The State vs. Muhammad - Crimes Against Aisha (Recruitment Period)

[bahamut19]

I wanted to do something different instead of a debate, although I love a good debate. I am a Baha'i who is well versed in the Qur'an. I will often see non-Muslims discuss the atrocity that Muhammad married a 9 year old girl and see Muslims seem rather proud Muhammad married a 9 year old girl. They don't do a good job, on average, responding to this particular criticism. I personally do not believe he married a 9 year old Aisha, and I believe he may not have had sex with her.

I am looking to see if there are any 2 people would like to participate in a mock trial of the Prophet Muhammad.

Role 1: The prosecution team. Someone who feels strongly that the Prophet did an immoral act by marrying Aisha and should be punished by the state.
Role 2: A person, preferably a Muslim, who will take on the role of the witnesses whom the prosecution and defense call.
Role 3: Myself, the Prophet's defendant. I will defend the Prophet Muhammad and make the case he is innocent of the charges.

This would start on a different thread. This would work like a trial. Only the 3 of us would participate, if there are other commentors, we just ignore them. The prosecution would call its first witness against Muhammad. A witness would have to be any person who knew him, Aisha, or claimed to know. An example could be the prosecution will call Abu Bakr to the stand, and the person serving as Role 2 will respond as if they are Abu Bakr. The prosecution will ask 1 question at a time, and the witness will answer. There will not be any blocking of questions. Any question is allowable.

The prosecution will be able to call 5 witnesses, and ask each witness 5 questions. The defense after the prosecution asks the 5 questions of the witness, can then ask 5 questions to the witness. In this case, to keep things brief, the defense will only call 1 witness who can be also cross examined by the prosecution.

Once the trial is over, we will get to the jury. A new thread will open where users of this forum may vote. Is Muhammad innocent or is he guilty? Discussion and debate will be welcome. For any Muslim who is concerned, I promise I will do my best and act in good faith.

Let me know if you would be interested in fulfilling either Role 1 or Role 2, and why you feel you'd do a good job.

 

[danieldemol]

I wanted to do something different instead of a debate, although I love a good debate. I am a Baha'i who is well versed in the Qur'an. I will often see non-Muslims discuss the atrocity that Muhammad married a 9 year old girl and see Muslims seem rather proud Muhammad married a 9 year old girl. They don't do a good job, on average, responding to this particular criticism. I personally do not believe he married a 9 year old Aisha, and I believe he may not have had sex with her.

I am looking to see if there are any 2 people would like to participate in a mock trial of the Prophet Muhammad.

Role 1: The prosecution team. Someone who feels strongly that the Prophet did an immoral act by marrying Aisha and should be punished by the state.
Role 2: A person, preferably a Muslim, who will take on the role of the witnesses whom the prosecution and defense call.
Role 3: Myself, the Prophet's defendant. I will defend the Prophet Muhammad and make the case he is innocent of the charges.

This would start on a different thread. This would work like a trial. Only the 3 of us would participate, if there are other commentors, we just ignore them. The prosecution would call its first witness against Muhammad. A witness would have to be any person who knew him, Aisha, or claimed to know. An example could be the prosecution will call Abu Bakr to the stand, and the person serving as Role 2 will respond as if they are Abu Bakr. The prosecution will ask 1 question at a time, and the witness will answer. There will not be any blocking of questions. Any question is allowable.

The prosecution will be able to call 5 witnesses, and ask each witness 5 questions. The defense after the prosecution asks the 5 questions of the witness, can then ask 5 questions to the witness. In this case, to keep things brief, the defense will only call 1 witness who can be also cross examined by the prosecution.

Once the trial is over, we will get to the jury. A new thread will open where users of this forum may vote. Is Muhammad innocent or is he guilty? Discussion and debate will be welcome. For any Muslim who is concerned, I promise I will do my best and act in good faith.

Let me know if you would be interested in fulfilling either Role 1 or Role 2, and why you feel you'd do a good job.

The problem with these sorts of trials as I see it is that there is not much of a "historical Muhammad" on which to base a case either for or against as far as I'm aware.

Instead all we seem to have are traditional dogmatic narratives vs modern dogmatic narratives.

So in the absence of any authentic history suggesting whether Muhammad really consummated marriage with Aisha at 9 it seems as though one can only put dogmatic narratives on trial vs a set of sensibilities which are either ancient or modern in my view.

 

[bahamut19]

The problem with these sorts of trials as I see it is that there is not much of a "historical Muhammad" on which to base a case either for or against as far as I'm aware.

