Jackass alert - I.

In contrast to intelligent Muslims who favor accomodating haphazard seventh-century thinking to liberal values in some way, there are those Muslims who resist any kind of ameliorating interpretation.

These gentlemen take the position similar to some Englishman's saying that the U.K. should go back to a form of land holding that prevailed at the time of the Norman Conquest. Then, as befitted an illiterate aristocracy, the son receiving land from his father was beaten to burn in his memory that a significant event in his life was taking place. Only the eldest son inherited land from his father.

Over the centuries, the common law in England and the U.S. adapted in myriad ways to changing social, technological, commercial, and political realities. Sometimes change was good, sometimes bad, but there was always the possibility of adaptation. Theocracy was eventually supplanted (though secularism without religion had a hideous record in the 20th century). Slavery was abolished.

In contrast. slavery only became de jure illegal in Saudi Arabia in 1962, give or take a year or two. (No need to rush these things.) Whether it became de facto illegal there is doubtful.^[1]

Imagine throwing out every legal advance in Europe and the English-speaking world during the last 1,400 years and reinstituting Anglo Saxon law. "Primitive" captures the essence of that legal system.^[2] And "whack job" describes anyone who'd want to turn back the clock to those days.

Trust me on this. Really.

In this spirit, The Colonel offers the views of former Pakistani president Mohammad Rafiq Tarar:

• The present government is alienating Pakistan from its glorious past^[3] and rich Islamic cultural heritage.
• Muslims are being massacred in Waziristan and Balochistan at the "signals" of the U.S.
• Unchecked freedom is promoting obscenity.^[4]
• The U.S. is the "greatest terrorist."

And this classic statement of the "All Change Is Disaster (ACID)" school of Islamic thought from Karachi [City District Government Chief Mr. ] Nematullah Khan:

• Muslims were chosen by Allah Almighty to guide all humanity^[5] because their character is built upon the Holy Quran and Sunnah.^[6]
• Muslims have fallen on hard times because of deviation from the Holy Quran and Sunnah.

(Emphasis added.) There you have it. Back to the basics of the seventh century and everything's jake.

With thanks to Khaleej Times Online.

Notes
^[1] Saudi Arabia is, you will note, the wellspring of Wahabism, the ne plus ultra model of correct atavistic Muslim thought. If this issue required what must surely have been a head bonking struggle inside the Kingdom of Saud, what are the chances of reform on some lesser issue? What can a reasonable person conclude but that Wahabism is permanently locked in medieval thinking?
^[2] E.g.: The Laws of Æthelberht, King of Kent, 560-616 A.D.:

82. If a man carry off a maiden by force, let him pay fifty shillings to the owner, and afterwards buy (the object of) his will of the owner. "

The Laws of King Alfred, 871-901 A.D.:

Of fornication with a nun.

8. If any one carry off a nun from a minster, without the king's or the bishop's leave, let him pay a hundred and twenty shillings, half to the king, half to the bishop and to the church-hlaford who owns the nun. If she live longer than he who carried her off, let her not have aught of his property. If she bear a child, let not that have of the property more than the mother. If any one slay her child, let him pay to the king the maternal kindred's share; to the paternal kindred let their share be given. . . .

^[3] I.e., when we were top dog.
^[4] E.g., bare ankles, exposed hair, female participation in the workplace.
^[5] A consternation devoutly to be missed.
^[6] Uh oh.