Islamic Bioethics Research Articles

Islamic and Catholic Bioethics of Pain Medication: A Response to Mercy Argument

Pain medication is one of the responses to the mercy argument that utilitarian ethicists use for justifying active euthanasia, on the grounds of prevention of cruelty and appeal to beneficence. The researcher reinforces the significance of pain medication in meeting this challenge and considers it the most preferred response among various other responses. It is because of its realism and effectiveness. In exploring the mechanism and considerations related to pain medication, the researcher briefly touches the Catholic ethical position on the issue, a position that cannot be ignored in the development of contemporary Western bioethics. The researcher particularly deliberates on the contemporary Islamic discourse on the issue, furthering the debate in line with the Islamic legal maxims and general guidance from the primary sources of Islamic law and ethics. The resolution on the issue is sought by synthesizing the views and legal max-ims (‘al-qawā‘id al-fiqhīyyah) on the issue, which in conclusion provide justification for pain medication by considerably regarding pain as “neces-sity” and “pressing need”. However, such resolution allows pain medication to the limit and proportion that removes the pain and prohibits overdosing the patient with medication that may directly cause the death.

Islamic bioethics of pain medication: an effective response to mercy argument

Pain medication is one of the responses to the mercy argument that utilitarian ethicists use for justifying active euthanasia on the grounds of prevention of cruelty and appeal to beneficence. The researcher reinforces the significance of pain medication in meeting this challenge and considers it the most preferred response among various other responses. It is because of its realism and effectiveness. In exploring the mechanism and considerations related to pain medication, the researcher briefly touches the Catholic ethical position on the issue, a position that cannot be ignored in the development of contemporary bioethics. The researcher particularly deliberates on the contemporary Islamic discourse on the issue; by furthering the debate in line with the Islamic legal maxims and general guidance from the primary sources of Islamic law and ethics. The resolution on the issue is sought by synthesizing the views and legal maxims (al-Qawaid al-Fiqhiyyah) on the issue, which in conclusion provide justification for pain medication by considerably regarding pain as “necessity” and “pressing need”. However, such resolution allows pain medication to the limit and proportion that removes the pain and prohibits overdosing the patient with medication that may directly cause the death.DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3329/bioethics.v3i2.11700 Bangladesh Journal of Bioethics 2012; 3(2):4-15

Consequential approach of Islamic Bioethics

Bioethics is the understanding of right, responsibility, justices and moral interaction in living being. It is the corner stone to guide the society for righteous action. Due to the enormous innovation of sciences and technology, wide-ranging ethical issues have been raised in biotechnology, nanotechnology, assisted reproductive technologies (ART) and stem cell research. These advancements could lead to irreversible disasters if not limited by ethical principles and similarly society can not gain the benefit from this new technology if not addressed by the philosophical reflection. To date few attempts appear to have been made at a critical interpretation of the philosophical reflection on Islamic bioethics. This article shows that the Islamic medical ethics is a virtue ethics, deontological ethics (moral duties and obligations) and a consequential approach. It may help the health professionals, educator and the policy maker to get insight the knowledge of new application of ART in their practice for the welfare of the society. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3329/bioethics.v3i1.10868 Bangladesh Journal of Bioethics 2012; 3(1):19-22

CORRIGENDUM

Zygon®Volume 47, Issue 2 p. 253-253 Free Access CORRIGENDUM This article corrects the following: THE BEGINNING OF HUMAN LIFE: ISLAMIC BIOETHICAL PERSPECTIVES Mohammed Ghaly, Volume 47Issue 1Zygon® pages: 175-213 First Published online: February 26, 2012 First published: 22 May 2012 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9744.2012.01268.xAboutSectionsPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditWechat In Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science 47(1), the following error was published on page 175. Corresponding author information Mohammed Ghaly is the research leader of the Islamic Medical and Scientific Ethics Project at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service in Qatar; e-mail: as2432@georgetown.edu. The text was incorrect and should have read: Corresponding author information Mohammed Ghaly is assistant professor of Islamic Studies at Leiden University, Faculty of Humanities, Leiden University Institute for Religious Studies, Matthias de Vrieshof 1, Postbox 9515, 2300 RA Leiden, the Netherlands; e-mail: m.ghaly@hum.leidenuniv.nl. Also, the following error was published on page 214. Corresponding author information Ayman Shabana is a member of the Islamic Medical and Scientific Ethics Project research team at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service in Qatar. He can be reached at 3300 Whitehaven Street NW, #2100, Washington, D.C. 20007, USA; e-mail: as2432@georgetown.edu. The text was incorrect and should have read: Corresponding author information Ayman Shabana is the research leader of the Islamic Medical and Scientific Ethics Project at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service in Qatar. He can be reached at 3300 Whitehaven Street NW, #2100, Washington, D.C. 20007, USA; e-mail: as2432@georgetown.edu. We apologize for these errors. References Ghaly, Mohammed. 2012. “The Beginning of Human Life: Islamic Bioethical Perspectives. Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science 47(1): 175– 213. Wiley Online LibraryWeb of Science®Google Scholar Shabana, Ayman. 2012. “Paternity between Law and Biology: The Reconstruction of the Islamic Law of Paternity in the Wake of DNA Testing. Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science 47(1): 214– 239. Wiley Online LibraryWeb of Science®Google Scholar Volume47, Issue2June 2012Pages 253-253 ReferencesRelatedInformation

