<Home> <Bioethics> <Medical Definiton of Death> <Opening Speech>

OPENING SPEECH
Dr. Abdel-Rahman Al-Awadi
President,
Islamic Organization for Medical Sciences,
KUWAIT

Dear guests and friends,
It has always been the policy of the Islamic Organization for Medical Sciences to tackle the ethical issues that emerged on the medical scene as an inevitable outcome of scientific progress. Various symposia were held comprising medical scientists and religious jurists for a combined discernment of the problems and their implications, only to find that Islamic jurisprudence never failed to formulate an Islamic ruling on all questions. One such issue was the definition of the onset of death, with its relevance to stopping of artificial life support and even the procurement of vital single organs for transplantation. At the global level, the time honored traditional signs of death were open to review and scientifically a shift from them seemed inevitable. After much debate and research ( which are indeed still ongoing), the concept of the death of both the brain and brain stem as evidence of death evolved, even while some external signs of life temporarily persist, usually by artificial means of animation. Various protocols to confirm the essentially clinical diagnosis of death of brain and brain stem were formulated, notably those of Helsinki, Minnesota, a Harward, Nottingham, Havana, Sydney and many others.

Hot debate also erupted in the circles of religion and ethics. For a little while the voice of Islam was absent, until the Islamic Organization for Medical Sciences felt the duty to catch up. A select group of high ranking Islamic jurists and medical scholars were invited to a symposium in Kuwait for mutual discussions.

This was perhaps the most difficult symposium in the history of the Organization. By their nature, jurists are understandably over cautious on this issue, for fear of passing a verdict of death on someone who might be still alive. One of the fruits of that symposium was the realization that thencomplexity of some modem issues makes it impossible for either side alone to formulate a ruling, especially in our age when such encyclopedic individuals excelling in both medicine and jurisprudence are no more. An example was Ibn Rushd of Andalusia whose works in medicine and in jurisprudence were among the top references. Although the debate was heated sometimes, both sides approached the matter with sincerity and open-mindedness until they reached a consensus and issued a ruling.

It is worthwhile to note that at that symposium ( 1985) the question of organ transplantation was not an issue; at that time, it was not given any consideration, and it was four years later that the Organization held its symposium on "Organ Transplantation".

With this introduction, I would like to pose to your attention the following seven points:

 ( 1) All of us in this Hall are one team searching for the truth. We might disagree but without resentment. It is not, no shame to change our positions if we should, for our elt prophet (pbuh) said "all humans fall into error but the ng best are those who revert to the truth ".  As Imam Malik said: "From all of you we might take some and leave some, except the one in this grave (the prophet's grave)".

(2) The priority of the Organization is to seek the common good manifested in the five objectives of the Shariah viz. "the protection and preservation of Religion, Life, Mind, Ownership and Offspring". This onl y pertains through solid faith and sound knowledge. In Islam the pursuit of knowledge is mandatory, as evidenced by more than 500 verses of the Quran. In this respect, it is interesting to note that Imam Al-Shafei said: "I know no nobler science than medicine except the sciences of religion".

(3) We are required to overcome our health problems through ardent scientific research, which unfortunately still lags behind in our Muslim countries, denying us many opportunities to development and relegating us to mere parasites on foreign knowledge.   The GATT threatens us with further widening of the gap between developed and developing nations.

( 4) The fruits of global scientific progress will inevitably face us. We should be keen to timely discern them, so as to adopt what does not conflict with our faith and decline what does.

( 5) This subject of defining the beginning of death is obviously of vital importance. Although the Organization already devoted for it a juridicomedical symposium in 1985, it saw fit to cast a second look, in the wake of the international conference at San Francisco on 17-19 November 1996. Three delegates from the Organization attended it, to give an update on any new developments or shifted positions on the subject. Their report has been distributed to you.

(6) We here tackle the issue from a purely professional stand point. We have invited the dissenting opinion and will give it its full opportunity in reasoning and expression, but we trust that our universal aim is seeking that truth transcending any prior or dug-in positions. The responsibility is grave before God, who is everwatching even on our intentions.

(7) This symposium is purely medical, without participation of the jurists. The ruling of lawful and unlawful of course belongs in their domain as scholars of religion. Although their ruling will be based on what we present to them as medical opinion, we should avoid passing religious verdicts, confining ourselves to the scientific and ethical aspects. There has always been ethical and unethical ( or outright evil) practices by the necessity of human nature that the Quran comments on:

"CONSIDER THE HUMAN SELF, AND HOW IT IS FORMED IN ACCORDANCE WITH WHAT IT IS MEANT TO BE, AND HOW IT IS IMBUED WITH MORAL FAIliNGS AS WELL AS WITH CONSCIOUSNESS OF GOD. TO A HAPPY STATE SHALL INDEED ATTAIN HE WHO CAUSES THIS (SELF) TO GREW IN PURITY, AND TRULY LOST IS HE WHO BURIES IT (INDARKNESS)." (91: 7-10).

Deviations are not confined to a time or a place, but the should always be sought out and corrected. It is also necessary to emphasize that benefiting from scientific progress is an Islamic obligation, in medicine and otherwise, or else millions of lives would have lost to diseases. The only criterion for accepting what is new is its compliance with the Shariah.

I pray for your success, and thank you for taking the trouble to attend, motivated by your love to Islam, your fellow Muslims and your fellow human beings.

"OUR LORD:  LET NOT OUR HEARTS SEVERE FROM THE TRUTH AFTER YOU HAVE GUIDED US; AND BESTOW UPON US THE GIFT OF YOUR GRACE; VERILY YOU ARE THE TRUE GIVER OF GIFTS" (3:8).
                        And peace be upon you.