Lashing? Stoning?

Do you personally believe in stoning and/or lashing as punishment for adultry> why or why not? (personally I find in my heart that forgiveness is more poweful then ppunishment.)

Well... It can be viewed from two angels, islamic and non-islamic.
Islamic-ly, it's justefiable, moral, and down right necessary.
On the other hand, it's simply barbaric, sadistic, disgusting, and nonhuman, according to everyone else -save the jews-.
I for myself, as an ex-muslim atheist, can't believe someone is welling to do it.
Regardless whether adultery is a sin, and let alone that islam punishes it by death, stoning is just plain... barbaric... I don't know any worse word to describe it

Maybe you didn't know this but Islam is not the only religion that has this law.
Punishment by death has nothing to do with Islam there are many countries in the world including America (if i am not wrong) that has these kind of laws/punishments.

I personally think its necessary for a healthy community.

F0uad said:

Punishment by death has nothing to do with Islam there are many countries in the world including America (if i am not wrong) that has these kind of laws/punishments.

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Not for adultery, no.

skepticalseeker613 said:

Do you personally believe in stoning and/or lashing as punishment for adultry> why or why not? (personally I find in my heart that forgiveness is more poweful then ppunishment.)

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Being unfaithful in a marriage can be destructive in it's own way and have unfortunate consequences by itself. It says something about a person's character.

Stoning might have been the course of punishment under Deuteronomic law or maybe under some forms of Shariah where witnesses were required.. etc. But under most religious groups today the preferred way of dealing with it is counseling and reformation of the character of the people involved.

Shoghi Effendi the Guardian of the Baha'i Faith wrote in a letter to an individual believer, September 30, 1949: Living the Life, pp. 15-16 as follows:

"...Every other Word of Bahá'u'lláh's and 'Abdu'l-Bahá's Writings is a preachment on moral and ethical conduct; all else is the form, the chalice, into which the pure spirit must be poured; without the spirit and the action which must demonstrate it, it is a lifeless form.

"When we realize that Bahá'u'lláh says adultery retards the progress of the soul in the after life -- so grievous is it..."

(Compilations, Lights of Guidance, p. 344)

I heard that Prophet Muhammad used stoning because no punishment for adultry was revealed to Islam yet at the time and he got such punishments from previous religions. From Judaism in this case.

The Quraan does not mention marital status for the lashing, so I believe it covers for both status.

Just my 2 cents.

Smart_Guy said:

I heard that Prophet Muhammad used stoning because no punishment for adultry was revealed to Islam yet at the time and he got such punishments from previous religions. From Judaism in this case.

The Quraan does not mention marital status for the lashing, so I believe it covers for both status.

Just my 2 cents.

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I'm not really aware of too many of the details about Islam. For instance, how frequently did they stone people for adultery? What was the filtering process? Were just two witnesses enough to judge a man guilty? Do they still do it today?

In Judaism, we have many laws that were once punishable by death. However, even with very convincing evidence of the person being guilty of these types of crimes, the amount of people who actually ended up getting stoned were very minor. It is said that a courthouse who sent more than one man to death in 70 years, was a bloodthirsty, murderous one.

The process a person needed to go through to actually get stoned was extremely specific and complicated to the point where if witnesses saw the person commit the crime, but hadn't warned him beforehand that what he was about to do was a crime, and then actually having him acknowledge that he understood the warning, this person was not admissible to death. And there are even more laws that restrain a criminal from being sent to death.

Darkness said:

"The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, and placing her in the midst they said to him, “Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. Now in the law Moses commanded us to stone such. What do you say about her?” This they said to test him, that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. And as they continued to ask him, he stood up and said to them, “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.” And once more he bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. But when they heard it, they went away, one by one, beginning with the eldest, and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. Jesus looked up and said to her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and do not sin again” (Gospel of St. John).

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Jesus lived in a time of Sanhedrin, and to make the call on whether a person should be stoned or not without bringing it up to the people whose responsibility is to apply justice as God has commanded them is just wrong, and not very Jewish-like of Jesus... Of course, many Christians discard the Gospel of John, and don't see it as authentic. Perhaps this is one of the reasons why?

dantech said:

I'm not really aware of too many of the details about Islam. For instance, how frequently did they stone people for adultery? What was the filtering process? Were just two witnesses enough to judge a man guilty? Do they still do it today?

