can you please advise whether it is permissible to stop my period for 6months using an injection in order to treat another illness which is preventing me from conceiving, also is ivf treatment allowed and if is it permissible to donate heathly eggs to other women who are trying to get pregnant?
In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful
Assalaamu `alaykum waRahmatullahi Wabarakatuh
1-Yes it is permissible to stop your period for 6 months using an injection in order to treat another illness which is preventing you from conceiving. However, you have to keep in mind that a woman is allowed to do so while being guided by the following conditions:
A. Taking such injection must not result in putting her life and health at risk.
B. It is better, before taking such medication, to seek the advice of a reliable Muslim physician.
2-One of the fundamental principles of Islamic Jurisprudence is that one should avoid imposing upon one’s physical body actions that are usually considered to be unnatural and unconventional UNLESS there is a real dire necessity for doing so. For instance, the human body is accustomed to acquiring its food and drink orally through the gullet; but there are times when, due to certain ailments, food cannot be given to a patient orally. In such cases, the patient is then fed intravaneously. Oral feeding is the conventional method whereas the intravaneous one will be considered to be the unconventional one. But because man cannot usually survive without food and drink, Shari’ah (Islamic Law) will permit the intravaneous method due to the dire necessity of the situation.
In the case where there is no such necessity, Shari’ah would NOT recommend the usage of unconventional methods of infusing objects into the body. That brings us to your question regarding artificial insemination. As all the modern methods of artificial insemination (GIFT, IVF, IVI and ICSI) are NOT conventional methods of inducing fertilization and, at the same time, these are NOT procedures upon which one’s life depends (hence the absence of a dire necessity); as such, opting for these procedures would be against the principles of Shari’ah.
If a husband, personally artificially extracted eggs from his wife’s ovaries and then mixed them with his own sperm before injecting them into his wife’s fallopian tubes, OR if the husband himself implanted embryos into her uterus (as in the IVI and ICSI methods) then, provided that the husband does not acquire the sperm through masturbation (which is prohibited), but rather by collecting it in a condom during intercourse or into a container using the coitus interruptus method or in some other way such as by way of extracting it with injection from the testicles; then although these methods would NOT be Haraam, they would still be discouraged and regarded as undesirable and abominable due to them being unnatural and unconventional methods of inducing fertilization.
However, in the case where one has these procedures carried out by a doctor (which will be the likely scenario), there would be many aggravating factors that would render such procedures totally prohibited in Shar’iah:-
First of all, one will probably be required to extract sperm by way of masturbation. As masturbation is a sin and prohibited in Shari’ah, one will NOT be permitted to remove the sperm in this manner.
Secondly, even if one can provide one’s sperm without having to resort to masturbation, then too there is the stigma of the husband or wife or perhaps both being required to expose the “satar” (those parts of the body that one HAS to conceal from strangers) to the doctor. One is only allowed to expose one’s “satar” to a doctor when there is a life or death situation or in cases of extreme necessity neither of which exists here, as the desire of having children is NOT an extreme necessity without which one cannot survive.
Thirdly, there is no guarantee that ONLY the husband’s sperm will be used for the procedure. If the husband ends up being treated by some money-hungry unscrupulous doctor, and the husband’s sperm is still found unsuitable (even after exhausting all avenues), then there is the likelihood that, in order to earn his money, the doctor could use someone else’s sperm from the sperm bank to inject into your wife, which would obviously be HARAAM, as it is only the husband’s sperm that can legally enter a woman’s uterus. These factors would thus render artificial insemination to be totally prohibited.
Hadhrat Mufti Mahmood Hasan Saheb rahmatullahi alaih has also strongly condemned these unnatural and artificial insemination procedures, as can be noted from his Fataawaa [Ref: Fataawaa Mahmudiyya, Vol. 5, Pg. 151 & 162; also Vol.12, Pg. 345].
