Islam & Human Rights (Edexcel GCSE Religious Studies B)

The Nature of Human Rights

• Human rights are the rights and freedoms to which every human being is entitled, wherever and whoever they are 

• In the UK, human rights are protected by the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights which the United Nations (UN) adopted in 1948 after the devastation of the two World Wars

• The UN Declaration of Human Rights sets out the rights to which every global citizen should be entitled. It states that:

  • All humans are born free and equal in dignity and rights (Article 1)

  • All humans have the right to life, liberty and security of person (Article 3)

  • All humans have the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion (Article 18)

Islam and the Importance of Human Rights

• Muslims would support the upholding of human rights

• They consider that they have two important responsibilities

  • Towards Allah, which involves living a good Muslim life and fulfilling duties including the Five Pillars of Islam

  • Towards other humans, which involves ensuring that everyone’s human rights are upheld

• One of Allah’s names is Al-’Adl or ‘The Just’ 

• Muslims must reflect this quality by being just in their own lives 

• This includes upholding the rights of everyone, especially those most in need of help

• The Qur’an teaches the importance of living a life that upholds justice for everyone

• The Qur’an also teaches that all humans are khalifahs of the world and this means they must look after everything in the world, including one another 

• The Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) set the example of justice and upholding the rights of others for Muslims to follow

  • For example, he accompanied a man who was owed money by a leader of Makkah, Abu Jahl, to the man’s house, where Abu Jahl admitted he owed the money and repaid it in full

• Another reason why Muslims must uphold human rights is because one of the meanings of the word Islam is ‘peace’. Therefore, ensuring everyone has their rights respected leads to a more peaceful society for everyone 

Divergent Muslim Responses to Human Rights

• The majority of Muslims would agree with the rights enshrined in the UN Declaration of Human Rights

  • They would say that even though these rights were only introduced internationally in 1948, in fact, the Qur’an had introduced many of them many centuries earlier, for example teaching about the importance of every individual’s dignity and rights

  • Therefore upholding them is only following the teachings of the Qur’an

• Other Muslims would say that the only rights needed are those given by Islam

  • They would have problems with some of the UN Declaration of Human Rights because they go against Islamic Shari’ah law.

  • For example, homosexuality or apostasy (leaving a religion) are both permissible in the UN Declaration but are condemned by Shari’ah law. Therefore they are punishable in some Muslim countries such as Saudi Arabia 

• This situation leads to problems for some Muslims:

  • A human right may go against their individual conscience

  • A human right may go against the law of the land they live in

  • A human right may contradict another right

  • Human rights differ from country to country, meaning that there cannot be equality and therefore peace

Situation ethics and human rights in Islam

• Muslims may turn to situation ethics to help them solve problems with human rights

• Situation ethics is an ethical theory that uses the principle of love to determine the best course of action in any given circumstance

• Situation ethics would help because it would allow human rights generally to be respected and upheld

• However, it would enable people to justify overriding human rights in certain circumstances

  • For example, under the principle of situation ethics, the bombing of Hiroshima could be justified because it brought the end of the Second World War and peace for the entire world

• If applied to the case of human rights today, Muslims may be able to justify treating people differently according to their individual situation. They could apply the principle of love

Non-religious people, such as atheists and Humanists, would support human rights, but not because of any religious teachings. 

• Non-religious people, such as atheists and humanists, would support human rights, but not because of any religious teachings

• Atheists would say that they would want everyone’s human rights to be respected because they would rely on their human reason to agree with the UN principle that ‘all humans have the right to life, liberty and security of person’

• Humanists would make moral choices by using human reason, logic, and compassion which would lead them to seek to uphold human rights as well

  • The British Humanist Association made a statement opposing anything that restricted human rights and would block human progress

• Most Muslims would respond by saying that they would agree with anyone who tries to uphold universal human rights.

  • They would have different reasons for doing this, since they would refer to the teachings in the Qur’an, the example of the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) and the meaning of the name of their religion Islam, ‘peace.’ They would share the ultimate aim that everyone has equal rights, however.