a case to recognize whether the facts fit the pattern of ghayra violence:

Section A of the form is designed to identify the relationship of the wali, the perpetrator, and the victim. Recall that wali means protector or guardian, and there are three ways in which this concept is recognized in sharia. The most specific use of wali applies to the father or grandfather, who have given life by donating sperm and, consequently, are recognized by sharia as the owners of the blood of their offspring. Either father or grandfather may kill their offspring with impunity. The second way sharia recognizes the concept of wali applies when both the father and grandfather are dead or absent. In that case, sharia specifies the order in which other male family members may become the guardian (wali).267 If there are no other male family members present sharia provides an official of the Islamic government may act as the wali. When the wali is a male family member, his ghayra is designed to enforce the sharia rules on the women in his namoos. These substitute guardians - not father or grandfather - are not the owners of the blood so they do not have the power to kill with impunity unless they are doing amr bil ma’ruf to correct a woman who violates sharia. Finally, the most general way sharia recognizes the concept of wali is from surah 9:71 of Koran, which gives the power of being the wali to all believers of Islam (mu’minun):

The believing men and women are guardians of each other. They enjoin good and forbid evil and stand up for prayer and pay zakat and obey Allah and His Messenger. They are the ones upon whom Allah will shower blessing. For sure Allah has honor [ezzat] and is wise.268

Under the authority of this verse, any believer may engage in amr bil ma’ruf to correct any other Muslim who violates sharia. Islamic governments rely on the authority granted by this verse when they establish amr bil ma’ruf police forces. The amr bil ma’ruf police are simply believing Muslims who are organized and funded by Islamic governments to enforce sharia when fathers or male family members fail to do their duty.

The critical fact which Section A of the Worksheet is trying to uncover is whether the perpetrator of violence is the wali or is acting with the knowledge of, and at the direction of, the wali. If the perpetrator is the wali or is acting at the wali’s direction, it is more likely the case involves ghayra violence.

Section B of the Worksheet is designed to determine whether the victim engages in behaviors that would violate the sharia provisions ghayra protects, the rules for women’s dress and sexually-related conduct listed in Chapter 8. Some giveaways might be if the victim says “I have done something that is against our culture,” or “my father is sensitive about… (fill in the blank).” If the victim has not violated these sharia provisions, the case may involve criminal domestic violence but it is not ghayra violence. This part of the form requires the victim be questioned carefully, because the violation might be something as simple as looking at a boy for a few seconds, as in Anusha’s case from Kashmir.

Section C of the Worksheet is designed to uncover whether either the perpetrator or the wali have taken less severe steps specified in the amr bil ma’ruf hierarchy of actions. The victim should be asked whether she has already been told that something is a violation - against culture, against family, or against Islam. Has she been warned not to do certain things, or been threatened with greater punishment? The more it is evident that the wali or perpetrator are following the script of amr bil ma’ruf actions, the more likely the case involves ghayra violence.

Section D is designed to collect any additional evidence that may show that either the perpetrator or the wali are acting from a sense of ghayra. Remember, ghayra is 1) control by the Muslim male 2) over his namoos, 3) to enforce concepts of Islamic morality. Relevant evidence can include family history - have other siblings had ghayra problems in the past - statements by other family members, or recent, similar problems in the local Muslim community.

Real-World Cases of Ghayra Violence

Case 1: Fauzia Muhammad, 2008, Afghanistan

Fauzia Muhammad is the real name of the young woman FOX News called “Miriam” in its 2008 special “Murder in the Family: Honor Killing in America.” Fauzia’s brother, Waheed, you’ll recall, stabbed her repeatedly outside the family home in the presence of other family members. Fauzia - Miriam - only survived because neighbors called police. Let’s go through the most important items on the Worksheet to Recognize Ghayra Violence using the facts FOX reported about Fauzia’s case and other information available online.

The perpetrator in this case was the victim’s brother. Apparently the victim’s father was either dead or did not accompany the family when they moved to the United States in 2002, therefore in this case the brother is not only the perpetrator but also the wali under sharia. Since only the father or grandfather can be the owner of the blood, the brother cannot kill his sister with impunity unless he is acting under amr bil ma’ruf to correct sharia violations. The brother is the wali in the second, broader, sense we described above, the more general case in which sharia specifies who may be the wali when the father or grandfather is dead or absent. Since the perpetrator in this case is also the wali, it is more likely to be a case of ghayra violence, because ghayra imposes the duty on the wali to correct sharia violations by members of his namoos.

The facts of this case demonstrate Fauzia did violate sharia’s provisions for the dress and conduct of women ghayra is designed to enforce, discussed under Section B of the Worksheet. She acknowledged, “when I was at home, like, oh my God, I have to be careful that my leg doesn’t show, I have to be careful that I don’t have low neck. You know, like stuff like that.” What’s more, under Section C of the worksheet, it is clear the brother took steps following the amr bil ‘maruf provisions to correct Fauzia before resorting to violence. When she won her scholarship to college he did not smile, he just looked at her. A glare like this is often the first action the amer - the person who does amr bil ma’ruf - takes to indicate his ghayra is becoming irritated. Second, the brother told her, “If I moved on campus, people, Afghani community would talk about our family…to bring shame to the family.” This statement shows the brother understood if the family itself did not enforce the relevant sharia rules, other Muslims might take action. In the West, it is still unlikely that unrelated Muslims would engage in violent amr bil ma’ruf, but they do organize to bring informal pressure on the family to force the violator to fall back in line. For example, the types of pressure the community might apply include letting the family know it was being talked about, asking the brother, “Where is your ghayra?”, correcting family members who say they are Afghani by telling them, “You are not Afghani, you have become American!”, or asking questions like “How is your sister, is she still living alone?” Finally, the family made it uncomfortable for Fauzia at home, so much so she began to come home less and less. In Fauzia’s case, she not only violated the sharia provisions relating to women’s dress and conduct but also knew she was violating them. The family and the wali took several steps following the amr bil mar’ruf provisions to correct Fauzia, although ultimately they appear to have skipped some of the steps between telling the victim about violations and using deadly force. NPR reported Waheed’s attack occurred when Fauzia’s friend arrived at the family home to take her to New York.269 If steps were skipped, the sudden appearance of the friend might be the reason. Because, to date, the press have been completely unaware of the steps of amr bil ma’ruf, is is possible they failed to report confrontations that might have occurred before Fauzia was stabbed. If Waheed assaulted and battered Fauzia before stabbing her, no steps were skipped.

Under Section D there are several pieces of evidence that indicate the perpetrator was acting to satisfy his ghayra. First, Waheed described his sister to police “as a bad Muslim girl.” Second, the Ayan Hirsi Ali Foundation reports Waheed also told investigators Fauzia “had disgraced their family by going to clubs and wearing immodest clothing.”270 These two pieces of evidence show Waheed was acting out of concern for sharia rules related to ghayra. Finally, from the degree of violence involved, there was no question Waheed intended to kill his sister. There is no provision of U.S. law that would justify Waheed in killing his sister. The only possible legal justification would be if he was acting under the amr bil ma’ruf private enforcement mechanism. A perpetrator acting under amr bil ma’ruf to enforce sharia rules relating to women’s dress and conduct is per se ghayra violence.

Islam: An Autonomous, Self-Correcting System

It is worth repeating that a person who takes action under amr bil ma’ruf is not required to be a devout or practicing Muslim. It is enough that he knows a violation exists that must be corrected. He does not need to be able to cite chapter and verse in a sharia law book or Islamic sources. The only justification he may be able to offer is he is enforcing his family’s values or culture. Because the amr bil ma’ruf provisions exist in sharia, the Islamic community automatically senses violations and corrects them, even though the actors might not understand precisely what they are doing. Islamic society is an autonomous, self-correcting mechanism that has assigned specific duties for each member of the umma. As long as the individuals perform their functions, they need not know why they are doing what they are doing. A relevant example might be a worker on the assembly line producing BMW automobiles. By himself, the worker might not be able to design a BMW, he may never have even seen a completed BMW, but he knows how to tighten a bolt. As long as he does his job correctly, the system will work to produce BMWs. Fauzia claimed her brother Waheed “does not know what Islam is all about.” This assertion is not supported by the facts. It is clear Waheed’s knew his sister’s conduct violated sharia, and that is enough. Waheed did the job Islam assigned him to do.

Case 2 Noor Al-Maleki, 2009, Iraq

Noor Al-Maleki’s honor killing was also reported by FOX News in the special “A Question of Honor.” Noor is the young woman who was run over by her father in 2009 along with her boyfriend’s mom. Let’s analyze Noor’s case using the Worksheet to Recognize Ghayra Violence.

In Section A, the perpetrator is Faleh Al-Maleki, Noor’s father. Since Faleh is Noor’s father, he is also Noor’s wali in the most specific sense recognized by sharia. Faleh is the owner of Noor’s blood and, under sharia, may kill her with impunity.

In Section B, Noor’s case presents a record of many behaviors that violate the sharia rules for women’s dress and sexual conduct that ghayra protects. First is the testimony of Noor’s friend, Sandra, who said Noor did not get along with her family and, specifically, “she didn’t want to wear this much clothes.”271 Pictures of Noor show she did not wear hijab or cover her body from head to toe as sharia requires, although her father apparently accepted Noor’s dress. In the quotation printed in her high school yearbook, Noor said, “My parents are very religious, but only about some things.”272 This highlights the subjective nature of ghayra. Each Muslim male has a different red line of sharia violations at which his ghayra becomes irritated. For one man, simply not wearing hijab might irritate his ghayra to the point where he would begin to do amr bil ma’ruf. For Faleh Al-Maleki, Noor’s violations of sharia’s dress code were apparently not sufficient to trip his ghayra. But Noor violated sharia rules in other, more serious, ways. As we discussed in detail in Chapter 8, Faleh took Noor to Iraq in the middle of her senior year where, acting as wali, he gave her in marriage. The first evidence Noor disregarded this marriage was that her father discovered a picture of Noor posing with two strange boys. The discovery evidently precipitated an argument between Faleh and Noor that led to Noor taking her father’s car and crashing it, as reported by police on May 6, 2008. Noor’s most serious violation came when she moved in with Alma Khalaf and began to date her son, although Noor was already a married woman.

Noor’s disregard of her marriage is obviously a violation of rules related to sexual conduct and also violates the norm of haya, the shyness sharia requires in a Muslim woman. But Haya does not relate just to sequestering the woman from outside contact, it also requires the woman to act obsequiously. Noor violated haya by acting disrespectfully to her parents. A few days after her murder, Noor’s brother Ali gave an interview to the local CBS affiliate in which he said, “The past two years, she’s been going out of her way being disrespectful…different cultures different values…one thing to one culture is not going to make sense to another culture.”273 The reason Noor had to find a place to live and moved in with Alma was that in March 2009 her mother kicked her out of the house and obtained a protective order against her because Noor had acted violently towards her mother. Noor’s disrespect of her parents was not sufficient to irritate her father’s ghayra, but her sexual misconduct did.

Section C of the Worksheet collects the facts that show the perpetrator followed the amr bil ma’ruf script. FOX News did not report whether Faleh followed the non-violent provisions of the script, such as telling his daughter what she was doing was wrong and scolding her with harsh words or threats. We can infer he did, because of the two arguments where Noor became violent that led to law enforcement intervention, the car wreck and the fight with her mother. Faleh also took a preemptive action which might have been intended to avoid using the more violent steps of amr bil ma’ruf when he took Noor to Iraq for an arranged marriage. Another step he took before killing her was when he went to Alma’s house to attempt to retrieve Noor after he found out she was dating Alma’s son. Since Noor was already married, dating Alma’s son was a clear act of adultery from Faleh’s perspective. Looking at Faleh’s actions objectively, it appears he earnestly desired to avoid taking the more violent actions authorized under amr bil ma’ruf. Muslim parents love their children, they don’t normally want to kill them, but each father has a red line beyond which his ghayra demands he take action.

For Section D of the worksheet, we have an incredible piece of evidence that shows Noor’s father was following the amr bil ma’ruf script out of a sense of ghayra. While he was in jail, the police recorded Faleh and his wife Sahem talking on the phone:274

Faleh: No one hates his daughter but honor [sharaf] is dear…and we have a prying culture and we can’t change it and I didn’t assault someone from the street.

Sahem: No.

Faleh: I tried to give her a chance, tried what you call it, with no results.

Sahem: You rushed it. You rushed it, Faleh.

Faleh: She did not take the right path…

Sahem: You couldn’t bear it. I know you couldn’t bear it. Nobody is like you.

Faleh: And an Iraqi without honor is nothing.

When evaluated from an Islamic perspective, this conversation is telling. Faleh’s reference to a prying culture reflects the insecurity Nicolai Sennels noted Muslims feel because they see themselves as members of a community in which their standing depends on how well their behavior reflects the values of the community. Ghayra can increase this feeling of insecurity because it puts the man’s ezzat and sharaf at the mercy of the behavior of the women in his namoos. Faleh’s s statement “I did not kill someone from the street” shows his mindset that he is the owner of his child’s blood and has the right to kill her with impunity. It reflects his expectation that he should not be prosecuted because he did what he had to do. Faleh’s statement to Sahem “I tried what you call it, with no results” and her response “You rushed it. You rushed it, Faleh” is a clear reference to amr bil ma’ruf. It reflects that Faleh was reluctant to use violence against Noor and skipped the steps of threatening her and beating her up before his ghayra finally snapped and he used the last step of amr bil ma’ruf, which is deadly force. When Faleh told Sahem “an Iraqi without honor is nothing,” he demonstrated the supreme importance of ghayra to Muslim men, although he apparently did not understand ghayra is an Islamic phenomenon, not limited to Iraqi culture. However, in a separate conversation with police when he attempted to retrieve Noor from the home of Alma, her boyfriend’s mom, Faleh told the police his “family law was above their state law.” This suggests he understood the origin of ghayra in sharia, the divine law of Allah.

Case 3: Aqsa Parvez, 2007, Pakistan

Aqsa Parvez was a 16 year-old 11th-grader at a high school in Mississauga, Ontario.275 She was murdered by her brother, Waqas, who strangled her to death in her bedroom in the basement of the family’s home in December, 2007. In an apparent attempt to mislead police, Aqsa’s father, Muhammad, called 911 to report he had killed Aqsa, and he instructed Waqas, the real killer, to tell police nothing. After the murder, Canadian feminists claimed characterizing the case as an honor killing was racist and Islamophobic, but an analysis of the facts of the case using the Worksheet to Recognize Ghayra Violence will show whether the case actually involves ghayra killing.

In Section A, the perpetrator of Aqsa’a murder was her brother, Waqas. Sometime in the Fall of 2007, Aqsa moved out of her family’s home, staying with friends or at youth shelters. At about 7:30 on the morning of December 10, 2007, Aqsa was at a bus stop with a girl she had been staying with when Waqas showed up and said she should come home, her father wanted to talk with her. A little after 8 a.m., Aqsa’s father, Muhammad, phoned 911 to say he had killed his daughter. Right after Aqsa was killed, Muhammad woke his wife up and told her “My community will say you have not been able to control your daughter. This is my insult. She is making me naked.” Muhammad instructed Waqas, Aqsa’s brother, to tell the police nothing, resulting in Waqas initially being charged only with obstruction, while Muhammad was charged with second-degree murder. The police discovered Waqas was the real killer and upgraded the charges against both men to first-degree murder,276 but in the end a deal was reached where both pled guilty to second degree murder and were sentenced to life imprisonment. They will be eligible for parole in 2028.

Continuing in Section A, Aqsa’s wali was her father Muhammad, who initially told police he was the murderer. Muhammad may well have told Waqas to remain silent because Muhammad thought he could escape punishment as the owner of Aqsa’s blood under sharia. If Muhammad had been in his native country Pakistan, he very likely would have escaped punishment for the murder. Because Aqsa’s brother Waqas, the perpetrator, acted on behalf of the wali, it is initially more likely this case involves ghayra violence.

In Section B, there is abundant evidence from friends and even Aqsa’s school that shows Aqsa violated the sharia provisions relating to women’s dress and sexual conduct protected by ghayra. The day after Aqsa’s murder, City News Toronto reported:

Her friends tell of a troubled family life, with the teen refusing to wear the traditional head covering hijab, and preferring more Western-style clothing.

“She wanted to be her own person,” Garbutt [Aqsa’s friend Ashley Garbutt] adds. ”She wanted to show who she really was. She wanted to show her own beauty. But he [Aqsa’s father] wanted her … to wear Pakistani clothing, wearing the hijab and everything, but she didn’t want to do that.”