In Judaism, we have many laws that were once punishable by death. However, even with very convincing evidence of the person being guilty of these types of crimes, the amount of people who actually ended up getting stoned were very minor. It is said that a courthouse who sent more than one man to death in 70 years, was a bloodthirsty, murderous one.

The process a person needed to go through to actually get stoned was extremely specific and complicated to the point where if witnesses saw the person commit the crime, but hadn't warned him beforehand that what he was about to do was a crime, and then actually having him acknowledge that he understood the warning, this person was not admissible to death. And there are even more laws that restrain a criminal from being sent to death.

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I never heard it happened at least here in Saudi Arabia, the strictest Muslim country, in my life time, and we actually tell in the news when crimes and their punishments happens to give examples to the community to minimize crimes as much as possible (which is another subject).

The stonings that happened in Islam were only by confessions and it was always never accepted quickly until the suspect insisted that it really happened giving full details of the happening. For some reason in Islam the number of witnesses increased to four people even though it was taken from Judaism which says only two witnesses suffice. No convection ever happened by witnesses. These happened in the times when the Quraan was still being revealed to Islam which is like ~1,400 (one thousand and four hundred) years ago.

As for the point of the knowledge of the validity of the crime and its punishment, in Islam it is exactly the same as you mentioned. No knowledge something was wrong, no punishment take place. Like a child that does something not knowing it was wrong, no punishment for them, but instead a teaching about it as a start.

dantech said:

Jesus lived in a time of Sanhedrin, and to make the call on whether a person should be stoned or not without bringing it up to the people whose responsibility is to apply justice as God has commanded them is just wrong, and not very Jewish-like of Jesus... Of course, many Christians discard the Gospel of John, and don't see it as authentic. Perhaps this is one of the reasons why?

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Is Jesus supposed to be Jewish-like? Jesus ushers in a New Covenant to replace the Old.

Darkness said:

Is Jesus supposed to be Jewish-like? Jesus ushers in a New Covenant to replace the Old.

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He isn't supposed to be Jewish like, he is supposed to be Jewish. And with all his "righteousness", she should be an enforcer of the Jewish law, as Christian scripture seems to show.

dantech said:

He isn't supposed to be Jewish like, he is supposed to be Jewish. And with all his "righteousness", she should be an enforcer of the Jewish law, as Christian scripture seems to show.

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I am not sure what you are trying to get at. The Gospels seem to be in clear tension with the Old Covenant. We are a new religion.

Darkness said:

I am not sure what you are trying to get at. The Gospels seem to be in clear tension with the Old Covenant. We are a new religion.

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I know you are a new religion. That is something that happened after Jesus. The Christian Bible clearly shows, however, that Jesus agreed with the Torah. There are many verses in which he speaks about the Torah in a strict manner regarding its observance.

skepticalseeker613 said:

Do you personally believe in stoning and/or lashing as punishment for adultry> why or why not? (personally I find in my heart that forgiveness is more poweful then ppunishment.)

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I don't think stoning or lashing for adultery is appropriate now as it was specifically for Israel during the time of the Mosaic Law/Covenant because now it is the church age or age of grace. From what I see in the scriptures, this does not mean that God is finished with Israel or that they are no longer His chosen people, but that God is working through the church at this time until the fulness of the Gentiles have come in (Romans 11:25).

Darkness said:

I am not sure what you are trying to get at. The Gospels seem to be in clear tension with the Old Covenant. We are a new religion.

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Bzzzt! False.

Read the Sermon on the Mount. "...For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished"

'All is accomplished' refers to the world to come.

skepticalseeker613 said:

Do you personally believe in stoning and/or lashing as punishment for adultry> why or why not? (personally I find in my heart that forgiveness is more poweful then ppunishment.)

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Sure. Every Friday I go with the family to the center of our local market to watch the weekly lashing and stoning. The public reading of the juicy sins people commit in the darkness is some of the best part of the show, sort of like a foreplay for the following gore. Later the wife and I take the kids for dromedary pretzels.
Oh wait, you were actually serious.