A Saudi Family Making End-of-Life Decisions in the PICU

In this “Ethics Rounds,” physicians must decide how far to go in respecting the wishes of a Saudi Arabian man whose infant is dying in the PICU. The man requests an approach to end-of-life decisions that is deeply rooted in both Saudi culture and the tenets of Islamic bioethics but at odds with prevailing US law and bioethics. We asked 3 physicians with expertise in cross-cultural issues to comment on the issues raised by this case. Dr Aasim Padela is an emergency medicine physician and a fellow in the Program on Medicine & Religion at The University of Chicago. Dr Sadath Sayeed is a neonatologist at Boston Children’s Hospital and on faculty in the Division of Medical Ethics at Harvard Medical School. Dr Maryam Naim is a pediatric intensivist at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. ### Case Representation A 2-month-old boy was found unresponsive in his crib after his mother heard him choke shortly after feeding. His parents drove him to the emergency department, where he was apneic and pulseless. He had return of spontaneous circulation after 30 minutes of cardiopulmonary resuscitation and was transferred to the PICU. On physical examination, the infant has intermittent respiratory effort over the ventilator, no withdrawal from painful stimuli, and no pupillary response to light. Over the next few days, his neurologic examination remained limited to intermittent seizures and irregular respiratory effort. There are no other signs of brainstem function on serial examination. The parents are young and had recently emigrated from Saudi Arabia. The mother is wearing a full black burqa exposing only her face. She speaks no English. The father is wearing a tee shirt and jeans and speaks fluent English. A meeting is scheduled with both parents, the neurologists, social workers, PICU team, and an Arabic interpreter to discuss the prognosis and plans. Before … Address correspondence to John D. Lantos, MD, Children’s Mercy Hospital, 2401 Gillham Rd, Kansas City, MO 64105. E-mail: jlantos{at}cmh.edu

MYSTERY?

MYSTERY?

THE BEGINNING OF HUMAN LIFE: ISLAMIC BIOETHICAL PERSPECTIVES

Abstract. In January 1985, about 80 Muslim religious scholars and biomedical scientists gathered in a symposium held in Kuwait to discuss the broad question “When does human life begin?” This article argues that this symposium is one of the milestones in the field of contemporary Islamic bioethics and independent legal reasoning (Ijtihād). The proceedings of the symposium, however, escaped the attention of academic researchers. This article is meant to fill in this research lacuna by analyzing the proceedings of this symposium, the relevant subsequent developments, and finally the interplay of Islam and the West as a significant dimension in these discussions.

BRAIN DEATH IN ISLAMIC ETHICO‐LEGAL DELIBERATION: CHALLENGES FOR APPLIED ISLAMIC BIOETHICS

Since the 1980s, Islamic scholars and medical experts have used the tools of Islamic law to formulate ethico-legal opinions on brain death. These assessments have varied in their determinations and remain controversial. Some juridical councils such as the Organization of Islamic Conferences' Islamic Fiqh Academy (OIC-IFA) equate brain death with cardiopulmonary death, while others such as the Islamic Organization of Medical Sciences (IOMS) analogize brain death to an intermediate state between life and death. Still other councils have repudiated the notion entirely. Similarly, the ethico-legal assessments are not uniform in their acceptance of brain-stem or whole-brain criteria for death, and consequently their conceptualizations of, brain death. Within the medical literature, and in the statements of Muslim medical professional societies, brain death has been viewed as sanctioned by Islamic law with experts citing the aforementioned rulings. Furthermore, health policies around organ transplantation and end-of-life care within the Muslim world have been crafted with consideration of these representative religious determinations made by transnational, legally-inclusive, and multidisciplinary councils. The determinations of these councils also have bearing upon Muslim clinicians and patients who encounter the challenges of brain death at the bedside. For those searching for 'Islamically-sanctioned' responses that can inform their practice, both the OIC-IFA and IOMS verdicts have palpable gaps in their assessments and remain clinically ambiguous. In this paper we analyze these verdicts from the perspective of applied Islamic bioethics and raise several questions that, if answered by future juridical councils, will better meet the needs of clinicians and bioethicists.

