@JohnDoe Ok 1. is somewhat relevant 2. is off topic 3. is actually the topic 4. 5. and 6. are off topic and 7. somewhat releavnt to the actual question

we could go ahead and check the posted verses and again we would end up with many verses that are irrelvant!

@Medi1Saif 2 is not offtopic, it very clearly indicates that this Abode is the Abode of Trial and not the Abode of Judgement, 3 is not off-topic since it shows that no one should force another on a belief (very relevant for religious freedom), and how are 4 5 6 offtopic?

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By the way I can't connect to meta.islam.stackexchange.com, can anyone offer some help?

It is off topic as it doesn't refer to freedom of religion

I have no idea why you can't connect to the meta site

I've never ha issues and right now I'm on it too

@Medi1Saif It doesn't explicitly refer to freedom of religion but it implicitly does.

@JohnDoe so if somebody ask you about Islam would you quote the whole Quran?

it implicitly does too

Answers should answer OP's question

check the help center and read what makes a good answer

@JohnDoe check whether you can access this post meta.islam.stackexchange.com/questions/1311/…

@Medi1Saif You're confusing between an implicit link with the source and an implicit link with the subject, free-will is an essential part of freedom of religion but it is not an integral part, it should nevertheless be mentioned

@Medi1Saif yes when I click on it I and click log in get redirected to this islam.stackexchange.com/users/…

But when I click on "click here" it redirects me back to meta.islam.stackexchange.com but I'm not logged in!!

strange

@JohnDoe it is not asked answers should be focused on answering the actual question

that's the definition of SE

so anything additional is off-topic

@Medi1Saif well it does answer the question, there's nothing off-topic there correct?

I'm not confusing anything

you just want to post your whole answer as it seems

Maybe the meta.stackexchange.com thing is a bug you should post it on meta as a new question

or check it there

@Medi1Saif ok thanks will do :)

@Caleb Hi! Do you have any idea as to why I couldn't log into meta.islam.stackexchange.com? Thanks!

@JohnDoe Don't login to meta. Go to the main site and login there, then you will automatically be loggged into meta.

@Caleb I'm already logged in in stackexchange.com

You probably have HTTPS anywhere or something else going on in your browser that breaks on meta.

@JohnDoe Login to islam.stackexchange.com

Caleb seems to have a point

@Caleb Okay, I will disable HTTPS-Everywhere plugin and try again

it seems you are not logged in

somehow

@Medi1Saif I'm logged in islam.stackexchange.com will try to disable that plugin to see if that's the problem

@Caleb So I disabled HTTPS-Everywhere, for some reason I'm connected in https:// islam.SE but I'm not connected in http:// islam.SE, when I click on login it brings to me the previous process

@JohnDoe https is not supported anywhere on SE yet except the one central login domain yet. If you are trying to force it it will break everything.

@JohnDoe Logout and get off of the https protocol and login from the http site (it will forward you to a secure domain for the actual login, then forward you back once you are authenticated).

You might need to clear cache/cookies for the SE domains if you got it really mixed up.

@Caleb Okay will try

@Caleb still the same problem :( even do I cleared cookies and everything, it ends up with me being logged in in the HTTPS site but in the HTTP one (HTTPS-everywhere is disabled) ... SE should really implement https

@JohnDoe They are in the process (which is why the protocol is activated at all) but there actually aren't providers that can handle all their domains on one cert so it would break the single signon for all sites. They have written extensively about this on meta and their tech blog. Please read up on that before complaining about it in chat (where none of us are responsible for it anyway).

@JohnDoe You wouldn't be hitting HTTPS at all if you weren't doing something in your browser still, that feature is simply not enabled for most of their domains. If you end up there it's because your sessions is still screwed up from using HTTPS-Anywhere.

@Caleb Okay, in any case I will try to find a work around

good

@JohnDoe You seem to take issue with answers that specifically address a question without giving a systematic overview over semi-related concepts. From the issues you mention, only 3 is actually relevant to the question of whether islam provides for freedom of religion.

