Ridiculous abuse of Islamic Law: Islamic beer and inadvertent divorce!

Two years ago, a joke circulated among lawyers and others interested in Islamic Finance: The lengthy joke used standard language that is used in Islamic finance, and ridiculed the process of structured finance to separate Muslims from what jurists continued to define as forbidden operations. The joke said that (1) the customer will lie down on the floor, face up to the ceiling and mouth open, (2) a mug of beer will be suspended above the customer by a rope, the end of which is tied to a door knob, (3) a third special purpose party (unrelated to the customer or the establishment otherwise known as bar) opens the door, thus tipping the mug and forcing the customer accidentally to swallow the beer. Jurists reasoned that the result is permissible (Shari`a compliant) because (1) lying on the floor is not forbidden, (2) non-Muslims can hang beer from ceilings, as it is permissible for them, and (3) it is permissible to turn door knobs and open doors. The joke said that this was hailed as a way to give observant Muslims a way to socialize with their non-Muslim friends, after years of suffering a disadvantage in the social arena. Jurists still differed in terms of how many such accidents a Muslim may have each evening (more strict jurists restricting the Muslim to two Shari`a-compliant accidental beer mug drinking per night, and others allowing as many as six such accidents per evening).

Very sadly, true life in Islamic jurisprudence has turned out to be funnier than fiction (the Arab proverb says that it is the worst of calamities that drive one to laughter). MSNBC.com has reported today, on its front page, that Islamic jurists in west Bengal ordered a man and his wife to be separated, after the man apparently talked in his sleep and declared his wife divorced three times!!