Our advice is that you rather consult a Hakeem for treatment as Hakeem-medicines have been found to be beneficial for these types of problems. Keep making Du’aa to Allah Ta’aala for a solution and accept whatever Allah Ta’aala has decreed and destined for you. If acquiring children has not been destined for you, no amount of treatment (whether it be in the form of artificial insemination or Hakeem medicines or whatever) is going to make any difference. Of course, one must at least try to do something, but in doing something, one should opt for procedures that are not considered reprehensible and detestable in the eyes of Shari’ah.
Further Information
Vitro Fertilization
In vitro fertilization (IVF) is a process by which egg cells are fertilized by sperm outside the woman’s womb, in vitro. IVF is a major treatment in infertility when other methods of assisted reproductive technology have failed. The process involves hormonally controlling the ovulatory process, removing ova (eggs) from the woman’s ovaries and letting sperm fertilize them in a fluid medium. The fertilized egg (zygote) is then transferred to the patient’s uterus with the intent to establish a successful pregnancy
Vitro fertilization is a biomedical method that is generally used when, due to some obstruction, the sperm of the husband cannot reach the ovum. In this case the ovum is removed from her ovary at the time of ovulation.
This ovum is then exposed to the husband’s sperm in vitro in the hope that it will be fertilized. The fertilized ovum is then maintained in a test tube and at a later stage when it becomes an embryo it is deposited in the woman’s uterus. Thus, a woman who would otherwise not be able to conceive a baby is able to have a normal pregnancy.
These are the ways Vitro Fertilization is mad:
1. The fertilization is made by adding the sperm of a man to the ovum of a woman other than his wife and then implanting the fertilized ovum in his wife’s uterus.
2. The fertilization is made by fertilizing a woman’s ovum by the sperm of a man other than her husband and then implanting the fertilized ovum in her uterus.
3. The fertilization is made between the sperm of a man and the ovum of his wife and then the fertilized ovum is implanted in the uterus of a surrogate mother.
4. The fertilization is made between the sperm and ovum of people other than the couple who want to conceive a baby and then the fertilized ovum is implanted in the wife’s uterus.
5. The fertilization is made by adding the sperm of a man having two wives and the ovum of one of his wives, and then the fertilized ovum is implanted in the uterus of the other wife.
6. Fertilizing a woman’s ovum with her husband’s sperm outside the body and then transferring the fertilized ovum into her uterus.
7. Inserting the man’s sperm into his wife’s uterus so that the fertilization be made inside her body.”
“Test-tube babies are the ones conceived through other means than direct sexual intercourse between male and female; they are medically called test-tube babies for they are conceived through artificial insemination first practiced on human beings in 1977 by John Hunther, a well-reputed British doctor.
Artificial Insemination: Nature and Scope:
Artificial insemination (AI) is the process by which sperm is placed into a female’s vagina (specifically, into the cervix (intercervical insemination) (ICI)) or into the female’s uterus (interuterine insemination) (IUI) for the purpose of impregnating the female by using artificial means rather than by sexual intercourse.
Modern techniques for artificial insemination were first developed for the dairy cattle industry to allow many cows to be impregnated with the sperm of a bull with traits for improved milk production.
The techniques of artificial insemination have been used in domestic animal breeding as early as the fourteenth century among Arabs to inseminate horses. In the early 1890s researchers in Moscow developed A1 for sheep, cattle and horses, and the technique is now a major part of the sheep and cattle industry worldwide. At the end of the 18th century, an English clinician, one John Hunter, claimed to have successfully applied the technique to humans. Successful experiments in France were followed by the report of an American doctor in 1866 that he had performed fifty-five inseminations on six women and had obtained the first A1 baby in this country.
Artificial human insemination is the introduction of semen in the woman’s vagina, cervical canal or uterus mechanically. This breakthrough in technology is probably well known to most people. The extended press coverage of Louise Brown, the first child born as a result of artificial reproduction on 25 July 1978 created great interest in the field of human reproduction. Artificial reproduction is a term used to illustrate the various means of having children.
“In AIH or Artificial Insemination using Husband’s semen, the husband does not have living spermatozoa in his semen. This approach is obviously hopeless. However, when the husband has normal spermatozoa but for some reason is not able to deposit them inside the genital tract of the wife, artificial insemination might solve the problem.
