Saudi court upholds sentence of beheading and crucifixion By HJS

Many of us in the west have few qualms about assessing the death penalties for pedophiles, especially those who murder their victims. We try to avoid painful retaliation, however, choosing the most humane method known to us, and the most impassive ritual we could devise to terminate a person's existence. When we assess the death penalty, we are simply choosing to disallow the criminal from living among us. If we could wave a magic wand and send the criminal into the great void to become nothing, it would satisfy us.

Obviously, the eastern culture does not agree with our ways. If one remembers that the Quran was not just inspired but actually created by a super-human being, a closer reading of Quran verse 5:33 is eye-opening. We must believe that not only does certain unnamed actions merit inhumane dismemberment and execution here, but apparently no chance of redemption and only unmitigated punishment in the hereafter. Has anyone throughout history truly merited odium not satiated by death? Do we as humans not seek relief from crime and criminals as opposed to demanding violent punishments? The verse is a commandment to more than 1.5 billion adherents. Is everything I have ever been taught wrong?

HJS

Saudi court upholds sentence of beheading and crucifixion

Here is evidence that this verse of the Koran is not a relic of history, but something that Sharia adherents take seriously as instructions valid for all time:

"The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His Messenger, and strive with might and main for mischief through the land is: execution, or crucifixion, or the cutting off of hands and feet from opposite sides, or exile from the land: that is their
disgrace in this world, and a heavy punishment is theirs in the Hereafter..." -- Koran 5:33

Sharia Alert from the Kingdom of Two Holy Places: "Saudi court upholds child rapist crucifixion ruling," from Reuters, November 3 (thanks to Block Ness):

RIYADH (Reuters) - A Saudi court of cassation upheld a ruling to behead and crucify a 22-year-old man convicted of raping five children and leaving one of them to die in the desert, newspapers reported on Tuesday....

International rights groups have accused the kingdom, the birthplace of Islam, of applying draconian justice, beheading murderers, rapists and drug traffickers in public. So far this year about 40 people have been executed in Saudi Arabia.
In Saudi Arabia, crucifixion means tying the body of the convict to wooden beams to be displayed to the public after beheading.