I am fed up with the negative narrative feed into Islamic discourse on media where few Islamic scriptures are misinterpreted and linked them to extremism or terrorism. Sadly to say the scholars invited on media like CNN and BBC can't answer their queries with reference to context of this Hadith (saying of Muhammad peace be upon him). I have come across a debate on Islam where someone quoted the Hadith that it is legitimate to kill someone who decided to leave Islam.
First watch this video
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I am neither a scholar nor familiar with Arabic language. However, I have attended many Friday prays where scholars orate on different topics. Fortunately I have listened the interpretation of the cited Hadith in detail.
Here is interpretation and background of this Hadith.
After publicly declaration of faith by the companions (may Allah be pleased with them) of Prophet (peace be upon him), the enemies began persecuting them, so to turn them back to their parental religion, but contrary to this, they more firmly attached with this Deen. Having seen their persistency in the practice of deen, a perception was created that anyone who once embraced Islam never abjured from it despite severe persecutions that conveyed a positive message to the disbelievers. Resultantly, Islam was flourished by leaps and bounds. In order to remove this impression, a bunch of Jewish hatched out a plot that they pretended to accept Islam in the beginning of the day and turned back to their old faith in evening, saying "there is no anything special in Islam with intention to restrict many disbelievers from confessing true faith, Islam or those who converted into Islam would leave it.
Allah the Almighty informed the Prophet (peace be upon him) through this verse of the Quran [03:72]
"And a faction of the People of the Scripture say [to each other], "Believe in that which was revealed to the believers at the beginning of the day and reject it at its end that perhaps they will abandon their religion".
In pursuance to this Quranic verse, the Holy Prophet (peace be upon him) ordered that whoever decided to leave Islam would be killed. Basically, this hadith erected barrier to the entry of hypocrites into Islam, so no one could dare to enter Islam with mal-intention. It's a clear message that whoever wishes to convert into Islam, must deliberate so much as there is no compulsion in faith.
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