@JohnDoe Similarly, my answer here islam.stackexchange.com/questions/36518/… gives a faithful picture of the specifics of zina and rajm, and you can't expect an answer about a specific crime to outline the general rules of criminal law in sharia.

Hi @G.Bach

No, each and every verse is either directly or indirectly related to freedom of religion.

Each verse either says that: "1. Differences in people's beliefs are bound to happen" OR "2. Judgement between people in their differences in belief is in the Day of Resurrection and not in this earthly world" OR "3. Compulsion and coercion is prohibited, and it is the way of the unbelievers and believers are its victims" OR "4 The Human being is free and responsible for his actions"

OR "5 Obligation to use the mind, to think and ponder, and prohibition from blindly following the religion of one's parents (hence no such thing as forced faith or blind faith)" OR "6 The purpose of Prophets and Mesengers is limited to preaching, and they are but warners and aren't watchers or guardians over people" OR "7 Having a different religion does not prohibit kindness and justice" r

I don't see how you can fail to realize that; as tho the matter of religious freedom boils down only to non-compulsion.

As for the answer on zina and rajm, I've implicitly hinted that your answer was incomplete and didn't address the concerns of the one who asked. By the way, I'm still waiting for an explanation for your downvote here.

Lol I'd be glad to know the explanations for the 100's of down votes I've got

But unfortunately this is part of the SE model

so waiting for that is useless and a waste of time

@JohnDoe maybe youre confused what freedom of religion means? it's not a matter of people being kind to each other, or what a religion teaches about an afterlife and accountability there, or whether or not people have a capacity to have different religious beliefs. it's a legal term of human rights law describing a legal right to choose, change, pronounce, and practice in private or public your religious beliefs and rituals.

@JohnDoe the only point you mentioned that addresses freedom of religion is 3, and the verses in the quran give a very incomplete picture about islam's attitude towards freedom of religion, since the ruling of death for apostates from islam is only justified via ahadith. even 2:256 says nothing about a muslim who wants to change his religion, it only says "i wont force you to change yours, and you cant force me to change mine"

@JohnDoe even to say "coercion in religion is the way of the unbelievers, and believers are its victims" is a very skewed depiction of the state of affairs; the imposition of jiziya, the different legal status of non-muslims under sharia compared to muslims in many regards, and killing apostates from islam are all forms of at least discrimination based on religion specifically demanded by sharia, and in the form of death for apostates it is outright coercion.

@JohnDoe like i said, you cannot expect an answer with regard to a question about a specific crime to include all legal constructs involved in deciding a court case where someone is accused of that crime. you can't expect an answer that includes all relevant legal principles required to decide a criminal law case when someone asks "what is the punishment for drinking alcohol". i did elaborate on li'aan after your suggestion.

@JohnDoe I downvoted that answer since many of its deductions seem flawed to me. The text explicitly commands to wage war on people based on the criterion of not submitting to islam or islamic rule and not paying jizya. it doesn't even mention hiraba, you read that into the text, and even quote a different ayah that does to suggest that 9:29 actually talks about hiraba while explicitly talking about disbelief and insubordination to muslim rule.

@JohnDoe if you want to give references that actually, classical scholars really did read 9:29 as being concerned with hiraba, i'll withdraw my downvote. as it is, you make deductions that seem unsound to me, give no references that those deductions enjoy any kind of authority in fiqh or tafsir, and divert the topic to a different ayah. i don't see value in that.

@JohnDoe Maybe you didn't even understand how those topics related to freedom of religion. It's not "a matter of people being kind to each other" yes, but it's "a matter of people being kind to each other regardless of differences of belief". It's not "about an afterlife and accountability there" but that "accountability is not in this world but in the afterlife" (hence you can't force and judge people upon a belief in this world).

@JohnDoe First of all, the questioner asked about religious freedom EXCLUSIVELY with regards to the Qur'an, and not about Islam in general. My answer would thus not pertain to intricate details about such other topics.

