Blasphemy Law: A Futile Attempt to Hide the True Face of Islam and Muhammad

Muslims try to hide the true face of Islam and Muhammad by using blasphemy law, censorship, intimidation, death-threats and even murder. But the internet is proving their efforts futile: the mask of Islam and Muhammad are slowly but surely being exposed, potentially spelling the eventual death of Islam.

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A Muslim author’s view on Blasphemy Law: In the February 2011 edition of the Bangalore-based monthly, Islamic Voice, appeared a very illuminating article, “Is blasphemy a capital crime in Islam?” by A Faizur Rahman. At the outset, the author says that if any one used derogatory words against Prophet Muhammad or insulted him, he used to advise his followers to adopt an attitude of forgiveness and forbearance; but today "Muslim extremism and Islamophobia now enjoy a symbiotic relationship feeding on each other’s fanaticism." Then to repudiate the assassination of Pakistani politician Salman Taseer, he says:

“Salman was killed, as confessed by his murderous bodyguard, for being a staunch opponent of the blasphemy law of Pakistan and seeking Presidential pardon for Aasia Bibi, the Christian woman who was recently awarded the death penalty under section 295-C of the Pakistani Penal Code for allegedly abusing Prophet Muhammad (pbuh).”

The author admits that use of derogatory language against Prophet Muhammad or any other Prophet is considered a great sin in Islam and worthy of death sentence. But his complaint was that the court pronounced the death sentence against Aasia Bibi in a hurry before the charges were incontrovertibly proven. It may be recalled that Lahore High Court judge Arif Iqbal Bhatti was shot dead by extremists in 1997 for acquitting two Christians of blasphemy charges. So, punishment for Aasia Bibi, a Christian, for blasphemy charges understandable. It is death, either be a judicial execution or extrajudicial murder by fanatics.

Does Islam support harsh punishment for blasphemy? The stance of the Quran and Prophet Muhammad on blasphemy is important in the context of the Penal Code for blasphemy in Pakistan (Section 295-C). There are some verses in the Quran, such as 6:68-59, 25:41, 38:4-5, 3:159), in which Allah urges Muhammad to exercise patience and forbearance at the critics of His revelations and mockers of the Prophet. Mr. Rahman also cited a few ahadith to show the Prophet's kindness toward his opponents. For example,

1. “Once a man demanded Muhammad’s debts from him in such a rude manner that his companions wanted to beat him up. But the Prophet said, “Leave him, for he (the creditor) has the right to demand it (harshly).” (Sahih Bukhari).
2. In one occasion, a Jew who was opposed to the Prophet cursed him saying As-saamu-alalikum, (death be upon you) and his wife Ayesha responded with As-saamu ‘alaikum wal-laa’na (death and Allah’s curse be upon you too). Muhammad expressed his strong displeasure saying, “Be gentle and calm, Ayesha.” And when one of his companions sought permission to harm the Jew, the Prophet silenced him with an emphatic “No” (Sahih Bukhari).

Since the above-mentioned verses of the Koran and the ahadith show that neither Allah nor Muhammad was in favour of harsh punishments to those, who used derogatory words against Prophet Muhammad or Allah's revelation, Mr. Rahman argues that section 295 C of Pakistan’s Blasphemy Law is not supported by the Koran and Sunnah. And he is astonished to see the religious frenzy, emotionalism and maddening perversity of the Pakistani extremists in this regard to the extent that one such fanatic has even announced an award of $6,000 to anyone who kills Aasia Bibi if the higher courts acquit her.

“It is precisely this kind of fiendish attitude that fuels Islamophobia across the globe”, says Faizur Rahman, adding:

Such is the sway of these preachers that Muslims in large numbers are falling prey to their manipulative agenda and have started to exhibit a supremacist attitude that looks down upon those who are reluctant to get initiated into their kind of Puritanism”. ...“The only way to neutralise the fanatics is for the moderate majority of the Muslims to morally and financially support the progressive scholars and help them intellectually counter religious chauvinism through the rational teachings of the Quran as done by the Prophet himself.”

