Birth Control – Abortion & Contraception

Abortion & Contraception

 

BIRTH CONTROL

ABORTION

Western civilization has conceded that the woman has a right to do with her body as she pleases. Consequently, if she becomes pregnant, she can abort the fetus even if her husband or boyfriend objects. The consequence is that over 1,300,000 babies are aborted each year in the United States alone.

The Islaamic point of view is that the developing child is a distinct and different entity from the mother. Scientifically speaking, even her blood does not mix with that of the child. Food is passed across membranes. She is merely a receptacle of life. The taking of life is forbidden unless for just cause. Even hunting for sport is forbidden in Islam.

Although the fetus is considered human after the beginning of the fifth month when the angel blows in the spirit, abortion prior to the fifth month is still taking a life without just cause. If the pregnancy threatens the mother’s life the fetus may be aborted. Some scholars also hold that in cases of rape where the delivery of the child will threaten the mental health of the woman, abortion at this stage is also permitted.

After the fifth month, abortion becomes murder. A crime punishable by death in Islaamic law. The West stresses “human rights” as an international principle. However, it ignores the right to life of the tens of millions of human fetuses aborted annually. Human rights in Islam begin from conception.

CONTRACEPTION

The contraception method of birth control was practiced during the era of the Prophet with his permission. It was known as`anal and involved extracation prior to ejaculation. However, it is not favored in Islam as the Prophet (pbuh) encouraged large families saying, ‘Marry and be plentiful, for I will be proud of your numbers among the various nations on the Day of Judgement.”16

If the method of contraception is considered harmful by the medical profession, its usage would be forbidden in Islamic Law according to the Prophet’s statement: “You may neither harm yourself nor harm others. ”

Tubal litigation, vasectomy and other forms of sterilization are not considered legal methods of contraception in Islam. Such methods are largely irreversible and as such constitute harm to oneself. There are many cases of men and women who have undergone such procedures feeling they had already had enough children, only have tragedy strike. Their children die in accidents or they end up divorced and want to have children with their new partners.

POPULATION CONTROL

The concept of “population explosion” or the “population bomb” was first introduced by Thomas Robert Malthus in his Essay on Population in 1798. It was based on the hypothesis that the rate of growth of human population exceeded the rate of increase of the capacity for food production. Malthus concluded that the population would eventually outstrip food resources leading to worldwide famine on a massive scale. However, he failed to foresee the technological innovations which humans developed to increase food production far beyond his calculations. Furthermore, humans occupy such a small percentage of the earth’s surface, the chances of overcrowding and scarcity of food are virtually nil. Malthus’ theory became the basis of a world sterilization program promoted through UN agencies where poor women in Third World countries are offered cash incentives to be sterilized.

The problem in Third World countries is not the world’s capacity to produce food but much more how the food that is produced is distributed. Each citizen of the First World consumes the equivalent of 5-10 citizens of the Third World. Yet the wealth of the First World is mostly gained from exploiting the resources of the Third World. Furthermore, the First World engages in destructive economic policies wherein millions of chicks are destroyed annually in the USA alone in order to keep the price of chicken artificially high. Likewise thousands of tons of grain, milk, etc. are kept out of circulation by storing them in government or corporate facilities.