It may happen that the seminal ejaculate lacks the proper concentration of live sperm, so that it becomes necessary to repeatedly collect the first wave of every ejaculate, which is the richest in sperms, and prepare a satisfactory concentrate to be used. This can be kept in cold storage, to be drawn from at the time of ovulation each cycle and deposited by the doctor inside the genital tract until hopefully a pregnancy results.”
Thus, in artificial insemination, bearing babies and giving birth to children is achieved in a non-natural way (the natural way being direct sexual contact.
Stressing the irreparable harms that occur as a result of another donor’s involvement in the process, it must be borne in mind that “Islam safeguards lineage by prohibiting Zina and legal adoption, thus keeping the family line unambiguously defined without any foreign element entering into it. It likewise prohibits what is known as artificial insemination if the donor of the semen is other than the husband.
“It is a despicable crime and a major sin which deserves also to be classified in the same category of adultery. Both (adultery and artificial insemination by anyone other than the husband) are similar in nature and in effect; that is, in both cases the tillage, which belongs exclusively to the husband, is intentionally inseminated by a stranger. Had the form of this crime not been of a lesser degree, such insemination would have been punishable by the same legal punishment or Hadd as is prescribed for adultery in the Shari’ah.
If that man claims to be the father and no one disputes that, then the child may be attributed to him, because the Lawgiver is keen that people should be named after their biological fathers. The Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, is reported to have said, “The child belongs to the bed and for the adulterer is the stone””
Artificial Insemination by a Donor’s Semen (AID)
In this situation, the husband is in fact infertile and does not possess semen of his own that is ever capable of producing a pregnancy; this is the case in men whose semen contains no spermatozoa and there is no known treatment that can correct their defect. Resort is then made to semen given by a fertile donor.
A ‘semen bank’ carries out the function of obtaining seminal ejaculates from healthy fertile donors, and preserving them at a very low temperature. The donors are medically checked to exclude diseases communicable by semen (lately AIDS -acquired immune deficiency syndrome – has been added to the checklist).
The donors and recipients remain unknown to each other and written consent is taken from the recipient and her husband. Although the procedure can put an end to the problem of the fertile wife of an infertile husband, it stands unacceptable in Islam.
One of the fundamental principles of Islamic Jurisprudence is that one should avoid imposing upon one’s physical body actions that are usually considered to be unnatural and unconventional UNLESS there is a real dire necessity for doing so. For instance, the human body is accustomed to acquiring its food and drink orally through the gullet; but there are times when, due to certain ailments, food cannot be given to a patient orally. In such cases, the patient is then fed intravaneously. Oral feeding is the conventional method whereas the intravaneous one will be considered to be the unconventional one. But because man cannot usually survive without food and drink, Shari’ah (Islamic Law) will permit the intravaneous method due to the dire necessity of the situation.
In the case where there is no such necessity, Shari’ah would NOT recommend the usage of unconventional methods of infusing objects into the body. That brings us to your question regarding artificial insemination. As all the modern methods of artificial insemination (GIFT, IVF, IVI and ICSI) are NOT conventional methods of inducing fertilization and, at the same time, these are NOT procedures upon which one’s life depends (hence the absence of a dire necessity); as such, opting for these procedures would be against the principles of Shari’ah.
If a husband, personally artificially extracted eggs from his wife’s ovaries and then mixed them with his own sperm before injecting them into his wife’s fallopian tubes, OR if the husband himself implanted embryos into her uterus (as in the IVI and ICSI methods) then, provided that the husband does not acquire the sperm through masturbation (which is prohibited), but rather by collecting it in a condom during intercourse or into a container using the coitus interruptus method or in some other way such as by way of extracting it with injection from the testicles; then although these methods would NOT be Haraam, they would still be discouraged and regarded as undesirable and abominable due to them being unnatural and unconventional methods of inducing fertilization.
However, in the case where one has these procedures carried out by a doctor (which will be the likely scenario), there would be many aggravating factors that would render such procedures totally prohibited in Shar’iah:-
First of all, one will probably be required to extract sperm by way of masturbation. As masturbation is a sin and prohibited in Shari’ah, one will NOT be permitted to remove the sperm in this manner.
