The Archbishop and Sharia

On 7 February 2008, Dr. Rowan Williams, the current Archbishop of Canterbury and leader of the Anglican Church, spoke of accommodating British Law to Sharia or incorporating elements of Sharia into English Law.

Though the reaction in the media and by politicians has been mostly negative, many people still wonder what are the main aspects related to such a proposition. On this page, we want to collect a number of links to articles that should be helpful to grasp the issues and see the matter clearly.

Long before these comments of the Archbishop hit the news, Dr. James Arlandson had written a series of articles on the Muslim goal of introducing Sharia in Europe and North America. The first entry is his overview article and the others are detailed discussions of specific matters:

The Archbishop speaks of not incorporating hudud (punishments) into English law or of permitting this area in Islamic courts of arbitration. However, sharia impacts women the most negatively, and this part of sharia is not concerned with hudud per se. Here are some articles that explain such laws as inheritance (men get twice the share as women do); courtroom testimony (men's count twice that of women); divorce (easy for men, but not for women); and a strange remarriage law (after a divorce, if the couple wants to reconcile and marry each other again, the ex-wife must marry another man and then get divorced from him),


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