Sunday, March 23, 2014
Sharia law to be enshrined in British legal system
John Bingham reports in the Telegraph that Sharia law is to be enshrined in the legal system of England and Wales for the first time under guidelines for solicitors on drawing up “Sharia compliant” wills.
This isn't coming from agitating Muslims or Sharia-friendly legislators, but from the 200-year-old Law Society – the professional association that represents and governs the solicitors' profession and provides services and support to solicitors as well as serving as a sounding board for law reform. That the Law Society should issue guidance to its members which effectively creates a parallel legal system to that which has evolved over centuries is, as some lawyers have said, "astonishing".
Of course Muslims should be able to order their own inheritance affairs as they wish, but it should be in accordance with the law of the land, for in a liberal democracy there is one law and all are equal before it. What is quite shocking about this Sharia guidance is that it circumvents equality legislation by specifically denying women an equal share of the deceased's inheritance: “The male heirs in most cases receive double the amount inherited by a female heir of the same class,” it says. Thus do the sons prosper while the daughters live in penury: their only redemption is the dowry they attract on betrothal. There is also acknowledgement of polygamy, which is illegal in the UK. This is the Law Society of once-Christian England effectively facilitating the bartering of Muslim women like cattle. Equality can go to the lowest of the depths of Jahannam.
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