“She’s kind of rebellious a bit,” confirms classmate Heather Bottecher. “She’s supposed to wear the hijab. But she doesn’t usually wear it. And she usually wears short sleeves when you’re supposed to wear long sleeves. And she wears, like, low cut shirts and stuff like that.”

“We noticed a drastic change in her appearance,” another friend, Shianne Phillips, recalls. “Like, she used to dress religiously. Now she’s dressing in, like, more causal (sic) clothing, like other people.”

There are reports the teen would wear the special garb to school then change when she got there to fool her father. 277

Although Aqsa’s young Canadian friends obviously do not know the details of sharia, they nevertheless display a surprising level of understanding about the principles that underlie sharia’s restrictions on women’s dress. Ashley Garbutt’s comment “She [Aqsa] wanted to show who she really was. She wanted to show her own beauty.” hits the heart of the matter. In surah 24:31, Koran expressly commands women not to show their beauty, which is the basis of the sharia restriction requiring women to cover themselves from head to toe:

And tell the believing women to lower their gaze and protect their private parts and not to show their adornment [every part of a woman’s body is considered to be adornment] except what appears when they are properly dressed and to cast their head coverings over their bosoms and not to show their adornment except to their husbands, their fathers, their husband’s fathers, their sons, their husband’s sons, their brothers or their brother’s sons, or their sister’s sons, or other Muslim women, or the female slaves whom their right hands possess, or old male servants who do not have sexual urges, or children who do not know about women’s private parts. And let them not stamp their feet to reveal what they have hidden of their adornment [do not wiggle or jiggle]. And you believers should all repent toward Allah so that you may be successful.278

Ibn Kathir, in his tafsir (commentary) on this verse, explains the woman’s “adornment” spoken of by the verse is her physical features, which were not hidden by women during the pre-Islamic time of Jahiliyyah (ignorance).279 For 1400 years Islamic scholars have agreed with this understanding, and their consensus is the reason the command to cover appears in sharia.

These young Canadians’ - Ashley Garbutt, Heather Bottecher, and Shianne Phillips - surprising understanding of the spirit if not the letter of sharia is a perfect example of how enculturation transfers the principles of sharia from generation to generation. Think about this, so you don’t miss what has happened here! The Koranic commands have been taught to the Islamic community by preachers (imams and mullahs), Aqsa’s father has adopted these commands as his way of life - or, you might say, his “culture” - and he has brought this understanding of right and wrong to Canada. He passed it along to Aqsa, his young daughter, and through her, even Canadian teenagers have come to understand the basic boundaries set by sharia. One might ask, why have these commands been transmitted so successfully by the process of enculturation? The answer is Allah has designed a mechanism to make enforcing Islam’s restrictions on women so valuable to Muslim males that they value the rules more than they do their own children. This mechanism is ghayra, which makes a man’s worth depend on how well his namoos obeys, and the private right of enforcement of sharia granted by amr bil ma’ruf. Islam paints the world in black and white. A person is either a member of Dar al Islam - the house of Islam - or a member of Dar al Harb, the house of war. A person either serves Allah, or serves Allah’s enemies, there are no shades of gray. Islam is alive and perpetuates itself through the continuity of obedience across generations. Muslim males unconsciously feel if their children are not going to be a part of the living process of transmitting Islamic commands to following generations then they - the children - have become worthless, a part of Allah’s enemies, and therefore a source of shame. These children will raise children who are not Muslims who will become members of the army that opposes Islam, so cutting them off before they can multiply becomes necessary.

As time went by, a clearer picture emerged of what had happened in Aqsa’s life. By the time her father and brother pled guilty, two and a half years after her murder, The Mississauga News reported comments from Aqsa’s friends that detailed how Aqsa’s dress and behavior turned away from sharia’s requirements:

Friend Tara Michener, 19, recalled how Aqsa would walk the halls in Grade 9, usually with her head down and eyes piercing the floor. Her head was covered by a hijab, the traditional shoulder-length head scarf worn by Muslim girls and women.280

Walking with her head down and eyes looking at the floor is exactly what surah 24:31 requires when it tells Muslim women to “lower their gaze.” The definition of hijab as just a “shoulder-length head scarf” comes from the liberal Hanafi school, which has many followers in Pakistan, but this definition is rejected by the other recognized Islamic legal schools. Aqsa’s rebellion began while she was in tenth grade. After her classmates admired her beautiful hair, she began not to wear the hijab in school:

Suddenly, tight-fitting jeans, talking to boys, late nights with friends and listening to rap and hip-hop music became the norm for Aqsa — as did fights with her family.281

As we have explained in Chapter Eight, all of these behaviors are forbidden by sharia.

Moving on to Section C of the Worksheet, there is much evidence Aqsa’s behavior provoked a response by her male family members and this response was in accordance with amr bil ma’ruf. National Post reported the efforts to follow amr bil ma’ruf began with surveillance in the home:

She had no privacy, not even in her bedroom, which had to be passed through by her parents whenever they went to their own room. A part of her bedroom wall was even removed, providing a view inside to her parents, her seven siblings or the wives of three of her brothers, who also lived in the house.282

As time went by, the attempts to correct Aqsa following amr bil ma’ruf increased from watching her to restricting her movements and access to people outside of her family. Aqsa was still allowed to go to school but was no longer allowed to socialize with her friends:

Her telephone access was restricted. She was not allowed to socialize, had to go straight home after school and was expected to remain with her family on weekends.283

Aqsa’s friends reported Aqsa was afraid that either her father or her brother would kill her for violating sharia’s dress requirements:

Krista Garbutt remembers walking down the street with Ms. Parvez earlier this year, when the two of them spotted Ms. Parvez’s brother walking toward them. Panicking, the teenager quickly fumbled for her head scarf, trying to put it on. “There were times when we’d be walking down the street and she’d see her brother and she wouldn’t be wearing her hijab and she’d have to put it on,” Ms. Garbutt said. “She said, ‘He’ll kill me, he’ll kill me.’ I said, ‘He’s not going to kill you,’ but she said, ‘Yeah, he will.’ And nobody believed it.”284

Another friend reported:

‘I remember we were sitting in the hall one day and Aqsa put on this really nice outfit, like something I would have worn. I told her she looked pretty in it and she said, ‘Thank you, but I shouldn’t be wearing this.’ I asked her why and she said, ‘My dad will kill me if he finds out.’’ It was a threat she said was made often. ‘I’d tell her she was being overdramatic,’…’I didn’t think it was true.’285

Aqsa’s fear of being killed supports an inference that her family members threatened her, in accordance with the steps of amr bil ma’ruf, and this inference is proven by evidence from her friends:

Another classmate and close friend, Dominiquia Holmes-Thompson, said Aqsa “got threatened” several times as the relationship with members of her family became tumultuous.286

After threats, the next step of amr bil ma’ruf would be battery. The next event reported by the press, however, was Aqsa left home and began staying with friends. Whether her move out was prompted by actual violence appears to be unknown. What is clear is the family took the step after battery, the use of deadly force.

Section D of the Worksheet to Recognize Ghayra Violence asks whether evidence exists to show the perpetrator or wali acted out of a sense of irritated ghayra. In this case there is no question, because of the statement made by the wali, Aqsa’s father, to Aqsa’s mother: “My community will say you have not been able to control your daughter. This is my insult. She is making me naked.”287

The evidence marshaled by the Worksheet shows irrefutably Aqsa Parvez’s murder was ghayra violence. One of the purposes of the Worksheet is to prevent teachers, counsellors, and school administrators from making the mistakes that were made in Aqsa’s case. Mary Rogan, who broke the story about Aqsa’s honor killing in Toronto Life, reports Aqsa made it clear to school officials that she was caught up in what we now see was amr bil ma’ruf and while Aqsa may not have used that term, she understood her life was in danger:

What was the reaction when you approached the staff for an interview at Aqsa’s school, Applewood Heights?
They were defensive. The school staff is preoccupied with cultural sensitivity, even though Aqsa went to them and said, “My culture is killing me. My father is insisting I wear the hijab and not see my friends.” The school’s response was to contact Aqsa’s imam, which seemed insane to me. It was like bringing in a Christian brother to speak to an altar boy who complained of abuse by a priest. She was very clear about what the problem was, but the school staff is trained to reach out to leaders in the community. And in the Muslim community, in Aqsa’s part of the world, the community leaders are imams. It was a crazy bind that she found herself in.288

Aqsa’s case make it obvious there is a glaring lack of understanding of the Islamic roots of ghayra killing. Everyone who is involved in education, in domestic violence intervention, and in law enforcement and the courts needs to understand why ghayra violence takes place so, next time, the school won’t have to call an imam.

Case 4: Rona, Zainab, Zahar, and Geeti Shafia, 2009 Afghanistan

In June, 2009, Mohammad Shafia, his second wife Tooba, and his son Hamed drowned Shafia’s first wife, Rona, who never bore him children, and Zainab, Sahar, and Geeti, three of seven children Shafia fathered with Tooba.289 The bodies of Rona, Zainab, Sahar, and Geeti were found inside a NIssan Sentra pushed into a canal lock at Kingston Mills near Kingston, Ontario.290 Zainab, age nineteen, was the oldest of the three murdered daughters. Sahar was seventeen, Geeti was only thirteen.291 Hamed, the brother who took part in the murder, was about a year younger than Zainab. Shafia’s other children included a boy and girl close to Sahar’s age, whom we will call A and B, both of whom played a roll in the amr bil ma’ruf that ended in fatal ghayra violence, and another, younger daughter.292 Having begun with only a grade school education, Muhammad Shafia had become a wealthy business man.293 He was the top Panasonic dealer in Dubai, and still owned property and business interests in Afghanistan.294 In June, 2007, the Shafia family minus Rona immigrated to Canada295 under Quebec’s immigrant investor program, which required Shafia to invest $400,000 with the government.296 Rona came six months later on a visitor’s visa, her identity as Sharia’s first wife concealed.297 They were originally from Afghanistan but had also lived in Pakistan, Dubai, and, briefly, Australia.298 By the end of June, 2009, Rona, Zainab, Sahar, and Geeti were dead.

The Shafia murder case shocked Canada and sparked “unprecedented national and international media attention,”299 making it probably the most thoroughly documented incidence of ghayra violence in the West. Besides the court record, which includes Rona’s diary, and the normal print and internet news sources, the case spawned at least five books: Killed Because They Were Girls: The Complete Coverage of the Shafia Trial by Christie Blatchford and the reporters and columnists of the National Post, Inside the Shafia Murder Trial by Rosie DiManno and Andrew Chung for the Toronto Star, The Shafia Honour Killing Trial: The Full Story of a Crime that Shocked the Nation by Michael Friscolanti from Maclean’s Magazine, Honour on Trial: The Shafia Murders and the Culture of Honour Killings by Paul Schliesmann, and Without Honor: The True Story of the Shafia Family and the Kingston Canal Murders by veteran crime reporter, investigative journalist, and author Rob Tripp. Tripp is also the founder and editor of CANCrime.com, a “blog/website about Canadian crime, criminals and the justice system and a repository of documents – parole records, investigation reports, confidential memos and other material.”300 Tripp’s book is the most detailed, tracing the lives of Shafia and his wives back decades, thoroughly documenting the family’s experiences in Canada including interactions with teachers, administrators, child welfare workers, and police before the murders, what is known of the commission of the crime, the details of the investigation and the complexities of the trial, which involved dozens of witnesses, as well as photos of all involved and the crime scene. For example, only Tripp reports Sahar’s crush on a classmate named Jake, which set the stage for Zainab to attempt a secret meeting with her boyfriend in March, 2008 when Shafia and Tooba took Sahar to Dubai, presumably for correction. When they returned, Sahar was forbidden to return to school until authorities intervened. Particularly interesting is Tripp’s account of how the police learned they were dealing with an honor killing.

What is missing from all the sources, unfortunately, is recognition that the restrictions the victims faced came from sharia - which is Islamic culture because it is the rules for how one practices Islam - and an analysis of the victims’ behaviors from the standpoint of the requirements detailed in Chapter Eight. Also missing is an analysis of the actions of the wali and other perpetrators in light of the steps of amr bil ma’ruf discussed in Chapter Nine. Missing, as well, is the significance of the abundant evidence that shows Shafia was motivated by ghayra, as defined and described in Chapter Seven. We can use the Worksheet to Recognize Ghayra Violence to supply the missing analysis. The Shafia case also presents a novel fact for our analysis, the murder not only of daughters but also of a wife.

Applying the facts to Section A of the Worksheet to Recognize Ghayra Violence, we know Mohammad Shafia was the wali of the three murdered daughters and had the right to kill them with impunity under sharia. But Shafia was not the wali of his wife, Rona. Under sharia, Shafia - or any other Muslim - could legally kill Rona - or any other Muslim - only if circumstances existed to allow the prospective killer to get to the last step of amr bil ma’ruf.

Moving on to Section B of the Worksheet, since there are four victims, it will be easiest to discuss their respective sharia violations if we take them victim by victim.

Zainab - Zainab’s problems began while the family lived in Dubai. Zainab and all the Shafia children attended the Al Sadiq Islamic English School. Although the school sought to impose Islamic requirements, Zainab was part of a clique of popular, fashionable girls who rebelled in small ways, such as breaking the school’s uniform requirements and using makeup.301 Whether they understood how sharia’s rules for women flow from the Islamic sources, the girls at the Islamic school did understand the restrictions they were under and knew they could be subject to violent correction if they disobeyed. Rob Tripp reports the girls “acknowledged the rules their traditional families imposed and respected their boundaries” and “were aware of the wrath their behavior could induce.”302

In Canada, Zainab at first attended St. Pius X adult education center along with her brother, Hamed.303 Sharia does not prevent women from learning, but it does prevent them from leaving the home. The purpose of the prohibition on leaving the home is to prevent women from interacting with non-mahram men. Ignoring this rule brought the Shafia girls in the position of falling into the Islamic sin of socializing with strange men. When she began at the school, Zainab wore a hijab, but she was careless about it, “[i]t looked as if she didn’t really want to wear the scarf but was making a half-hearted attempt, while trying to be stylish at the same time.”304 The hijab referred to here is really just a headscarf, which does not meet sharia’s requirements. The hijab sharia requires is a head to toe cover that hides the woman’s shape. Zainab caught the eye of Ammar Wahid, a young Pakistani man. The purpose of the hijab is to prevent exactly what happened in this case, causing Ammar to fall into the sin of lust because Zainab’s beauty was on display. Ammar “thought he caught [Zainab] staring invitingly at him” so he began to try to meet her.305 Koran requires women to “lower their gaze” specifically to prevent them from having eye contact with men. Zainab ignored this rule, and the result was starting a non-Islamic relationship with a man. The relationship was non-Islamic because Islam does not allow a man and a woman to socialize after the woman passes age nine.

