{"id":2640043,"date":"2026-08-04T03:35:02","date_gmt":"2026-08-04T07:35:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaignwhy-todays-islam-is-incompatible-with-the-american-way-of-life\/"},"modified":"2026-08-04T03:43:56","modified_gmt":"2026-08-04T07:43:56","slug":"utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaignwhy-todays-islam-is-incompatible-with-the-american-way-of-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaignwhy-todays-islam-is-incompatible-with-the-american-way-of-life\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Today&#8217;s Islam Is Incompatible With The American Way Of Life"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">22<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Futm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaignwhy-todays-islam-is-incompatible-with-the-american-way-of-life%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2640043&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>This article examines the complex relationship between Islam, sharia law, and Western liberal values. It begins by referencing controversial comments made by Indiana\u2019s lt. Gov. Micah Beckwith about Islam, highlighting the backlash and the importance of understanding the underlying impulses-namely, the desire to preserve freedoms and resist systems that threaten those freedoms.<\/p>\n<p>The piece explores whether a legal system claiming authority over conscience and speech, like sharia, can coexist within a constitutional democracy. Mustafa Akyol, a Muslim advocate, argues that sharia can be understood as a voluntary, private devotion that does no harm to others. However, the article counters that the reality of sharia&#8217;s implementation involves mandatory aspects that are inherently incompatible with liberal principles-such as laws regarding apostasy, blasphemy, and inheritance that are enforced or threaten severe penalties, including death.<\/p>\n<p>the author emphasizes that these laws are not merely theoretical but are actively upheld in some countries, with many Muslims endorsing harsh penalties for leaving Islam or insulting the prophet. Examples from countries like Iran, Egypt, and Jordan illustrate how sharia&#8217;s penal prescriptions are applied and prioritized over individual rights.<\/p>\n<p>The argument is made that attempts to present sharia as compatible with liberal democracy rely on external legal interventions or reforms that are not rooted within the tradition itself. Without a theological repudiation of these traditional laws by authoritative Islamic scholars, the core principles of sharia remain at odds with Western notions of freedom and individual rights. The article warns that sharia\u2019s ingrained claims cannot be simply contained or pacified, as the tradition\u2019s foundational assertions make it resistant to such domestication.<\/p>\n<p>while there is a movement toward a more liberal, private interpretation of sharia, the system as established by Muhammad and upheld by many scholars remains fundamentally incompatible with liberal democracy. The author cautions that underestimating sharia\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/3YuVZYV\" >traditional claims risks future conflicts<\/a> and emphasizes the need to recognize the ongoing sovereignty of classical islamic law over the domain of personal and societal conduct.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>This spring, Indiana\u2019s Republican Lt. Gov. Micah Beckwith <a href=\"https:\/\/indianapolisrecorder.com\/micah-beckwith-islam-comments\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">called Islam \u201ca demonic death cult\u201d and said Americans needed \u201cpermission to hate again.\u201d<\/a> The phrasing, at least as excerpted, was unfortunate, and the backlash has been as expected. Several Muslim advocacy groups have <a href=\"https:\/\/indianapolisrecorder.com\/micah-beckwith-islam-comments\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">called<\/a> Beckwith\u2019s comments \u201cdangerous\u201d and \u201chateful.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>But it is worth asking what he was reaching for, because the impulse beneath the words is not imaginary or shameful. Americans sense, correctly, that some systems in the world aspire to unmake the freedoms that protect them and their children, and that a free people is entitled to say so plainly and to resist.<\/p>\n<p>Can a legal system that claims final authority over conscience, speech, and the courtroom be welcomed into a constitutional republic and trusted to remain in submission to the laws of the land? The question deserves more than a sound bite \u2014 and this week it received a serious attempt at an answer. <\/p>\n<p>Writing in part in response to A. S. Ibrahim\u2019s new book <a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/4x0JpiE\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><em>Sharia Versus the U.S. Constitution: Why Americans Must Choose Freedom<\/em><\/a><em>, <\/em>Mustafa Akyol \u2014 a Cato Institute senior fellow, former New York Times columnist, and perhaps the most articulate Muslim advocate of reconciling Islam with Western liberty \u2014 <a href=\"https:\/\/alhurra.com\/en\/27778\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">argued<\/a> that it can. He argues that sharia, rightly understood, need be no more than a voluntary devotion, a way of living toward God that does no harm to any unwilling neighbor.