Apostasy Islam

Apostasy in Islam (Arabic: ردة, romanized: ridda or ارتداد, irtidād) is commonly defined as the abandonment of all or part of Islam by a current or former Muslim, in thought, word, or through deed. It includes not only explicit apostasy, renunciations of the Islamic faith by converting to another religion or abandoning religion altogether, but also blasphemy or heresy by those who consider themselves Muslims, through any action or utterance which implies unbelief, including those who deny a "fundamental tenet or creed" of Islam. An apostate from Islam is known as a murtadd (مرتدّ). While Islamic jurisprudence traditionally calls for the death penalty for those who refuse to repent of apostasy from Islam, what statements or acts qualify as apostasy, and whether or how they should be punished, are disputed among Muslim scholars, with liberal Islamic movements rejecting physical punishment for apostasy altogether. The penalty of killing of apostates is in conflict with international human rights norms which provide for the freedom of religions, as demonstrated in human rights instruments such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights. Until the late 19th century, the majority of Sunni and Shia jurists held the view that for adult men, apostasy from Islam was a crime as well as a sin, punishable by the death penalty, but also allowed for a number of options for leniency (such as a waiting period to allow time for repentance or enforcement only in cases involving politics), depending on the era, the legal standards, and the particular school of law. In the late 19th century, the use of legal criminal penalties for apostasy fell into disuse, although civil penalties were still applied. As of 2021, there were ten Muslim-majority countries where apostasy from Islam was punishable by death, but legal executions are rare. Most punishment is extrajudicial/vigilante in nature, and most executions are perpetrated by jihadist and takfiri insurgents (al-Qaeda, the Islamic State, the GIA, and the Taliban). Another thirteen countries have penal or civil penalties for apostates – such as imprisonment, the annulment of their marriages, the loss of their rights of inheritance and the loss of custody of their children. In the contemporary Muslim world, public support for capital punishment varies from 78% in Afghanistan to less than 1% in Kazakhstan; among Islamic jurists, the majority of them continue to regard apostasy as a crime which should be punishable by death. Those who disagree argue that its punishment should be less than death and should occur in the afterlife, as human punishment is considered to be inconsistent with Quranic injunctions against compulsion in belief, or that it should be applied only in cases of public disobedience and disorder (fitna). Despite potentially grave and life-threatening consequences, some Muslims in these areas continue to leave the Islamic religion, either becoming irreligious (atheism, agnosticism, etc.) or converting to other religions, mostly to Christianity.