Against above Quranic and hadith reference, Mr. Rahman ignored more explicit examples to the contrary, namely Muhammad's assassination of the poetess Asma and two other poets Kab bin Asraf and Abu Afak of Medina for writing poems criticizing his deeds.

Blasphemy law stifles freedom of expression: Salman Rushdie was sentenced to death for blasphemy by the Iranian leader Ayatollah Khomeini for Rushdie's derogatory depiction of Muhammad in his novel The Satanic Verses, and an Iranian businessman offered a $3 million reward to anyone for carrying out the sentence. Despite Khomeini death, the fatwa remains a permanent threat to Rushdie's life. The death-threat saga to Rushdie extended beyond the person of Rushdie: Professor Hitoshi Igarashi of the University of Tsukuba Ibaraki, the Japanese translator of his novel, was murdered in 1991; its Italian translator was beaten and stabbed in Milan; the novel's Norwegian publisher William Nygaard was shot in 1993; Aziz Nesin, a well-known Turkish satirist, was murdered in the hotel in Sivas, where he had invited people to listen to a speech based on some parts of the book.

Bangladeshi author Taslima Nasrin is another victim of blaspheming the Quran and Muhammad. In May 1994, a death-fatwa was issued against her for saying "…the Koran should be revised thoroughly". She was also under fire for her 1993 book Lajja (Shame).

In Pakistan, Ghulam Akbar, a Shi'a Muslim, was convicted of uttering derogatory remarks against Muhammad in 1998, and was sentenced to death; in August 2000, a Lahore court sentenced Abdul Hasnain Muhammad Yusuf Ali to death and 35 years' imprisonment for "defiling the name of Muhammad".

In 2001, prior to 9/11, American magazine Time printed an illustration of Muhammad along with the Archangel Gabriel waiting for a message from God. The magazine apologized for printing the illustration after widespread protests in Kashmir.

In June 2002, Iranian academic Hashem Aghajari gave a speech and asked Muslims to refrain from blindly following their clergy. He was sentenced to death for "blasphemy against Muhammad" in November 2002.

To assuage Muslims' opposition to the holding of Miss World pageant in Nigeria, This Day newspaper published an article, suggesting that had Muhammad been alive, he would have chosen one of the contestants as his bride -- based on a hadith, in which Ayesha said: Muhammad liked three things, good food, good perfume and women. The commentary sparked deadly riots across Nigeria that claimed over 200 lives.

Dutch film maker Theo van Gogh and Ayaan Hirsi Ali created the 10-minute film Submission in 2004 to highlight the mistreatment of, and violence against, women in Islamic societies. Both van Gogh and Hirsi Ali received death-threats after its release. On November 2, 2004, Van Gogh was stabbed and shot dead by a Muslim fanatic Mohammed Bouyeri in Amsterdam. Interested readers may see Blasphemy Law and Free Speech (Wikipedia Free Enclycopedia) for many similar stories.

Can Blasphemy Law hide the true face of Muhammad? Muslims use blasphemy law, threats and violence etc. to hide the truth about Islam and its prophet forever, but it is proving a futile exercise in the age of Internet, which has emerged as a useful and hard-to-suppress medium for exposing the truth about Muhammad and his evil creed Islam.

Numerous Websites have propped up in the Internet to expose the nature of the Quran and Prophet Muhammad, which is causing a deluge amongst Muslims to leave the cult of Islam. There are numerous Muslim apostates in the Internet -- social networking sites and blogs -- engaged in revealing the true face of Islam. A group of Bangladeshi apostates in the U.K. issued a statement explaining the reason why they have abandoned Islam, which was aired by the BBC. The statement read:

“One who claims to be a messenger of God is expected to live a saintly life. He must not be given to lust, he must not be a sexual pervert, and he must not be a rapist, a highway robber, a war criminal, a mass murderer or an assassin. One who claims to be a messenger of God must have a superior character. He must stand above the vices of the people of his time. Yet Muhammad’s life is that of a gangster godfather. He raided merchant caravans, looted innocent people, massacred entire male populations and enslaved the women and children. He raped the women captured in war after killing their husbands and told his followers that it is okay to have sex with their captives (Quran 33:50). He assassinated those who criticized him and executed them when he came to power and became de facto despot of Arabia. Muhammad was bereft of human compassion. He was an obsessed man with his dreams of grandiosity and could not forgive those who stood in his way.”

