Allah Agrees: It's Implantation Not Conception!

 

I was pleased to learn on February 7 that Allah agrees that the time in human gestation when we should realize that we are dealing with two individuals, not one, is implantation, not conception, as many Christians hold.

I was among those who learned this from Hassan Hathout ["Ha-toot"?] at the Loma Linda University 2008 Jack W. Provonsha Lecture Series. He is a retired obstetrician, gynecologist and reproductive geneticist who received his advanced medical education at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland.

He is also a practicing Muslim and a respected scholar of Islam who now lives with his wife, a retired pathologist, in Pasadena, California. A daughter of theirs is a professor in the LLU School of Medicine.

Hathout was a dignified and quietly eloquent speaker. His mind was clear, his humor contagious and his voice strong. Yet he was frail, standing while he lectured but sitting while he responded cheerfully to questions and comments.

Hathout made it clear that Allah has not specifically addressed this issue; however, twenty or so years ago a number of Islam's top scholars met to see what they could discern about Allah's will from the things about which he has clearly spoken.

The five "postulates" they formulated at the outset were of the greatest interest to me:

1. The selected time should be "clear-cut," easily distinguishable from other ones;

2. The new life should either be growing or capable of this under normal conditions;

3. This step should naturally lead to subsequent ones;

4. The living organism genetically should be a member of the human species; and

5. The selected time should be the earliest one at which the four prior requirements are fulfilled.

These "postulates" point to implantation, not conception, the group concluded, according to Hathout. He did not recoil from the implications:

Artificial Insemination? Yes.

In Vitro Fertilization? Yes.

Contraceptives that prevent implantation? Yes.

Discarding unneeded frozen embryos at In Vitro Fertilization Clinics? Yes.

Embryonic stem cell research? Yes.

The group of Islamic scholars two decades ago did not approve of donor sperm or ova or of surrogate gestation. These come too close to adultery, they held. Also, every attempt should be made not to end up with too many frozen embryos, Hathout stated.

Someone from the audience asked Hathout Islam's stance on abortion. It is banned except as justified by factors that are "more pressing" than the life of the fetus, he explained.

These include abortion to save the woman's physical life. Her mental well-being also counts, "providing we are serious and honest." Fetal anomalies that are inconsistent with life can also justify an abortion, he explained.

Islam is of two views on the issue of rape, he stated. Some see it as an ethical justification for abortion and others don't. Hathout's own view is that it is best not to end the life of the "one true victim." Much better it would be for society to take care of babies born to women who had been raped, he held.

It was not immediately obvious how this position on rape cohered with the earlier approval of abortion to protect a woman's mental health and no one asked Hothout about it.

Also, I think that "adoption" is a better analogy than "adultery" for the use of donated sperm and ova. Also, surrogate gestation can be viewed as "visiting" someone else's home for nine months. This is especially appropriate if the surrogate mother is a sibling of one of the new life's biological parents.

Putting everything together, it is possible for one infant to have at least five parents: (1) sperm donor, (2) ova donor, (3) surrogate mother, (4) parental mother and (5) parental father.

We must say "at least" because if death or divorce separates a husband and wife, and one or both of them remarries, the infant's step father and mother come into the picture. If those marriages end as well.................

I have no unconditional or categorical ethical objections to any of these; however, I have many conditional or hypothetical ones. The more people one involves the more likely it is that there will be misunderstandings and mistakes. These can be very costly!

Many of Hathout’s most provocative words were about Jesus of Nazareth and Christians, not human gestation. “Cast away anything you hear about Islam, especially these days!” he said at the outset. "Christians say that 'God is love' but many of them speak of Muslims with hatred."

We aren't your enemies, he declared. "But even if we were, what does Jesus say? He says 'Love your enemies.'" His wish was that all three Abrahamic religions--Judaism, Christianity and Islam "would obey Jesus on this matter."

It was a pleasure to learn about the ways of Allah from Doctor Hathout. But if Islam is anything like Christianity there are other Muslim scholars who see things differently. They all attempt to discern Allah’s will about issues he has not addressed by reflecting upon ones he has. Those of us who are Christians do the same thing with the Old and New Testaments, and rightly so.