<\/p>\n<p>It is a gracious vision. It is also a familiar one. The same hope reaches us from academic panels, interfaith gatherings, and editorial pages \u2014 wherever thoughtful people wish that sharia could be received as a private faith rather than a public law binding even upon bystanders. The difficulty is that what Akyol wishes sharia to be is not what it is.<\/p>\n<p>The ambiguity is not academic. <a href=\"https:\/\/dallasexpress.com\/metroplex\/sharia-is-already-here-speaker-tells-plano-mosque-open-house\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">At an open house at a Plano, Texas mosque this July, an outreach director reassured visitors: \u201cSharia is already here\u201d<\/a> \u2014 by which he meant feeding neighbors, caring for parents, giving to the poor. On that definition, sharia is simply devout private life, and no one need fear it. <\/p>\n<p>Outside the same event stood an Iranian-born Christian who had lived under the other sharia. He did not hate Muslims, he said. He wanted Americans to understand that Islam \u201cbecomes offensive the minute it takes power\u201d \u2014 when the blasphemy and apostasy laws begin. One word, two meanings. The whole question is which one governs when the choice is no longer voluntary.<\/p>\n<p>Sharia is the meticulous legal implementation of Muhammad\u2019s teaching, example, and indeed his explicit plan for the ordering of society. All of society, composed of those who believe his message and those who do not.<\/p>\n<p>There can be nothing voluntary about certain aspects of adherence to sharia. Yes, one can choose whether to enter Islam (although the sole alternative is sometimes death), but once in Islam, one may never leave, on penalty of death. One may proclaim aloud that Jesus is not God (can you imagine a greater insult?), but one may not state publicly that Muhammad was a false prophet \u2014 again, on penalty of death. <\/p>\n<p>A non-Muslim may dislike being barred from holding authority over a Muslim, or from ever testifying against a Muslim in a criminal case, but that is the way sharia demands. Someone may wish his daughters to inherit equally with his sons, but sharia will not hear of it.<\/p>\n<p>None of this is a hostile outsider\u2019s caricature. The apostasy penalty rests on Muhammad\u2019s own reported command: \u201cWhoever changes his religion, kill him\u201d (Sahih al-Bukhari), and it is not a dead letter. Roughly a dozen governments still prescribe death for leaving Islam, and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pewresearch.org\/religion\/2013\/04\/30\/the-worlds-muslims-religion-politics-society-overview\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Pew\u2019s survey of tens of thousands of Muslims<\/a> found that among those who want sharia as the official law, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pewresearch.org\/religion\/2013\/04\/30\/the-worlds-muslims-religion-politics-society-beliefs-about-sharia\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">majorities endorsed executing apostates<\/a> \u2014 86 percent in Egypt, 82 percent in Jordan. Where sharia is most fully embraced, so are its penalties. The pattern is not incidental to Islam. It derives from it.<\/p>\n<p>The reply will come: these punishments are not always carried out. That is often true, and it is beside the point. A law that prescribes death for leaving a religion is not made less menacing by an executioner who is usually occupied elsewhere. The rule stands on the books, waiting, and enforcement follows conditions, not conscience \u2014 Iran applied these penalties sparingly under the Shah and comprehensively after 1979, though the law itself had not changed. <\/p>\n<p>But set the death penalties aside, since they are the easiest cases to wave away. The quieter disabilities remain in force even where the harsh ones are dormant: the man whose testimony against his neighbor is barred, although his neighbor\u2019s against him is not, the citizen who may not be promoted over a colleague, the daughter who inherits half her brother\u2019s share. Those who assure us these are minor matters are rarely the ones harmed by them.<\/p>\n<p>Akyol offers a related reassurance: the penal code is only a small part of sharia. This is true and unpersuasive in the same breath. A small quantity of poison in a glass of water is a poor reason to drink it. <\/p>\n<p>The provisions that end or harm a life may occupy relatively few pages in the <em>fiqh<\/em> (Islamic jurisprudence) manuals, but these rules run the whole length of a life lived under them\u2014governing what one may say, whom one may marry, what one may inherit, and whether one\u2019s testimony counts at all\u2014and the whole breadth of the territory those manuals govern. That they are few in proportion does not diminish their reach. Page count is not jurisdiction.