On Valentine’s Day, 2008, Ammar took advantage of a school program to send roses to other students to send Zainab a flower.306 On the card, Ammar told Zainab to wear white to school the following day if she was interested. The next day, when Ammar arrived at school, he saw Zainab waiting in a window overlooking the parking lot dressed completely in white.307

Zainab and Ammar began to meet and communicate secretly, trying to avoid being seen by her brother Hamed. Whether or not Zainab still half-heartedly wore the head scarf, when she met Ammar she adopted Western clothing, like jeans and knee-high boots.308 She was forward, she was not embarrassed to tell Ammar she had fallen in love with him at first sight.309 In March, 2008 Hamed caught Zainab and Ammar trying to meet secretly at the family’s apartment while their parents were on a trip to Dubai. As punishment, Zainab was kept home from school for almost a year during which time she rarely left her room.310 From the standpoint of Islam, this is not a punishment, it is simply a return to what is required, the woman staying at home. If she left her room, her father and brother subjected her to angry glares.311

Over the course of the next year, Zainab continued to send emails to Ammar, though they did not meet. This was another sharia violation since the general rule of not having contact applies to both physical and virtual contact. For example, a Muslim woman cannot have a virtual relationship through any electronic means with non-mahram men. Physicality is not the criterion. Zainab eventually was allowed to return to school, taking a French class at night with Hamed also enrolled to keep an eye on her.312 In early 2009, Zainab called Ammar and the pair once again began to meet secretly.313 By April 17, 2009, Zainab appeared to have contrived a plan to force Ammar to marry her and get her out from under her father’s control. She later told her uncle, Fazil Jawid, she “wasn’t particularly interested in getting married,” but “it was the only way to escape her house.”314 If this really was a trick to force Ammar into marriage, sharia would consider it to be an attempt to arrange her own marriage and, consequently, a forbidden act. Zainab called Ammar, telling him, “Come get me, if not, I’m taking a taxi and I’m leaving”315 At first Ammar resisted, he was still living at home and did not have a job, but he worried Zainab could not take care of herself if she left on her own.316 Ammar succumbed to Zainab’s pleas and she ended up at the Passages women’s shelter.317 She and Ammar began to see each other every day. On April 22, 2009 Zainab and Ammar agreed to get married, they also, apparently, began to have sex.318 The facts of the case show how a steady pattern of ignoring minor sharia requirements led directly to a very serious violation: zina, or fornication. At trial, the prosecutors told the jury Zainab had “put her ‘sexual integrity’ in doubt.”319

To induce Zainab to return home, her mother, Tooba, promised if she returned home the family would allow her to marry Ammar.320 Zainab agreed, and on May 18, 2009, Ammar and Zainab completed the nikah, the Islamic marriage ritual we described in Chapter Eight, at a local mosque.321 The following day, the Shafia family hosted a wedding reception for Zainab and Ammar. Ammar was not involved in these plans and had told the Shafias that his family opposed the marriage and would not attend the reception. There is only one way in which the family of a Muslim girl would interpret the groom’s family’s refusal to participate in the wedding reception, they would think the groom’s family looked at them with contempt. In this situation, the girl’s family would consider that her behavior was responsible for the groom’s family’s contempt. Zainab understood the shame she had brought on her family. She told Ammar,”I can’t do this, I can’t ruin my family’s reputation”322

After the failed marriage to Ammar, Tooba’s uncle tried to “clear this bad spot from the skirt of Zainab” by arranging a marriage between Zainab and his son, Hussain. As discussed in Chapter Ten, “washing a filthy spot from my skirt” is the phrase used when a woman’s behavior violates ghayra. This recognition of Zainab’s sharia violations by an outsider, even though a family member, would also be an affront to a Muslim man’s ghayra. He would feel an outsider is taking control of his namoos. Upset with Zainab’s behavior, Shafia forbade her from meeting with Hussein until he returned from a business trip outside Canada.323 “As she had done with Ammar before, Zainab ignored her father’s edict. She and Hussain met often…. They talked and traded text messages every day.”324 At the same time, she was still in touch with Ammar.325

Zainab documented her actions and attitudes that violated sharia in photographs with her boyfriend and selfies in which she appeared in various states of undress.326 At least some of these were seen by Shafia.

Sahar - When the Shafias moved to Canada, Sahar, who was 15, began attending a Canadian high school, Antoine-de-St-Exupéry - “St. Ex” for short - where Geeti also eventually attended.327 The environment at a Western high school was very different from what Sahar experienced in Dubai. “[B]ody-hugging jeans and hallway embraces” were the norm here, replacing sharia’s requirement of hijabs and it’s prohibition on boys and girls socializing enforced by the school in Dubai.328 In such an environment, it was impossible for a young Muslim girl not to see sharia violations on a daily - if not moment by moment - basis. Sahar, like Zainab, wanted small freedoms, “Canadian friends, makeup and clothes, and the company of boys.”329 They wanted “nothing more than to be normal Canadian kids”330 but sharia forbids all the things they desired.

Sahar repeated Zainab’s pattern of sharia violations. It wasn’t long before Sahar developed a crush on Jake, a classmate from Columbia.331 Sahar did not maintain her haya, but became a part of the the group of girls who admired Jake. She began to try to get him to talk to her.332 Jake was in the habit of greeting the girls who hung out with him with a kiss on the cheek. On a fateful morning, Sahar was with this group of girls when Jake gave her a friendly kiss on the cheek. Sahar’s little sister, B, happened to see the kiss, and reported it to Shafia, who got angry and slapped Sahar.333 One of Sahar’s teachers testified at trial Sahar confided to her “she couldn’t have a normal life, the normal life of a young girl…. Sahar told her she couldn’t see friends of her choosing and could not go out of the home.”334

Despite the problems at home created by Sahar’s interest in Jake, she decided to give him a birthday present. There is an Islamic principal of usul-al-fiqh called tariq al-ula, which literally means “the higher way.” This principal means that if someone will violate an important prohibition, they will certainly violate a less important prohibition. In this case, when Islam has already prohibited non-mahram (a member of the opposite sex who is not unmarriageable kin) to even see a woman or hear her speaking seductively, it has certainly forbidden hugging and kissing, even on the cheek. Sahar sent a message to Jake to meet her during a class break. When Jake found Sahar she dragged him behind some lockers to give him her gift, a scarf and bracelet.335 To thank Sahar, Jake kissed her on both cheeks and gave her a hug.336 Unfortunately for Sahar, B once again just happened to see what went on. The consequence was her parents ordered her family not to speak to her.337 The kisses and hug might seem small from a Western perspective, but physical intimacy with a non-Mahram male - especially a kafir (non-Muslim) - is a serious violation of sharia’s rules for women’s dress and conduct. Sahar also got caught by her father wearing eyeshadow at school.338 Her father just happened to be in the corridor at her school - possibly investigating reports made by B - when she passed by.

Sahar was kept out of school and taken to Dubai for the month of March, 2008. When the family returned to Canada, she was kept out of school for another two weeks. She was only allowed to return to school after school officials told her parents attendance was compulsory for children under sixteen. When she returned to school Sahar was required to wear a hijab.339

Sahar wore the hijab when she left home, but by the next school year she had begun changing her clothes and applying makeup once she got to school.340 In April of 2009, a detective who met with her noted she was wearing makeup and jewelry.341 Sahar once again confided to her teacher, telling her she was afraid her brother, A, would tell Shafia she was socializing with boys and misbehaving.342

Sahar’s biggest sharia violation came when she became romantically involved with Ricardo Sanchez, a twenty-one year-old non-Muslim from Honduras.343 Sahar was only seventeen. The age difference, significant in the West because Sahar was still a minor, is insignificant to sharia. But the fact Ricardo was a non-Muslim aggravates Sahar’s violation of sharia’s restriction on contact with the opposite sex. Ricardo was enrolled in the French class Zainab attended at night. It was Zainab who introduced Sahar to Ricardo.344 Sahar and Ricardo and Zainab and Ammar double dated a few times and Ricardo began to come to Sahar’s high school to meet her secretly at lunch time.345 In May, 2009, Sahar’s brother, A, caught them together at a lunch rendezvous.346

Like Zainab, Sahar also documented her sharia violations in photographs, some of which were found in her brother Hamed’s briefcase and, undoubtedly, fell into the hands of Shafia, her wali and the owner of her blood.347

Geeti - By age ten at the Islamic school in Dubai, fourth-grader Geeti was already known as “the naughtiest Shafia.”348 She openly challenged the authority of teachers in class, caused disturbances, and even kicked a teacher in the hallway. This type of rebelliousness has nothing to do with sharia’s rules for the dress and conduct of women, of course, but under the influence of her sisters and step-mother, Rona, Geeti began to rebel against the control of her father once the family moved to Canada.

By age 13, Geeti’s rebelliousness blossomed into violations of sharia’s dress requirements. Sometimes she dressed like a boy, sometimes she dressed provocatively.349 She was “sent home from school for wearing revealing clothing” and the school vice-principal called to let the family know why she was sent home.350 Based on the principle tariq al-ula, if Canadians did not consider Geeti’s dress proper, it is certain sharia would not approve it. She painted her nails and pierced her ears - both of which are minor violations - but she also pierced her navel, something considered offensive even by Muslims who do not practice their faith.351

Rona - The Shafia case presents not just the killing of a wife but the killing of the first of two wives. Islam allows a man to have an unlimited number of wives, four at a time. Islamic divorce, as we explained in Chapter Eight, is as simple as the man saying “I divorce you, I divorce you, I divorce you” before two male witnesses. Not every Muslim majority country follows sharia completely, so local domestic relations law may impose some additional requirements, but these requirements are non-Islamic. They are adding something more than Allah has required, which is a sin.

Shafia married Rona in 1979.352 Shafia married Tooba nine years later in 1988, after Rona was unable to conceive.353 Nobody - and particularly not a Westerner - who has not seen the situation from the inside when a man has more than one wife can truly understand how polygamy complicates the relationships and perverts the incentives inside the family. The love of the husband, which the wife should possess complete and undivided, becomes a zero sum game. In a zero sum game, whatever one player gains, the second player loses. In a family with two wives, whatever love - and any other resources, such as time or finances - the one wife gains comes at the expense of the other wife. The fact the wives are rivals destroys the love that should exist between every member of a family and creates perverse incentives between the wives. Normally in a family, when one family member receives a benefit, the other family members are happy for this family member. They also benefit, even if it is only by having good feelings. For example, one sibling feels happy to see another sibling receiving love and attention from the father. Children innately understand they must share the love of their parents and are satisfied as long as the love is distributed fairly equally. But wives never want to share the love of their husband. Each one wants all of the husband’s love, and wants to exclude all other women from receiving any of her husband’s love. In polygamy, what hurts one wife makes the other happy, creating perverse incentives for each wife to try to hurt the others.

These perverse incentives filter down and affect the attitudes and relationships of the children - to their parents, to each other, and to people in general - in five principal ways. First, children know their mother is hurt when their father marries another woman and this creates resentment against not only the other woman and her children but also against the father. It is a fact that in Islamic culture, the incidence of fathers being hurt by the children of their first wives is greater than fathers being hurt by the children of subsequent wives. Second, existing children know their inheritance will be reduced by the children of subsequent wives. This creates a feeling of irreversible financial loss. Third, the addition of step children to the family intensifies sibling rivalry for the father’s affection. Step siblings of rival wives are not as happy to see their half brothers and sisters receiving love and attention from their father as are siblings who share relationship with both parents. There is an unavoidable sense of deprivation, that what the step sibling gained came at the expense of the other children. Because the children cannot actually see their father’s heart, this sense of deprivation is driven by perceptions and can be increased by misunderstandings and suspicions. Fourth, the children of first wives typically experience poverty, when their father is just starting out on his career, while the children of later wives enjoy more prosperity. This also contributes to feelings of inequality and deprivation. Fifth, living in families driven by rivalry rather than undivided love often results in children witnessing many, and sometimes violent, arguments. This creates feelings of stress, and often leads to the children being short-tempered.

There is probably nothing a Muslim woman fears more than her husband taking another wife. When Shafia married his second wife, Tooba, Rona wrote in her diary “It was thus that he married a second time and I was visited with a new catastrophe.”354

Author Rob Tripp describes Rona as “a liberal woman who liked makeup and fashionable clothes.”355 Zainab, Sahar, and Geeti all shared Rona’s passion for makeup and fashion, perhaps due to her influence.356 It is clear Rona’s behavior was not in accordance with sharia’s rules for the dress and conduct of women and offended Shafia’s ghayra. Tripp reports Shafia “believed that Rona was turning her back on Afghan customs and Islamic traditions.”357 Shafia called Rona’s brother in France and complained, “Your sister has removed her head covering and she is using nail polish on her hands and feet.”358 When Rona removed her head covering, she not only rejected sharia law, she rejected the control of her husband. When she put on nail polish - which is forbidden outside the home - the message a Muslim male would receive was she was making herself attractive to other men. Just as Hamed informed on Zainab and B and A informed on Sahar, Tooba fed Shafia’s suspicions by telling him “Rona was behaving immodestly and spending entire days away from the house, perhaps doing inappropriate things.359

As early as 2002, while the Shafias were still in Dubai, Shafia told Rona to go back to Kabul, but Rona refused to go.360 It is very unlikely Shafia was serious about wanting to send Rona back to Kabul while he was still married to her because, in Islam, the man is responsible for everything that happens to the woman while they are married. If Shafia had not divorced Rona before sending her back, he would have faced a serious loss of sharaf - the honor concept related to a Muslim’s personal character. Shafia admitted as much in his conversation with Rona’s brother, saying, “She is my wife, I cannot leave her.”361

Once in Canada, Rona gained significant leverage over Shafia. Shafia could not find a way to get Rona admitted to Canada until November, 2007, five months after the Shafias came in.362 Shafia did not - and could not under Canadian law - admit that Rona was his first wife. Shafia concealed Rona’s identity as his wife by declaring she was a domestic worker.363 Rona had a distant relative who lived in Virginia and was a human rights worker.364 This woman was Fahima Vorgetts. Vorgetts told Rona that Shafia’s fraudulent declaration to obtain her visitor visa gave Rona a tremendous weapon to hold over him: “[O]nce you tell the police that you are his wife, they will know that he violated the immigration law…. He’ll be in trouble, not you.”365

Shafia and Tooba understood how Rona now held the security of their family in Canada in her hands, “if the government discovered the truth…the entire family could face deportation.”366 They took Rona’s passport along with photos and other documents that could prove she was Shafia’s wife.367 Because obtaining a divorce under Canadian law would force Shafia into admitting he had committed fraud, his threat to divorce Rona no longer had any power over her. Rona told her sister Diba Masoomi, who lived in France:

‘When he hit me, I asked him for a divorce.’ He said, ‘I have already given you your divorce,’ but I said, ‘Please write this divorce in a proper paper.’’ Shafia turned to Tooba and told her, ‘I have to find another way for this.’

Since Islamic divorces are verbal, by asking Shafia “to write this divorce in a proper paper” Rona was asking Shafia to obtain a Canadian divorce, something she knew he could not do without exposing his fraud.

Shafia had another justification for killing Rona under amr bil ma’ruf. Rona passed her rebellion against sharia rules for women onto Shafia and Tooba’s daughters. Rona characterized Shafia as “a tyrant who gave his teenage daughters no freedom.”368 In battles between the daughters and their parents over rules, Rona sided with the girls against their parents. Rona’s actions destabilized the family, leading Tooba to tell Rona she “no longer had any right to intervene” with the children or the home.369 Shafia could not send Rona away without exposing his fraud and, with the problems his daughters were experiencing, could no longer tolerate Rona spreading her rebellion to the children. In his mind he was left with only one alternative, to kill Rona.

Section C of the Worksheet to Recognize Ghayra Violence collects the facts that show the perpetrator(s) followed the steps required by amr bil ma’ruf in an attempt to correct or stop the sharia violations of the victim(s). In the Shafia case, there is evidence to show that not a single step in the amr bil ma’ruf hierarchy was skipped. The first step of enjoining good and forbidding evil is a two-part step that requires the amer (perpetrator) to 1) know that an action is against sharia and 2) that a violation has occurred. The Shafia case is a good example of how a Muslim male who does not attend mosque or, evidently, pray, nevertheless knows what is required or forbidden by sharia with respect to women’s dress and conduct. When the Shafia children attended school in Dubai, these requirements were unmistakably passed on to them. As Rob Tripp reported, the girls at the school in Dubai “acknowledged the rules their traditional families imposed and respected their boundaries.” To fulfill the second part of the first step - knowing a violation has occurred - Shafia used other family members to conduct surveillance on those whom he suspected of violating the rules.370 While tattling on siblings may be normal behavior for children everywhere, from the standpoint of sharia it is part of step one of amr bil ma’ruf.

The second step of enjoining good and forbidding evil is to explain that something is wrong. This step was satisfied by the school in Dubai, and Paul Schliesmann reports: “Before they left Dubai, the family had also made a pact: no one was to date until they finished their education. When they were old enough, they could marry. In the meantime, no dating.”371 Shafia continued to tell his daughters what was expected when the family moved to Canada. When Zainab received the rose from Ammar, before she began to meet secretly with him, she admitted she knew what she was doing was wrong by sending him an email that “laid out the rules of friendship.”372 Zainab said, “firstly be aware of my bro…if my bro is around, act like a complete stranger.”373 When Shafia returned to Canada after the wedding fiasco with Ammar had happened, Zainab apologized to him for her behavior.374 Sahar made a desperate confession to her teacher she could not have the life of a normal Canadian teenager because she could not chose her friends or go out when and where she wanted to. Using words is not the only way to explain that something is wrong. It can be done with just a glare, and with well-trained children this is often enough. For example, when Zainab received the rose, Hamed glared at her, indicating the very act of reaching to receive the gift was wrong. After she was banished to her room, Hamed and Shafia glared at her when she came out.