Instead all we seem to have are traditional dogmatic narratives vs modern dogmatic narratives.

So in the absence of any authentic history suggesting whether Muhammad really consummated marriage with Aisha at 9 it seems as though one can only put dogmatic narratives on trial vs a set of sensibilities which are either ancient or modern in my view.

Do you have an example of such a mock trial in this case?

Debates on a forum aren't exactly perfect either, but I figure if there are any online mock trials with this situation, it will probably have a Muslim defending the Prophet, instead of merely serving as a witness. For an act which happened in the medieval era, it is ok if the "technology" and methodology is not fully modern. It's not like we are going to DNA swab Aisha.

 

[Ebionite]

the atrocity that Muhammad married a 9 year old girl

It's a fiction. It's been fairly well known that the story of the young age of Aisha from the Hadith is contradicted from the timeline of the life of Muhammad. The Hadith has an extensive history of error.

 

[bahamut19]

It's a fiction. It's been fairly well known that the story of the young age of Aisha from the Hadith is contradicted from the timeline of the life of Muhammad. The Hadith has an extensive history of error.

It might not be well-known enough.

 

[Ebionite]

It might not be well-known enough.

I think the problem is that the Hadith forms a large part of the teaching about Islamic practice, so to say that it still contains error would be a difficult admission for mainstream Islam.

 

[bahamut19]

I think the problem is that the Hadith forms a large part of the teaching about Islamic practice, so to say that it still contains error would be a difficult admission for mainstream Islam.

This is very true. You should see the abuse Qur'an only believers often suffer at the hands of Hadith lovers. Muslims who reject the Hadith as required for their religious practice is a very small minority.

 

[danieldemol]

Do you have an example of such a mock trial in this case?

Its been debated here several times.
I dont think @Shakeel is still around, but he used to defend it.

Perhaps you'll find threads such as this useful; Why did the Prophet Mohammad (s) marry Aisha at a very young age?

 

[danieldemol]

It's a fiction. It's been fairly well known that the story of the young age of Aisha from the Hadith is contradicted from the timeline of the life of Muhammad. The Hadith has an extensive history of error.

How can you claim that it is fiction given your source of contest is from those very same hadith? If the hadith are in error then it could just as easily be for example that the hadith you are quoting are in error as opposed to the hadith that say she was nine.

 

[bahamut19]

How can you claim that it is fiction given your source of contest is from those very same hadith? If the hadith are in error then it could just as easily be for example that the hadith you are quoting are in error as opposed to the hadith that say she was nine.

So in the case of the mock trial... instead of debating the Hadith... the prosecution could place on the witness stand the narrator of the Hadith. such as Anas ibn Malik. The prosecution asks Anas a question, the Muslim witness answers.... Prosecution asks another question... this repeats for 5 questions, then the defense would ask Anas ibn Malik 5 questions.

Trust me.. this is a different take than what you usually see here.

 

[bahamut19]

Its been debated here several times.
I dont think @Shakeel is still around, but he used to defend it.

Perhaps you'll find threads such as this useful; Why did the Prophet Mohammad (s) marry Aisha at a very young age?

Of course its been debated several times. It isn't a mock trial, though.

 

[Ebionite]

How can you claim that it is fiction given your source of contest is from those very same hadith? If the hadith are in error then it could just as easily be for example that the hadith you are quoting are in error as opposed to the hadith that say she was nine.

I can make that claim because of a consistency test. IIRC the Quran says that a girl must be physically and emotionally mature before she can be married. If the historical data points which support the idea that Muhammad honoured the Quran are internally consistent then the single data point that opposes that idea can be rejected as spurious. The rationale for a consistency test comes from Occam's Razor, which selects the explanation which makes the minimum number of assumptions made for the relevant data, the assumption being that the spurious text was written with malicious intent but was not rejected because of cultural acceptance of child brides.

 

[danieldemol]

IIRC the Quran says that a girl must be physically and emotionally mature before she can be married.

Historically women were considered physically and emotionally mature enough to be married when they had their monthly in Islam as far as I'm aware, so there is nothing inconsistent here.

If the historical data points which support the idea that Muhammad honoured the Quran are internally consistent then then single data point that opposes that idea can be rejected as spurious.

There isn't much of a historical Muhammad beyond that he existed as far as I'm aware so you have a complete absence of historical data points in my view.

Additionally rejecting a data point that does not confirm that Muhammad honoured the Quran (which is anyhow irrelevant as explained above) would simply be confirmation bias in my view. Occam's razor would simply suggest that if there are few data points on which Muhammad did not obey the Quran that he rarely disobeyed the Quran, not that he never disobeyed it as I see it.

