It is uncommon that we observe the background details of a well-produced film or notice the subtle masterpieces behind a state-of-the-art play. Aside from those that are very observant, these elements usually only come into view when production experiences a horrible mishap, perhaps if an actor’s costume is ruined or they forget their lines. The same can be said for the quiet mechanisms and systems, which our lives are dependent on, on a daily basis, namely our organs and their exceptionally complex makeup that we often take for granted. This issue aims to take a deep look at some of the processes that affect us every day that we usually do not think about.

Modern medicine is perhaps one of the greatest blessings of our time, as synthetic drugs are able to cure complex diseases in previously unknown ways. These medicines undergo intense research, testing, and scrutiny before being released to the general public. We quickly rush to the doctor’s office and pop a few pills when we feel ill, yet we rarely ponder over highly exhausting and costly process of developing these drugs.

Our hearts never rest from the moment we are born to the day we die. This organ we don’t usually think about pumps onwards multiple times per minute and allows us to perform our daily functions. In her piece in this issue, Ceyda Sablak reminds us how delicate the anatomy of this organ is and why we should maintain a healthy, balanced life of physical and spiritual activity, as many spiritual masters have seen a connection between our biological heart and our spiritual well-being.

Stem cell research has been a common point of discussion, debate, and controversy in the past few decades. Researchers argue that they possess an almost endless number of possibilities while advocates argue that they are derived in an unethical manner. The science behind them is fascinating, and the potential that they possess is undoubtedly inspiring.

Lastly, it turns out that our tears are integral to keeping our eyes healthy and itch-free. A lack of tears can result in a multitude of annoying and harmful disorders that can severely affect a person’s life. Searches have been underway to find the perfect “alternative tear” for those that suffer from tear related disorders. Who would have thought that something so simple contributes so much to our normal happiness and peace?

Question: Among the characteristics of “ignorance” that his followers would not completely abandon, the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, mentions boasting on the basis of one’s rank, reviling others’ genealogies, expecting rain from the stars, and wailing extremely over a lost loved one [1]. What are the lessons to be drawn from this saying?

Answer:

Boasting of one’s merits is a deception

Boasting about any quality like status, nobility, knowledge, wealth, beauty or intelligence, etc. signifies disrespect toward God. For Bediuzzaman, disregarding Divine favors is ingratitude, whereas laying claim to them is boastfulness. So, if a person wishes to avoid both ingratitude and boastfulness, he must acknowledge that all these blessings such as knowledge, wisdom, reason, judgment, wealth, health, and the like, come from God. If necessary, a person should only mention them in the form of acknowledging God’s blessings.

Boasting and vanity are qualities disliked by God. Even if a person is descended from the pure lineage of the noble Prophet, he must say: “My God, coming from such a blessed lineage is not something in my control. I know that You are the One Who blessed me with it. This goodness belongs to You and it is a heavy responsibility for me at the same time. My Lord, I praise You with thanks for having bestowed on me this favor and I ask for Your help so that I can give this responsibility its due.” No one should ever use this as a way to assume superiority over others.

Being a descendant of a general, coming from a wealthy family, being the child of a high-ranking bureaucrat … none of these bear any value in the sight of God. In this respect, no matter at what level, a person should not commit a mean act by being boastful of one’s family and should not see this as a factor of superiority. The merits of one’s ancestors are of no benefit whatsoever for a person. What really matters is having worthy personal values: “Surely the noblest, most honorable of you in God’s sight is the one best in piety, righteousness and reverence for God” (Qur’an 49:13). The measure of an individual’s value is related to that person’s worship, the quality of his or her relationship with God, and whether that person leads a God-conscious life; acting with the knowledge that God sees everything and as if one were able to see God. If a man does not stand where he should, descending from a noble lineage will be of no benefit to him at all.

Superiority by lineage

Secondly, the Messenger of God referred to the issue of holding others in contempt on account of their ancestry. While a person’s coming from a humble background and being the child of a shepherd does not reduce that person’s value at all—as stated above—coming from such and such lineage does not bring any virtue either. The following couplets of Ibrahim Haqqi summarizes this situation well:

“Haqqi come, do not reveal your secret;
If you wish to progress on this path,
Do not deride the wretch my dear;
There are such wretches that hide a treasure.”

It is definitely wrong to reproach and deride people by looking at their cultural environment, material status, neighborhood, family and the like. Ideas of superiority, and seeing others as inferior, date back to a more distant past. In the present day, this understanding continues in overt or covert forms in many places in the world. There is a caste system in different forms and manifestations around the world despite so many claims of progress in civilization, democratization and human rights.

