Surah An-Nisa Verse 15

523 Most commentators understand this to refer to adultery or fornication: in that case they consider that the punishment was altered to 100 stripes by the later verse, 24:2. But I think it refers to unnatural crime between women, analogous to unnatural crime between men in 4:16 below; because (1) no punishment is specified here for the man, as would be the case where a man was involved in the crime; (2) the word, at lati, the purely feminine plural of al lati, is used for the parties to the crime; (3) the punishment is indefinite; see the next note but one. 524 To protect the honour of women, stricter evidence is required, i.e., the evidence of four instead of the usual two witnesses. It is the same for adultery (see 24:4.) 525 Keep them in prison until some definite order is received. Those who take the crime to be adultery or fornication construe this definite order ("some other way") to mean some definite pronouncement by the Prophet under inspiration; this was the punishment of flogging under 24:2. for fornication, and stoning to death under the Prophet's directive for adultery. If we understand the crime to be unnatural crime, we might presume, in the absence of any definite order ("some other way") that the punishment would be similar to that for men in the next verse.