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A View from Islamic Scholar Khaleel Mohammed

In the absence of any truly authoritative body that represents what may be deemed Islamic, one finds Muslims all over the word having various opinions on the subject of family planning. Many of the third world Muslim societies are plagued by lack of education and accept certain traditional viewpoints as if they have the stamp of divine approval. In many cases, one of the biggest problems has to do with family planning.

Many Muslims view the matter in a fatalistic manner: they don’t practice any form of birth control, assuming that if God does not want them to have children, then they will not have them, and that even if a pregnancy is unwanted, it is a manifestation of the Divine Will. This is indeed a wrong way of viewing things, since God says in the Qur’an that “God does not change the condition of a people until they change it themselves.” This means people are the custodians of their affairs, and what they reap is a result of their own actions. We have a duty to children and should not treat them as necessary results of conjugal relations. The Qur’an states that God has created mates, establishing “love and affection” between them. This means, among other things, that a woman should not be seen simply as a baby machine. It stands to reason that responsible parents do not create situations where there is no birth control, where there are too many mouths to feed, where the health of the mother is endangered every time there is a pregnancy.

For those who state that they do not want to be deemed as opposing tradition, there is an Islamic law maxim that states “dar al mafaasid yuqaddam ala jalb al masalih”—the removal of evil takes precedence over the observance of that which is good.” This functional translation means that if there is no birth control, and many births will affect the family and society, both economically and health wise, then such is “mafsadah”—something that promotes evil—and the removal of such evil must be given precedence to what tradition may deem as good. It is the right of the unborn that we seek as much as possible to bring them into a world where they will be welcomed. As such, it is time for all Muslims to recognize that they should unstintingly support the call for full funding for international family planning services.

If Muslims claim that, as the Qur’an says, men and women are all created from the same matter, to live in love and harmony, then they must see the necessity of family planning without fear of recrimination. The time has come for Muslim societies throughout the world to encourage the development of educational facilities for women in all areas of the world, particularly those regions where there is lack of adequate family planning and health facilities.

In many of the Muslim majority countries, women are now in parliament or, in some cases, even leading such countries. They should use this clout to approach the United Nations and other bodies, including those from richer Muslim majority countries, to seek help in establishing educational facilities.