(a.), “crucifixion”. In Islamic doctrine and practice, it refers to a criminal punishment in which the body of the criminal, either living or dead, is affixed ¶ to or impaled on a beam or tree trunk and exposed for some days or longer.

Before Islam, many cultures, including the Persian and Roman ones, practised crucifixion as a punishment for traitors, rebels, robbers and criminal slaves (M. Hengle, Crucifixion in the ancient world, London 1977).

The Ḳurʾān refers to crucifixion in six places. The significant verse for legal practice is V, 33: “The recompense of those who make war on ( yuḥārib…