Qur’an on homosexuality: Setting the record straight

A response to “Homosexuality in Islam” an article by Undule and Trapence in Weekend Nation

In the post-colonial world, the ‘civilising mission’ continues and the crusade for civilising the backward Muslims into embracing the sexual mores of the civilisers is going full speed ahead. Since openly declaring that the Qur’an and Islam are plain wrong does not get you much mileage with the target audience, their challenge is how to perform a perfect inversion of Qur’anic teachings and simultaneously assure everyone that this inversion is in harmony with one’s belief in the Qur’an.

Consider homosexuality. The Qur’an condemns it in no uncertain terms and calls those who committed it as musrifoon (going beyond limits) (7:81), Qaumun Aadoon (transgressing bounds) (26:166), Qaumul Mufsideen (mischievous people) (29:30), and Zalimeen (evildoers) (29:31). In other words, they were extremists to the highest degree.

The civilisers’ dilemma: How to declare those who want to legitimise this practice in the Muslim society as moderates and those who question this extremism as extremists and hardliners?

It is an impossible task but that has not kept the daring from trying. No wonder the new champions cannot agree on what their argument is. One of them, Scott Siraj al-Haqq Kugle, says “The Koran does not condemn homosexuality.” Another pundit, Arash Naraghi, an Iranian academic in the US, says that the Qur’an does condemn homosexuality but it is okay anyway because reason says so.

In their article, Mwakasungula and Trapence cite Mushin Hendricks (2010) whose report claims Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender individuals exist in Islam but they are rejected in the Islamic spheres as commanded by Allah. Another writer that  the article by Mwakasungula and Trapence  cites is one by Kecia Ali (2006), who claims that the prohibition of same-sex relationships in Islam does not stem from the Qur`an, but from the legal construction of marriage.

To our surprise, as we are searching for ‘theological latitude,’ quotes both of them with satisfaction and without the smallest hint that they are mutually contradictory, as means of making ‘progress.’ Let us also remember that Islam takes its teachings from two sources which are the Qur’an and Sunna (Teachings of Prophet Muhammad S.A.W) not from any writer or scholar.

The existence of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender individuals in our amidst does not necessarily mean they ‘must’ not be rebuked. The fact that we have thieves amongst us does not guarantee them an escape from punishment. Let us also take note that the quoted Qur`anic verse 30:22 by Mwakasungula and Trapence is out of context as it reads “And among His signs is the creation of heavens and the earth, and the variations in your languages and your colours: Verily in that are signs for those who posses knowledge”. The verse clearly states the variation of human beings in languages and colours not in moral inclinations. The moral variations in human beings are clearly stated in the Qur`an with their rewards and punishments which amongst them is the homosexuality.

The story of the people of Prophet Lut (Lot) is mentioned in more than 10 surahs in the Qur’an. This is a story of crime, defiance and punishment: Unprecedented crime, extremism in insisting on that crime and exemplary punishment. Anyone who reads this narrative with an open mind cannot have the slightest confusion about Islam’s attitude about homosexuality.

People have a right to accept or refuse to accept Islamic teachings, values, and commandments. But no one has a right to lie about them. Unfortunately, there are many who are willing to do just that. This account is, therefore, offered to set the record straight.

The first thing the Qur’an mentions is that homosexual practice was invented by the people to whom Prophet Lut was sent as a messenger. He is very emphatic about this: “And [remember] Lut, when he said unto his people: ‘Do you commit abominations such as none in all the world has ever done before you?’” (Al-A’raf 7:80).

The Qur’anic word is al-fahisha, which means lewdness, shameful act, indecency. Fornication and adultery (zina) are also mentioned as examples of fahisha in the Qur’an. (Isra 17:32). But here the definite article al is added to show the even more serious nature of this act. Homosexual act is not fahisha but al-fahisha. It is not just a shameful act but the shameful act, the lewdness, the abomination.

In telling that no one before them committed this act, the Qur’an uses the word min in addition to ahadin. Without this, it would still mean that no one did it before you. But with min emphasis is added. In other words, no one whosoever ever did this act among all the creatures. This is an outright rejection of the claim that this tendency is an inborn and ingrained part of nature for which no person should be held accountable.

Prophet Lut accuses them of having made this choice. And the Sodomites do not say that they are helpless because it is a call of nature. Rather they say, “You know very well what we want.” (Hud, 11:79). And that the Prophet would be added to the list of people who have been expelled from their city for objecting to their practices if he does not cease and desist from criticising their way of life. (Al-Shu’ra 26:167). They are the inventors of this perversion and fully committed to use of violence to defend it.

This Qur’anic account regarding the genesis of this perversion is attested to not only by the Bible and the Talmud but also by the terms used to describe this act in languages around the world. It is sodomy in English, sodomie and sodomiser (the doer) in French, sodomia and sodomizar in Spanish and sodomi in Norwegian. Sodomie in German and sodomia in Polish also refer to variant forms of sexual perversion.