Birthday # 54

Yet another birthday will arrive at midnight and my new life is moving along.  My children are doing well, my parents are still here, I have great friends, a job I like, and even with a small amount of serious family drama going on, my new life is wonderful....and I'm so grateful to have been able to make it happen! 

Pashtunwali vs Sharia

I find that I get annoyed when people say things about the Koran,  Islam, or Muslims, that lump all the people of this faith into the "stoning women" category.  Therefore, I thought I would post this so that we could all be better educated.....

From the book Captive: My Time as a Prisoner of the Taliban, by Jere Van Dyke

"In brief, the main tenet of Pashtunwali is honor. All other tenets -- hospitality, revenge, right of refuge, inheritance, marriage, divorce, and all forms of punishment --- stems from honor. It goes to the heart of what it means to be a Pashtun. A man has no tolerance for anyone who attacks his personal, family, or tribal honor.

Pashtunwali demands blood vengeance, contradicting the Koran, which states that a man must not kill another Muslim. A man must never let an insult go unpunished.  Sharia, or Islamic law, on the other hand, is interested in arbitration, settling a dispute, paying blood money for murder."

This is the really interesting part......

"All men are equal under Pashtunwali, and noble, but if a man looks at a women with the slightest slant, demeaning her honor, it is grounds for murder.  Courtship and romantic love are forbidden. A man and a woman who elope lose respect. The family can retrieve its honor and status only if they kill the elopers. The woman must die first. Nowhere in the world are they safe. Male and female are stoned or buried alive.  Under Sharia, adultery must be witness by four people. Under Pashtunwali, a rumor can end a woman's life."

Pashtunwali is obviously the more fundamentalist brand......the brand that the Tailban practices......

Food for thought....

Happy Birthday, Harry

I have loved Science Friday from the very first moment I stumbled upon it via the Internet almost six years ago....and firmly believe that had I found it years earlier, perhaps my life would have gone in a very different direction.

Because of Science Friday, I got an H1N1 flu shot (and learned to stop calling it "swine flu.)

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