Recently, Dutch MP Geert Wilders, the Chairman of the Dutch Freedom Party and the maker of the short film FITNA, has written an article "Time To Unmask Muhammad", in which he cited many unflattering truths about Muhammad’s life and deeds.

Conclusion: The advent of the Internet has become a serious threat to unmask the true face of Islam and its originator Muhammad. It has enabled critics to overcome the taboo of telling the truth about Islam and Muhammad. As a result, gradually more and more people, both Muslims and non-Muslims, are comprehending the true face of Islam. This is spoiling the well-guarded of the image of Muhammad, which will weaken the central doctrine of the Islamic faith, the Kalema Taib, that says: La Ilaha Illallah, Mohammadur Rasulullah (Allah is the only God to be worshipped and Muhammad is the messenger of Allah). And this may spell the death for Islam. For this reason, more and more Islamic countries are blocking many Websites that are striving to expose the true face Islam and its founder.

References:

Watch these videos:

1. Blasphemy Of Muhammad PBUH Is The Insult Of Islam
2. 25 Blasphemous Images - Muhammad
3. Asia Bibi, The Result of Blasphemy of Muhammad (PBUH)
4. Asia Bibi (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8ai9_H7FvI&feature=related)
5. Asia Bibi blasphemy case - Pakistani Islam and Peace (English subtitles)
6. Blasphemous Law In Pakistan, 01
7. Blasphemous Law in Pakistan, 02

Blasphemy Law & Its Cruelties

When the world's 1.5 billion Muslims want to project Muhammad -- who was a vile rapist, pedophile, mass murderer, plunderer and robber -- as a pious soul and a prophet, they can do so only in engaging in barbaric laws and actions.

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Why Muslims are so sensitive to defamation of Muhammad

Islamic religious concepts and practices include the five pillars of Islam, called arkan al-Islam, namely (1) the shahadah (creed), (2) daily prayers (salat), (3) almsgiving (zakah), (4) fasting during Ramadan and (5) pilgrimage to Mecca (hajj) at least once in a lifetime. The Shia and Sunni sects both agree on the essential details for the performance of these acts.

The Shahadah, which is the basic foundation of Islam, contains six oaths or kalemas, and the first kalema, namely kalema Taib, is most important. It says “La Ilaha Illallah, Muhammadur rasulullah”, i.e. “Allah is the only God to be worshipped and Muhammad is the Prophet of Allah”. This kalema is considered the "soul" of Islam. Slightest doubt in it will make even a devout Muslim "an apostate" at once, who is to be killed.

Islam does not have strong philosophical basis; instead, it commands blind belief in the most irrational and unscientific dictates of the Koran and Sunnah. It has survived the past 14 centuries on this blind faith and fear psychosis. If a Muslim derails from this belief system, he/she would risk even his/her life. Islam is, therefore, may be imagined as an extremely brittle glassware hanging in the air with the help of a delicate thread, called kalema Taib. So, if reverence or faith in the Prophethood of Muhammad weakens, the fine thread kalema Taib would snap and entire edifice of Islam would collapse.

Therefore, the image of Muhammad is strictly guarded from suffering any damage. He was the perfect man ever. His deeds should always be praised. He must be projected as an apostle of peace and compassion, notwithstanding his extremely cruel deeds. No one is to be allowed to make critical comments on his life and actions. Divinity must be sought in his marrying 12 (or 22) wives in his declining years, even in his marrying of 6-year-old Aisha at the age of 52. Any thought contrary to this paradigm should be labeled as "blasphemy" and such blasphemers should be punished with death. Even simple statement of facts of his life, which may unmask his true color, must also be treated as blasphemy.

