and disbelieve in some of it, then you are, in truth, a disbeliever in all of it; for your very attitude declares that you only accept what does not clash with your personal desires, whereas whatever conflicts with your desire you refuse to accept. That is unbelief. In doing so you have followed your whims and taken your own caprice as a deity besides Allah.

The conclusion, therefore, is that the matter is exceedingly grave—among the gravest issues confronting today’s Muslim rulers. They have promulgated statutes that contradict the Sharia while fully aware of the Sharia’s dictates, yet—Allah’s refuge is sought—they adopted those statutes in imitation of Allah’s enemies, the unbelievers who first framed them and whose peoples have continued to abide by them. What is astonishing, given these rulers’ scant knowledge and weak religiosity, is that they know perfectly well that the author of the code was a certain unbeliever who lived centuries ago, in an age far removed from ours, in a land foreign to the Muslim world, among a people unlike the peoples of the ummah. Even so, they impose these laws upon the Muslim community without ever referring back to the Book of Allah or the Sunnah of His Messenger, peace and blessings be upon him. Where, then, is Islam? Where is faith? Where is the affirmation that Muhammad, peace be upon him, was sent to all mankind? Where is belief in the universality of his message—that it governs every affair?

Many ignorant people assume that the Sharia concerns only the acts of worship between a servant and Allah, or at most matters of personal status such as marriage and inheritance. They are mistaken, for the Sharia is comprehensive of every domain. If you wish to see this clearly, ask: What is the longest verse in the Book of Allah? You will be told that it is the verse on contracts of debt: “O you who believe, when you contract a debt for a fixed term, record it…” (Q 2:282)—an entire verse devoted to financial transactions. How, then, can anyone claim that Islamic law is confined