Surrogacy: A Comparative Study of Sunnī And ShīʿAh Fiqh

Abstract

Human beings have always strived to perpetuate their lineage and ensure the survival of their species. Throughout history, various religious and social contracts have been established to address such concerns. However, there are couples who face the challenge of not being able to conceive naturally. To address these challenges—whether social, religious, or personal—innovative solutions like surrogacy have emerged as a ray of hope for many. Surrogacy as the latest medical development has opened new possibilities for the couples experiencing infertility, still it raises many legal and ethical questions across different religious groups. Surrogacy’s application in Muslims comes across with profound values of lineage, kinship and family integrity. The study involved descriptive and comparative analysis of surrogacy between Sunnī and Shīʿah fiqh, investigating how each sect addressed the underlying issues associated with surrogacy. Core concepts regarding lineage and kinship of both the sects influence jurisprudential view of marriage and procreation and accordingly respond to infertility treatments. The study analysed Sunnī and Shīʿah jurists’ perspective on surrogacy, including reasons of Sunnī scholars’ prohibition enrooted in Qurʾānic and aḥādīth evidences and Shīʿah jurists’ conditions to allow surrogacy with some jurists emphasizing its permissibility under necessity, no evidence of prohibition from basic sources and surrogacy’s non-adulterous nature, some scholars permitting it under mutʿah marriage to avoid its adulterous nature. Sunnī scholars questioned all kinds of surrogacy based on the process’s similarity with zinā. However, majority of the Shīʿah scholars permitted surrogacy without any restriction accepting egg, sperm and embryo donation.