refers to offense mentioned in the Quran or the Hadiths, but where neither the Quran nor the Hadiths specify a punishment. In Tazir cases, the punishment is at the discretion of the state, the ruler, or a qadi (kadi), or court acting on behalf of the ruler. Tazir punishment is for actions which are considered sinful in Islam, undermine the Muslim community, or a threaten public order during Islamic rule, but those that are not punishable as hadd or qisas crimes. The legal restrictions on the exercise of that power are not specified in the Quran or the Hadiths, and vary. The judge enjoys considerable leeway in deciding an appropriate form of punishment, and the punishment does not have to be consistent across the accused persons or over time. The ruler or qadi also has the discretion to forgive tazir offenses. Scripture The word tazir is not used in the Quran or the Hadith, in the sense that modern Islamic criminal law uses it. However, in several verses of the Quran, crimes are identified, punishment of the accused indicated, but no specific punishment is described. These instances led early Islamic scholars to interpret the Quran as requiring discretionary punishment of certain offenses, namely Tazir. Example specific verses from the Quran that support taazir are, Examples of Tazir offenses Tazir offenses are broadly grouped into two sub-categories in Islamic literature. The first are those offenses that have the same nature but do not exactly meet the complete requirements of hudud crimes. Examples of such Tazir offenses include thefts among relatives, or attempted but unsuccessful robbery, fornication that does not include penetration, and homosexual contacts such as kissing that does not result in fornication. The second sub-category of Tazir offenses relate to offenses committed by an individual that violate the behavior demanded in the Quran and the Hadiths. Examples of the second sub-category include false testimony, loaning money or any property to another person for interest in addition to principal, any acts that threaten or damage the public order or Muslim community or Islam. The fourteenth century Islamic jurist Ibn Taymiyyah included any form of disobedience as a Tazir offense, although his views were not accepted widely and listed several examples where there is no legal penalty in Sharia: the man who kisses a boy or a woman unrelated to him by marriage or a very near kinship; the man who flirts