@JohnDoe The points you raise do not in any way contradict the Qur'anic position that "coercion in religion is the way of the unbelievers, and believers are its victims". You mention jizya, yet forget that there are 2 kinds of jizya: 1) compulsory jizya (anwiyah), 2) jizya sulhiyah. The first is the jizya that is imposed on combatants after a battle in which they fought the Muslims as a sign of submission and secession of hostilities. In exchange, the Muslims are obligated to

@JohnDoe I'm @G.Bach, you're @JohnDoe

1) protect them against any threat, 2) exempt them from military service (in point of fact, if they choose to serve in military service they were exempted from it, and that's why such jizya is only imposed on males who can conduct military service, and not children, monks, ...)

:)

The second type is only levied after both parties agree on an amount and exemptions. It is not necessary in peace treaties, and there can even be treaties in which Muslims pay non-Muslims. (and there are historical examples for that)

are you always starting from Adam and Eve to explain anything?

your answer loses the focus of the question

no don't mention them, i don't want to bring up evolution

lol

@G.Bach Your comments on Q.9:29 don't make sense, you state "explicitly commands to wage war on people based on the criterion of not submitting to islam" yet i showed that this was precisely flawed. Looks like you downvoted simply because you disagreed with my conclusion rather than with an inherent flaw in the argument I presented (which is a standard classical one by the way)

I'm afraid it is hopeless

Medi, am i completely in the wrong here? i cant tell anymore

The overwhelming majority of Muslim scholars from Hanafis, Malikis, Shafi'i in one opinion, Hanbalis held that unbelief itself is not a justification for war. If you want a reference see : Sh. Muḥammad Saʿīd Ramaḍān al-Būṭī, al-Jihad fi-l-Islam : kayfa nafhamuh wa kayfa numārisuh, p. 94.

You also seem to forget that the arabic term used in Q.9:29 qitāl (قتال) and not qatl (قتل). The latter implies initiation of fighting, while the former means if you said ‘qātaltu (قاتلت) him’ if you "resisted his effort to fight you by a reciprocal fight, or if you forestalled him in that so that he would not get at you unawares." (i.e. self-defense)

@G.Bach I'd be very interested in hearing a counter-argument if you have one. And you can launch a new chatroom to discuss this to keep this place clean.

@JohnDoe the question was specifically about 9:29, and i told you the issue i have with it: there's no references that the wonky deductions you made are respected in fiqh discourse; this is a q&a site, you can't expect people to know the things you know, so you have to tell them where you know them from so people can check if you're just writing what you think should be considered the right interpretation, or whether you actually accurately reflect what scholars said

@JohnDoe it's also an english-language platform, so references should be english as much as possible

@G.Bach That book has been translated. And as I said, the overwhelming majority of Muslim scholars from Hanafis, Malikis, Shafi'i in one opinion, Hanbalis held that unbelief itself is not a justification for war. I'm only re-iterating that position through that explanation.

@JohnDoe how is "people being kind to each other regardless of differences of belief" or "accountability is not in this world but in the afterlife" in any way related to whether or not islam provides for a legal right to choose, change, pronounce, and practice in private or public your religious beliefs and rituals?

@JohnDoe you have to substantiate that claim, and if the book has been translated, then link to the translated version (or cite it by the name of the translation)

@G.Bach If the right to "choose, change, pronounce, and practice in private or public your religious beliefs and rituals" was non-existent in Islam then we certainly would expect it to consider this Abode to be the Abode of Judgement and we would expect it to not be kind to people of other faiths.

@JohnDoe that doesnt follow

@G.Bach I don't have the translated version. I'll try to look it up on Google Books to find (at least) the relevant page and then I'll edit the question to add it. Does that solve your earlier concern?

@G.Bach Why?

@JohnDoe it would partially solve it, but you dont just claim its one opinion, but that its the majority opinion, and for that i would be interested in someone more classical and authoritative than al-buti

@JohnDoe i dont see how it follows, elaborate

@JohnDoe especially since i have seen claims that ash-shafii took the position that offensive jihad against disbelievers merely based on their disbelief, even if they dont previously enter into conflict with islam, is at the very least halal

@JohnDoe What about Ibn Taymiyya?