<\/p>\n<p>Akyol points out that even Israel and Greece accommodate sharia courts. But his own examples illustrate the opposite point more clearly than he perhaps intends. <\/p>\n<p>In Greece, Muslim women gained the right to opt out of sharia inheritance rules <em>only after<\/em> the European Court of Human Rights intervened on behalf of a widow shortchanged under sharia relative to Greek civil law. The reform came not from within the tradition but from an external court with superior political authority. In Israel, by contrast, no such external intervention has occurred, and so Muslim citizens who would prefer civil inheritance law over sharia\u2019s rules have no exit. <\/p>\n<p>Akyol presents these as examples of sharia\u2019s compatibility with liberal democracy. They actually demonstrate something more sobering: sharia conforms to liberal norms when and only when a superior external power requires it to. When that external pressure is absent, it reverts to the shape in which Muhammad left it.<\/p>\n<p>The vision of reform is admirable. But the pathway from the classical position to a tame sharia requires more than the mere fact that many Muslims happen to prefer non-enforcement in a given time and place. It requires the tradition itself to declare Muhammad\u2019s explicit commands and demonstrated example misunderstood, historically limited, or permanently superseded\u2014a theological transformation of the first order, and one that <em>has not happened<\/em>. <\/p>\n<p>The obstacle to it happening is the foundational claim of Islam that Muhammad was the final prophet, that his words and example are binding precedent, and that the classical scholars who derived these rulings were doing exactly what the tradition requires. Until someone inside the tradition with genuine scholarly authority explains how Muhammad\u2019s commands on apostasy and blasphemy are permanently inapplicable\u2014without abandoning the prophethood that makes his words authoritative\u2014the constitutional conflict Ibrahim documents remains as he describes it.<\/p>\n<p>Someone may note that American society has done well with a citizenry that largely holds the Bible \u2014 which also prescribes stoning \u2014 to be true. But they would not be comparing apples to apples. The church long ago read the Mosaic penal law as fulfilled and repudiated its coercive past on its own scriptural authority. That is the very move sharia cannot make, resting as it does on the example of the prophet the tradition holds final.<\/p>\n<p>There is a further question that must be faced soberly. The strategy underlying this whole approach is to welcome sharia in, assign it a bounded domain, and trust that it will stay there. This invites the question: what makes you confident that you, or your heirs, will always be able to keep it in that box? <\/p>\n<p>A tradition that has not theologically repudiated its own political and penal claims does not become domesticated simply because liberal democratic institutions currently contain it. It remains what it is, waiting for conditions that let it be what it insists it must be.<\/p>\n<p>Readers should understand that, while liberal Islam does exist, no one has yet persuaded the gatekeepers of sharia, those Islamic scholars who hold Muhammad\u2019s words and example to be binding, to enlist those words in the service of the tame vision of sharia that Akyol recommends. We may dream of the day that they do, for it would bring a notable reduction in violence and injustice the world over.<\/p>\n<p>Until then, we must occupy the world as it is. A world in which sharia as a system of law remains an irreconcilable enemy of freedom. Those who treat Akyol\u2019s sharia as if it had already arrived will find themselves undefended against the one that actually governs.<\/p>\n<hr>\n<p>      Daniel Brubaker, PhD, is author of By The People? The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election and Theft of Americans\u2019 Right To Self Rule (Think and Tell, 2022), Red Is Democrat (2023), and Corrections in Early Qur\u02be\u0101n Manuscripts: Twenty Examples (2019).<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What Beckwith Really Meant About Islam and Sharia<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2994,"featured_media":2640044,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/malik-shibly-lKbz2ejxYbA-unsplash.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[33651],"tags":[44135,26161,71126,57947,82321],"class_list":["post-2640043","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-western-journal","tag-american-culture","tag-islam","tag-multiculturalism","tag-religious-differences","tag-societal-values"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/malik-shibly-lKbz2ejxYbA-unsplash.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2640043","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2994"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2640043"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2640043\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2640049,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2640043\/revisions\/2640049"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2640044"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2640043"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2640043"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2640043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}