Contributors

Monday, March 02, 2015

House Republicans to Host Sharia Law Foreign Leader

Lots of Republicans think the United States is a Christian nation, and that Congress and state legislatures should make it official. Yet Republicans in Congress are asking the leader of a foreign country that recognizes Muslim Sharia Law to lecture Americans about moral imperatives.

They criticize President Obama because he frames the war against the so-called Islamic State as an action against criminals and terrorists. Obama refuses to give into the terrorists' narrative that they somehow represent Islam, and that Islam and Christianity are somehow at war. The president believes that if the United States is perceived as embarking on another Crusade in the Middle East, as Republicans appear to fervently desire by their pious declarations, then other Muslims will feel that the US is waging a war against them as well.

Anti-Islamic rhetoric has reached a fevered pitch in many parts of the United States since 2001. Republican-controlled legislatures have debated or passed laws that prohibit "Sharia" law, or recognizing any form of "foreign" law. They believe that only "Christian" law should apply in the United States.

Common law, the basis of American law, predates Christianity.
However, the Christian part of the bible, the New Testament, doesn't establish any laws: it's just the story of Jesus, plus some dire predictions about hellfire and damnation. The part of the Bible that contains actual laws is the Torah, also known as the Old Testament. This set of laws, known as Mosaic Law, is not Christian, it's Jewish law, and is expanded upon by the Talmud. American law is based on British common law, which existed before Christianity.

In Israel Judaism is the official state religion. Religious law governs family matters. That means that in order for a Jewish woman to get a divorce, she has to get her husband's permission, even if she's an atheist Russian emigree who's never set foot in a synagogue. Some women have been forced to wait for decades to get a divorce, held hostage by husbands who are free to take up with other women and have children who will be recognized as Jews by the rabbinate.

However, Israel has a very large Muslim population, and a sizable Christian one. That means that Israel also recognizes Sharia courts:
The jurisdiction of the Sharia Courts
Under  the Palestine Order in Council 1922-1947, the Sharia Courts were given jurisdiction to adjudicate the following matters in accordance with the Sharia Courts Procedure Law for the year 1333 E:
  • Marriages - Proof of marriage, annulment of marriage, ratification of marriage, bride prices and dowries.
  • Divorce - Proof of divorce, arbitration, separation and dissolution of marriage.
  • Maintenance - Wife, son, father and grandfather.
  • Legal capacity and guardianship.  
  • Custody of children - visitation and accommodation arrangements.
  • Inheritance.
Republicans invited Bibi Netanyahu, a foreign leader, to come scare Americans with stories of Muslim bogeymen, when his own country allows Sharia Courts dictate the most basic rights of Israeli citizens to marry, divorce, have children and inherit property.

Yeah, there are complex historical reasons for this. But it just shows how foolish the idea is that a democracy should have an official state religion, especially Christianity. Because there's no such monolithic thing called "Christianity" -- or Judaism or Islam, for that matter, which demonstrates what a farce the Israeli situation is.

The theocracies in Iran and Saudi Arabia illustrate the evils of official state religions run amok, and even Britain has several dark pages in its history when the State wielded religious power to murder its political opponents.

Religious laws governing marriage and family are all over the map in Christianity: most protestant faiths allow divorce, Catholicism bans it, and when it started, Mormonism allowed polygamy, and some adherents still claim it does.

Think of the utter chaos trying to enforce several hundred religious courts in this country over issues of marriage, divorce and child custody and especially inheritance, considering how frequently Americans marry people of other faiths, and how Americans can simply change faiths by walking across the street.

Our modern secular moral code is stronger than so-called biblical morality.
And an official state religion is unnecessary. Morality has nothing to do with religion -- it's just a set of rules established to govern social interaction. Morality is merely informed by religion and philosophy, not dictated by them.

Despite the popular claim to the contrary, morality can, is and should be legislated. By Americans, for all Americans who alive right and here and now. Not by decree of some self-styled foreign oracle who's been dead for centuries, for a tiny sliver of Americans who think they know better than everyone else.

The irony is that our modern secular moral code is stronger and more just than so-called morality of the Bible, which condoned, promoted and even glorified genocide, vengeful murders, ritual human sacrifice, polygamy and slavery.

No comments: