[donaldscrankshaw] Donald: Obama the apostate?

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Posted by Donald:
Obama the apostate?
http://www.donaldscrankshaw.com/posts/1210988789.shtml


   This [1]editorial in the [2]New York Times discusses something I've
   been wondering myself:

     One danger of such charisma, however, is that it can evoke
     unrealistic hopes of what a candidate could actually accomplish in
     office regardless of his own personal abilities. Case in point is
     the oft-made claim that an Obama presidency would be welcomed by
     the Muslim world.
     ...
     As the son of the Muslim father, Senator Obama was born a Muslim
     under Muslim law as it is universally understood. It makes no
     difference that, as Senator Obama has written, his father said he
     renounced his religion. Likewise, under Muslim law based on the
     Koran his motherâs Christian background is irrelevant.
     Of course, as most Americans understand it, Senator Obama is not a
     Muslim. He chose to become a Christian, and indeed has written
     convincingly to explain how he arrived at his choice and how
     important his Christian faith is to him.
     His conversion, however, was a crime in Muslim eyes; it is
     âirtidadâ or âridda,â usually translated from the Arabic as
     âapostasy,â but with connotations of rebellion and treason. Indeed,
     it is the worst of all crimes that a Muslim can commit, worse than
     murder (which the victimâs family may choose to forgive).

   I've wondered about this before, although not on this blog. The thing
   that made me question whether this was actually the case is the fact
   that Obama was never a practicing Muslim, so would he necessarily be
   considered an adult convert from Islam, or would he have been
   considered to have converted from his birth religion as a child? This
   article doesn't address that question, but my suspicion is that it
   doesn't work that way. Islam doesn't distinguish between "practicing"
   and "cultural" the way evangelical Christianity does (and not all
   forms of Christianity do anyway). When one is born a Muslim, one
   remains a Muslim, whether one practices or not. It is only when one
   makes a contrary declaration of faith that one breaks with Islam,
   under which definition Obama may very well be considered an apostate.
   Why should that concern us? Luttwak continues:

     Because no government is likely to allow the prosecution of a
     President Obama â not even those of Iran and Saudi Arabia, the only
     two countries where Islamic religious courts dominate over secular
     law â another provision of Muslim law is perhaps more relevant: it
     prohibits punishment for any Muslim who kills any apostate, and
     effectively prohibits interference with such a killing.
     At the very least, that would complicate the security planning of
     state visits by President Obama to Muslim countries, because the
     very act of protecting him would be sinful for Islamic security
     guards. More broadly, most citizens of the Islamic world would be
     horrified by the fact of Senator Obamaâs conversion to Christianity
     once it became widely known â as it would, no doubt, should he win
     the White House. This would compromise the ability of governments
     in Muslim nations to cooperate with the United States in the fight
     against terrorism, as well as American efforts to export democracy
     and human rights abroad.
     That an Obama presidency would cause such complications in our
     dealings with the Islamic world is not likely to be a major factor
     with American voters, and the implication is not that it should be.
     But of all the well-meaning desires projected on Senator Obama, the
     hope that he would decisively improve relations with the worldâs
     Muslims is the least realistic.

   It's food for thought.

References

   1. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/12/opinion/12luttwak.html
   2. http://www.nytimes.com/