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Top British judge gives blessing to Sharia law

Britain's top judge obviously doesn't fully understand the tenets of Sharia law, says Islam critic Robert Spencer, or the judge wouldn't have given his blessing for the use of Sharia law in Britain to resolve disputes among Muslims, reports Chad Groening, OneNewsNow.

According to the Daily Mail, Lord Chief Justice Nicholas Phillips' endorsement has already created a huge controversy across Britain. In a speech at an East London mosque, he said that Islamic legal principles could be employed to deal with family and marital arguments and to regulate finance. Phillip's recommendations came just five months after Archbishop of Canterbury Dr. Rowan Williams suggested that Islamic law could govern marital law, financial transactions, and arbitration in disputes.

Robert Spencer, director of Jihad Watch, says the problem with Sharia law is that there is always more Sharia to accommodate. "Once they get into the idea that Sharia is legitimate in terms of family law, then it's going to be hard to draw a line because family law in Sharia and Islamic law infringes upon many other things," he continues.

According to Spencer, Sharia law allows women to be treated like commodities. "Apparently that is just fine by the Chief Justice of Great Britain," he comments. "He doesn't seem to realize just how much women are devalued in Islamic Sharia law -- even the ostensibly benign version of Sharia law that he thinks he would be instituting," Spencer notes. "[O]bviously this is a man who doesn't know what Sharia is really all about."

Spencer believes it is very likely that elements of Sharia law will ultimately be introduced -- probably sooner rather than later, he says.

[07/11/2008]

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