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Malaysian Sharia Court Agrees To Cancel Woman's Prior Conversion To Islam

By Howard M. Friedman

AFP today describes as "rare" a decision handed down in Malaysia by Penang Sharia Court judge Othman Ibrahim. He permitted a Buddhist woman who had converted to Islam to reconvert to Buddhism. Islamic courts usually do not permit renunciations of Islam, but here the court said that Siti Fatimah only converted in order to be able to marry a Muslim man. She never practised Islam. Now that her husband has left her the judge said he had no choice but to order her original conversion certificate nullified since she had continued to practice Buddhism anyway. The woman now still has to convince authorities to change her identity card so she will no longer be classified as a Muslim on it.

Full post as published by Religion Clause on May 08, 2008 (boomark / email).