Saying truth about Muhammad's life is also blasphemous

The Kolkata-based English daily Statesman ran on 5 February, 2009 an article of award-winning British journalist and writer Johann Hari, entitled Why should I respect these oppressive religions?—earlier published in The Independent. In it, he wrote, “I don’t respect the idea that we should follow a ‘Prophet’ who at the age of 53 had sex with a nine-year old girl, and ordered the murder of whole villages of Jews because they wouldn’t follow him.” What Mr Hari wrote is fact proudly documented in revered Islamic literature, but Muslims considered it a blasphemy of Muhammad by Hari.

Muslims protesting against Statesman

After republication of the article by Statesman, angry Muslims organized demonstrations in front of paper's office in Calcutta. Muslims allied with the Jamiat-e-Ulema e Hind (The Organisation of Indian Scholars, a leading Islamic group in India) filed a complaint with police alleging that the publication had “outraged their religious feelings”, which is an offence under Section 295 A of the Indian Penal Code.

Police arrested the Statesman’s editor Ravindra Kumar and publisher Anand Sinha on charges of “hurting the religious feelings” of Muslims and produced them in court. Kumar said he had already issued a public apology for reproducing the article. “I admit it was an editorial misjudgement but it was never intentional,” Kumar told the BBC.

Demonstration by Muslim protesters, including attack on police and blockade on streets, continued for days. When police tried to chase away the protesters to restore order, "Demonstrators threw stones, soda bottles and shoes injuring four cops. Some agitators later took shelter in a nearby mosque and threw stones, empty bottles and shoes targeting policemen." On February 8, more than 20 people, including four policemen, were injured in a clash that broke out when police tried to clear Lenin Sarani.

Blasphemy law in Pakistan

Today, the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is one of the most notorious for applying "blasphemy laws" to prohibit and punish blasphemy against religion. While the law in theory is designed to prevent blasphemy against all religions, it only applies to Islam. Penalties for blasphemy under this law range from a fine and prison term to death. Apart from judicial procedure, an accusation of blasphemy commonly leads to extrajudicial harassment, threats and attacks.

According to the constitution (Article 2), Islam is the state religion of Pakistan. By the constitution's Article 31, it is the country's duty to foster the Islamic way of life. By Article 33, it is the several sections of Pakistan's Criminal Code comprise its blasphemy laws. Article 295 forbids damaging or defiling a place of worship or a sacred object. Article 295-A forbids outraging religious feelings. Article 295-B forbids defiling the Quran. Article 295-C forbids defaming the prophet Muhammad. Except for 295-C, the provisions of 295 require that an offence be a consequence of the accused's intent. Defiling the Quran merits imprisonment for life. Defaming Muhammad merits death with or without a fine. If a charge is laid under 295-C, the trial must take place in a Court of Session with a Muslim judge presiding.

Article 298 states:

Whoever, with the deliberate intention of wounding the religious feelings of any person, utters any word or makes any sound in the hearing of that person or makes any gesture in the sight of that person or places any object in the sight of that person, shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to one year, or with fine, or with both.

Article 298-A prohibits the use of any derogatory remark or representation in respect of Muslim holy personages. Articles 298-B and 298-C prohibit the Ahmadiyya from behaving as Muslims, and the violator is liable to imprisonment up to three years and a fine. Article 45 of the Constitution says, "The President shall have power to grant pardon, reprieve and respite, and to remit, suspend or commute any sentence passed by any court, tribunal or other authority." It is claimed that, no judicial execution has so far occurred under the charge of blasphemy in Pakistan. On Jan. 12, 2011, Prime Minister of Pakistan Yousuf Raza Gilani once again said that there would be no amendments to the blasphemy law.

However, the punishment for the defamation of Prophet Muhammad is death under the provision Article 295C. The Federal Sharia Court (FSC) also maintains this view and says, "The penalty for contempt of the Holy Prophet… is death”. Those accused of blaspheming Muhammad are subject to immediate incarceration, and are denied bail to forestall mob violence. It is common for those, accused of blasphemy, to be put in solitary confinement for their protection from other inmates and guards. Those, who have served a sentence for blasphemy or acquitted of the charge, usually go into hiding or leave Pakistan.