Islamic Medical and Scientific Ethics Research Project

Background: In 2009 the proposal to establish an international information resource on Islamic bioethics submitted to Qatar National Research Fund was accepted and awarded a three-year grant. The project was conceived and proposed by two of Georgetown University's research libraries: the Bioethics Research Library (BRL) at the Kennedy Institute of Ethics in Washington D.C. and the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service in Qatar Library (SFSQL) with the vision to become the world's most comprehensive resource on Islamic bioethics. Building on the valuable experience of these two institutions, the project promises to serve the needs of the local and international community of researchers in the area of bioethics. The project utilizes the best practices gained from work on similar projects on bioethics scholarship in collaboration with renowned institutions in the field such as the National Library of Medicine of the National Institute of Health in the US. Currently the project is in the third year of the grant and the research team believes that the project is on schedule to achieve its vision. Objectives: This presentation aims to demonstrate the efforts to achieve the targeted goals of the project. It also seeks to share the lessons gained from work on the different components of this project. In addition to highlighting the challenges encountered, the presentation will also illustrate the innovative solutions that were undertaken to fulfill the objectives of each of the project's components. Methods: The presentation will address each of these components: - The collection development: the proactive acquisition plan - Database Development: innovative solutions - Local Impact: partnerships and networking - Global Impact: the world's premiere resource on Islamic bioethics - Future Plans: further expansion and growth Results and Conclusions: The presentation will share the policies and strategies that were implemented in order to fulfill the targeted goals of each of the components listed above. It will also demonstrate and showcase the results of the project.

Religio-ethical discussions on organ donation among Muslims in Europe: an example of transnational Islamic bioethics

This article analyzes the religio-ethical discussions of Muslim religious scholars, which took place in Europe specifically in the UK and the Netherlands, on organ donation. After introductory notes on fatwas (Islamic religious guidelines) relevant to biomedical ethics and the socio-political context in which discussions on organ donation took place, the article studies three specific fatwas issued in Europe whose analysis has escaped the attention of modern academic researchers. In 2000 the European Council for Fatwa and Research (ECFR) issued a fatwa on organ donation. Besides this “European” fatwa, two other fatwas were issued respectively in the UK by the Muslim Law (Shariah) Council in 1995 and in the Netherlands by the Moroccan religious scholar Muṣṭafā Ben Ḥamza during a conference on “Islam and Organ Donation” held in March 2006. The three fatwas show that a great number of Muslim religious scholars permit organ donation and this holds true for donating organs to non-Muslims as well. Further, they demonstrate that transnationalism is one of the main characteristics of contemporary Islamic bioethics. In a bid to develop their own standpoints towards organ donation, Muslims living in the West rely heavily on fatwas imported from the Muslim world.

Globalization and gametes: reproductive ‘tourism,’ Islamic bioethics, and Middle Eastern modernity

‘Reproductive tourism’ has been defined as the search for assisted reproductive technologies (ARTs) and human gametes (eggs, sperm, embryos) across national and international borders. This article conceptualizes reproductive tourism within ‘global reproscapes,’ which involve the circulation of actors, technologies, money, media, ideas, and human gametes, all moving in complicated manners across geographical landscapes. Focusing on the Muslim countries of the Middle East, the article explores the Islamic ‘local moral worlds’ informing the movements of Middle Eastern infertile couples. The ban on third-party gamete donation in Sunni Muslim-majority countries and the recent allowance of donor technologies in the Shia Muslim-majority countries of Iran and Lebanon have led to significant movements of infertile couples across Middle Eastern national borders. In the new millennium, Iran is leading the way into this ‘brave new world’ of high-tech, third-party assisted conception, with Islamic bioethical discourses being used to justify various forms of technological assistance. Although the Middle East is rarely regarded in this way, it is a key site for understanding the intersection of technoscience, religious morality, and modernity, all of which are deeply implicated in the new world of reproductive tourism.