 

[Ebionite]

There isn't much of a historical Muhammad beyond that he existed as far as I'm aware so you have a complete absence of historical data points in my view.

Non-sequitur. You have know way of knowing what information I'm aware of.

Additionally rejecting a data point that does not confirm that Muhammad honoured the Quran (which is anyhow irrelevant as explained above) would simply be confirmation bias in my view.

Straw man. It's about overall consistency. Explanations for inconsistencies are more likely to involve assumptions than explanations for consistent data.

Occam's razor would simply suggest that if there are few data points on which Muhammad did not obey the Quran that he rarely disobeyed the Quran, not that he never disobeyed it as I see it.

Occam's Razor has to account for all the assumptions made by the competing explanations.

 

[danieldemol]

Non-sequitur. You have know way of knowing what information I'm aware of.

Cite the western academic consensus or for that matter the western academics that can confidently tell you what Aisha's age at marriage is please.

Straw man. It's about overall consistency. Explanations for inconsistencies are more likely to involve assumptions that for consistent data.

Assuming the explanation that ignores data points is the best one is an unnecessary assumption, Occam's razor slashes that assumption. If the data points show 10 instances were Muhammad obeyed the Quran and 1 instance were he disobeyed the fewest assumptions is that he disobeyed 1 out of 11 instances in my opinion.

No, Occam's razor has to account for all the assumptions made by the competing explanations.

You haven't done that so far in my opinion.

 

[Ebionite]

Cite the western academic consensus or for that matter the western academics that can confidently tell you what Aisha's age at marriage is please.

Why would I want to do that?

 

[danieldemol]

Why would I want to do that?

To show some credibility to your claims i guess *shrugs*

 

[Ebionite]

To show some credibility to your claims i guess *shrugs*

Credibility doesn't derive from a fallacious argument, eg abritrary restriction of evidence.
It's not my problem that you don't think that Occam's Razor is a credible method of evaluating competing explanations.

 

[danieldemol]

Credibility doesn't derive from a fallacious argument, eg abritrary restriction of evidence.
It's not my problem that you don't think that Occam's Razor is a credible method of evaluating competing explanations.

To the contrary i not only accept Occam's razor as a credible method of evaluating the likelihood of competing explanations I explained in post#15 why it does not support your consistency assertion in my view.

ETA also no one is restricting evidence here thank you very much in my opinion.

 

[Link]

I wanted to do something different instead of a debate, although I love a good debate. I am a Baha'i who is well versed in the Qur'an. I will often see non-Muslims discuss the atrocity that Muhammad married a 9 year old girl and see Muslims seem rather proud Muhammad married a 9 year old girl. They don't do a good job, on average, responding to this particular criticism. I personally do not believe he married a 9 year old Aisha, and I believe he may not have had sex with her.

I am looking to see if there are any 2 people would like to participate in a mock trial of the Prophet Muhammad.

Role 1: The prosecution team. Someone who feels strongly that the Prophet did an immoral act by marrying Aisha and should be punished by the state.
Role 2: A person, preferably a Muslim, who will take on the role of the witnesses whom the prosecution and defense call.
Role 3: Myself, the Prophet's defendant. I will defend the Prophet Muhammad and make the case he is innocent of the charges.

This would start on a different thread. This would work like a trial. Only the 3 of us would participate, if there are other commentors, we just ignore them. The prosecution would call its first witness against Muhammad. A witness would have to be any person who knew him, Aisha, or claimed to know. An example could be the prosecution will call Abu Bakr to the stand, and the person serving as Role 2 will respond as if they are Abu Bakr. The prosecution will ask 1 question at a time, and the witness will answer. There will not be any blocking of questions. Any question is allowable.

The prosecution will be able to call 5 witnesses, and ask each witness 5 questions. The defense after the prosecution asks the 5 questions of the witness, can then ask 5 questions to the witness. In this case, to keep things brief, the defense will only call 1 witness who can be also cross examined by the prosecution.

Once the trial is over, we will get to the jury. A new thread will open where users of this forum may vote. Is Muhammad innocent or is he guilty? Discussion and debate will be welcome. For any Muslim who is concerned, I promise I will do my best and act in good faith.

Let me know if you would be interested in fulfilling either Role 1 or Role 2, and why you feel you'd do a good job.

I think it was an action like Khidr (a) when he killed a child, yet it's forbidden for people to do it. Or when Yusuf (a) framed his brothers, but it's forbidden to frame. And when Lut (a) offered his daughters, when it normal circumstances it's not allowed (fornication).