Fortune telling by the stars

Another characteristic of the Age of Ignorance that continues to survive is the issue of expecting rain from the stars and ascribing the coming rains to the stars. In Mesopotamia particularly, the people deemed the stars to imbue a special holiness. The people of that land believed the stars to be directly influential on a person’s destiny. Although such beliefs do not exist in our time, belief in fortune telling by the stars and horoscopes still continues showing that this tradition of the Age of Ignorance remains in different forms.

In relation to this subject, the noble Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, expressed that God Almighty stated:

“On this morning, some of My worshippers remained as true believers and some became unbelievers; he who said that it rained with the blessing and mercy of God is one who believes in Me and does not believe in the stars, but he who said it rained because of such and such (star) does not believe in Me and believes in the stars.”

Then, seeing the falling rain as a manifestation of God’s mercy and responding to it with praise is a sign of faith, whereas ascribing it to simple causes, such as the stars, is a sign of associating partners with God. If God Almighty had rendered the stars a veil before the operation of His power and greatness, it could have been acceptable to see them as causes. However, as the natural sciences have also proven, there is not even a direct relation of causality between the stars and rainfall.

Unfortunately, when people do not believe in what they should, namely, when they do not have sound faith in God, the Prophets and the Qur’an, the natural need for belief in something, that is an attribute of human nature, leads them to believe in falsehoods. While some seek help in yogism or meditation, others try to find satisfaction with horoscopes and the like. All of these block the ability and potential of the human soul from accepting the real truth. Human nature is inclined to a quest for the truth but sometimes people put on the hat of falsehood and try to satisfy their heart, which actually yearns for the truth, with stones, trees and stars instead, even though those are not even conscious beings.

Culture of wailing

The final point stated in the hadith is wailing over the dead. In some parts of the world, there still exist certain forms of mourning where people slap their hands on their knees and cry artificially like performers.

However, this exaggerated display of emotions is of no benefit to the deceased whatsoever. If a person did not attain closeness to God through worship, and did not live as an obedient servant while in this world, it is of not much of a benefit for him (or her) even if a large crowd attends his funeral, sings his praises, or bears witness that he was a good person. In addition, it also needs to be stated that knowingly giving a positive account of an evildoer is bearing false witness. We surely make judgments according to the outward reality. Only God knows what is in one’s heart. If a person has passed away with faith and righteous deeds, the number of people who attended his or her funeral does not really matter. Millions of people attended the funerals of so many pharaohs and other tyrants, but this does not absolve them from the sins of their atrocities and oppression.

As a matter of fact, the noble Prophet said that if forty people bear positive witness for a deceased person, that person will be forgiven. However, as I have tried to point out above, this does not apply to knowingly bearing false witness. The Messenger of God made the following address to Abu Hurayra as a warning against death:

“Restore your ship, for the sea is deep. Take your provisions perfectly, for the journey is truly long. Keep your load light, for the slope before you is truly steep. Preserve sincerity in your deeds because God, The All-Seeing and Righteous One, is well aware of any of your acts” [2].

These were the points the Messenger of God found worthy of emphasis. If you pass away having remained within such a righteous sphere, then you will have passed to the pure horizons of our soul and be blessed with the truth of: “Surely we belong to God (as His creatures and servants), and surely to Him we are bound to return” (al-Baqarah 2:156). Otherwise, the wailings and praises—even if performed by millions of people—and the crowds attending your funeral will do you no good at all.

Notes

[1] Hakim, Al-Mustadrak, 1/539.

[2] Daylami, Al-Musnad, 5/339.

It was.

Brittany’s path towards recovery had been abruptly cut short. After three months of chemotherapy, radiation, and alternative treatments that never ended, and with a bone marrow transplant on the horizon, Brittany had unexpectedly developed a massive infection that could not be controlled. She had been doing so well, and no one saw it coming. I was told that she had passed away in the early morning hours while I was still sound asleep in my warm, soft bed. My mom was on the phone when I arrived in the office. She was equally devastated not only because Brittany was my dear friend, but because she was also the niece of her best friend. It was a close inner circle. Now someone was missing from it.

As I reflect on that horrific day over four years later, I have finally come to peace with Brittany’s tragic and untimely death, though I doubt I will truly ever understand it. Yet I have realized that we have no choice other than to come to terms with death because it is an integral part of the life process. However, I do not consider Brittany to be truly gone. I believe she lives on in so many ways, and I think that we as a society are just on the threshold of understanding life beyond death and the spiritual continuance and connection that lives on in the day to day lives of everyone who knew the deceased.

