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13. Hudood Laws Presume The Existence of Justice

Some people forward the argument that “these hudood laws presume the existence of an Islamic society based on justice and social & economic equality.”[39] Anwar Syed, a columnist, extending from the above premise, said that ‘this is akin to postponing the hudood laws indefinitely.’

The above argument has got undue popularity even among sincere & educated persons; some ulema even forward this argument. Now’s the time to trash this argument!

This argument itself is usually based on the presumption and forwarded by those who think that unless there are four witnesses, a rapist cannot be punished; since, this is a fallacy, it is fairly simple to dispose off this argument.

Furthermore, no person in Pakistan can guarantee or even suggest that in the coming years, the Islamic Shari’ah will be fully implemented in the society, or that all obscenity, immodesty, etc. will end & Islamic dress code, etc. shall be obeyed by all. Thus ending the Ordinances will only facilitate the further corruption of society.

But, the above two points are not enough as the absurdity of this argument is not unveiled yet!

To proceed to analyze this argument, we restate it here.

These hudood laws presume the existence of justice...

If I ask you as to what do the hudood laws constitute? Your reply will surely be that these laws are a part of the criminal law. Thus the argument becomes:-

A part of the criminal law presumes the existence of justice.

If I ask: what is the criminal law for? Your reply might be that it is for punishing the evil-doers, etc. If I ask you further, you will surely state that the criminal law is for providing justice to the citizens of a state. In other words, the criminal law is a source of justice.

Putting this in the original argument, we get:-

The source of justice presumes the existence of justice.

This argument thus is based on the following general principle:-

The source of x presumes the existence of x.

And if that didn’t quite take you away, take a look at a more familiar & specific application of the principle:-

This light bulb (source of light) presumes the existence of light in a room.

We will be justified here to ask as to when do people use light bulbs or turn them on? Yes! In dark conditions i.e. where there is a deficiency of light. When there is a deficiency of x, you turn on the source of x to eliminate the deficiency.

This is a natural example; we see everywhere that light bulbs, lamps, etc. which are sources of light are used when there is less light. Street lights are turned on at night and not at day.

Going the other way around, it means that if x exists in adequate amounts, then there is no need for a source of x. If there is enough light in the room, we need not turn on the lights.

In the same way, if justice already exists in a society, then there is no need for a source of justice. If Islamic norms are being followed by almost each and every person, then there are almost no crimes or criminals and consequently, there would be no need of a criminal law.

To sum up then, if these hudood laws presume the existence of justice, then this is one of the most absurd arguments, the world has ever witnessed.