The third step of amr bil ma’ruf is forbidding the act verbally. When Hamed caught Zainab and Ammar meeting secretly at the Shafia apartment, Zainab tried to get out of trouble by claiming Ammar was not her boyfriend, but the boyfriend of a girl named Muhja. Shafia, Tooba, and Hamed met personally with Muhja to hear her confirm Zainab’s lie. To keep Zainab from getting into trouble through Muhja again, Shafia instructed her not to talk to Muhja ever again.375 Rona told a confidant that after a clash with Tooba, “Shafia sat me down and proceeded to preach to me, telling me that I should try to get along with Tooba.”376

The fourth step of enjoining good and forbidding evil is censuring with harsh words. Even Hamed carried out this step, scolding Sahar for dressing improperly and acting rebelliously.377 Likewise, after Hamed kicked Ammar out of the house when Zainab and Ammar tried to meet secretly, “He began screaming at Zainab for defying family rules.”378

Righting the wrong by hand is the fifth step of enjoining good and forbidding evil. In this step, the amer destroys property that is forbidden to be used by sharia, such as alcohol, musical instruments, and immodest clothing. In 2007 when the Shafias arrived in Canada, Tooba’s uncle, Latif Hyderi, invited the Shafias to attend his daughter’s wedding. His nephew took Tooba shopping to get wedding clothes for her daughters, but Shafia shredded the clothing because he said it was “too revealing.”379

Intimidation is the sixth step of amr bil ma’ruf. Police officer Choquette said when she met the Shafia children at their home “they were afraid of their father…he just looked at the children and they stopped talking.“380 The Shafia children told Montreal police their father “often threatened to kill them.”381 They told school officials they were “afraid of [their] father, afraid of getting beaten.”382 A social worker who interviewed Sahar along with her parents said that when the parents arrived, Sahar “started changing - going back on what she said.”383 The social worker testified she was surprised by the change in Sahar’s attitude and wondered “do I have before me a child that is afraid?”384

The sixth step of enjoining good and forbidding evil is battery. Author Tripp reports, “The children…told police that they were punched, slapped, pulled by the hair, shaken by the shoulder and often threatened with death.”385 Rona was also battered by Shafia. Rona told her sister, Diba Masoomi, who lived in France, that Shafia would pull her hair and kick her.386

The final step of amr bil ma’ruf is the use of deadly force. Rona, Zainab, Sahar and Geeti were killed on on June 30, 2009.

Section D of the Worksheet to Recognize Ghayra Violence collects the facts that show the perpetrator or the person who hired the perpetrator was acting from a sense of irritated ghayra. Statements that show the perpetrator recognized and was upset by the violations of sharia rules for women’s dress and conduct committed by the victim(s) are the type of evidence an investigator should look for in Section D.

In the Shafia case, the evidence Shafia’s ghayra was irritated by the conduct of his first wife and his oldest daughters is overwhelming, and includes statements made by other family members. Even little B, the next to the youngest of the Shafia children, recognized her father’s ghayra was violated when Zainab ran away to the women’s shelter. Daughter B told police “it was a dishonour that Zainab had run away.”387

Latif Hyderi, Tooba’s uncle, testified Shafia told him about Zainab that “she is a whore, she is dirty and she has cursed her father.”388 From an Islamic perspective, Shafia’s use of the word curse reflects the idea that Allah has brought judgment on Shafia through his daughter because of his own failure to be a faithful Muslim. If Shafia had been a good example of a faithful Muslim, his children would likely have followed him. Shafia told Fazil Jawid, Tooba’s brother, that Zainab was a whore and a prostitute and he wanted to kill her.389 Shafia was clearly upset by Zainab’s sharia violations.

Zainab confided to Hussain, Latif Hyderis’ son, that she wanted to shame her father by irritating his ghayra. She was “fed up” with her father’s restrictions. “She wanted to get away and she wanted to shame her father in the process.”390

Zainab accomplished her objective. At trial, the prosecutor asked Shafia, “Their treachery brought dishonour to you and your family?”391 “We believe in that,” Sahfia agreed.392 In a police wiretap, Shafia revealed the root cause of these ghayra violence murders: “They committed treason themselves. They betrayed humankind. They betrayed Islam. They betrayed our religion-they betrayed everything.”393 Many people in the West need to be asked, if sharia, the rules for how to correctly practice Islam, do not prohibit the victims’ behaviors, why did Mohammad Shafia say this?

Ghayra Outside the Immediate Family

In some situations, the Muslim man may fail to enforce his ghayra by correcting the members of his namoos who violate sharia. In these cases, members of the extended family - cousins, uncles, or even more distant relatives - may feel it necessary to engage in amr bil ma’ruf to correct or stop violations of the rules for women’s dress and conduct. In such a case, the Muslim male who fails to enforce his ghayra may also fall victim.

Two cases from Iran illustrate the situation. In the first case, a man who lived in a rural area of Iran married a woman from a large city. Despite being married, the woman engaged in sexual activities with other men, though not for money. Her conduct became well known within the community, to the point where the head of the tribe to which the husband belonged began to be taunted by men outside the tribe. After many years in which the husband failed to fulfill his duty to correct his wife, the leaders of the tribe felt compelled to take action. The leaders held a meeting and commanded the husband to put his wife in a car and drown her, the same modus operandi as in the Shafia case. The next day, the husband and his wife fled to another city.

The second case involves a well known shaheed - martyr - from the Iran-Iraq war, out of respect we will call him H.R.B. In Iran, the term shaheed is applied to veterans of the Iran-Iraq war who were either killed or injured, because the injured often die later from their war wounds. This use of the term martyr is justified by Islam.

For Shaheed H.R.B., the term martyr is used loosely, because although he was paralyzed in the war by a spinal cord injury, he did not die from his wounds. He and his wife were beheaded by his brothers-in-law in a ghayra killing.

H.R.B.’s paralysis left him unable to have sex. After the war, he became a high school teacher. To satisfy his wife, he began bringing some of his male students home to have sex with her. His wife’s brothers found out what he and their sister were doing and their ghayra became inflamed. They went to the house and beheaded H.R.B. and their sister.

Violence Outside the Namoos

In some cases, violence, such as threats, batteries, and deadly force, can be directed against people who are not members of the namoos or even family members. In these cases, the perpetrator may act from a sense of violated ghayra, but whether the violence fits into the category of amr bil ma’ruf and is therefore allowed under Islamic law presents an evidentiary question. To hold the perpetrator acted under amr bil ma’ruf, there must be evidence to show the perpetrator intended his actions to correct a person who was violating sharia or simply to stop a sharia violation. The best evidence to establish an intent to correct would be to show the perpetrator followed each of the steps of amr bil ma’ruf making his intent to correct clear by words before he took any violent action. Amr bil ma’ruf can only be used inside the umma, against another Muslim.

Regardless of whether a violent act is protected under Islamic law by being judged an act of amr bil ma’ruf, violence that is motivated by ghayra should be recognized as ghayra violence. Earlier, we dealt with an example of violence motivated by ghayra that was not directed at a member of the perpetrator’s namoos and was not judged to be justified under amr bil ma’ruf. This was the case of the Afghani man who returned home to a ranch in Iran to learn that the ranch owner has used undue influence to coerce the man’s wife into committing adultery. As the case worked out, the Afghani man killed the ranch owner but the murder was not excusable as either amr bil ma’ruf or punishment for adultery because the Afghan had not witnessed the adultery and could not meet the standard of proof for adultery required under sharia law. To understand the limits of amr bil ma’ruf, it is useful to consider how this case would have turned out under slightly different facts. For example, if the Afghani man had returned home and found the ranch owner and his wife in the actual act of adultery, he could have killed both his wife and the ranch owner if he was sure the sexual relations were consensual. Regardless of whether the wife consented or not, he could kill the ranch owner with impunity if he had caught him in the act. Killing the ranch owner because he was caught in the act of adultery would be justified under sharia on the grounds of punishment, not amr bil ma’ruf. Catching a person in the actual act of adultery is probably the only situation in which sharia allows a private individual to punish, in other cases punishment must be meted out by a sharia court. Since amr bil ma’ruf does not exist under Western law, the important point here is simply to recognize ghayra can provide the motivation for violence directed against people who are not members of the perpetrator’s namoos or family.

A situation is currently under investigation in Texas that may involve ghayra motivated violence against people outside not only the namoos but also outside Islam. The situation was brought to light by the murders of Gelarah Bagherzadeh, a 30 year-old Iranian Christian student, and Coty Beavers, also a Christian. Bagerzadeh was shot in her car while returning home to her parents’ residential complex in January, 2012. Coty Beavers was found shot dead in the apartment he shared with his wife, Nesreen Irsan, in November, 2012.

Nesreen is the common link between Coty and Gelarah. Coty has an identical twin brother named Cory. Cory met Nesreen first, while they were both attending Lonestar Community College.394 Cory introduced Nesreen to his twin brother Coty, and Coty and Nesreen soon became romantically involved. Nesreen later transferred to the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center where she met Gelarah Bagherzadeh. Nesreen and Galerah were both studying molecular genetics. Nesreen introduced Gelarah to Cory Beavers, and Cory and Gelarah also quickly became romantically involved.

In May, 2014 police arrested Nesreen’s father, 56 year-old Ali Irsan, and charged him with Gelarah Bagherzadeh’s murder.395 The Houston Chronicle reported:

The father…was furious when his Jordanian-American daughter married a man without his permission. Ali Mahwood-Awad Irsan blamed his daughter’s husband [Coty], relatives say. They say he also faulted one of her closest friends, 30-year-old Gelareh Bagherzadeh.396

This case has not yet come to trial so whether Ali Irsan is guilty is yet to be proven. Irsan is currently in federal custody on other charges.397

Chapter Twelve

Prevention

A young man walked toward the seashore. On the beach in the distance he saw a gray-haired man bending over and throwing something into the ocean. As he approached the old man, the young man saw the beach was littered with starfish, as far as the eye could see.

“What are you doing?” he asked the old man.

“The tide is going out, so I’m throwing the starfish back into the ocean. If they’re left on the beach they’ll die,” the old man answered.

The young man shook his head. “But there are millions of them,” he said, “you can’t possibly make a difference.”

Picking up another starfish the old man looked the young man in the eye, “It makes a difference to this one,” he said, and tossed it gently into the sea.

There is a critical step that must be taken to prevent honor killing. The people whose profession brings them into personal contact with Muslim women - teachers, counsellors, social workers, nurses, doctors, cops, and prosecutors - must recognize it is the religion of Islam that provides the motive and dictates the modus operandi for ghayra (honor) killing and lesser forms of ghayra violence. As we have explained, the mechanism that leads to ghayra killing is quite simple. Sharia, the rules for how to practice Islam, provide restrictions on women’s dress and conduct. When women violate these restrictions, they irritate the ghayra of Muslim men, the control Islam demands Muslim men exercise over the sexuality of their namoos to ensure Islam’s moral principles are observed. When his ghayra is irritated, the man uses the power sharia gives him to correct or stop a violation of the restrictions on women. This power is called amr bil ma’ruf - enjoining good and forbidding evil - and it extends from verbal admonition all the way to deadly force.

In every case of the ghayra killing of an adolescent Muslim girl in the West, there were many Western non-Muslims who were directly or indirectly involved in the girl’s life and who recognized there was a problem. Unfortunately, the best these people could do was to observe the Muslim girls could not have a “normal” life - they could not dress or behave like Western teenagers. Because these people did not understand the Islamic origin of ghayra violence, they did not know the restrictions on dress and behavior the girls faced came directly from sharia, the rules for how to correctly practice Islam. Consequently, they didn’t know what the restrictions were, and they didn’t know the consequences for violating the restrictions. Because they did not understand the Islamic origin of ghayra violence, they did not know that ghayra, the Muslim male’s motive to enforce these rules, is a characteristic of Allah, Himself. They did not realize ghayra has an important function within the religion of Islam, it is not a tribal, cultural, or patriarchal phenomenon that can be dismissed. Because they did not understand the Islamic origin of ghayra violence, they did not understand that sharia, the rules for how to correctly practice Islam, gives Muslims the private enforcement power of amr bil ma’ruf which no government - Muslim or non-Muslim - can take away. In short, because they did not understand the Islamic origin of ghayra violence, they failed to appreciate the danger and take effective action to save the girls’ lives.

Every person whose profession brings them into contact with Muslim women needs to know that ghayra is a concept unique to Islam, and consequently ghayra violence cannot be lumped together with other types of violence, even if these other types of violence are also classified as “honor” violence. For example, sometimes Sikh or Hindu women are included in lists of “honor” killing victims. The question is, were these women killed because they were violating restrictions for women’s dress and conduct that come from sharia, the rules for how to practice Islam? Were the perpetrators motivated by ghayra, the jealousy Muslim men share with Allah for enforcing the rules for women’s dress and conduct? Does the history of interactions between the perpetrator and the victim show the perpetrator was following the hierarchy of steps laid out in the sharia provisions that govern amr bil ma’ruf? Unless the answer to all three of these questions is yes, it is not correct to call the murder of non-Muslim women ghayra violence.

We mentioned before that using the word “honor” is a bit like using the word “football.” Football means soccer to most of the world, but in the United States it means a very different game. The same thing is true for “honor.” The concept of honor can be defined in general as a condition that describes how well one follows a given set of moral rules. If one follows the rules, he or she is “honorable.” If one does not follow the rules, he or she is “dishonorable.” Unfortunately, this generalization says nothing about the substantive content of the moral rules. To the extent the content of moral rules is different between people groups, something that is “honorable” to one group may be “dishonorable” to another group. Undoubtedly, cultures that flow from different religions all have concepts that get translated into English as “honor,” but which mean very different things. For example, the Japanese historically had a concept of honor which was responsible for the practice of “hara kiri,” a form of ritual suicide. On the 2013 DVD “Honor Diaries,” a Sikh woman shared that her sister had committed suicide rather than dishonor her family by leaving her husband. For Sikhs, one of the most important principles of “honor” is that a woman must not leave her husband.398 This apparently means a woman may not seek a divorce. Islam, on the other hand, does not prevent women from leaving their husbands or seeking a divorce. Sharia provides a woman may petition for divorce before the Islamic court. The Islamic judge has authority from the imam to divorce a woman on behalf of her husband. Using a broad and ambiguous word like honor to categorize violence against women causes confusion and prevents people from seeing the real motivation behind the murder of Muslim girls. It is much better to use Islam’s own term, ghayra, to describe these so-called “honor” killings.

When professionals who interact with Muslim women understand ghayra violence comes from Islam, they are no longer left without a guide to know what is happening in the lives of these girls. They can go to Chapter Eight in this book to see the list of behaviors that will put a Muslim woman’s life in danger. From Chapter Nine they can see the list of steps a Muslim man normally takes to enforce the sharia provisions for women. If the Muslim women have already been subjected to some of these steps, the professional should hear an alarm bell. Likewise, as in the case of Noor Al-Maleki, police do not have to be puzzled when the perpetrator claims his family law is above state law. A statement like this should immediately alert the police the perpetrator is motivated by ghayra.

Professionals need to recognize that the danger of ghayra violence and killing - following sharia’s restrictions on women and the steps of amr bil ma’ruf - is actually greater among Muslims who appear secular, less well-educated, or non-practicing. This may sound counter-intuitive. One might expect that someone who follows Islam closely is more likely to commit ghayra killing. In fact, this is not the case, because parents who are more observant are more likely to train their children to follow sharia rules than are less observant parents. It is possible to break Muslims in the West down into four categories with respect to their educational level and how correctly they observe Islam. The categories help indicate how likely a particular Muslim is to engage in ghayra violence. “Educated” or “uneducated” here refers to academic training from a Western perspective, not the level of Islamic education. How closely an individual practices Islam is captured in the qualities of being “observant” or “nominal:”

1. Educated Observant Muslims - These individuals tend to be true followers of sharia with a correct understanding of its requirements. This category includes people who follow Islam’s command to make taqiyya to deceive non-Muslims about what Islam teaches and who attempt to justify Islamic punishments and Islam’s restrictions on women as being humanitarian. These people know the maqassid al-sharia and avoid practices which, if discovered, might reflect badly on Islam. They generally do not practice female genital mutilation or force their wives to cover completely. Because children from educated observant families are more likely to be true Islamic believers, they are more likely to become leaders of Islamic communities, founders of Islamic “charities” and other organizations, and leaders of jihadi groups.

2. Educated Nominal Muslims - Those who follow their own interpretation of Islam, which may include a syncretistic mix of other religions and ideologies, even atheism. There are people who classify themselves as “atheist-Muslims.” Westerners often view these people as “moderate” Muslims, but Islam itself would classify them as non-Muslims because they do not even practice the five pillars of shahada, prayer, fasting, zakat, and hajj. The five pillars are the minimum requirement to be considered a Muslim. This type of so called “moderate” Muslim creates room in society for the educated observant Muslims to operate and deceive Westerners by pretending to be moderates themselves.

3. Uneducated Observant Muslims - These Muslims do not have much education but they try to follow sharia as closely as possible. These people tend to circumcise their female children and begin to discipline their children harshly early in life to ensure they follow sharia. Jihadi foot soldiers often come from this class.

4. Uneducated Nominal Muslims - uneducated Muslims who do not attend mosque or practice sharia requirements in their own lives. This class presents the greatest risk for ghayra killing.

