The Right Way Through the Region of Sin: Islam, Bioethics and New Reproductive Technologies

Abstract

In the 1980s numerous debates were held in the House of Lords on the scientific research of embryos, with certain participants attempting to point out the difference between two styles of thought, namely, religious and scientific thought. Yet was the conflict in the House of Lords between two styles of thinking, or rather between the proponents of the scientific approach, on the one hand, and the proponents of religious thought, on the other, for intellectual and moral domination in society? Clearly, these debates hinted at something beyond and something more complex than a mere concern about embryos. What was actually being problematized? Or, to put it differently, to what extent does the use of bioreproductive technologies call into question the notions and issues of ethics, procreation and kinship, regardless of the religious dogma that considers the possibilities of their application? This paper will be confined to an analysis of Islamic dogma and any correspondences between this dogma and certain aspects of the new reproductive technologies. Still, in order to be able to discuss the relation between the new reproductive technologies and Islamic ethics, it is necessary to devote the greater part of this paper to an interpretation of how man is perceived in the context of the Koran.