Secondly, even if one can provide one’s sperm without having to resort to masturbation, then too there is the stigma of the husband or wife or perhaps both being required to expose the “satar” (those parts of the body that one HAS to conceal from strangers) to the doctor. One is only allowed to expose one’s “satar” to a doctor when there is a life or death situation or in cases of extreme necessity neither of which exists here, as the desire of having children is NOT an extreme necessity without which one cannot survive.
Thirdly, there is no guarantee that ONLY the husband’s sperm will be used for the procedure. If the husband ends up being treated by some money-hungry unscrupulous doctor, and the husband’s sperm is still found unsuitable (even after exhausting all avenues), then there is the likelihood that, in order to earn his money, the doctor could use someone else’s sperm from the sperm bank to inject into your wife, which would obviously be HARAAM, as it is only the husband’s sperm that can legally enter a woman’s uterus. These factors would thus render artificial insemination to be totally prohibited.
Hadhrat Mufti Mahmood Hasan Saheb (rahmatullahi alaih) has also strongly condemned these unnatural and artificial insemination procedures, as can be noted from his Fataawaa [Ref: Fataawaa Mahmudiyya, Vol. 5, Pg. 151 & 162; also Vol.12, Pg. 345].
Our advice is that you rather consult a Hakeem for treatment as Hakeem-medicines have been found to be beneficial for these types of problems. Keep making Du’aa to Allah Ta’ala for a solution and accept whatever Allah Ta’ala has decreed and destined for you. If acquiring children has not been destined for you, no amount of treatment (whether it be in the form of artificial insemination or Hakeem medicines or whatever) is going to make any difference. Of course, one must at least try to do something, but in doing something, one should opt for procedures that are not considered reprehensible and detestable in the eyes of Shari’ah.
As far as Islamic Shari`ah is concerned, surrogate motherhood or what is called “hiring a womb” is not allowed since it involves introducing the sperm of a male into the uterus of a woman to whom he is not married and, thus, it clearly falls under the specific category of transgressing the bounds of Allah.
Surrogate motherhood
Surrogate motherhood is often euphemistically referred to as “hiring a womb.” The procedure involves using the service of another woman to serve as a carrier for the fertilized ovum of a couple. The woman makes herself available to inject the fertilized ovum into her own womb and then carries the child to its full term on behalf of the other couple. It is often done in lieu of a specified remuneration or free of charge. People resort to this procedure either because a married woman who desires to have a child has problems in carrying her child to its full term or because of her desire to simply forgo the “trouble” of conception and labor.
According to the rules of Shari`ah, surrogate motherhood as described above is not allowed, since it involves introducing the sperm of a male into the uterus of a woman to whom he is not married and, thus, it clearly falls under the specific category of transgressing the bounds of Allah as stated in the Qur’an:
Those who guard their private parts except from their spouses… (Al-Mu’minun: 5). “Whosoever goes beyond that are indeed transgressors” (Al-Mu’minun 23: 7).
By introducing a third party into the family equation, this procedure throws into confusion the issue of the identity of the child. In Islam, every child has a right to a definite parentage, namely, that of a father and mother. In the case of surrogate motherhood, the question arises as to the identity of the real mother of the child thus conceived. Is she the genetic mother who provides the egg from which the child is born, or is she the woman whose womb serves as a carrier for the child? Such confusion is bound to affect the child emotionally as he will be torn between two mothers. Further, it may also lead to legal fights over the parentage of the child, as happened in the United States in the case of a child thus conceived in 1987.
Finally, the entire procedure amounts to dehumanizing the process of human procreation by reducing womb down to the level of a commodity that can be bought or rented for service. Ultimately, such a process, yet again, violates the dignity and honor that Allah Almighty has bestowed on man and woman.
And Allah knows best
Wassalam
Maulana Mohammad Ashhad Bin Said
Student of Medicine
Checked and Approved by:
Mufti Ebrahim Desai
Darul Iftaa, Madrassah In’aamiyyah