In the most simplistic terms, I see Brittany in the spirits, faces, and actions of every person’s life she ever touched. I see her in her mother and how she compassionately and gently treats other people; I see her in her sister and her never ending kindness and understanding; I see her in her aunt and her eternal optimism; I see her in the many friends she had who worked so hard to keep her memory alive within a very large high school environment; and I see her in myself when I try to embrace her passion, patience, and inner peace. She lives on in all of us and always will. I have come to believe that a person’s spirit and soul are truly separate from their earthly body; I’ll never see her smiling face again other than in pictures, but I still see her every day.

During Brittany’s brief but valiant battle with cancer, she embodied so many traits to which the rest of us can only hope to aspire. She exemplified a true sense of inner grace that I had never witnessed before in any other person. Throughout her illness, she never showed any outward signs of fear, although undoubtedly she was terribly frightened. She never complained although she must have often been in excruciating pain. She was always positive and optimistic and tried to keep a smile on her face, even though I know it must have been an incredible challenge. I knew she was struggling, but she didn’t want anyone to know. She never wanted to burden anyone, even though she was facing the biggest battle anyone can ultimately face. Brittany did not have the benefit of growing old and wise, yet her spirit is endless and inspirational. At only fifteen years old, she never even had the opportunity to graduate from high school, go to college, fall in love, raise children, and live a long life.

She was only in the 9th grade, a mere freshman in high school. So what does this say about a teenager who is selfless enough to not want to impose any pain on anyone around her when she was clearly suffering? I often wonder if she thought that she might die, even though she always said that she was going to be okay, and even proclaimed that she planned to run laps around the hospital once she was finally released. Certainly, she thought of others more than herself during this very difficult time. I sometimes wish I had talked to her about death just to know more about her thoughts on the subject; I just don’t think that she ever considered death to be an option, but I’ll never know for sure.

Yet even today I continue to feel Brittany around me, just as I see her in the all people’s lives that she forever touched. She has obviously left her earthly body, but that does not mean she is not present in the lives of those who loved and continue to love her. She had such an incredibly strong spirit and it was not in any way defined by the body that she so briefly resided in; her spirit remains while it has also moved on to its next destination, no doubt to find a higher purpose. She will never truly be gone, nor will the people who knew her and loved her ever let go of what she represented and the joy she brought to their lives.

What ultimately defines a person’s spiritual being both in life and in the afterlife? Is the earthly body and spirit a completely different entity from the heavenly spirit or does it represent an ongoing continuum? Does a person’s spirit die just as the body dies? I contend that it does not because the spirit is never something you can reach out and touch. It is real, but it is not palpable, even in life. You can’t see it, touch it, taste it, hear it, or physically feel it, yet you can sense it. A person’s spirit forever defines their goodness or lack thereof in some circumstances, their impact on other people’s lives, and the innate individual qualities that make that soul unique.

A person’s spirit is not finite by any means, but rather it is all encompassing. It is the inherent essence of the soul of an individual, whether living or deceased. Could anyone truly claim that the spirit of Martin Luther King Jr. is dead and gone after his inspirational, albeit abbreviated life and his infamous words, “I have a Dream”? Conversely, doesn’t the spirit of Adolph Hitler similarly still exist in the families that continue to mourn the atrocities endured by the victims of the Holocaust? A spirit is not limited by life or by death, by good or by evil, nor by a moment in time or by eternity.

In life, Brittany was indeed unique and someone many would consider to be a refreshing and optimistic soul, and certainly she continues to be the same years after her passing. No one ever had a negative thing to say about Brittany, even in an often catty high school environment. She was never among what many would consider the “popular” crowd; rather, she hung with members of the Anime Club. She was generally happier reading a book than going to the latest movie. She was quiet and introspective, scientific and analytical, not one interested in parties, dating and high school football games. Wherever she is today, I envision her working with the angels, perhaps on mathematical and scientific innovations that may eventually benefit those of us on earth. She certainly wouldn’t be happy sitting idle. She would always need a challenge and an opportunity to use her amazing brain power. God must have needed her for a much higher purpose.

Surely her untimely death has left her family devastated and questioning why this happened, especially to such a kind and innocent young person. For those of us who knew and loved her, it obviously makes no sense, and I continue to question, but in the end, know that I will someday understand. But I know for a fact that she wouldn’t want sadness or bitterness. That’s not at all what Brittany was about. I believe that she would instead hope that we look inside of ourselves and take a harder look at what purpose we want to fulfill within our own lifetimes.

