Blocking the Means and Preventing Crimes in the Islamic Teachings

One of the most important ways to struggle against crimes is controlling causes and means of crime. In the Islamic teachings, procurement of instruments of crime, abettance, jobs which lead to unlawful things or crimes and the like are unlawful and this is among measures taken to prevent crimes. [In the present article] the rule of blocking the means, necessity of that which leads to a necessary and prohibition of that which leads to unlawful are studied in terms of preventing crimes. While discussing various views of the Muslim jurists, the present writing emphasize that in the jurisprudence of all Islamic schools, necessity of opposition to causes and grounds of crimes has been emphasized; but this is, in each school, based on a different foundation. Finally, it should be noted that in order to avoid extreme criminalization and useless expansion of the list of crimes, we do not seek to consider all or most causes and grounds of crimes as being crime; but, based on the emphasis the Islamic teachings put on necessity of controlling such cases, it is recommended that necessary attempts be made to consider certain cases as being crimes and to make uses of non-criminal mechanisms in other cases.