Nope, I won't live under sharia law

I am learning more and more. For one thing, I thought Islam = sharia law. But no! There are many Muslim majority countries who don't use sharia law, or abolished it, and others that use some of the laws to govern personal matters. For the most part, these countries have abandoned the old barbaric ways much the same as Christians no longer practice the barbaric punishments in the Old Testament.

First of all, lets look at the Balkans, my first and only experience of visiting a Muslim majority country. Albania and Kosovo. This list also includes Bosnia, and Turkey, which abolished sharia law in 1924.

I visited Albania and lived for a short time in Kosovo. You will rarely see a headscarf in Kosovo. Women only cover when praying. Kosovo is secular, meaning, like America, there is a separation of church and state. That means the government can't tell you what religion to practice. It can't tell you not to practice, nor that you must practice, or even what to practice. Many people misunderstand that, thinking that removes God from the country. Not true. That removes the government's authority to tell you how to believe. In Albania I saw old women in villages who all looked like Mother Theresa, but the cities are modern. In Kosovo, women are free to wear what they want.

Now, look at the Legend. The countries shown in purple have full sharia law. You can read about individual countries in the list. I count 13 countries with full sharia law. I count 34 countries with sharia law for personal matters but otherwise have a secular court system. I count 27 secular countries and 3 with mixed laws depending on the area of the country.

It appears to me that sharia law is more of a cultural law held mostly by Arab countries. Islamophobes here in America rant about sharia law being a great threat to America. Well, I wouldn't want to live under sharia law either. But I think people fail to separate Islam and sharia. As I said before, I erroneously thought Islam = sharia, but I was wrong! Yes, there are sharia countries where stoning and hand cutting is still practiced. Yes, it's barbaric! And yes, they will tell you that if you are against sharia law then you are against Islam. NOT TRUE!

Tossing all Muslims into the same box as these backward extremists is the same as declaring all Christians the same as Hitler, or the same as the Crusaders, or the same as in the Dark Ages when people were tortured in dungeons (although they will point out they have a very low crime rate). What happens is an across the board fear of all Muslims, Islamophobia. It marginalizes many of America's citizens.

Muslims have been in America for a long time. Read this short article by the History Detectives.

"When Columbus made his journey to the United States, it is said he took with him a book written by Portuguese Muslims who had navigated their way to the New World in the 12th century.

What is clear is the make up of the first real wave of Muslims in the United States: African slaves of whom 10 to 15 percent were said to be Muslims." - Islam in America, The History Detectives

Learning the truth is always the right choice.