@G.Bach Well what did I say: "al-Shafi'i in one opinion" His other opinion was that it was unbelief that is the justification for war, an opinion that is largely against the consensus and that even Shafi'i scholars didn't consider.

@JohnDoe and even if classical scholars in the majority considered the basis of the smaller jihad to be hiraba, not kufr, then that would at least require a definition of what they considered hiraba

@G.Bach I agree that's the view of the shafi'i and hanbali school according al-Qurtobi

@Medi1Saif what is?

@G.Bach Well then you should've said "It's not clear to me how..." not "It's not the case that ..." will elaborate more

disbelieve

@Medi1Saif That is absolutely false, only a minority of later Hanbali scholars held that opinion such as al-Shawkani

a-Shawkani wouldn't call himself hanbali

@JohnDoe please read my responses with attention, i explicitly said that your deductions seem flawed to me, and i dont trust their being authoritative without substantial references

and either way, the question was not about the fiqh with regard to aggressive jihad in general, but about 9:29 in particular

and your answer nowhere mentions ash-shafii

@G.Bach It doesn't because 1) that doesn't contradict the vast majority opinion, 2) that doesn't contradict the other opinion of ash(Shafi'i that is narrated from him 3) that doesn't contradict what the vast majority of Shafi'i jurists held after his death

@G.Bach You still didn't answer my question: What about Ibn Taymiyya?

@JohnDoe what about ibn taymiyya?

@G.Bach Also this is not a question of defensive/aggressive war, but of the justification for war. Since war can be "offensive" if for example a leader learned in advance about the preparation of war of an army and he can thus launch an attack before they attack him. That's "aggressive" but that doesn't mean it's not justified.

@G.Bach You said: "i would be interested in someone more classical and authoritative than al-buti" I asked you whether Ibn Taymiyya fit that category

@JohnDoe that would be preemptive, but still defensive, if you have reliable information that the group you attack is preparing a war against you; the question of disbelief being a justification only comes up if hiraba/being attacked does not arise

@G.Bach Ok, that was just a clarification, since some label every preemptive war as necessarily offensive which is not the case.

And hiraba is the intent of waging war, which includes such situation I described.

@JohnDoe im not quite sure about him to be honest; i have seen him criticized heavily (to the degree that people denied his fiqh had any legitimacy), and i have seen him praised heavily; i suppose he enjoys widespread support among salafis, but im not sure how respected his fiqh was among scholars before the 20th century

Let me tell you al-Buty was a great scholar

@JohnDoe intent of waging war is one example of hiraba, but theres others

but from my reads I found out that he often chose one opinion and declared it as the opinion

For example his book on Quran sciences is great but he declaes a specific view as the interpretation of 7 ahruf!

While as-Suyuti quoted a list of 40 opinions or so

@G.Bach "Intent of waging war" is the only example of hiraba, in fact that's literally the definition of hiraba

@Medi1Saif I read his book on the Quranic sciences, he very clearly said that the position of the majority are this and this, not that they were not other opinions

@Medi1Saif By the way I think he was talking not about al-Buti but about Ibn Taymiyya

I know

But what he claimed to be the view of the majority wasn't

@JohnDoe i've seen respectable scholars say that terrorism, highway robbery, or organised crime are reasonable to be included in the understanding of "hiraba", basically a cover-all term for "spreading mischief in the land"

His accuracy in his books depends on the audiance or readership in muhadarat fil fiqh al-muqarin he is very accurate!

@G.Bach No, it's the hiraba meant by the verse on hirabah, not the one on war

@Medi1Saif Indeed, that was a great book by the way

Also if you look at the number of editions, his book on the seerah had to pass on many editions (23 now I think) but some of his other books had only 2 editions.

I know

IMO his one of the last great fuqaha'

Well I have to go now!

See ya later @Medi1Saif

@JohnDoe Salam

@G.Bach see you

@Medi1Saif cheers!

hello

@engfan salam alaykom welcome to islam SE :)