Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!sdd.hp.com!decwrl!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!jarthur!nntp-server.caltech.edu!news
From: mentor.com!ikhan%tessi.uucp@RELAY.CS.NET (Iqbal Khan)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.islam
Subject: Re: Question about Pakistan's "official Islam"
Message-ID: <1990Aug3.082507.10790@laguna.ccsf.caltech.edu>
Date: 3 Aug 90 08:25:07 GMT
Sender: news@laguna.ccsf.caltech.edu
Organization: California Institute of Technology
Lines: 26
Approved: bes@tybalt.caltech.edu

In article <14209@wpi.wpi.edu> lieuwen@mycella.cs.wisc.edu (Dan Lieuwen) writes:
>
>part of the enslavement raped.  When the Pakistani authorities raided the
>homes, the enslavers weren't punished.  The women were put in prison for
>ADULTRY.  Now, from my reading, adultry requires that two people be punished,
>not one.  Also, the gist of Quaranic law seems to be an attempt to protect 

Correction here.  Adultry does not require both the particpants to be punished.  In
fact, if one of the persons confesses, he/she is not even asked who the partner was.
Of course, all this is the princinple of Islam and not what might be practiced.

The second thing is that a person is not convicted of adultry unless at least four
male or two males and four females (??) bear witness to the actual penetration.  This
extreme condition is there to protect the accused.  In general, the understanding is 
that if a judge gives the maximum punishment of adultry merely on basis of witneses, 
it is not a correct judgement.  The extreme punishment of stoning is given mostly 
when the person confesses himself/herself.

Keeping this in mind, if Pakistan's courts convicted any women in the above mentioned
cases, they are certainly not following any Sharia laws.  The problem in Pakistan is
that Islamic laws are being enforced in a procedural judicial system.  In a procedural
system, if a person is accused of a crime, he/she is arrested immediately and then tried.
Well, in case of adultry accusation, the person loses the reputation even if he/she is
innocent.

Iqbal Mustafa Khan