Who's the apostate?

Andrew McCarthy points out the difficulty of reconciling religious freedom with the rest of Aghanistan's constitution. As I've said, I believe that the radical Islamist clerics who interpret the Quran to make conversion from Islam a capital crime are arrogating the role of prophet to themselves. The Quran says that there is no coercion or compulsion in matters of religion, but a book, Bible or Quran, cannot be understood in its original meaning without the same spirit in which it was given. Neither the Bible or the Quran has come down to us without going through the hands of a series of scribes and persons who had no claim to the guidance of Heaven. Important things are missing from each one. The very fact of the multiplicity of interpretations shows that some must be wrong, if not all of them together.

Those who assume the right to put others to death based on a religious revelation which has room for various interpretations are putting themselves in serious jeopardy, before God, if not before mankind. If apostasy is worthy of death, how much more evil is it to have assumed the authority to punish it without some clear revelation from God? This is one of the parts of both religions that must give us pause. Both Christians and Muslims claim that there can be no revelation after their scriptures. Why not? Is God unable to speak anymore? Does he not care whether we worship him correctly? Does he not care about us at all? Do we not need his guidance? Or are all of our various beliefs correct all at once?

The answer is that most if not all modern clerics whether pastors, imam, mullahs or aytollahs are apostates.