Our survey shows British Muslims don’t want sharia

bill

Of course, we all know this. It's just the usual clap-trap the elite serve us up to keep us divided so we don't look to closely at how they're cynically ripping us off.
Yawn.
I wouldn't mind so much but I think they genuinely believe they're being clever/

Keith

I am not surprised UK Muslims feel patronised by this,I am sure many are here precisely to avoid over the top interpretations of religious law.They must be sick of other religious and PC politicians claiming to know what they want.The system of secular law in the UK is better than any religious system, more just and more equitable and caters for belief and non belief. Let us also remember that non believers and those not attached to organised religions have equal rights under the law with the religious and can equally be offended by overt displays of religion or religious law.

Herbert Thornton

The last sentence of this paragraph in the survey strikes me as especially significant -

"Iraqi Shia Ayatollah Ali Sistani, one of the world’s preeminent sharia authorities, teaches that, ‘If [a Muslim] has given [a non-Muslim government] a commitment — even if indirectly (as is implied in the immigration documents) — to abide by the laws of that country, it is necessary for him to fulfil his commitment.’ If they cannot do this, they should return to Muslim territory."

Now, let us ask ourselves - do any of the political parties see virtue in that last sentence? If so, which?

Ib

Very helpful. Our government at all levels consults very hard liner Muslim 'leaders', hence beds moved 5 times per day in Dewsbury hospitals, the pulling of honour killing legislation. Churches do the same, speaking to ultra conservatives as representing all Muslims.
It has been a disastrous policy, strengthening the fanatics, bringing ordinary Muslims by birth under their 'leadership', and making British Islam more and more conservative. Look at the muslim council of Britain website and its links to DTI rules for prayers etc in factories.
So thanks: we rarely get a snapshot of grass roots opinion.

Charles Smyth

For those who must have Sharia as the law, there are states to which they can repatriate or expatriate to, in order to enjoy this class of law. In the UK and/or EU an introduction of Sharia would be divisive in itself vis-à-vis the state law, which is designed to be even handed to all, and would, as has been tentatively suggested in Germany, demand the reintroduction of other faiths' doctrines into law. Fortunately, the majority of Muslims in the UK have more sense than to advocate the introduction of Sharia, which many of them have fled to the UK, to avoid.

http://www.youtube.com/v/R4J80UytcHo

Iftikhar Ahmad

Salaam

Sharia laws and State funded Muslim schools are for those who believe in Sharia laws and who would like to send their children to Muslim schools. Silent majority of Muslims would like to live under Sharia laws and want to send their children to Muslim schools. There is no complusion in Islam.

Nicholas storey

For the sake of comity between peoples, I welcome comprehensible explanations of Islam, since it is much misunderstood by non-Muslims and, like anything that is misunderstood, it is routinely feared and, ultimately, attacked by the tabloid-led rabble; especially when a cynical minority of cynics adopt the ostensible cause of Islam to pardon and excuse the perpetration of attrocities in order to satisfy some perverted instinct. It might be useful if someone ran through the major basic tenets of Islam for the non-Muslim British public - and even for the Americans. Then they might realize that Islam does not reject the person whom they call 'Jesus of Nazareth' as a great prophet, it rejects that he was the Son of God and of the Virgin Mary. But all that should be dealt with comprehensively by those who know far more about it than I. Turning to the article, several points do arise: first of all, you say that Muslims are told that they should abide by the Laws of the land into which they go. However, what if they find the very core of the State into which they go, so lacking in moral fibre that it has lost its own sense of identity and desire to uphold its own laws; that it bends with the wind and shows eager to adopt the healthier parts of Sharia, even to a restricted extent? Would Islamic scholars then deny Muslims the right to exploit this weakness, this rottenness to the very core in the State into which they have gone? For, the Archbishop of Canterbury as the head of the Church of England (which, the last time that I looked, was both still a Christian organization and still an established part of the Constitution)has no business making political pronouncements about the state of the secular law, except to the extent that it is proposed to make it inconsistent with Christian morals or ecceliastical law. Rather, he and his clergy have a bounden duty to get out there and convert non-Christians to Christianity. Is this not how it all began - men (mainly but not just men) dying for the Faith? Men like Thomas More died to uphold his own brand of the Faith, the point of which would be lost on most modern Britons. Secondly, since the whole purpose of abolishing the office of Lord Chancellor was to make the judiciary appear to have no political links or bias, one wonders why the unelected Lord Chief Justice sees fit to give out political opinions (coincidentally as spineless, as ignorant, as unwise and as contrary to the purpose of his office, as the opinions of Dr Rowan Williams) on the legal infra-structure, enacted by Parliament, which it is his sole function to enforce.
NJS

David Short

I once had the chance, which I did not take, in a farmhouse in a very posh part of England, the Cotswolds, to ask: 'More tea, Vicar?'

I wish I had, just for history's sake, but we were talking, lots of us, about the Muslim religion, and this was about 15 years ago.

I said to the young vicar, who was in fact drinking lots of whisky under the disapproving nose of his wife because he had a service to perform that evening: 'But of course Islam is an evangelical religion!'

He replied, quite correctly: 'So is Christianity!'

I missed another opportunity around a Sunday fireside to reply: 'How true, vicar! How true!'

Do we value our own religion?

If not, then don't complain.

Nicholas Storey

David Short says 'don't complain' - but he doesn't say about what. Might he please clarify?

Vir Narain

So British Muslims do not want Sharia. What if they did? Surely it is not for them to choose, or not to choose, what laws should govern the United Kingdom. The line of reasoning implied by the title is pernicious