Question
A friend says that it is compulsory to consume even haraam medicine to save one's life if no halaal remedy is available. He says that it is just like saving one's life with haraam food, even pork if no halaal food is available. If a person refuses to eat the haraam food and dies as a result of hunger, he will be sinful. The same rule applies if he dies because of abstaining from the haraam medication. Is his reasoning valid in the Shariah?
Answer
His reasoning is invalid, and his analogy is fallacious. Whilst consuming the haraam food becomes incumbent, the same rule does not apply to haraam medicine. Starvation and total abstention from food are certain causes of death, just as consuming poison is a certain cause of death. For this reason hunger strikes leading to death are haraam. If there is yaqeen (certitude) that a circumstance will cause death, and if that circumstance is avoidable, then it is Waajib to avoid it even by haraam methods. Thus,
- Source
- themajlis.co.za
- Published in
- The Majlis Vol 24 No 07
- PDF page
- 10
Appears under ZAKAAT ON MINERALS (approximate).