The Principle of Autonomy as Related to Personal Decision Making Concerning Health and Research from an ‘Islamic Viewpoint’

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5915/43-1-6396 Informed consent is now accepted as a cornerstone of medical practice. It is a derivative of the four fundamental principles of medical ethics, which are patient autonomy, nonmaleficence, beneficence, and justice. Islam upholds the underlying virtue of these four basic principles, but diversity arises in their interpretation and practical applications. In the World Health Report 2000, the World Health Organization opined that the expectation for autonomy was universal, while acknowledging cultural differences in its interpretation and implementation. The concept of autonomy applies well in securing the rights of patients against paternalistic infringement and in cases of malpractice. However, in this paper we argue that strict adherence to the Western grounded philosophy of medical ethics and autonomy is insufficient to solve ethical dilemmas in modern medicine, as it denies the role of faith in a supernatural being. Most non-Western cultures are still proud of their communal relations and spiritualistic ethos. In Western bioethics, patient autonomy prevails in choices involving all sectors of social and personal life, a concept unacceptable in many other cultures. In Islamic bioethics, the rights of God, the community, as well as the individual do feature in consideration. Islam emphasizes health promotion and disease prevention, making it obligatory for a Muslim physician to dissuade practices that undermine individual and collective health. Islam encourages individuals to get involved in such research, which has a public benefit and justifies the risks of participation. We propose a more flexible viewpoint that accommodates cultural values in interpreting autonomy and applying it in an increasingly multilingual and multicultural, contemporaneous society.

Educating the Ummah by introducing Islamic bioethics in genetics and modern biotechnology

The western is the well known pioneer of current genetic and modern biotechnology development. These technologies come as a package, promising various benefits along with the controversies on their possible risks and permissible status. Aiming at realizing Islamic worldview as a comprehensive approach to educate the ummah, Islamic bioethics could be promoted as a holistic and universal education platform to begin with. In this paper, the main sources of Islamic law are al-Quran and Sunnah, other Islamic sources like ijma’, together with Qawaid Fiqhiyyah and Maqasid al-Shariah will be applied in order to frame the Islamic bioethics guideline. This guideline can be used to educate the various level of society such as students, the public, the scientists, government regulatory officers and other related stakeholders. From this guideline, we will be able to see the comprehensive, practicality and applicability of Islamic law in welcoming the latest discovery of genetic and modern biotechnology. In conclusion, Islamic bioethics is the most suitable platform to educate and guide the society on the acceptability of current genetic and modern biotechnology development.

Medical Experts & Islamic Scholars Deliberating over Brain Death: Gaps in the Applied Islamic Bioethics Discourse

The scope, methodology and tools of Islamic bioethics as a self-standing discipline remain open to debate. Physicians, sociologists, Islamic law experts, historians, religious leaders as well as policy and health researchers have all entered the global discussion attempting to conceptualize Islamic bioethics. Arguably, the implications of Islamic bioethical discourse is most significant for healthcare practitioners and their patients, as patient values interact with those of healthcare providers and the medical system at large leading to ethical challenges and potential cultural conflicts. Similarly the products of the discourse are of primary import to religious leaders and Imams who advise Muslim patients on religiously acceptable medical practices. However, the process and products of the current Islamic bioethical discourse contains gaps that preclude them from meeting the needs of healthcare practitioners, religious leaders, and those they advise. Within the medical literature, published works on Islamic bioethics authored by medical practitioners often contain gaps such as the failure to account for theological debates about the role of the intellect, ‘aql, in ethical decision making, failure to utilize sources of Islamic law, and failure to address the pluralism of opinions within the Islamic 1 Address correspondence to: Aasim I. Padela, RWJF Clinical Scholars Program, 6312 Med Sci Bldg I, 1150 W Med Center Drive, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor MI 48109-5604; email: aasim@umich.edu; phone: 734-647-4844. © 2011 Hartford Seminary. Published by Blackwell Publishing Ltd., 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford, OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148 USA.

Interaction between Islamic and Secular Bioethics: A Philosophic Approach

Although nowadays science and technologies including biomedical sciences are interestingly developing, ethical requirements of such developments are not considered in Islamic world based on regional and Islamic dimensions. International bodies who are dealing with ethics of science and technology also are not fully aware of religious requirement of bioethical issues in Islamic countries. On the other hand, developing a comprehensive ethical theory in bioethics needs precise and deep deliberation in ideological and philosophical underpinnings. To start such reflection a suitable way which we used in this article would be a comparative study in ideological and meta ethical differences and similarities between Islamic and secular bioethics. Thus this article tries to explore ideological differences in the first part such as differences on attitudes toward the creator or origin of the universe, differences on attitudes toward the whole universe and difference on the attitudes toward this world properties and tradition. Then we will turn to anthropologic differences including dereferences on attitudes toward human creation, different dimensions of human life and After-Death life and the last set of differences which we will discuss are meta ethical differences between Islamic and secular bioethics including on ethologic, epistemological and semantic differences. In the second port of the article, similarities, which most seems to be normative, are disused. Finally we concluded that acceptance of existing differences and similarities as facts are inevitable and would be a potential start point for a mutual dialogue between secular and developing Islamic bioethics as an independent theory.

