This week, on 13 October 2016, Free Malaysia Today published not one but two articles regarding a new mobile application released by the Selangor Islamic Religious Department (JAIS). It goes on to show the direction of thought professed by some news outlets. They prefer to allow vice rather than prevent it.
I am intrigued by these articles and the efforts made to demean JAIS. Verses from the Qur’an were quoted in these articles. This time around I will not indulge in debunking their use of Qur’an and hadith. However we will definitely confute their idea in general. Their idea or their assumption is that this app will encourage voyeurism.
From the Islamic perspective, a person cannot be sentenced for a crime based on testimony obtained by spying. It is not possible to do so under the Syariah Law. The way this mobile application works in my opinion is very different. We will not discuss the programming or algorithm behind the application. We will see the reporting mechanism.
JAIS conducts raids based on reports of suspicious individuals. The intent is not to defame others but to prevent vice. We do not know the intent of the person who makes the report. That is truly between them and God. But what all of us can do as citizens is to stop the spread of profanity among our society.
How can a person that knows an unmarried couple is entering a house and leave them at that? Shouldn’t there be some form of responsibility towards the society? The couple might think that they will be having fun. They might be blinded by their passion towards each other.
But it is up to others to correct this act before it happens. To cover a person’s sin is very Islamic indeed. That is, not to expose someone’s wrongdoings in public.
But so is the prevention of sin. Every Muslim must stop evil from happening. As the Prophet S.A.W. said,
“Whosoever of you sees an evil, let him change it with his hand; and if he is not able to do so, then [let him change it] with his tongue; and if he is not able to do so, then with his heart — and that is the weakest of faith.”
Narrated by Muslim
According to this hadith, we need to change evil. And how does one change evil? The answer is to change evil, by either preventing it from happening, or stopping it while it is. The notion that we should not shame others is a bit of a straw man. Shaming someone who has a weakness is wrong. None of us are perfect and to make fun and shame others by pointing out their weakness is just wrong.
That is one of the contexts of not shaming someone. But when something wrong is taking place, it has to be corrected. One cannot simply ignore vice by saying “let us not shame the people involved”. Can you imagine what kind of society we will become with this kind of behaviour?
It is not for us to shame someone who has been punished for a certain crime too. All of us have a responsibility towards one another. Imagine if a guy was to bring our family members to have “fun”. Would we prevent or encourage such and act? If we would prevent such things from happening to our family members then why the double standard for others?
As the Prophet said in another hadith,
The Last Hour will not be established until there will remain those people who will neither be aware of the virtues and never prevent the vices.(Ahmad)
Apparently the last hour is near, as there are those among us who do not want to prevent vice. I am intrigued by a comment in one of the articles. Fa Abdul said, someone came to her when she was sitting with a male friend in a car. The person said “It’s not proper to sit together in a dark place like this”.
Yes, kudos to that person, we value such behaviour. But at the same time we can’t encourage it either. Due to the concerns for safety. Some people might accept an advise while others might be offended and respond in an unfit manner. We don’t know who is who. Hence it is better to let the authorities take care of the matter.
If we do not report a crime for whatever reason, then we should not stop others from doing so. It has to be noted, that the failure to report crime is a crime by itself. We all have an obligation towards ourselves, the society, towards the nation and towards our religion. If we do our part, only then can we expect other to do theirs. The adamance to prevent vice does not reflect well on ourselves.
What will we say, (God forbid) when the future generation of women do not know who the father of her child is? Should we not work to stop such things from happening in the future? As mentioned by CP Scott, “Comment is free, but facts are sacred”. Anyone can say anything regardless of that view being right or wrong.
We should seek answers before giving out comments. The Islamic way is to verify the news and think about the consequences of an act or speech before it happens. We are responsible for what we do. If we are not willing to prevent vice, then that reflects our thoughts towards ourselves. Those involved in doing wrong, might be committing a crime or it might be a mistake, but for those who would not help others, that is a weakness that needs to be treated from the inside.
Rehan Ahmad Bin Jamaluddin Ahmad
Research Fellow, Institut Kajian Strategik Islam Malaysia (IKSIM)
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the official views of, and should not be attributed to, Isma or Ismaweb.
Prevention is better than a cure. Alas, liberals don’t know about the proverb ! They will rather allow immorality to destroy society than prevent it from occurring because Liberals themselves are wallowing in heinous and disgusting sins.