Life is inherently limited. We all know that someday it will come to an end for each and every one of us. It is very, very sad when it comes to an end prematurely; at least by our standards. But God’s standards may be infinitely different from our own, and in the end, an individual’s legacy to those left behind on this earth cannot be measured by longevity. Further, it does not matter whether a person is a John F. Kennedy, an Albert Einstein, a Mother Teresa or a small town high school student, because it is not the number of lives we are able to touch, but the spirit in which we are able to do it. As long as a life is lived with a sense of true, unabashed passion, the spirit as we know it can never be extinguished in the minds of those left behind. More importantly, for reasons yet to be understood by mere mortals, that spirit has found another place in time, another purpose to fulfill, inevitably choreographed by the most divine power.

When I graduated from high school in 2008, Brittany’s mother gave me a memorable gift. Knowing my love of music and dance, she presented me with a CD by Lee Ann Womack with the feature track being “I Hope You Dance”. The lyrics are inspirational and timeless. In part, they are as follows:

“I hope you never lose your sense of wonder,
You get your fill to eat but always keep that hunger,
May you never take one single breath for granted,
God forbid love ever leave you empty handed,
I hope you still feel small when you stand beside the ocean,
Whenever one door closes I hope one more opens,
Promise me that you’ll give faith a fighting chance,
and when you get the choice to sit it out or dance –
I hope you dance, I hope you dance.” (MCA Nashville, 2000)

Brittany’s mom, whose daughter should have been in that same procession marching in cap and gown to “Pomp and Circumstance”, receiving her well earned diploma, simply wrote the message, “April, I hope you dance!” At that moment, I once again felt Brittany’s eternal presence.

There is without a doubt a higher plan, in my opinion, for every relationship we encounter on this earth. Brittany and I will see each other again someday, and I have no doubt that she will still have that beautiful, inspirational smile on her face. Still I miss her, but I do know that she is not far away. And when we do meet again, she’ll probably just say something like, “Hey there, April, I missed you, but I told you I was just fine.”

Since that terrible day in 2005 when I found out that my best friend, who was thought to be on the road to recovery, suddenly and unexpectedly lost her battle, I have done a great deal of soul searching and introspection. Sometimes I wonder how the potential and very unselfish bone marrow donor in New Jersey felt when he heard that he matched a young high school girl thousands of miles away and could save the life of this anonymous recipient. I imagine that he must have been excited yet somewhat nervous because the bone marrow extraction from the donor is said to be somewhat uncomfortable. But then I wonder how this man felt when the statistically unlikely match failed to come to fruition. I would think that this stranger must have grieved as well, or at least this is what I want to believe.

Brittany and this unknown New Jersey resident had more than bone marrow in common. Having known and loved Brittany, I knew she was kind, loving, unselfish, and generous. Even though I never knew her potential donor, he obviously embodied the same qualities. And when I say “embodied,” I mean it in a spiritual sense. If Brittany had not suffered a massive infection, a person who had never met her was willing to undergo an invasive procedure in an attempt to save her life. That is a person’s true spirit. It is what defines us, it is who we are in life and thereafter, it is the life we live while we are here on this earth and legacy we ultimately leave behind.

April Bollig is pursuing a degree in Elementary Education at University of Colorado at Colorado Springs.

To begin with, we can agree, as pointed out by Mason and McCall Smith (1984, p.107), that what constitutes the state of being a person, or personhood, is a matter of moral decisions, not of scientific facts. The relevant arguments are therefore primarily based on some moral, philosophical and theological hypotheses. However, even these arguments are informed by the scientific knowledge we have recently obtained about the condition and development of the human embryo. Insofar as the question is a moral one, arguments fall broadly into two groups, those that follow a secular approach, and those that follow a theological approach.

According to the secular approach, the basic condition for being a person is being capable of valuing one’s own existence. And the moral difference between a person and non-person lies in the value that persons can give to their own lives. Through language a person can comment on and declare awareness of awareness or fully developed self-consciousness (ibid. pp.l9, 21). Command of human language is thus offered as the decisive criterion. On this argument, pre-embryos, embryos, fetuses and very young infants are living beings, even living human beings, but they are not human persons. So, morally, we owe them nothing.

