Examining the Sorcery in Iranian Criminal Law with Moral Approach

Abstract

From a long time ago, it has been very interesting and tempting to get acquainted with strange sciences. Sorcery is an extraordinary affair that differs from the realization of ordinary ones and cannot be conceived through ordinary and customary assumptions. The effects of sorcery on human beings are of psychological and sometimes physical aspects. The lack of individual awareness and the enticing features of sorcery have attracted people toward this science; this has created a special opportunity for witches to easily benefit from the ignorance of the people. In Islam, sorcery is of certainties that teaching and learning of it is forbidden due to its immoral effects on individual, family, and community. Sorcery has innumerable moral harms. The most important damages that may be mentioned are conflict among people especially between couples, undermining the beliefs of people in society, promoting superstition, and in particular providing a platform for emerging sects. With alcoholic beverages, psychedelic drugs, promoting promiscuity, preventing marriage, and having illegitimate relationships, the sects undermines the foundation of family and causes mental illness, suicide, and delinquency. According to Iran's criminal law, bill 12-225, sorcery is considered a crime and sorcerer is punished, which according to its immoral implications is commensurate with the crime; however, since the purpose of the punishment is to reform the offender to re-enter the community and maintain the interests of society and guarantee its survival, this punishment was removed from the bill of laws. The present study was conducted through descriptive-analytic method and aimed to express the immoral effects of sorcery, while attempting to familiarize the reader with an overview of sorcery culture and its jurisprudential-legal verdict Please cite this article as: Hamidzadeh M, Aghaei Begestani M, Rohani Moghadam M. Examining the Sorcery in Iranian Criminal Law with Moral Approach. Bioethics Journal, Special Issue on Human Rights and Citizenship Rights 2019; 93-104.