Among the above groups, educated Muslims, either observant or nominal, have a lesser problem with honor killing. The reason is that educated Muslims can communicate more effectively to their children. An Educated Observant father who has a good job and salary forms or seeks out a like-minded Islamic community. This community has its own schools, gyms, and pools that follow the Islamic standards of the parents. This insulates the children from Western ideas about good or bad. Teenagers in this community wear hijab and obey Islamic rules without complaining. By directing their children toward an obedient Islamic community, the parents influence their children to adopt Islamic rules of their own free choice. These children therefore believe that the decision to follow Islamic rules is their own choice, without realizing how they have been influenced in this direction by their parents. This community has worked assiduously to develop Islamic methods for every activity in which Western children engage. They have even developed Islamic women’s swimsuits!

Daughters in this community are loved by their fathers because they accept the supremacy of Islam and males. The Muslim girl from the Educated Observant family does not try to have relationships with non-Muslims, especially non-Muslim males. They don’t object to arranged marriages, although in some cases they find their husbands from among their Islamic community. The male members of the families of these obedient girls do not have to use ghayra violence.

The second category, Educated Nominal Muslims, do not have problems with ghayra violence with their adolescent girls because they interpret Islam in a way that allows them - both the fathers and the girls - to do whatever they want to do. In their interpretation, every action Islam has forbidden can become allowed. Drinking alcohol, wearing shorts, having non-Muslim boyfriends might all be permitted for the girls of these families.

The third category, Uneducated Observants, have many problems when they arrive in the West. They mostly get jobs with low salaries and cannot afford Islamic private schools. Their children go to public school. To prevent their children from adopting Western ideas, Uneducated Observants usually begin to discipline their children harshly from an early age. The atheistic, deeply secular environment of the Western public school clashes with what the Uneducated Observant father believes about moral rules. If the father does not begin discipline early and the daughter accepts Western standards, communication with the father may completely break down. But, more often, fear takes over, and the girl finds it easier to repress her desires than to be rebellious and face even more severe punishments.

When the Uneducated Observant father cannot persuade his daughter to follow his beliefs, he may resort to force to stop her from acting like Westerners and force her to obey sharia. For example, trying to fit in, the girl might join the school band and bring a musical instrument home to play. Because playing music is forbidden in Islam, the father “enjoins the good” and asks his daughter to take the instrument out of the house and stop playing it. If his daughter does not obey, the father - following the procedure for amr bil ma’ruf - would break the instrument. Other situations that might obviously result in ghayra violence are easy to imagine, such as a daughter who adopts Western dress or, especially, attempts to have relationships with non-Muslim boys. Because of the strict discipline from childhood, however, Uneducated Observant families generally do not have problems with their children violating sharia. This category of Muslims has less problems with ghayra killing but more problems with ghayra violence. Ghayra violence starts from childhood with this category of Muslim.

The last category, Uneducated Nominal Muslims, are at the highest risk for both ghayra violence and ghayra killing. An Uneducated Nominal Muslim father might drink alcohol, marry a western woman, shave his beard and wear blue jeans. In childhood, he allows the Western community to form his daughter’s values and, consequently, her behavior. Many non-Islamic behaviors are allowed for such girls when they are prepubescent, but problems arise as the girls get older and their behavior begins to transgress certain limits. The father might not even have been aware that he would not tolerate the daughter’s behavior past a certain limit until the limit is actually reached. At this point, the father’s ghayra starts annoying him and he has to do something to stop his daughter from misbehaving. This point is very often reached when the daughter begins to dress seductively or to have relationships with boys, especially non-Muslim boys. If the girl continues to rebel, the situation might lead her father to engage in ghayra violence or killing. The overwhelming majority of ghayra killings occur among this category of Muslims.

The bottom line for professionals is they must not assume there will be no problems with ghayra killing simply because a family does not practice Islam. The less a family that identifies itself as Muslim actually practices Islam, the greater the likelihood they will engage in ghayra killing.

Most importantly, professionals need to realize Islam will never be officially recognized as the source of honor killing. If they are going to make a difference in the lives of the girls they serve, they are going to have to learn to recognize the sharia restrictions and steps of amr bil ma’ruf when they encounter them in practice. Sadly, there is a great deal of misinformation in the area of honor killing. Even people who claim to care about the lives of women and to understand honor killing have actually put out false and misleading information.

An example of this type of misinformation is the 2013 DVD Honor Diaries. On this DVD, a number of women have a dialogue about “honor killing” and other practices that victimize women like female genital mutilation and early child marriage. The DVD says absolutely nothing substantive about either the sharia rules for women’s dress and conduct or the mechanism that results in Islamic ghayra killings. A quote from writer/producer Paula Kweskin demonstrates how Honor Diaries fumbles with the true origin and nature of “honor” killing:

Honor Diaries is the first film of its kind to break the silence on honor violence…. It comes as a result of a woman going against what’s known as honor…. It’s an abstract concept, you know, it is difficult to explain. It’s when a woman goes against the grain, you know, when she goes against what her family’s perceptions of her should be.399

Ms. Kweskin can’t really be faulted for her lack of detailed knowledge about the source and mechanism of “honor killing,” which she can only refer to as “going against the grain.” Kweskin was probably misled by Raheel Raza, one of the dialogue participants who went out of her way to say Islam has nothing to do with honor killing. Raza spoke up when Juliana Taimoorazy, an Assyrian Christian who lived in the Middle East for a number of years, expressed her opinion that the source of honor killing was religion:

Juliana Taimoorazy: As a Christian women, we lived in Muslim countries for centuries, obviously, but we didn’t adapt to honor killing so I don’t think this is cultural, I think it is more religious, because we didn’t have that in our communities.

Nazanin Afshin-jam: Juliana, you grew up in Iran for many years. In your family, or those around you, did the word aberu ever come up? Like the idea of don’t do that, it might shame, bring shame?

Juliana Taimoorazy: Yes, but not to the point of killing somebody.

Raheel Raza: Just to point up what you said about it being religious, it isn’t, the reason being that this idea of honor and honor killing is embedded in Sikh, Hindu, you know, it has been there, not only in Muslim societies. In, you know, in these salvation communities, salvation culture has sort of perpetuated this, but then, you know, in the Arab world it exists as well.400

As this whole book demonstrates, Juliana is correct that the source of ghayra killing is Islam. Many other religious minorities live in Islamic countries, such as the Bahai, Zoroastrians, Assyrian Christians, Armenian Christians, Orthodox Christians, and Jews. None of these groups practices ghayra violence or killing (honor killing) because they do not follow the sharia restrictions on women’s dress and conduct and do not have the concept of ghayra, which exists to enforce these restrictions. Nazanin displays her own ignorance in pointing to aberu as the source of ghayra violence because, as we explained in Chapter Seven, aberu is a much more broad concept of which ghayra is only a small part. The factors that can offend aberu range all the way from serving food that is too salty, sneezing loudly, a man appearing in public with uncombed hair, to a woman having sexual relationships that do fall within the area protected by ghayra. Attempting to equate aberu with ghayra is a huge mistake, because they are not the same, as Juliana’s answer recognizes.

But it is Raheel Raza’s two cents that is most misleading. Sikhism and Hinduism may well have concepts that can be loosely translated as “honor” that result in violence against women, but this does not eliminate Islam as the source of ghayra violence, as we discussed in the beginning of this chapter. Raza is also incorrect when she tries to blame “culture” as the source of ghayra killing. Ghayra killing exists wherever Islam exists, because Islamic culture is sharia, and sharia is Islam. Raza is no different than the Islamic apologists who obscure the reasons for ghayra killing. Without them, even laymen would see the connection between ghayra killing and Islam.

Another misleading claim on Honor Diaries comes from Qanta Ahmed, a physician from New York. Dr. Ahmed claims, “Female genital mutilation is not advocated in Islam in any way, shape, or form. It doesn’t appear in the Koran. It has very much been adopted by some Muslim societies.” Dr. Ahmed is correct that the command to perform female circumcision does not appear in the Koran, but then neither does the command to perform male circumcision. The Koran is not the only authoritative Islamic source, however. What does appear in the Koran is the command to follow what both Allah and His Messenger have commanded. As we have already discussed, Koran is what Allah says, and the hadith are what Muhammad said and did. Without hadith, Islam is incomplete, because without hadith it is impossible to completely understand the Koran. The hadith provides the asbab al-nuzul, the causes of inspiration that are used to explain Koranic verses. The hadith also provides the details of how to fulfill the obligations Allah commands, such as how to fast, pray, make pilgrimage, treat Muslims and non-Muslims, and many other things. A number of authoritative hadith graded as sahih - authentic - affirm the requirement that both men and women must be circumcised. At the risk of being repetitive, here is the discussion of female circumcision we presented in Chapter Eight:

Muhammad stated expressly that circumcision is required:

Narrated Abu Huraira:

Allah’s Messenger said, ‘Five practices are characteristics of the Fitra: circumcision, shaving the pubic region, clipping the nails and cutting [the hair under the armpits and] the mustaches short.’401

The Arabic word fitra used here literally means instinct, as in what one instinctively knows is right or wrong. The idea is it is self-evident to all individuals that these five acts are required. The word translated circumcision is al-khitan, the plural of khatna, the Arabic word that literally means circumcision. The use of the plural form shows circumcision is required for both men and women and this is confirmed by a sahih (authentic) hadith that makes a ghusl bath necessary after circumcised male and female sexual organs touch:

Aishah narrated that:

the Prophet said: ‘When the circumcised meets the circumcised then Ghusl is required.’402

The circumcision Islam requires for girls is radically different from circumcision performed on boys. For boys, circumcision simply means cutting the foreskin around the head of the penis. Islamic circumcision for boys copies the ritual performed by the Jews and, indeed, its origin dates back to when Abraham circumcised Ishmael in Genesis 17:23. Male circumcision is usually performed shortly after birth, however all Muslim males are required to be circumcised, so uncircumcised male converts to Islam must also undergo the procedure regardless of their age.

For girls, circumcision means the complete removal of the woman’s clitoris. The purpose of female circumcision is to serve the male’s ghayra by reducing the likelihood a woman will engage in illicit sexual relations. The idea is removing the clitoris will reduce the woman’s desire for sex.

Female circumcision strikes Westerners as cruel and unusual, so it is often the object of taqiyya403 by Muslim leaders in the West. In many Islamic countries, there is no such taqiyya, and the requirement for female circumcision is asserted unabashedly. An obvious example of such taqiyya may be found in Nuh Ha Mim Keller’s translation of Reliance of the Traveller, a six hundred year-old manual for laymen on sharia law as practiced by the Shafi legal school. Keller’s translation presents the English side by side with the original Arabic. Here is what Keller’s English translation says about circumcision:

Circumcision is obligatory (O: for both men and women. For men it consists of removing the prepuce from the penis, and for women, removing the prepuce (Ar. bazr) of the clitoris (n: not the clitoris itself, as some mistakenly assert). (A: Hanbalis hold that circumcision of women is not obligatory but sunna, while Hanafis consider it a mere courtesy to the husband.)404

Here is what the Arabic actually says:

It is required on every man and woman, al khitan (plural form of circumcision). And that is cutting the skin that is over the head of the penis. But about woman’s circumcision, that is cutting the clitoris.

You will only discover Keller’s deception if you know Arabic. Although he claims the requirement is to remove the prepuce of the clitoris, the word he translates as “prepuce” in the Arabic passage is actually - bazr [bathr] - which is, in fact, the Arabic word for clitoris. It is the clitoris which must be removed. If the passage had, in fact, said “prepuce of the clitoris” it would have used the Arabic term gholfat al-bathr. It is common sense that what would be required is the removal of the clitoris because removing just the prepuce would not serve Islam’s purpose of protecting the man’s ghayra.

The producers of Honor Diaries claim the DVD was produced to promote understanding of honor violence and save women’s lives. In fact, all it does is hide the true source and reasons for honor violence. It might as well have been produced by the Muslim apologists who try to cover up the relation between ghayra killing and Islam.

So, besides Raheel Raza’s “salvation culture,” to what does Honor Diaries attribute the practice of ghayra killing? The answer is the familiar feminist cliché, “patriarchy.” On the Honor Diaries website, Raza moves her finger of blame from pointing at “salvation culture” to pointing at men:

Whether it’s racism, or forced veiling by the Taliban; whether it’s attacks on freedom of movement or the rights to education and work under dictatorial regimes, the leaders of these movements are always men, and the victims are always women. The challenge before women in general, and Muslim women in particular, is to shift from the reactive mind-set, in which it is necessary for women to assert their autonomy over their lives in the face of strong opposition from patriarchal structures and systems of thought and behavior -- to a pro-active mind-set, in which they can finally begin to speak of themselves as full and autonomous human beings who have not only a body but also a mind and a spirit.

Blaming “the patriarchy” as the root cause of ghayra killing is illogical for a number of reasons. First, Western, non-Muslim feminists have battled “the patriarchy” for decades, but this Western, non-Muslim patriarchy never practiced ghayra killing. Second, women become victims of ghayra killing when they violate specific rules, the sharia rules for women’s dress and conduct, but there are no written rules of “the patriarchy” which would justify the claim victims of ghayra killing violated “patriarchal” rules. If such “patriarchal” rules did exist, in each case of ghayra killing we would be able to open the book of “patriarchal” rules for women’s dress and conduct and point to the violations that led to the ghayra violence. Third, women are not the only victims of ghayra killing. Men who take the female role in homosexual relations are also the victims of ghayra violence and killing. In these types of cases, it is not unusual to see a mother kill the boy. Fourth, women are frequently co-conspirators, accomplices to, and co-defendants in ghayra killing. Honor Diaries, itself, opens its segment on honor killing with a case where the killer was a woman, the case of Anusha Zafar we discussed in Chapter Eleven. Finally, the real victims of ghayra killing are the men themselves. Islam indoctrinates them into a system where they are twisted into destroying the people they love the most for the sake of sharia. Islamic society - including women - and the people around the men expect them to react violently when they see behaviors that violate their ghayra. If they don’t take action, others might do it for them. If they facilitate the ghayra violations, they themselves might be killed. Islam makes this feeling so strong in the hearts of men they respond reflexively to behaviors that violate their ghayra.

Recommendations

The following suggestions are inexpensive to implement and may be beneficial in preventing ghayra violence and killing:

1. 1. Training at least one specialist in each police department who would understand the Islamic source of ghayra violence and the behaviors that can trigger ghayra violence.

2. 2. Educating 911 operators to recognize calls that may potentially involve ghayra violence and to direct such calls to the police specialist.

3. 3. Establishing places of sanctuary - shelters or foster homes - for potential victims of ghayra violence. An explicit threat from a family member might be the trigger to move someone out of the home. Workers in existing shelters need to be trained to appreciate the magnitude of danger to Muslim women and understand how relentlessly the Muslim family may pursue a woman to harm her, even while she is in the shelter.

4. 4. Educating Muslim women about the behaviors that may trigger ghayra violence. As we explained above, problems often fester into actual violence when a father sees a behavior that he had not previously realized would motivate him to violence. Since the father did not anticipate the behavior would trigger his ghayra, he probably did not tell his daughter to avoid the behavior.

5. 5. Educating school teachers and staff about the source and reasons for ghayra violence and killing and ensuring they act to involve police and other authorities before ghayra violence takes place.

6. 6. Educating judges, lawyers, prosecutors and social workers about ghayra violence.

7. 7. Perhaps the most effective step would be to reform the immigration visa process to tell potential immigrants about laws prohibiting ghayra violence in the United States. Such changes might involve:

1. A. informing potential immigrants about criminal liability in the United States for ghayra violence and imposing a mandatory waiting period after they receive such education before they can obtain a visa.

2. B. steps to make deportation easier should a potential offender take steps such as threatening a female family member.

Hopefully, this book will be an effective tool in the hands of professionals to help save the lives of Muslim women.

Professionals should not think it is racist to recognize sharia rules for women’s dress and conduct as the root cause of ghayra violence. People around the world, from many different races, practice Islam. Islam is a set of ideas, it is not a race.

Glossary

aberu - a Farsi word that literally means “water on my face,” communicating the idea that something that is dishonorable makes sweat break out on one’s face. For Persians, aberu is an even more general category of honor above both ezzat and sharaf.

ahadith - plural form of “hadith,” the purported sayings, deeds, and silences of Muhammad.

al-amr bi al-ma’ruf wa al-nahy ‘an al-munkar - An Arabic phrase that literally means “enjoining good and forbidding evil.” It is what Muslims are commanded to do to enforce all that Islamic monotheism ordains. The concept includes a private right for each and every Muslim to enforce sharia. Since the right is divinely ordained it cannot be taken away by any government, Muslim or non-Muslim.

