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Can someone explain to us, what is exactly 'blood money' ? Is it really part of Islamic law, shariah, hadits, etc ?

nusa wrote:Can someone explain to us, what is exactly 'blood money' ? Is it really part of Islamic law, shariah, hadits, etc ?

It means: get a life insurance policy. Because "blood money" means that if you are unintentionally killed (say in a car accident or thru other type of negligence) the guilty party pays 200K dirhams (60K us$) for you life. That's what your life is worth!

So a person worth say 10M dirhams can drive 180 km/hr, kill someone in an accident (as he/she is likely to be driving a tank) and simply pay 200K or 2% of his/her money. Now if the entire 10M dirhams were at risk I say this person would be driving 90 kms/hrs tops.

It is UAE law (its root - I don't know). *waits for shafique's answer*

I have to say I was not aware of the details of blood money - other than knowing it was part of Arab culture/society even pre-Islam.

Generally, it is the money paid to the family someone who was murdered. It is meant to compensate the family for the loss - a concept that also appears in secular civil law (as opposed to criminal law).

I did a quick google - and wiki has a short page on the topic, from which I'll quote a small bit
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qisas

Islamic and Arab tradition
The law of Diyat was in force in Arabia before the advent of Islam. The Qur’an directed to pay Diyat just according to this law both in case of intentional as well as un-intentional murder.[1] In Islamic and Arab traditions, blood money is the fine paid by the killer or his family or clan to the family or the clan of the victim (compare weregild and główczyzna). It is unlawful for a believer to kill a believer except if it happens by accident. And he who kills a believer accidentally must pay Diyat to the heirs of the victim except if they forgive him. The tradition finds repeated endorsement in Islamic tradition; several instances are recorded in the Hadith, which are the acts of the Prophet Muhammad.

Cheers,
Shafique