In his widely read article ‘A defence for abortion and infanticide’, Tooley (1973) observed that it is important to be very clear about what makes an entity a person, what gives that entity a right to life. He went on to define five necessary properties: 1) the capacity to envisage a future state for oneself, and to have desires about it; 2) the capacity to have a concept of a self; 3) being a self; 4); the capacity for self-consciousness; and 5) self-consciousness. As unborn babies, very young infants and PVS patients do not fulfil these requirements; they would not qualify as human persons. Singer (1993, p.87), in a forceful line on personhood, made a point of comparing human ‘animals’ with non-human animals, arguing that there could be a person who is not a member of our species and, conversely, there could also be members of our species who are not persons.

Those writers who, by contrast, accept the spiritual side of being a human person, have used different arguments to define personhood but, generally, link it with the human embryological state. Keith L. Moore, one of the foremost embryologists of our time, answered the question ‘When does the embryo become human?’ as follows: ‘The scientific answer is that the embryo always had human potential, and no other, from the time of fertilization, because of its human chromosome constitution. Two things are definite: (1) human development begins at fertilization, and (2) the zygote and early embryo are living organisms. My personal view is that the embryo becomes human being during the eighth week when it acquires distinctive human characteristics’ (Moore, 1989, p.72). 

Most of the writers who think that human personhood begins at some stage of embryological development base their view on various theological arguments. Before explaining these arguments it will be useful to give some historical background.

Aristotle (d. 322 BC), considered the first thinker to speak explicitly of human life as beginning in the womb, wrote: ‘the soul is the cause and the first principle of the living body’ (1957 edn. p.4l5b). He suggested that, when first formed, the embryo would have a nutritive or vegetative soul, replaced in due time, as a result of the causal influence of the particular semen’s pneuma, by the sensitive soul. Finally, in the case of a human, the rational soul would emerge to complete the generation of a human offspring. Aristotle associated quickening and differentiation into distinct stages of 40 days for the male and 90 days for the female, and so has been traditionally interpreted as placing the beginning of the individual boy and girl at those times respectively.

Aristotle’s ideas on this subject influenced many philosophers and scientists from prior to Christian times right through to the Middle Ages, notably Thomas Aquinas (d.1274), and for several centuries afterwards. His ideas also shaped the views of philosophers and scientists from the Islamic world and the East. For example, according to Musallam (1990), the method of lbn Sina (Avicenna, d. 1037) consisted of bringing Aristotle’s facts up to date, then re-stating the original Aristotelian arguments on the basis of the new facts.

Aristotle’s concept of the soul as the cause and first principle of the living body is confirmed by all monotheistic religions with little divergence. Despite significant differences on other points, these religions share the concept of life as sacred because given by God, and therefore forbid the termination of an innocent human life after it has been given its soul. However, they differ in their understanding of when this happens and what it means. Christian theology is definite that ‘immediate animation’ or ‘ensoulment’ is the instant at which our humanity is determined, but is uncertain when that instant occurs. Mahoney sums up the Christian theological position on the beginning of a human life as follows: In point of fact, current Roman Catholic teaching on the time of human ensoulment is one of uncertainty. Official Roman Catholic teaching is that we cannot be absolutely certain when animation takes place, or when the conceptus or the fetus is a human person; but it may well be precisely at the moment of conception’ (Mahoney 1984, pp. 6 7-9).

Evidently, in the monotheistic religions, certain topics can only he discussed knowledgeably after clear Divine guidance or Revelation. Without such guidance, human beings simply cannot know when ensoulment takes place. Because this information is not disclosed in the Christian scriptures, there is uncertainty on the subject among Christian authorities.

In the case of Islam, the situation is quite different. The creation of the human individual, fetal development and ensoulment are referred to in several dozen verses of the Qur’an in various contexts (32:8-9, 23:13-14, 71:14, 16:4, 75:37-9, 86:6, 77:20-1, 76:2, 22:5, 96:1-2, 40:67, 39:6, 53:45-6, 35 11, 3:6). Also, in the second source of knowledge after the Qur’an, namely the Hadith, there are a number of sayings of the Prophet, upon him be peace, which specifically address the subject of the embryological stages of a human being and the time of ensoulment.

From these texts, the great majority of Muslim scholars have understood that ensoulment takes place 120 days after conception (al-Nawawi, 1965 edn, p.189). However, when the relevant verses and ahadith are considered more carefully, the time for ensoulment should be put at between 40 and 45 days after implantation (the detailed textual discussion to support this view cannot be given here; see Aksoy, 199-) This means that. 49 or 55 days after conception, a human individual, with all the attendant rights, can be considered to exist, due to ensoulment having taken place.

