An Analytical and Critical Study of Modern Thinkers’ Views on the Islamic Punishment of Rajam (Stoning to Death)

حدِ رجم کے بارے میں جدید مفکرین کی آراء کا تجزیاتی و تنقیدی مطالعہ

Abstract

This study examines the perspectives of selected modern Muslim scholars on the Islamic legal punishment of rajam (stoning to death) for married adulterers. Traditionally, rajam is recognized as a fixed (ḥadd) punishment, supported by all four major Islamic jurisprudential schools, based on the Sunnah and a Qur’ānic verse with abrogated recitation but retained ruling (mansūkh al-tilāwah dūn al-ḥukm). However, contemporary scholars like Maulānā Amīn Aḥsan Iṣlāḥī, Javed Aḥmad Ghāmidī, and Shaykh Abū Zahrah challenge its divine mandate, arguing rajam is a discretionary (taʿzīrī) punishment for habitual offenders, supported by weaker solitary reports (khabar al-wāḥid). They advocate that the Qur’ānic punishment of one hundred lashes applies universally to adultery cases. This paper critically evaluates these views against classical Islamic jurisprudence, Qur’ānic principles, Ḥadīth evidence, and historical practices of the Prophet (ﷺ) and the Rightly Guided Caliphs. It establishes that rajam is firmly rooted in mutawātir (mass-transmitted) Ḥadīth and consistently applied in early Islamic history. The claim that rajam falls under the Qur’ānic punishment for ḥirābah lacks textual or historical backing. The study concludes that rajam is a divinely ordained punishment, upheld by prophetic practice and scholarly consensus, and its rejection contradicts primary Islamic legal sources.