Al-Hidayah - An Arabic word that literally means “The Guidance.” It is the name for a leading fiqh manual of the Hanafi madhab.

al-lazina ootul kitab - An Arabic phrase that literally means “those who have been given a book.” It is used to refer to Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians.

al-maqasid al-sharia - The goals of Islam, usually used to refer to the most important goal, establishing the deen or religion of Allah throughout the entire world. Surah 2:193 commands Muslims to fight until all religious worship is for Allah, alone. Any and all moral rules recognized by sharia may be bent or broken to achieve the maqasid.

amer - The person who engages in enjoining good and forbidding evil - amr bil ma’ruf. In ghayra violence this person is the one who perpetrates the violence. The plural form is amerin, which would be used when a group of people do amr bil ma’ruf.

amr bil ma’ruf - An abbreviated way to refer to al-amr bi al-ma’ruf wa al-nahy ‘an al-munkar.

aqida - An Arabic word that means “belief.” Used to refer to the basic tenets of Islamic faith specified in the “first pillar.”

asbab al-nuzul - An Arabic phrase which means the “causes of inspiration.” The asbab al-nuzul give the historical circumstances surrounding a Koranic ayat and help mujtahids to understand the meaning of the ayat.

ayat - An Arabic word that literally means “sign,” used to refer to the verses of Koran which are each considered to be miraculous signs.

az-zalimun - the plural form of al-zalim, those who commit iniquity. Surah 2:193 commands Muslims to fight az-zalimun, meaning wrongdoers, polytheists, and the unjust, all of whom reject Islam.

badal - An Arabic word which literally means “to substitute,” with a connotation of “to supersede one thing by another.” Used in connection with the doctrine of abrogation.

deen - An Arabic word that literally means “religion.” Islam’s most important goal is spreading the worship of Allah through the religion of Islam.

dhima - An Arabic word that means “obligation or responsibility.” It is used to refer to the people of the book who submit to the political control of Islam and pay the jizya. The obligations these dhimmis must perform are in the dhimmi laws, also known as the “contract of dhimma.”

dhimmi - A Jew, Christian, or Zoroastrian who surrenders to the political control of the Muslims. The Hanafi madhab has also allowed Hindus to become dhimmis. The Arabic word Dhimmi literally means “under obligation.” The words, actions, property, family members, and even lives of non-Muslims who become Dhimmis are literally under obligation to the Muslims. The obligation is to observe the Dhimmi law provisions of sharia. A Dhimmi who violates any of the provisions of the Dhimmi laws instantly loses any protection he had and becomes the same as a person who fights the Muslims.

da’wa - The call to Islam that must be given to a people or community before Muslims engage in jihad.

ezalah - An Arabic word meaning to remove or to void. The word applies to the doctrine of abrogation, the idea Allah can remove or replace a verse of Koran. The strength of the meaning of this word can be seen from the other contexts in which it is used in sharia law, such as “removing the virginity” in Islamic family law, and “removing the pubic hair” in the context of tahara, cleaning up.

ezzat - One of the broad Islamic concepts of honor. Ezzat comes from the Arabic root Ezz which has several literal meanings, such as: might, power, standing, weight, strength, force, honor, glory, high, rank, fame, celebrity and also a sense of honor, self-respect, and self esteem. Koran uses ezzat as both a noun, “honor”, and a verb “to honor.” Ezzat primarily refers to one’s social status or rank in the community.

faqih - An Arabic word that means “the one who knows fiqh,” in other words, an Islamic scholar or jurist qualified to make ijtihad. Such scholars are called mujtahids or fuqaha, the plural of faqih.

fard or fardh - An Arabic word that means “obligatory.” Used to refer to acts that are wajeb or required by sharia.

fatwa - an Islamic legal ruling that describes the nature of a situation, thing, or action from the standpoint of Islam. The plural is fatawa.

fiqh - An Arabic word that literally means “understanding.” It is used to refer to the science of how to derive an Islamic legal ruling from the authoritative Islamic sources.

fitnah - Unbelief and the worship of others besides Allah. Surah 2:193 commands Muslims to fight until there is no more fitnah and all religious worship is for Allah, alone.

fitra - An Arabic word that means “nature” or “instinct.” Muhammad said one knows by fitra that both male and female circumcision are required.

ghayra - An Arabic word that literally means “other,” as in “other people.” As an Islamic idiom it has the connotation of jealousy or excluding others. Specifically, ghayra is the sense of jealousy that a Muslim male has about his right of authority over his family members with respect to their contact with other people, especially contact that may lead to a sexual relationship. As a concept of Islamic law, ghayra has three elements: 1) control by the Muslim male 2) over his “namoos,” 3) to preserve Islamic concepts of morality. The Islamic concepts of morality that are enforced by ghayra are sharia’s rules for a woman’s dress and the rules for her conduct that relate to sexuality.

haya - An Arabic word that literally means shyness. It is used to describe women who carefully observe Islam’s prohibitions on a woman’s dress and conduct.

hezanah - An Arabic word meaning “guardianship” of “taking care of” as in the legal guardianship of a minor. It is a separate topic from the concept of the wali.

hujb - An Arabic word that literally means “blocking” and is the root word from which hijab is derived.

hukm - An Arabic word that means “ruling,” as in a ruling a judge may render. It means sharia’s legal ruling about the action described in a particular verse of Islam’s authoritative sources. Sharia applies to every possible human action and interaction, and provides a hukm that classifies the action or interaction along a scale from required, encouraged, neutral, discouraged, to, finally, prohibited.

ijma - An Arabic word that means “consensus,” used to refer to the consensus of scholars on a point of Islamic law.

ijtihad - The process of legal reasoning the jurist follows to discover the requirements Allah has set forth in the authoritative texts.

ird - The Arabic word ird is often used in conjunction with aberu, so one might hear a Persian say “my ird and aberu are gone.” To Persians, the words ird and aberu mean the same thing, but Arabs, on the other hand, use ird as an equivalent to namoos. To the extent there is a difference, namoos is the thing protected - the woman and her sex organs - and ird is the condition of the thing, whether it is chaste and above suspicion or not.

irtidad - An Arabic word that means “to reject.”

jahilyya - An Arabic word that literally means “ignorance.” In general it refers to the time in any society before Islam becomes dominant but it is most often used to refer to pre-Islamic Arabia.

kafir - An Arabic word that literally means “infidel,” a person who does believe in Islam. The plural is koffar.

khatna - The Arabic word that literally means “circumcision.” When circumcision is referred to in hadith the word al-khitan, the plural of khatna is used, indicating both males and females must be circumcised.

khul divorce - A divorce issued by the Islamic court on the petition of a wife who has performed tamkeen and on behalf of a husband who has failed to pay the expenses Islam considers necessary for the upkeep of the woman or who has threatened or endangered the life of the woman.

mahram - An Arabic word that means “unmarriageable kin.”

madhab - An Arabic word for an Islamic legal school.

mahfuz - is the name for the doctrine that Allah preserves His Word in Koran.

mubarat divorce - A divorce issued by the Islamic court on the petition of a wife who has obtained her husband’s agreement to the divorce, usually by paying money.

muftar - An Arabic word and a legal term of art that means one who commits a libel.

mujahada - The act of jihad.

mujtahid - A mujtahid is an Islamic jurist who meets a rigorous set of requirements designed to ensure that he has comprehensive knowledge of the authoritative texts of Islam and how the requirements to practice Islam correctly - the sharia or Sacred Law -flow from those texts.

mu’min - An Arabic word that means “believer.” The plural is Mu’minun.

murtad - An Arabic word that means “the one who rejects.” Used to refer to apostates from Islam.

mushaf - The name of the Koran written in Arabic.

muta - A temporary marriage. It may last from minutes to years, the point is the parties do not consider it to last until death.

nafye al-sabil - A Koranic principle meaning Muslims and Islam must always and everywhere be supreme to non-Muslims and all that is not Islamic.

najis - An Arabic word and Koranic concept that means “filthy.” As a Koranic concept it applies to koffar.

namoos - An Arabic word that literally means “law.” As an Islamic idiom it means the thing the man controls. Specifically, the “thing” is the private parts - the sexual organs - of his female family members.

nashizah - A woman who refuses to tamkeen - to submit to her husband’s demand for sex. It is a legal term of art that means the husband’s duty to pay support is ended and his right to physically force her to submit to his sexual desires is operative.

naskh - an Arabic word meaning the same as ezalah, to remove or to void. Used by Koran to describe the doctrine of abrogation.

niqab - An Arabic word that literally means veil. It refers to the piece of fabric women are required to wear that covers the mouth and nose. Combined with the hijab it leaves only the eyes showing.

osvat-al-hasana - An Arabic phrase meaning “the excellent example.” The Koran says repeatedly Muhammad is the excellent example that Muslims must emulate.

qadi - An Islamic judge, plural is qodat.

rad - An Arabic word that literally means “to spurn or rebuff.” Rad is the root of the terms irtidad, murtad, and ridda.

rashideen - An Arabic word derived from the root that means “to grow.” It is used to refer to the first four caliphs, Abu Bakr, Umar, Uthman, and Ali who were grown in the faith of Islam, who had a mature, orthodox understanding of Islam.

ridda - An Arabic word that literally means “apostasy.” The Law of Ridda applies to apostates and hypocrites from Islam.

shaheed - One who dies fighting in the cause of Allah and, therefore, goes directly to paradise, a martyr.

sharaf - One of the broad Islamic concepts of honor. The word sharaf does not appear in Koran, but it is found in hadith where it refers to good character. As a noun it means high rank, nobility, distinction, eminence, dignity, honor, or glory. As a verb it means to elevate, exalt, raise to distinction, or confer honor upon. Sharaf relates to one’s personal character.

sira - An Arabic word that literally means “the characteristics” used to refer to the life of Muhammad.

siyar - The word siyar is the plural of sirah…. In the shariah it is applied specifically to the strategy adopted by the Prophet in his military expeditions.

sunnah - An Arabic word referring to “the path (sunnah) of the Prophet.” It is contained in the authentic ahadith, which give the purported sayings, deeds, and silences of Muhammad. If something is sunnah, it is good or required because it is what Muhammad did.

surah - a chapter of the Koran.

tabarra - A Koranic doctrine that prohibits good Muslims from providing or accepting support, help, or protection from non-Muslims.

taqiyya - Taqiyya allows Muslims to act or speak in a deceptive way provided they remain committed to Islam in their hearts. The doctrine of taqiyya comes from surah 3:28, which commands Muslims not to take non-Muslims as friends or protectors unless their purpose is to defend themselves or Islam from the non-Muslims. The Arabic word for defend used in 3:28 is the source of the word taqiyya. Taqiyya, lying by commission, is one of three forms of deception Islam commands or allows, the others being kitman, false swearing or lying by omission, and tawriyya, saying something misleading but not necessarily untrue.

taqlid - the principle that Muslims who are not mujtahids must follow the rulings of someone who is a mujtahid. Ordinary Muslims who must follow a mujtahid are called muqalid.

tabar’roj - An Arabic word that means “becoming like a tower,” used to refer to women who dress or act in a way to make themselves standout, especially in a sexual way. Practicing tabar’roj is prohibited by surah 33:33 of Koran.

tamkeen - A woman’s duty to submit to her husband’s sexual desires.

tariq al-ula - A phrase that iterally means “the higher way.” This principal means that if someone will violate an important prohibition, they will certainly violate a small prohibition. For example, if you will kill someone, you will certainly punch them.

tawalla - An Arabic noun that means support, help, or protection. The Koran states emphatically that Muslims should only support, help, or have fellowship with other faithful, practicing Muslims.

thayyibah - A woman ho was legally married but has been properly divorced or become a widow. A thayyibah does not need the permission of a wali to remarry.

Umdat al-Salik - An Arabic phrase that literally means “the primary source for a disciple.” It is the Arabic name of the Shafi’i madhab fiqh manual known in English as Reliance of the Traveller. It is in wide use in the West.

umma - The global Muslim community.

usul al-fiqh - An Arabic phrase that literally means “the principles of understanding,” used to refer to the methodological tools that allow mujtahid scholars to produce a coherent body of law from the primary texts.

wakil - An Islamic sharia lawyer, plural is wokala.

wali - See walid.

walid - The one who gives life to the child, i.e. the father and grandfather. Because they are considered to be the life givers, sharia classifies them as the “owners of the blood” of the children and they may kill their children with impunity. The term walid is identical to the term wali. The term wali is generally used in civil law contexts - divorce, custody, etc. - and walid is usually used in the criminal law context. Sharia provides for a succession to other relatives or even the imam should the father or grandfather be dead or unavailable.

zarurat - An Arabic word meaning “necessities,” it refers to the top five goals Islam exists to achieve, spreading the religion of Islam, life (nafs), progeny (nasl), intellect (aql), and wealth (mawl). These goals are hierarchical, the four lesser goals help to achieve the most important goal of spreading Islam.

zina - An Arabic word which means adultery in its broadest sense, including both fornication by unmarried people and adultery by married people.

Endnotes

1 Bukhari Bk.62 No.147 “Narrated ‘Abdullah bin Masud: The Prophet, said, ‘There is none having a greater sense of ghayra than Allah. And for that He has forbidden the doing of evil actions such as illegal sexual intercourse. There is none who likes to be praised more than Allah does.’”

2 See, generally, Sheikh Al-Islam Ibn Taimiyyah, Enjoining Good and Forbidding Evil (Al-Firdous 2000) (originally published c. A.D. 1320).

3 Koran 3:110. Unless a translator is indicated, ayats are translated directly from the Arabic.

4 Ahmad ibn Naqib al-Misri, Reliance of the Traveller ‘Umdat al-Salik’ A Classic Manual of Islamic Sacred Law 23-24 Nuh Ha Mim Keller, trans. (Amana Publications 1994).

5 Al-Misri at 24.

6 Imam Nawawi, Al-Maqasid 189-190 Nu Hah Mim Keller, trans. (Amana Publications 2002) The legal schools of other sects besides Sunni also reject new ijtijad on issues where ijma has been reached.

7 Nawawi at 108.

8 Sunan Abu Dawud Bk. 1 No. 336.

9 Nawawi at 108.

10 Nawawi at 109.

11 Sunan Abu Dawud Bk.25 No.4.

12 Nawawi at 109.

13 Koran 9:122.

14 Imran Ahsan Khan Nyazee, Theories of Islamic Law: The Methodology of Ijtihad 24 (Adam Publishers 2007)

15 Asad Zaman, Islamic Economics: A Survey of the Literature http://www.iefpedia.com/english/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/Islamic-Economics-A-Survey-of-the-Literature.pdf accessed July 18, 2012.

16 Nawawi at 105.

17 See Al-Misri at 101-219.

18 Nawawi at x. Nu Hah Mim Keller is not counting every step in the isnad, the chain of transmitters, or duplicate ahadtih, and he is speaking of the number of ahadith accepted in the Sunni tradition. Sunnis have 6 principal collections of hadith: Bukhari, Muslim, al-Nasa’i, Abu Dawud, al-Tirmidhi, and Ibn Majah. The Shia tradition adds four principal hadith collections, Usul al-Kafi, Man la yahduruhu al-Faqih, Tahdhib al-Akham, and Al-Istibsar, which, together, add an additional 43,000 ahadith. An additional source of ahadith that is accepted in both traditions is Ibn Ishaq’s Sira, or biography of Muhammad. If collections beyond the principal collections are also considered the number of ahadith is probably over 100,000.

19 Koran 4:59.

20 Koran 4:115.

21 Koran 9:28.

22 Koran 98:6.

23 Koran 8:55.

24 Misri at e14.0. You will have to read the Arabic to find kafir listed.

25 Misri at e8.3; see also Koran 56:77-79. Even Muslim believers should perform ablution prior to handling a Koran printed in Arabic (the mus-haf or “the pages”) and must not touch Quran if they are in need of a purificatory bath (ghusl). Lately some Muslims have begun to make taqiyya about this ruling by handing out translations of Koran. See infra at 41. Also, note the rules the U.S. Southern Command follows when US soldiers need to touch detainees Korans. See http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2005/jun/9/20050609-092940-3178r/ accessed November 13, 2014. Similar rules are followed in European schools.

26 Al-Misri at k1.2(e). This is the opinion of all but the Hanafi legal school.

27 The contract is recorded in the tafsir of Ibn Kathir in the commentary on ayat 29 of surah 9 http://www.qtafsir.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=
view&id=2566&Itemid=64 accessed July 21, 2012.