Aristotle’s argument that ‘the soul is the cause and the first principle of the living body’ should not be dismissed as a religious myth. Something important is lacking in all our reflections on the subject if we take into account only the material existence of living beings. Although life is a continuous process, the physical existence of living beings is finite. If a human is taken as an example, every single cell in a human body has a limited (and programmed) lifespan. Some cells live a couple of hours, others a couple of days, weeks or months. After that they die and are shed. It is now known as incontrovertible fact that, with the exception of certain brain cells, all the cells in a human body are replaced with new cells every two years. Thus, in two years time, as regards my physical and material existence, I will be a completely different being from the one I am today. So, if I murder someone today and am caught after two years, I might say: ‘It was not me who did the crime. It was not exactly ‘this brain’ that planned it, not ‘these feet’ that walked to the scene, not ‘this finger’ which pulled the trigger’. This defence is logical and must be acceptable if I am only a material being. Of course, our current legal systems are not based upon the (false) assumption that a person is a merely physical being and therefore I would be unable deny responsibility on these grounds.

There should be something beyond merely physical existence that makes me me. Parfit (1984, Part 3) has discussed the nature of a person and sought answers to such questions as: What makes a person at two different times one and the same’? and What is necessarily involved in the continued existence of a person over time? He defines two kinds of sameness or identity: qualitative identicalness (or exact alikeness), and numerical identicalness (or one-and-the-sameness). He writes: ‘Two white billiard balls are not numerically but may be qualitatively identical. If I paint one of these balls red, it will cease to be qualitatively identical with itself as it was. But the red ball that I later see and the white ball that I painted red are numerically identical. They are one and the same ball’ (ibid., p.20l). According to Parfit, a person is a separately existing entity, distinct from his brain and body, and his experiences. What makes an individual at two different times one and the same person is psychological connectedness and/or continuity, with the right kind of cause. The psychological connectedness is the holding of particular direct psychological connections. And the psychological continuity is the holding of overlapping chains of strong connectedness. Parfit addresses these and similar matters extensively and intelligently in his Reasons and Persons (ibid.).

All the Divine religions and some philosophers name that which provides the necessary continuity to make a person as soul. According to the authority of religion, a living human being consists of body and soul. Soul cannot manifest its existence without a body, and a body cannot be animate and survive without a soul. They are like glove and hand: just as the glove is an inanimate piece of cloth until the hand enters it, so the body becomes a human person only when the soul enters it. Likewise, just as when the hand is removed, the glove reverts to a piece of cloth, so too the human body ceases to be identifiable as a human person when the soul departs. Aristotle expresses the soul in this famous, graphic image: ‘For if the eye was an animal, then sight would be its soul…. so that when sight leaves it is no longer an eye except homonymously, much as we might say of a dead body that it is our friend; in one sense it is but in a very different sense it is not’ (Aristotle, 1957 edn, p.412b).

In sum: when the body meets with the soul it comes to be a human person, with all the attendant rights, especially the right to life.

References

• AKSOY, S. (199-) ‘When does a human individual begin to be?: A philosophical, embryological and theological perspective’. (Unpublished paper)
• AL -NAWAWI. (1965 edn) Sahih-i Muslim Bi-Sharh-i Nawawi, Kitab al Qadar, vol.16, Matbaa-i Misri. Egypt.
• ARISTOTLE (1957 edn), On the Soul (De Anima), trans. W.S. Hett. W. Heinemann, London and Cambridge, Mass.
• MAHONEY, J. (1984) Bio-ethics and Belief Sheed & Ward, London.
• MASON, J.K.& McCAll. Smith, R.A. (1984) Law and Medical Ethics, Butterworths, London.
• MOORE, K,L..(1989)Before We Are Born, W. B. Saunders Company, Philadelphia.
• MUSALLAM, B. (1990) ‘The human embryo in Arabic scientific and religious thought’ in G.R. Dunstan, (ed.) 7 ‘The Human Embryo: Aristotle and the Arabic and European Traditions, University of Exeter Press, Exeter. pp.32-46.
• PARFIT. D. (1984) Reasons and Persons, Clarendon Press, Oxford.
• RISPLER-CHAIM, V. (1993) Islamic Medical Ethics in the Twentieth Century, E.J. Brill, Leiden.
• SINGER, P. (1993) Practical Ethics, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
• TOOLEY, M. (1973) ‘A defence of abortion and infanticide’ in J. Feinberg (ed.) The Problem of Abortion’, Wadsworth Publication Company, California, pp. 51-91.