Cyber-apostasy: its repercussions on Islam and interfaith relations^*

Abstract

In relations between Islam and the West, apostasy has been an issue of perennial contention. Although the Qur’ānic perspective on apostasy is ambiguous, the ḥadīths and later Islamic legal thought prescribe harsh sanctions against apostasy, making repudiation of Islam extremely difficult, if not impossible, in the Muslim world. Such a coercive approach contravenes the Western value of freedom of conscience and the correlative right to religious freedom. Moreover, the rise of a parallel form of Islam—online- or cyber-Islam—has complicated the issue of apostasy even further. For countless Muslims worldwide, this parallel expression of their religion, although virtual, is even more ‘real’ than its offline, analogue expression. In this new Islamic expression, freedom of conscience can indeed be exercised. Online dissent, even to the point of engaging in ‘cyber-apostasy’ and encouraging others to do likewise, has given rise to a new level of reciprocity between Islam and other religions interacting with it in the ‘marketplace of religions’, thus opening a new chapter in the history of Islamic interaction with other faiths in the contemporary world.

Keywords:

• Islam
• Muslims
• ex-Muslims
• apostasy
• apostates
• religious freedom
• conscience
• Qur’an
• hadiths
• interreligious
• web sites
• cyber

Notes

1. In making this assertion, Anthony cites Simon Cottee (2015).

2. The translation cited throughout this section is The Holy Qur’an (1984).

3. The term ṣaḥīḥ is best translated as ‘authentic’ and indicates ḥadīths of the highest level of reliability. Those of lesser caliber are described as ḥasan (‘good’), ḍa῾īf (‘weak’) or mawḍū῾ (‘fabricated’). The ḥadīths discussed in this section are all deemed authentic.

4. Variations of this ḥadīth appear in other collections. For example, it is included in the fourteenth of the 40 ḥadīths collected by al-Nawawī (d. 1277), in which Muḥammad states that “it is not permissible to spill the blood of a Muslim except in three [instances]: the married person who commits adultery, a life for a life, and the one who forsakes his religion and separates from the community” (http://40HadithNawawi.com, accessed 18 June 2015).

5. This same succinct command regarding execution of apostates from Islam is included in the Bulūgh al-Marām of Ibn Hajar Al-῾Asqalānī (d. 1449), Bk. 9, Had. 1242 (http://sunnah.com, accessed 18 June 2015).

6. Several variants of this ḥadīth are found. In one, Muhammad drives nails into the apostates’ eyes. Another depicts him as piercing them with hot nails, casting them on to a stony plain and refusing them water until they die. (Zwemer 1924, 38)

7. Sina’s apologia, explaining his repudiation of Islam, is featured in the FFI web site archive (Sina, n.d.). See also his personal anti-Islamic site: http://alisina.org, accessed 18 June 2015.

8. For a fuller chronology, see “Major events in the Rifqa Bary Case” (2010).

9. The tone of Hirsi Ali’s most recent book, Heretic, is a bit more tempered in that the author calls for a modification of Islam rather than for its outright suppression. Nevertheless, in its present state, Islam is deemed unacceptable by Hirsi Ali (Rodenbeck 2006).

10. This site has been attacked. As of 15 June 2015, the URL leads to a wide-ranging site, pro-Islamic in orientation.

11. These were Ibn Warraq, Taslima Nasrin, Ali Sina, Parvin Darabi, Nonie Darwish, and Anwar Sheikh.

12. It is easy to see how the ‘Apostates of Islam’ web site would draw the ire of some Muslims. The site administrator posted a notice (accessed 17 December 2013) that s/he was looking for a new web site owner “due to lack of time and involvement in other real-life issues”, stressing that s/he would proceed cautiously in this transfer of ownership so that the site might not come under the control of someone wishing to neutralize it as a means of cyber-apostasy. Moreover, the administrator urged apostates who wanted to contribute their testimonials of apostasy to use pseudonyms and other precautions: “The prospect of prosecution is very real for a Muslim who leaves Islam, especially if they are present in a Muslim country, like Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and the rest of the Middle East. According to Sharia, an apostate must be killed… We do not want to risk death, or have us or our families suffer prosecution.”

13. This article could be found, as of 16 September 2013, at http://alieteraz.com/2007/09/12/muslim-of-consciences-attack-on-death-penalty-for-apostasy/, a URL which is discontinued as of 16 September 2013. However, the article is now included in extenso in a discussion thread on another web site (http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=122979271&pagenumber, accessed 27 February 2017).

14. For a commentary on the significance of this case for religious freedom, see Stetzer (2014). For a brief explanation of the Christian commitment to freedom of conscience in relations with other religions, see Gonzalez-Ruiz (1972) and Reynolds (2011).

15. This article ultimately led to a book-length study by Leirvik (2006).

16. This ambiguity has been clearly evident, according to Leirvik, in the difficulty experienced by scholars trying to find an Arabic word to translate ‘conscience’ (Leirvik 2003, 278, 282). In further discussing this ambiguity, Leirvik argues that the exercise of conscience implies a tension between an individual’s autonomy and the communitarian pressure applied to the individual. In the Islamic understanding of conscience, this tension has been skewed in favor of the latter aspect. (Leirvik 2003, 279–282)