In May 2010, Pakistan blocked access to Facebook, because the website hosted a page, called Everybody Draw Muhammad Day. Pakistan lifted the block after Facebook prevented access to the page. In June 2010, Pakistan blocked seventeen websites for hosting content, which the authorities considered offensive to Muslims. At the same time, Pakistan began to monitor the content of Google,Yahoo, YouTube, Amazon, MSN, Hotmail, and Bing.

Application of the Law

Between 1986 and 2007, Pakistani authorities charged 647 people with offences under the blasphemy law. Ironically, 50% of the people charged were non-Muslims, while they constitute only 3% of the total population. So, it is often said that Pakistan's blasphemy law is used as a tool for persecuting the minority religious communities. It is also interesting to note that 20 of the accused were murdered by fanatic Islamists and mobs.

The recent incident that aroused international attention is the case of Christian woman Asia Bibi (Noreen), who was sentenced to death in November 2010 on charges of blasphemy. An appeal against the verdict now sits before the Lahore High Court. Meanwhile, the Punjab Governor Salman Taseer, who felt outraged by the bogus charge against Asia Bibi and demanded amendment of the law, was shot dead by his own security guard.

His support for the acquittal of Asia Bibi and changes in the blasphemy law attracted mass protests across Pakistan. Imams of Mosques accused Salman Taseer of defying Prophet Mohammed and demanded death sentenced for him. On December 12, 2010, major Islamic parties in Pakistan launched a campaign for upholding the sanctity of Muhammad against the proposed amendment in blasphemy laws.

Next, not long after assassination of Taseer, Shahbaz Bahtti -- a Christian and the Federal Minister for Minorities Affairs -- was assassinated on March 2 by unknown assailants in Islamabad. Bhatti was killed, because he had been struggling to bring changes in the blasphemy law.

A few other cases of blasphemy

In another case, the Lahore High Court, in July 2010, ordered the release of Zaibun Nisa, a woman who was jailed in 1996 on a charge of blasphemy. While a complaint that a Quran had been defiled by her was investigated by police, her lawyer reported: "There was no evidence linking her to the crime."

In July 2010, a trader in Faisalabad complained that one of his employees had been handed over a pamphlet, which contained derogatory remarks about Muhammad. According to police, the pamphlet appeared to have been issued by Christian Pastor Rashid Emmanuel and his brother Sajid. Both brothers denied the charge, and they were arrested without investigating the alleged offence. While policemen were escorting the brothers from a district court, fanatic Islamist gunmen shot and killed both the brothers.

Minister Shahbaz Bhatti's death may have been linked to the case of Emmanuel brother. Pakistani cleric Allama Ahmed Mian Hammadi has claimed that Minister Bhatti had himself committed blasphemy by branding the Christian brothers, recently murdered, as victims of Pakistan blasphemy laws. Bhatti had said that the murder of Rashid Emmanuel, 30, and his brother Sajid, 27, by unidentified masked gunmen inside a courthouse in Faisalabad was highly deplorable.

Pakistani Urdu daily, Daily Jasarat, had earlier quoted cleric Mr Hammadi as saying: "Muslims cannot tolerate blasphemy against Muhammad." Hammadi added: "It is not a cruelty to kill blasphemers, rather blasphemy itself is such an enormous brutality that the one who commits it neither has got a right to live in this world nor is there any pardon for the blasphemer… Muslims won't tolerate even a slightest blasphemy against Prophet Muhammad. If Shahbaz Bhatti committed blasphemy he would be beheaded."

The interesting part of Pakistan's "blasphemy law" saga is that Islam needs to legislate laws and murder people to save the image of Muhammad. There are many great men like Gautama Buddha, Jesus Christ, Guru Nanak, Sri Ramakrishna Paramhansa et al, the followers of whom do not require such barbaric means (at least not any more) to protect their image. It is no wonder either that when the world's 1.5 billion Muslims want to project Muhammad, who was evidently a vile rapist, pedophile, mass murderer, plunderer and robber, as a pious soul and a prophet; they can do so only in engaging in such barbaric acts and means.