The Muslim World. - Review - book review

Arab Studies Quarterly (ASQ), Summer, 2000 by Abdul Karim Khan

Jonathan E. Brockopp, Ed. "Islamic Ethics of Killing and Saving Life," Special Issue of The Muslim World. Hartford, CT: The Duncan Black Macdonald Center, Vol. LXXXIX, No. 2 April 1999, 209 pages. Paperback $25.

In past traditional Muslim societies abortion, as we know it in Europe and the United States, had never been an issue even though women usually married in early age and had multiple pregnancies. In case of a medical problem, which was not detected until it became life threatening, abortion was too late anyway to save the woman. However, abortion as a remedy to escape the social stigma of a rape or sex outside wedlock did exist and was usually carried out in hiding in the first few weeks. In the modern non-Muslim world, abortion is a women's issue closely related to women's rights to personal freedom and socio-economic empowerment. But in the Muslim world, where other women's basic rights to vote, own property, receive higher education, and compete for public positions were trampled on, abortion was considered not only culturally wrong but religiously a sin. But men could impose abortion on their wives and concubines by getting the Shari'a, or the Islamic religious law, interpreted in their favor. The issue o f abortion is still in its infancy and not much talked about. Since the late 1950s, however, one can see almost everywhere in the Muslim world changes occurring in the social status of women. A growing debate on abortion in Muslim societies is already underway. The two succinct articles on abortion in The Muslim World are timely contributions to the evolving question of when or whether to abort the fetus, and under what circumstances.

In her article, "The Islamic Ethics of Abortion in the Traditional Islamic Sources," Therisa Rogers traces ethics of abortion through the traditional sources of Islam. While the Qur'an does condemn in the strongest possible words the pre-Islamic Arabs' practice of infanticide, especially, of baby girls, Muslims have continued the prevention of unwanted pregnancies through 'azal, or coitus interruptus, which was widely used among ancient Arabs. Even though the Qur'an and Hadith do not explicitly discuss abortion, the 'ulama, or Islamic scholars, as well as the laity have traditionally rejected the kind of abortion which is at the heart of women's choice in the West and the United States.

In the absence of a clear divine ruling for or against willful abortion, Muslim scholars refer to the Qur'an and Hadith which describe the transformation of a fetus from a drop of semen to a lump of flesh. Now at what stage Allah invests the fetus with a soul to become a human being is crucial to the question as when a fetus can or cannot be aborted. Rogers quotes those scholars who think that the terminal period for aborting a fetus is before and not after it is 120 days old. Before the 120 day-period the fetus is in the "biological" stages of a drop of sperm, a clot of blood, and a lump of flesh, and God has not yet invested it with a soul and destiny to become a human being. And, therefore, if a person causes a miscarriage, by injuring a pregnant woman intentionally or unintentionally, the perpetrator has to pay diya, or indemnity, rather than being dealt with hadd, or Islamic criminal law.

There are, however, other scholars, not mentioned in Rogers' article, who believe that willful abortion even before 120 days is a murder punishable with hadd. Why? Because the fetus during the period before 120 days is a person with rights of lineage and inheritance. How? On the death of her husband a woman, whether she is pregnant or not, loses her right to remarry before the 120th day of her husband's death to determine and protect the lineage and inheritance rights of the fetus-child. It is the socio-economic rights of the fetus, and not her choice, that take priority, and put her under 'iddat, or the 120-day obligatory waiting period before remarrying.

Another important question that Muslim scholars are grappling with is: Does a fetus have the right "not to be born" as a deformed and chronically disadvantaged child without enjoying a happy and dignified life? And does the child, after being brought to a "wrongful birth," have a right to sue the medical staff who imposed such a "worthless," and miserable life on him/her? Some Western ethicists believe that the deformed fetus does have such rights before and after birth. In her article, "The Right not to be Born: Abortion of the Disadvantaged Fetus in Contemporary Fatwas," which is based on her well researched book, Vardit RisplerChaim writes that Muslim ethicists, like their Western and American counterparts, are divided on these issue. One reason is that, unlike secular Western ethicists, Muslim scholars are bound by the Qur'an and Hadith which may or many not have clear-cut rulings on such issues.

Some Muslim scholars consider the absence of a divine ruling a blessing in disguise. It allows them to come up with ijtihad, or reinterpretation of the Qur'an. According to some fatwas, non-binding legal opinions of Muslim theologians, especially, from Saudi Arabia and Egypt, and, in view of the positive attitude of Islam toward scientific research, a fetus of proven deformity can be aborted before it is 40, and according to others even 120, days old. A fetus of rape cannot be aborted in spite of the criminal act, and regardless of the bad emotional, social and economic consequences which the child and mother would have to suffer from. But a fetus can be aborted at any stage if the mother's life is in danger.