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During
the time of the Holy Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him)
there was no fixed punishment for an alcoholic.
The accused, who was arrested and brought for trial, was beaten
with shoes, kicked, given blows and thrashed with sticks and ropes.
Forty stripes were the maximum punishment given for this crime.
‘Abur
Rehman b. al-Azhar (Allah be pleased with him) said: I can still picture
myself looking at Allah’s Messenger (peace and blessings of Allah be
upon him)when a man who drunk wine was brought before him and he told the
people to beat him.
Some struck him with sandals, some with sticks and some with mitakhas.
Ibn Wahb said this means green palm fronds.
Then Allah’s Messenger (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him)
took some dust from the ground and threw it on his face. (Abu
Dawud)
Abu
Huraira (Allah be please with him) said:
When a man who had drunk wine was brought to Allah’s Messenger
(peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) he told us to beat him, and
some struck him with their sandals. (Abu Dawud)
The Holy Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) did not
prescribed any definite punishments in different circumstances.
‘Umar
b. Sa’id an-Nakh’ai told that he heard ‘Ali b. Abu Talib say,
“If I impose Hadd on
any one, and he (in course of punishment) dies,
I would not mind except in case of drunkard.
If he dies, I would pay indemnity for him because the Messenger of
Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) has laid down no rule for
it.( Bukhari and Muslim)
Anas
b. Malik (Allah be pleased with him) reported that a person who had drunk
wine was brought to Allah’s Apostle (peace and blessings of Allah be
upon him).
He gave him a beating of palm branches and sandals.
Hadrat Anas said that forty stripes were the maximum punishment for
that crime during the caliphate of Hadrat Abu Bakr (Allah be pleased with
him). But
when he saw that the crime was on the increase, he consulted other
Companions.
Hadrat ‘Abdur Rahman b. ‘Auf (Allah be pleased with him) said:
“The maximum punishment for this crime is eighty stripes.”
So Hadrat Abu Bakr(Allah be pleased with him) laid down eighty
stripes for this crime and Hadrat ‘Umar (Allah be pleased with him) also
ordered this punishment for alcoholics during his caliphate. (Agreed
upon)
Imam
Malik and Imam Abu Hanifa and, according to a tradition, Imam Shafi’i
were of the same opinion.
But Imam Ahmad bin Hanbal and, according to another tradition, Imam
Shafi’i also were of the opinion that forty stripes should be inflicted
for the crime of drinking.
Thahur
b. Zaid ad-Dailami told that ‘Umar (Allah be plesed with him) sought
counsel about the prescribed punishment for drinking wine and ‘Ali
(Allah be pleased with him) said to him,
“I think you should give the person who drinks it, eighty lashes,
for, when
he drinks he becomes intoxicated, when he is intoxicated he raves, and
when he raves he makes up lies.”
So ‘Umar (Allah be pleased with him) inflicted eighty lashes as
the punishment prescribed for drinking wine. (Malik)
Shah
Waliullah has given a very thought-provoking
explanation for prescribed forty or eighty lashes for drinking.
He says that the best one can expect form a drunkard is that, under
the influence of intoxication, he would talk nonsense and bring people
into disrepute an sling mud at them.
This offence falls under the category of baseless slandering the
prescribed punishment for which is eighty stripes.
So forty stripes is a reasonable punishment just for drinking.
But with the passage of time when the people became immoderate,
this punishment was enhanced to eighty stripes equal to punishment for
baseless slandering.
The
punishment of a free person, for drinking wine or other intoxicating
liquor, is eighty stripes, on the authority of all the Companions; and
those eighty stripes are to be inflicted in every respect under the same
rules and restrictions as in the case of whoredom.
If
the drinker of wine be a slave, male or female, the punishment for
wine-drinking is forty stripes only, because the state of bondage induces
only half punishment.
According
to the Shari’ah, it is the
duty of the Islamic State to enforce prohibition.
That is why during the time of Hadrat ‘Umar (Allah be pleased
with him), the shop of a man, named Ruvaished, who belonged to the clan of
Bani Thaqif, was burnt by his order, because wine was secretly extracted
and sold there.
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