28 Permissible lying is found in al-Misri at r8.2. For expiation for a broken oath see al-Misri at o20.0.

29 Quran 3:28, Yusuf Ali translation.

30 Koran 3:28, N.J. Dawood translation.

31 Islam’s doctrine of deception, against not only koffar and apostate Muslims but also against Muslims themselves, is actually quite extensive. Besides taqiyya, which is lying by commission, there is also tawriyya, saying something misleading but not technically untrue, and kitman, which is false swearing or lying by omission.

32 See, e.g., Koran 16:106.

33 Al-Misri at r8.2 (emphasis added).

34 Al-Misri at h1.0.

35 Al-Misri at h8.17. “As-Sadaqat (here it means Zakat) are only for the Fuqara’ (poor), and Al-Masakin (the poor) and those employed to collect (the funds); and for to attract the hearts of those who have been inclined (towards Islam); and to free the captives; and for those in debt; and for Allah’s Cause (i.e. for Mujahidun - those fighting in the holy wars), and for the wayfarer (a traveller who is cut off from everything); a duty imposed by Allah. And Allah is All-Knower, All-Wise.” Koran 9:60.

36 See, e.g., “Somali al-Shabaab terror trial opens in Minneapolis” http://www.twincities.com/localnews/ci_21680842/minneapolis-man-funded-terrorism-state-alleges-hes-too accessed November 24, 2012; “Investigators link nightclub owner, associates to drug deals, militant Islamic group, homicide case” http://www.statesman.com/news/news/local/investigators-link-nightclub-owner-associates-to-1/nRmXg/ accessed November 24, 2012; “Feds: Orange County Imam had ties to accused group in 1993 WTC bombing” http://www.wftv.com/news/news/local/orange-county-imam-contributed-1993-wtc-bombing-fe/nS96Y/ accessed November 27, 2012; “Mosque With Terrorist Ties Raided With Cultural Sensitivity” http://judicialwatch.org/blog/2011/05/mosque-with-terrorist-ties-raided-with-cultural-sensitivity/ accessed November 27, 2012. The meaning of jihad has, itself, become an object of deception, see infra at 32-41.

37 Nyazee at 234.

38 Nyazee at 237.

39 Nyazee at 238.

40 Quran 2:193, M. Khan, trans.

41 Al-Bukhari, Bk.2 No.18

42 Koran 4:141 (emphasis added).

43 Nyazee at 240.

44 Koran 9:111. To be credited with an action, either to lift Islam’s obligation to perform an action or, as here, to earn the reward of an action, intent or niyat must be present. “A man will be rewarded only for what he intended.” Sahih Muslim Bk.33 No.222.

45 Narrated Abu Huraira: The Prophet said, “The person who participates in Allah’s cause and nothing compels him to do so except belief in Allah and His Apostles, will be recompensed by Allah either with a reward, or booty (if he survives) or will be admitted to Paradise (if he is killed in the battle as a martyr). Had I not found it difficult for my followers, then I would not remain behind any sariya going for Jihad and I would have loved to be martyred in Allah’s cause and then made alive, and then martyred and then made alive, and then again martyred in His cause.” Bukhari Bk.2 No.29; It has been narrated on the authority of Anas b. Malik that the Messenger of Allah (may peace be upon him) said: “Who seeks martyrdom with sincerity shall get its reward, though he may not achieve it.” Sahih Muslim Bk.33 No.224.

46 Bukhari Bk.63 No.155

47 Bukhari Bk.2 No.29.

48 Center for the Study of Political Islam, The Sunnah of Muhammad, the Number of Times Koran Commands Muslims to Imitate Muhammad, http://www.cspipublishing.com/statistical/TrilogyStats/imitate_mohamed.html accessed November 9, 2012.

49 Koran 21:47, 101:6-11.

50 See, e.g., Titus 1:2.

51 Koran 5:64.

52 Koran 21:23.

53 Koran 33:32; 24:31. “It is the responsibility of a woman to assume such poise and behavior that she does not excite a man’s passions. Even a glance of lust can infatuate a man and a seemingly harmless encounter eventually lead to mischief and corruption in society, destroying entire families.” http://www.al-islam.org/greater_sins_complete/15.htm accessed December 11, 2012.

54 al-Misri at o9.9 (citing al-Hidaya).

55 “O Prophet, make jihad against the unbelievers [koffar] and the hypocrites [munafiqin], and be harsh against them, their dwelling is Hell, a miserable destination.” Koran 9:73.

56 2 Al-Hidayah 287 Imran Ahsan Khan Nyazee trans (2006).

57 1 Ibn Rushd The Distinguished Jurist’s Primer 454 (Imran Ahsan Khan Nyazee trans. 1994).

58 al-Misri, at o9.0. The notion that warfare is the lesser jihad derives from a weak hadith reported by only one Islamic historian, Al-Baihaqi, in his book Al Zuhd al Kabir. Baihaqui himself recognized that the hadith was weak and untrustworthy, but the title of his book means “The Great Piety” so he was probably interested in presenting any hadith that was on point to his subject. Many other Islamic scholars - such as Ibn Taymiyya - reject this hadith because the chain of narrators had a reputation for not being trustworthy and the substantive content of the hadith contradicts every Koranic verse and ahadith dealing with jihad.

59 Technically, Muhammad did not deceive the people of Mecca because he did not know what Allah would eventually reveal. It was Allah who deceived the Meccans by not revealing jihad and other doctrines until he moved Muhammad to Medina. As Koran tells us, Allah is the best deceiver. Koran 3:54 states: “And they (the disbelievers) schemed, and Allah schemed (against them): and Allah is the best of schemers.” The word translated “schemer” is al-makireen, which comes from the root makr meaning deception. Today, however, Muslims who do know all of Islam deceive non-Muslims by pretending Islam consists only of the “Five Pillars” revealed in Mecca while concealing the belligerent parts of Islam revealed in Medina.

60 There is no better example of the Western Left than U.S. President Barack Obama. In a September, 2012 speech at the U.N., Obama famously said, “The future must not belong to those who slander the prophet of Islam….” http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/26/world/obamas-speech-to-the-united-nations-general-assembly-text.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0 accessed February 18, 2014.

61 An Explanatory Memorandum On the General Strategic Goal for the Group in North America 5/22/1991 p.7 available online at http://www.investigativeproject.org/documents/case_docs/445.pdf. The idea of destroying a house from within “by their hands and the hands of the believers” comes explicitly from Koran’s description of how one of the Jewish tribes in Medina, Bani Nadhir, was destroyed. See Koran 59:2.

62 http://www.wam.ae/en/news/emirates-international/1395272478814.html?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter accessed November 22, 2014.

63 Ali Dashti, Twenty Three Years: A Study of the Prophetic Career of Mohammad 186 (F.R.C. Bagley trans. Mazda Publishers 1994)

64 Id. at 195.

65 Id. at 76 (discussing Muhammad’s expedition to Taef in A.D. 620).

66 Koran 18:1-3.

67 Koran 29:46. This surah is explicitly abrogated by 9:29 which commands Muslims to fight Jews and Christians who do not believe in Allah. Most Christians don’t realize it, but 29:46 is also abrogated by 3:64, which demands Jews and Christians agree not to worship anyone but Allah, i.e. forsake Jesus. Unfortunately, many prominent Christian leaders have fallen victim to a program of deception by Muslims purporting to bring agreement between Islam and Christianity on the basis of 3:64. The program is called “A Common Word.” For an explanation of the Islamic concept of abrogation see infra at 64-70.

68 Koran 18:1-4.

69 Koran 2:109.

70 Ibn Ishaq, The Life of Muhammad: A Translation of Ibn Ishaq’s Sirat Rasul Allah 203 (A.Guillaume, trans. Oxford University Press 1955) (hereinafter “Sira”).

71 Id. at 208.

72 Id. at 204.

73 Id. at 205.

74 The Arabic word used to mean “life” in surahs that command Muslims to make jihad with their lives is the word “nafs,” which means the same as the Hebrew word “nefesh.” The command is literally to make jihad with one’s soul or spirit, the thing that inhabits the body to make it alive.

75 For sure, Allah has bought from the believers their lives and their property in exchange for Paradise. They kill in the way of Allah, so they kill and are killed. This is a true promise in the Torah and the Gospel and the Qur’an. And who fulfills his promise more than Allah? So take the good news about the bargain you have concluded with Him. That is the magnificent eternal happiness. Koran 9:111.

76 The weighing will come with truth [on the Day of Resurrection]. For those whose scale is heavy [with good deeds], they are the successful. But for those whose scale is light, they are the ones who have lost their souls because they oppressed and rejected Our ayat [verses]. Koran 7:8-9.

77 The idea that forgiveness and paradise is not assured appears in many places in the Islamic sources but is sometimes subtly stated. For example, surah 24:56 says you may receive mercy - i.e. be forgiven - but it is not assured: “And perform As-Salat and give Zakat and obey the Messenger that you may receive mercy.” Quran 24:56. Even Muhammad himself said, “[T]hough I am the Apostle of Allah, yet do I not know what Allah will do with me.” Bukhari Bk. 63 No.155.

78 Sira at 205.

79 Koran 22:39-40 Shakir transl.

80 Koran 2:193, M. Khan, transl.

81 Koran 22:40, Shakir, transl.

82 Is Allah of Islam the same God as the Jews and Christians worship? Muslims believe there is only one God, Allah. The Koran in surah 9:30 says Jews associate Ezra with Allah and Christians associate Jesus with Allah, thereby committing shirk, the unpardonable sin in Islam. Jews and Christians, therefore, worship a God other than Allah - a different God. Up until surah 9 was sent down, Allah maintained the deception that Jews and Christians worshipped Him, but surah 9 makes it clear they worship a different God.

83 Koran 9:29.

84 Koran 9:73.

85 Koran 5:54. The words translated “rebuke” and “rebuker” in this verse are “lauma” and “la’em,” which literally mean “rebuke” and “the one who rebukes.” A modern example is when the West criticizes Islam by saying it violates the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This verse explicitly orders Muslims to ignore such criticism.

86 Sheikh Al-Islam Ibn Taimiyyah, Kitab al-Iman, 8 (Ibn Khaldun Publications, Alexandria, Egypt).

87 See generally Abula A’la Mawdudi, Towards Understanding Islam (Kazi Publications 1992).

88 2 Abu Bakr Jabir Al-Jaza’iry, Minhaj Al-Muslim, 170 (Darussalam 2001); the hadith also appears in Sunan an-Nasa’i Bk.25 No.13, Sunan Abu Dawud Bk.15 No.26 and others.

89 Bukhari Bk.52 No.44.

90 Translation of the Meanings of The Noble Qur’an in the English Language 39 (Muhammad Taqi-ud-Din Al-Hilali & Muhammad Muhsin Khan trans) (footnote to surah 2:190).

91 Koran 4:136, M. Khan, trans.

92 Koran 2:216.

93 Al-Sayuti, Al-Itqan fi Ulum al-Qur’an (Majma Malik Faad) (c.1470 translated by author).

94 Koran 2:106.

95 Koran 13:39.

96 Koran 16:101.

97 Bukhari Bk.86 No.56.

98 Ibn Aqil al-Baghdadi al-Hanbali, Kitab Al-Funun online at the Internet Archive ia600209.us.archive.org/9/items/fununakil1/funun_akil_1.pdf accessed May 1, 2014.

99 Koran 9:29.

100 A small number of Islamic scholars reject this ijma and hold that the sunnah can abrogate Koranic ayats. By contrast, the classic example that shows the Koran can abrogate Muhammad’s actions is abrogation by surah 9:5 of the Treaty of Hudaibiyah, a treaty Muhammad made with the people of Mecca. Once Allah abrogated the treaty by sending down surah 9:5, Muhammad conquered the city. There are also cases where Muhammad had to abrogate his own actions, for example when he prayed to curse some of his opponents. When these people later became Muslims, Muhammad had to abrogate his curse.

101 FOX News, Murder in the Family: Honor Killing in America (Part 3) at 7:33 minutes https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tp0lHtiDVHU accessed May 1, 2014.

102 Id. at 8:20.

103 Id. at 8:35.

104 Id. at 8:49.

105 Id. at 9:35.

106 Id. at 9:53.

107 FOX News, Murder in the Family: Honor Killing in America (Part 4) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qEkRIib__U0 at :23 seconds accessed May 8, 2014.

108 Id. at :32.

109 Id. at :42.

110 Id. at :45.

111 Id. at 1:12.

112 Id. at 1:37.

113 Id. at 2:04.

114 Id. at 3:49.

115 Id. at 4:17.

116 Id. at 4:29.

117 Id. at 4:34.

118 Id. at 4:49.

119 Id. at 4:58.

120 Koran 4:141.

121 Koran 5:44 (emphasis added).

122 Sahih Al-Bukhari 29 (Muhammad Muhsin Khan trans.) (Darussalam) (at footnote 1 to Bk.62 No.29).

123 Id.

124 “‘You’ve messed with the wrong Muslims!’ CCTV images show the dramatic moment three women tried to kidnap and rob their sister’s lesbian lover during row over arranged marriage,” Mail Online, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2545464/Youve-messed-wrong-Muslims-CCTV-images-dramatic-moment-three-women-tried-kidnap-rob-sisters-lesbian-lover-row-arranged-marriage.html accessed May 11, 2014. “Texas dad killed daughter, her lesbian lover because he disliked that she was gay: mom,” New York Daily News, http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/dad-killed-daughter-lesbian-lover-gay-mom-article-1.1722103 accessed May 11, 2014.

125 English translations of Koran do not distinguish between ezzat and the Arabic word Akram, both are translated as “honor,” however akram literally means “more dear.” See, e.g., surah 49:13 where akram is translated as honor.

126 Koran 4:139.

127 Koran 5:12.

128 1 Abu Bakr JabirAl-Jaza’iry, Minaj Al-Muslim 289 (Darussalam 2001) (quoting Hadith Al-Tabarani who noted that this hadith had a good isnad - chain of narrators).

129 Koran says “Repulse not the beggar.” Koran 70:25. See also Koran 22:36 (feed the needy and the beggar).

130 11 Wasa’il al-Shiah, 560 quoted at http://www.maaref-foundation.com/english/library/ethics/taqwa_advice_of_ahl_al_bayt/32.htm accessed May 20, 2014.

131 See, e.g., the 1925 Armenian movie “Namus,” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdsXrn5j33c; the Turkish movie “Namus” from the 1970s, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2iUxowf2MYM; or the Iranian movie “Akbar Dilmaj” from the Shah’s time http://www.iranproud.com/movies/classic/akbar-dilmaj.

132 Koran 28:25 (describing the daughters of Jethro whom Moses met at the well in Midian).

133 Sunan an-Nasa’i Bk.47 No.22.

134 Bukhari Bk.78 No.146.

135 Narrated Abu Huraira: “Allah’s Messenger said, ‘Five practices are characteristics of the Fitra [nature]: circumcision, shaving the pubic region, clipping the nails and cutting the moustaches short.’” Bukhari Bk.77 No.106; Aishah narrated that: the Prophet said: “When the circumcised meets the circumcised then Ghusl is required.” Al-Tirmidhi Bk.1 No.109. Koran commands that whatever Allah and His Messenger have forbidden or have commanded must be part of Islamic belief and practice. Because female circumcision appears in the authentic hadiths it is required in sharia. It is against Islam to believe the Koran is the only and complete source of Islamic belief and practice. Without the hadith and ijma [consensus of the scholars] Islam is incomplete.

136 Bukhari Bk 60 No.161.

137 Bukhari Bk.18 No.154.

138 Al-Misri at p27.3.

139 Bukhari Bk.93 No.512.

140 Bukhari Bk.62 No.29.

141 Bukhari Bk.62 No.33.

142 Bukhari Bk.67 No.157.

143 Koran 33:53.

144 Tafsir Ibn Kathir, http://www.qtafsir.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1835&Itemid=89, accessed May 27, 2014. Talhah’s desire to marry Aisha after Muhammad died is very well documented in Islamic sources. See, e.g., 7 Sonan Al-Kobra Beihaghi 140, (Daralkotab Al-Elmia); 12 Al-Soyotie, Al-Dorar 112, (Markaz hejr 2003); 3 Tafsir Maghatil, Maghatil bin Solaiman, 504 (Moasesa Tarikh Al-Arabi). Years later, Talhah fought on the side of Aisha at the Battle of the Camel, which eventually led to the Sunni/Shia split in Islam.

145 Tafsir Ibn Kathir, commentary on Koran 33:59.

146 Koran 33:59.

147 Bukhari, Bk.8 No.24.

148 Tafsir Ibn Kathir commentary on Koran 33:53.

149 Bukhari Bk.4 No.12.

150 Koran 33:32-33.

151 Koran 24:31.

152 Al-Misri at r26.1(2) (quoting Sunan Al-Tirmidi).

153 Sheikh Al-Islam Ibn Taimiyyah, Enjoining Good Forbidding Evil 117 (Al-Firdous Ltd. 2000).

154 Koran 9:71.

155 FOX News, A Question of Honor at 3:34 minutes.

156 Id. at 53:15.

157 “UN rights chief urges action after pregnant Pakistani woman stoned to death by family” http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=47907#.VJm1voMALD accessed June 12, 2014.

