Islamism, the West and Human Rights
by Nils A. Haug, Gatestone Institute:
The Torah‘s ethical and moral laws, which became known to the world as Moses’ Ten Commandments, founded the West’s moral-ethical precepts on which its laws and judicial concepts such as justice and mercy are based. This development is reflected in the United States’ founding documents, as well as England’s Magna Carta of 1215, among others.
The opening paragraph of America’s 1776 Declaration of Independence, for instance, refers to “the laws of nature” and “nature’s God.” From this assertion, the imperative of a sound ethical, moral and religious foundation for America’s values was established. According to America’s founding fathers, therefore, the laws of Moses – those moral codes collectively referred to as the natural law – underpin the value-based Western order.
The moral components of the laws given to Moses, says American scholar Leon Kass, are “an orienting aspirational guide for every Israelite and every human heart and mind.” Adoption of Mosaic codes thus gives advent, in the West, to civilization as distinguished from barbarism. In terms of religion, the Jewish people generally value the underlying importance of the Torah to their community.
The emphasis on ethical and moral parameters might disturb many in the West, particularly those who hold a secular or atheistic worldview. Social unrest can take place, but the West has an obligation to protect its core principles of upholding the values of civilization.
Islamic values have not come from the West. They originated from the Quran and the Hadith –– the sayings and actions of Mohammed. Both works form the bases of Sharia, Islamic law. Sharia law in application can have severe moral and ethical requirements contrary to Western concerns of justice.
Sharia tenets – which have views of human rights, justice, mercy and compassion that differ from those of the West — can appear alien to Judeo-Christian precepts. Sharia, in usage, often appears to contravene the basic humanistic values of the West.
The outcome is that, in application, the moral laws of each tradition — that of the Torah as opposed to that of Sharia — which prescribes harsh punishments, such as amputation for theft; death for leaving Islam (apostasy) or blasphemy, or being stoned to death for adultery, which can include having been raped — are consequences inimical to Western ideas of justice, mercy and human rights.
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