Zina

Zina is a hudud offense under Islamic law for unlawful sexual relations outside a valid marriage, understood by traditional jurisprudence to potentially include adultery, fornication, and other prohibited sexual conduct. As a hudud crime, classified as an offense against God carrying a scripturally prescribed rather than discretionary punishment, it requires an unusually stringent standard of proof: conviction requires either a confession repeated on four separate occasions without retraction, or the testimony of four adult male witnesses of proven integrity who observed the act directly. Because this evidentiary bar is difficult to meet, historical records show only a small number of completed prosecutions resulting in the harshest prescribed penalty. An accusation of zina that cannot be supported by this standard of proof is itself treated as a separate offense, qadhf, punishable by eighty lashes.