Abstract
Executions can be understood as symbolic events and part of wider political culture. Recent commentators on early Islamic execution have observed that Umayyad punishment of apostates, rebels and brigands was ‘pre-classical’. There is less agreement about the extent to which ‘Islam’ affected Umayyad practice. Epistles and poetry provide a more secure basis for understanding Umayyad public capital punishment than the problematic anecdotal evidence of other sources. Umayyad punitive practice was indeed not ‘classical’, and its justification does not seem to have explicitly invoked Prophetic precedent. However, it was sometimes justified with reference to the Qurʾān, and in particular with reference to ideas about violation of God’s covenant (nakth) and public violence (khurūj and fasād fī l-arḍ). Furthermore, when the supposed forms of punishment are considered in their late antique context, features of Umayyad-era penal culture that appear to have been shaped by the wider, monotheist context can be identified.
Highlights
Classical Islamic legal thought distinguished between two main kinds of public violence by Muslims: ‘brigandage’ and ‘rebellion’
The death penalty, which was the punishment for apostasy from Islam, was usually associated with ‘brigandage’ and ‘highway robbery’
The two relevant passages from the Qurān were held to be 5.33–4 and 49.9–10, respectively: The recompense of those who make war against God and His Messenger and cause corruption on the earth is only that they be killed, or crucified, or their hands and their feet be cut off on opposite sides, or that they be banished from the land
Summary
Executions can be understood as symbolic events and part of wider political culture. Recent commentators on early Islamic execution have observed that Umayyad punishment of apostates, rebels and brigands was ‘pre-classical’. There is less agreement about the extent to which ‘Islam’ affected Umayyad practice. Epistles and poetry provide a more secure basis for understanding Umayyad public capital punishment than the problematic anecdotal evidence of other sources. It was sometimes justified with reference to the Qurān, and in particular with reference to ideas about violation of God’s covenant (nakth) and public violence (khurūj and fasād fī l-arḍ). ONLINE when the supposed forms of punishment are considered in their late antique context, features of Umayyad-era penal culture that appear to have been shaped by the wider, monotheist context can be identified
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