Page:The young Moslem looks at life (1937).djvu/97

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STRAIGHT PATH 83

remains that changes which have come in Moslem law in the different countries have usually come in spite of the learned doctors of the law.

Turkey and Iran have been transformed hy the substitution of French and Swiss codes of law for the law of Islam. In India, Moslems have been obliged to accept the English civil and penal codes, and retain Islamic law only for governing their personal affairs, such as marriage, divorce, and inheritance, and for religious practices. In that country the question has been seriously debated among the doctors of the Law as to whether Moslems could really follow their religion properly because of these changes which have been forced upon them. As recently as 1920 thousands of devout Moslems were persuaded to emigrate from India to Afghanistan and other strictly Moslem lands where they could follow their religion according to the divinely revealed requirements of the Prophet. In the eyes of the orthodox, Turkey, by treating Islamic law in the way she has done, has committed the unpardonable sin. Many conscientious young Moslems are genuinely puzzled about whether to consider Turkey a Moslem country today.

Is there any place in the moral law for personal responsibility? We have already discussed the question of man's free will in relation to God's mighty power. The matter now comes up in another form. What is the nature of sin in Islam? Does sin consist simply in the outward act of breaking a law; or is it an inward condition of the heart or nature of man?