Theological approach in Islamic Bioethics

Many disputes in biomedical ethics in the west stem from disputes about the extent to which normative principles in this domain can be generalized throughout various cultures such that certain actions can be universally acknowledged as required, prohibited or permitted. In Muslim countries, among various articles on the framework of Islamic bioethics, there had been no studies about the nature of moral-theological discourse that informed the development of the Islamic legal-ethical system. In other words, their descriptive rather than analytical approach to the debate about the principles of biomedical rulings in Islam does not deal with Islamic theological-philosophical ethics and the way it has affected medical jurisprudence in the modern times. The ethical questions in contemporary discussions require attention to larger questions about what constitutes ethical conduct in Islam rather than the mere presentation of the legal rulings as regards issues like abortion, organ donation and so on. There is no consensus among Muslim jurists of various schools of Islamic law on any of these issues. In the cross-cultural context of bioethics, the work of Muslim scholars would be significantly enhanced by systematic investigations into the underlying principles and rules of practical ethical guidance in the Islamic tradition which is rooted in Islamic theology.

The Dilemmas of Islamic Bioethics in the Twenty-first Century

The current discourse on bioethical questions often reveals a certain patchiness or seeming inability to answer contemporary bioethical problems within an Islamic epistemological paradigm. Attempting to analyze the causes of this phenomenon, the author describes the decontextualization of Islamic concepts from a background of secularized medical care and the ethics in the Islamic world—as well as the estrangement due to these questions of Islamic law from its holistic framework of application as a pervasive phenomenon, which brought about the dilemmas of bioethics in the twenty-first century. The author discusses chosen bioethical case studies in this light, with a focus on the concept of brain death. Doing so, the author takes into consideration the paradigmatic relationship between science, bioethical models, and the implications of the relevant different worldviews. The author shows how constructed realities related to the life sciences have been imported from the secular setting into an already estranged Islamic context to be answered, and describes the evolving dilemmas that make Islamic bioethics appear like a stranger moving in a strange land.

THE CONFLICT OF HUMAN CLONING TECHNOLOGY WITH ISLAMIC BIOETHICS

Human cloning as the most important development of the present century is the product of the advancements in science, biological and genetic technologies that has particularly affected the religious, ethical and even political circles. The imagination of the birth of a living being - especially human being- beyond the natural method and without using sex cells wonders everybody; as though the science now has demonstrated its art to the whole world. Finally we concluded that the human cloning is in conflict with the principles of Islamic bioethics. Thus, the human cloning must be banned. Method: In this paper, through the library study, the human cloning has been analyzed based on the principles of Islamic bioethics and at the end we reached to the conclusion that the mentioned technology is in conflict with the principles of Islamic bioethics.

The Dilemmas of Islamic Bioethics in the Twenty-first Century

The current discourse on bioethical questions often reveals a certain patchiness or seeming inability to answer contemporary bioethical problems within an Islamic epistemological paradigm. Attempting to analyze the causes of this phenomenon, the author describes the decontextualization of Islamic concepts from a background of secularized medical care and the ethics in the Islamic world—as well as the estrangement due to these questions of Islamic law from its holistic framework of application as a pervasive phenomenon, which brought about the dilemmas of bioethics in the twenty-first century. The author discusses chosen bioethical case studies in this light, with a focus on the concept of brain death. Doing so, the author takes into consideration the paradigmatic relationship between science, bioethical models, and the implications of the relevant different worldviews. The author shows how constructed realities related to the life sciences have been imported from the secular setting into an already estranged Islamic context to be answered, and describes the evolving dilemmas that make Islamic bioethics appear like a stranger moving in a strange land.

La bioética jurídica islámica como fenómeno jurídico-cultural regional: Tensiones internas y externas en la actualidad producidas en su inserción como derechos humanos

This paper is the third Part of a Trilogy around the socalled Islamic World. It presents us the “Islamic bioethics” as a legal regional phenomenon instead of an international one, as believed in the West World. It contains a glossary sui generis with specifically Islamic connotations. It means, with similarities and differences far away from the usefully ones in the West World and Spain, so that a big amount of mistakes of interpretation can be avoided, because the aimed words are written in similar way but with very different signification. The paper analyzes the tensions produced in and outside of the Islamic World by associating bioethics and human rights. Such a situation reproduces –in the meaning of the author– another old problem up-to-day not resolved, the so-called “Universal human rights versus regional Islamic human rights”. A selected bibliography in the end contains specifically themes of human rights, Islamic bioethics and constitutionalism, and finally the own contributions of the author.