158 Id.

159 Koran 5:45.

160 Koran 5:47.

161 Koran 5:48.

162 Koran 5:49.

163 Koran 9:30.

164 Koran 9:31.

165 Koran 33:59.

166 “Saudi Arabia Outlaws ‘Tempting Eyes’” http://metro.co.uk/2014/11/04/saudi-arabia-outlaws-tempting-eyes-4935034/ accessed November 22, 2014.

167 Koran 33:33.

168 This is not the only point of contention between the Hanafi school and other Islamic legal schools. Many Hanafi rulings contradict the plain text of Koran and hadith. Consequently, throughout Islamic history the Hanafi school has not been generally recognized as a valid legal school by Muslim scholars.

169 Sahih Muslim Bk.37. No.190.

170 Bukhari Bk.77 No.102.

171 The notorious fatwa that purported to legalize intercourse for the purpose of enlarging the receiver’s anus so he could carry a bomb in his rectum is an example of how the mufti issuing this fatwa relied on the principle that any moral rule may be set aside to achieve the maqassid al-sharia of spreading the religion. For a discussion of this fatwa see http://www.memri.org/clip/en/0/0/0/0/0/0/3496.htm.

172 Bukhari Bk.67 No.61.

173 Bukhari Bk.77 No.146.

174 Sunan an-Nasa’i Bk.48 No.187.

175 Bukhari Bk.77 No.147.

176 Bukhari Bk.77 No.149.

177 Bukhari Bk.77 No.158.

178 Bukhari Bk.67 No.69.

179 Bukhari Bk.63 No.120.

180 Bukhari Bk.64 No.56.

181 Al-Albani No.2383.

182 FOX News, A Question of Honor, aired August 6, 2011. See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yOUpBf0ChxM; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kl32FmHJa-4; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hula16g8eu4; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eWhhZnKvzoI.

183 Id. at 5:18.

184 Id.

185 Al-Misri at m3.7.

186 Al-Misri at m3.4.

187 Id.

188 Sunan Ibn Majah Bk.9 No.1956.

189 Koran 33:32.

190 Koran 24:30.

191 Koran 33:33.

192 Bukhari Bk.11 No.24.

193 Bukhari Bk.67 No.170

194 Israel National News, http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/179039#.U6o4uBbmn5g accessed June 24, 2014.

195 See, e.g., Al-Misri at m10.3.

196 We are not unaware of the controversy over fatwas dealing with suckling. These fatawa rely on one hadith that contradicts the whole corpus of authentic Islamic sources.

197 Koran 33:53.

198 Koran 33:58.

199 Koran 2:221.

200 Koran 23:1-7.

201 Bukhari Bk. 67 No.52.

202 Koran 4:141.

203 Koran 4:34.

204 Bukhari Bk. 77 No.162.

205 Bukhari Bk. 77 No.166.

206 Bukhari Bk.67 No.82.

207 Koran 31:6.

208 Tafsir Ibn Kathir on surah 31:6.

209 Sunan Ibn Majah Bk.36 No.95.

210 Bukhari Bk.77 No.106 (English translations sometimes miss the requirement from the original Arabic to cut the hair under the armpits, but that leaves only four obligations); Sahih Muslim Bk.2 No.64.

211 Jami at-Tirmidhi Bk.1 No.109.

212 As we have explained, surah 3:28 of Koran commands Muslims not to take non-Muslims as friends or protectors unless their purpose is to deceive the non-Muslims. Previously we called this deception taqiyya, but technically there are three different types of deception that are allowed. Taqiyya corresponds to outright lying. Kitman, a second form of deception, involves concealing the truth, such as by swearing an oath one does not intend to obey, The third form of allowable deception is tawriyya, which is making statements which, while not technically untrue, nevertheless are misleading. Tawriyya is allowed even between Muslims. In the circumstances here of hiding the truth about female circumcision this type of deception is probably best classified as kitman.

213 Al-Misri at e4.3.

214 Koran 4:24.

215 Jalaluddin Umari, Ma’roof and Munkar: Enjoining what is Right and Forbidding what is Wrong 62 (Internaitonal Islamic Publishing House 2008).

216 Id. at 52.

217 Koran 9:71.

218 Koran 3:104.

219 Koran 9:111.

220 Supra at 58.

221 Id.

222 Koran 4:136, M.Khan, trans.

223 Koran 9:112, M. Khan, trans.

224 Koran 3:110.

225 Umari at 21.

226 Koran 49:12.

227 Al-Misri at q5.4.

228 Id. at q5.5.

229 Umari at 212.

230 Al-Misri at q5.8.

231 http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/lex+talionis accessed July 15, 2014.

232 Mail Online, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2690701/Gunmen-slaughter-25-women-branded-prostitutes-Baghdad-storming-apartment-building.html accessed July 13, 2014.

233 Al-Misri at o1.2.

234 Al-Imam Abu Abdullah Muhammad bin Idris al-Shafi ’i, Al-Umm (Bait al-Afkar al Doualiya) (Imam Shafi’i, lived from A.D. 767 to A.D. 819).

235 Jami at-Tirmidhi Bk.16 No.16.

236 Sunan Ibn Majah Bk.21 No.2763.

237 “In Raqqa, an All-Female ISIS Brigade Cracks Down on Local Women” http://www.syriadeeply.org/articles/2014/07/5799/raqqa-all-female-isis-brigade-cracks-local-women/ accessed July 20, 2014.

238 Id.

239 Fox News Special Murder in the Family: Honor Killing in America (Part 4) at 4:28 of 9:38 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qEkRIib__U0 accessed 15 January 2014.

240 Supra at 95.

241 Yvonne Yazbeck Haddad & Adair T. Lummis, Islamic Values in the United States, 149 (Oxford University Press 1987).

242 Id.

243 http://www.jihadwatch.org/2013/12/ask-the-expert-q-a-with-nicolai-sennels-and-fans.html accessed 9 January 2014. Throughout this chapter, Nicolai Sennels’ quotations are used by permission. Dr. Sennels’ opinions do not necessarily reflect my own.

244 Id. (emphasis added).

245 Sennel’s work was done among incarcerated male Muslims in the West, but the same psychological factors can be observed among free female Muslims in Muslim countries. The female Muslim cartoon super-heroine, Qahera, for example, responds with violent aggression to any criticism of Islam. Qahera is drawn by a female Muslim in Egypt. For examples of Qahera’s behavior, see http://qahera.tumblr.com/index.

246 http://www.frontpagemag.com/2010/jamie-glazov/among-criminal-muslims/ accessed 9 January 2014.

247 Id.

248 http://www.jihadwatch.org/2013/09/nicolai-sennels-psychology-why-islam-creates-monsters.html accessed 9 January 2014.

249 Koran 4:34.

250 Ibn Majah Bk9 No.1926. Multiple sources cite this incorrectly as Ibn Majah 1854.

251 The Bible, Esther 1:10-20 (KJV).

252 Koran 3:85.

253 Al-Misri at o8.7(20).

254 Koran 5:55.

255 Koran 5:51.

256 Koran 3:28.

257 Koran 9:1-4, Sahih International, trans.

258 Koran 48:29a.

259 Koran 2:221.

260 http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/181457#.U_Fnm1bmn5g accessed August 17, 2014.

261 Bukhari Bk.62 No.64.

262 Koran 16:58-59.

263 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-20202686#TWEET334623 accessed August 19, 2014.

264 http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/11/05/pakistan-acid-murder-anusha_n_2075467.html accessed August 19, 2014.

265 http://www.topnews.in/law/pak-mother-who-killed-teen-daughter-acid-says-it-was-her-fate-die-2123725 accessed August 19, 2014.

266 Id.

267 Supra at 114.

268 Koran 9:71.

269 http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=99622481 September 2, 2014.

270 http://theahafoundation.org/issues/honor-violence/ accessed September 2, 2014.

271 FOX News: A Question of Honor, August 6, 2011 at 3:24.

272 Supra at 97.

273 A Question of Honor at 17:37.

274 Id. from 26:36 to 29:13.

275 http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/teen-tried-to-leave-strict-family/article699530/ accessed September 9, 2014.

276 http://www.citynews.ca/2010/06/15/father-brother-of-murdered-teen-aqsa-parvez-plead-guilty/?__federated=1 accessed September 9, 2014.

277 http://www.citynews.ca/2007/12/11/tradition-and-terror-suspected-behind-murder-of-16-year-old-mississauga-girl/ accessed September 9, 2014.

278 Koran 24:31.

279 http://www.qtafsir.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2430&Itemid=79 accessed September 14, 2014.

280 http://www.mississauga.com/news-story/3156437-aqsa-just-wanted-to-be-herself-/ accessed September 11, 2014.

281 Id.

282 http://www.newsrealblog.com/2010/06/17/canadian-islamic-honor-killings-for-embracing-western-culture/ quoting National Post, accessed September 14, 2014.

283 Id.

284 http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/teen-tried-to-leave-strict-family/article699530/ accessed September 14, 2014.

285 http://www.newsrealblog.com/2010/06/17/canadian-islamic-honor-killings-for-embracing-western-culture/ quoting National Post accessed Septermber 14, 2014.

286 http://www.mississauga.com/news-story/3156437-aqsa-just-wanted-to-be-herself-/ accessed September 14, 2104.

287 http://www.newsrealblog.com/2010/06/17/canadian-islamic-honor-killings-for-embracing-western-culture/ accessed September 14, 2014.

288 http://www.torontolife.com/informer/random-stuff-informer/2010/06/21/revisiting-aqsa-parvez-qa-with-mary-rogan/ accessed September 14, 2014.

289 http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/the-shafia-trial-at-a-glance-1.1194933 accessed November 19, 2014.

290 Id.

291 Id.

292 Rob Tripp, Without Honor: The True Story of the Shafia Family and the Kingston Canal Murders 27 (2012).

293 Rosie DiManno and Andrew Chung, Inside the Shafia Murder Trial 7 (date unknown) available online at http://www.lib.washington.edu/msd/norestriction/b71692101.pdf accessed November 19, 2014.

294 Paul Schliesmann, Honour on Trial: The Shafia Murders and the Culture of Honour Killings 55 (2012).

295 Christie Blatchford, Killed Because They Were Girls: The Complete Coverage of the Shafia Trial location 61 of 943 (2012) (citations to Kindle edition).

296 Michael Friscolanti, The Shafia Honour Killing Trial: The Full Story of a Crime that Shocked the Nation 10 (2012).

297 Blatchford at 61 of 943.

298 DiManno and Chung at 7.

299 Schliesmann at IX.

300 http://www.cancrime.com/about-2/ accessed November 19, 2014.

301 Tripp at 14 and 21.

302 Id. at 18.

303 Id. at 28.

304 Id. at 38.

305 Id. at 39.

306 Id. at 39.

307 Id. at 40.

308 Id. at 43.

309 Id. at 45.

310 Friscolanti at 146.

311 Tripp at 50.

312 Friscolanti at 15.

313 Friscolanti at 143.

314 Id. at 122.

315 Id at 143.

316 Tripp at 64.

317 Friscolanti at 144.

318 Tripp at 77-79.

319 Blatchford at 559 of 943.

320 Friscolanti at 18.

321 Id. at 92.

322 Id. at 19.

323 Id. at 20.

324 Tripp at 100.

325 http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2011/11/21/christie-blatchford-zainab-shafias-doomed-amazing-love-story/ accessed November 21, 2014.

326 Blatchford at 38 of 943.

327 Id. at 146 of 943.

328 Tripp at 28.

329 Blatchford at 80 of 943.

330 Blatchford at 102 of 943.

331 Tripp at 29.

332 Id. at 29.

333 Id. at 30.

334 http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/Shafia+murder+trial+Sahar+spoke+abuse+teachers/5761986/story.html
+spoke+abuse+teachers/5761986/story.html access November 21, 2014.

335 Id. at 33.

336 Id.

337 Id.

338 Id. at 36.

339 Id. at 50-51.

340 Firscolanti at 17.

341 Id.

342 Tripp at 75.

343 Friscolanti at 15.

344 Id.

345 Id.

346 Tripp at 91.

347 Blatchford at 564 of 943.

348 Tripp at 16.

349 Id. at 71 and 74.

350 Blatchford at 58 of 943.

351 Friscolanti at 4.

352 Id. at 8.

353 Id.; http://www.thewhig.com/2012/01/09/woman-sobs-on-stand accessed November 21, 2014.

354 Paul Schliesmann, “Reading Rona’s Diary,” Kingston Whig-Standard, Nov. 8, 2011 http://www.thewhig.com/2011/11/07/reading-ronas-diary accessed Nov. 17, 2014.

355 Tripp at 42.

356 Friscolanti at 15, 37 & 122.

357 Tripp at 86.

358 Id.

359 Id. at 42.

360 Rona’s diary, Queen vs. Shafia Exhibit 17(A) at 8.

361 Tripp at 87.

362 DiManno and Chung at 8.

363 Tripp at 34.

364 DiManno and Chung at 33..

365 Tripp at 58.

366 Friscolanti at 223.

367 Tripp at 58.

368 Id. at 42.

369 Id. at 41-42.

370 Blatchford at 246 of 943.

371 Schliesmann at 58.

372 DiManno and Chung at 26.

373 Friscolanti at 132.

374 Tripp at 108.

375 Id. at 49.

376 DiManno and Chung at 45.

377 Tripp at 51.

378 Id. at 47.

379 Id. at 27.

380 Friscolanti at 17.

381 Blatchford at 38 of 943.

382 Id. at 144 of 943.

383 Schliesmann at 61.

384 Id. at 62.

385 Tripp at 69.

386 DiManno and Chung at 34.

387 Tripp at 73.

388 Friscolanti at 123.

389 Id.

390 Tripp at 96.

391 Blatchford at 289 of 943

392 Id.

393 Id. at 38 of 943.

394 http://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Suspect-held-in-2012-Galleria-area-slaying-5500054.php accessed September 22, 2104.

395 http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/06/12/murder-iranian-activist-pulls-cover-off-texas-family-empire-fraud-weapons-and/ accessed September 22, 2014.

396 http://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Suspect-held-in-2012-Galleria-area-slaying-5500054.php accessed September 22, 2104.

397 http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/06/12/murder-iranian-activist-pulls-cover-off-texas-family-empire-fraud-weapons-and/ accessed September 22, 2014.

398 Sikhism is a syncretistic blend of Islam and Hinduism. Sikhism arose in the Punjab, an area of India named for a Farsi term meaning “five water.” This area was conquered and reconquered by Islam. The impact of Islam on Sikhism is apparent from a shared religious vocabulary, for example “shaheed” for martyrs or “bibi” for respected ladies. Sikhism does have concept of ghayra in its first pillar, “Kirat Karo,” but here ghayra or kirat is used with the broader connotation Iranians sometimes give ghayra. In this broader connotation ghayra means “manhood.” Kirat Karo therefore means “working hard like a man.” The similarities between Islam and Sikhism may extend to the sharing of concepts and practices. The Sikh restrictions on women may therefore have some similarities with the sharia restrictions. To the extent they do, it reinforces the idea that ghayra “honor” killing originates from Islam. Wherever Islam has put its foot, from Norway to Nigeria and from Morocco to Indonesia, the practice of ghayra violence has been implemented.

399 Paula Kweskin, interviewed on the “Ask the Source” segment of Israel Now News. Air date September 7, 2014.

400 Honor Diaries at 35:23 to 36:14.

401 Bukhari Bk.77 No.106 (English translations sometimes miss the requirement from the original Arabic to cut the hair under the armpits, but that leaves only four obligations); Sahih Muslim Bk.2 No.64.

402 Jami at-Tirmidhi Bk.1 No.109.

403 As we have explained, surah 3:28 of Koran commands Muslims not to take non-Muslims as friends or protectors unless their purpose is to deceive the non-Muslims. Previously we called this deception taqiyya, but technically there are three different types of deception that are allowed. Taqiyya corresponds to outright lying. Kitman, a second form of deception, involves concealing the truth, such as by swearing an oath one does not intend to obey, The third form of allowable deception is tawriyya, which is making statements which, while not technically untrue, nevertheless are misleading. Tawriyya is allowed even between Muslims. In the circumstances here of hiding the truth about female circumcision this type of deception is probably best classified as kitman.

404 Al-Misri at e4.3.