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| Life (al Hayat) Dr.Omar Hassan Kasule Sr. DEFINITION OF LIFE All of us agree when we see a living thing
that it is alive when it is breathing, moving, and eating. There are
several situations that are borderline and require a clear definition.
Both life and death are earthly events (7:25). Life cannot be defined
simply as the opposite of death. It is definable on its own. Life can be
defined biologically, chemically, legally, and spiritually. It is not
surprising that there is no one single definition of life; life is complex
and its definition must be complex. The biological definition is not easy.
Phenomena of death occur on a continuous basis. On a daily basis cells die
and are replaced. Some organs can die while the rest of the organism is
still living. Even in situations in which the whole organism is considered
dead by ordinary criteria, some parts of it could maintain manifestations
of life for a long time. Organs of dead persons stay alive for a long time
in transplantees. Human cells have been maintained in long-term culture
for decades. Life could also be defined in chemical
terms as a series of chemical reactions in metabolism. These reactions are
not much different from inorganic reactions that occur between elements.
Viruses make a very fine line between life and death. One of the signs of
life is dynamic change. There is growth and development. There is also
degeneration and death. The elements that make up the human body are
recycled. The degenerate cells and tissues whether in life or after death
break up and become part of the earth. They are later incorporated into
new cells as food, water or air that is breathed in. Life could also be
looked at in spiritual terms. Life without any spirituality is no life at
all. Spiritual death could occur without biological death. Spiritual
diseases could transform a human to be at the level of animals or even
worse. We can conclude that life is a complex phenomenon with biological,
chemical, and spiritual components. Life can be described at various levels:
ruh, the whole living organism, the organ, the tissue or cell, the
molecule, and the atom. The highest level is that of the ruh about which
we know very little. We however know that the ruh is the essence of human
life and that it is eternal. Humans share with animals the biological
nature of life but they have in addition the ruh that makes them special. The Qur'an mentions insertion of the ruh in case of Isa (PBUH) (4:171, 31:91, 66:12). The ruh is inserted in the fetus during intra-uterine life to give it human life, nafakh al ruh (15:29, 32:9, 38:72, 15:29, 21:91, 32:9, 38:72, 66:12). The body without the ruh has lost all the essence of a human being. On burial most of the human body decomposes and disappears within a short time and only bones persist. The Qur'an has mentioned the bones as a
challenge to the unbelievers that He can indeed bring them back to life
(17:49, 17:98, 23:35, 23:82, 37:16, 37:53, 56:47, 75:3, 79:11). The various organs of the body have a life
and an individuality of their own and will bear witness against the human
shahadat al a'adha (24:24). Life can be looked at in three stages:
pre-uterine phase, uterine phase, the post-uterine phase, and the after
death phase. The Qur'an has mentioned two lives and 2
deaths (40:11). Life on earth is described as enjoyment,
hayat akl duniya matau (3:14, 3:185, 4:77, 6:32, 7:32, 9:38, 9:69,
10:23-24, 10:70, 10:98, 11:15, 13:62, 20:131, 23:33, 28:60-61, 28:77,
29:64, 33:28, 40:49, 42:20, 42:36, 43:32, 43:35, 46:20, 47:36, 57:20).
Humans have a blind love for life on earth and its enjoyment (p 382 2:96). Life in the hereafter starts with
resurrection (6:6:36, 7:29, 7:57, 10:4, 10:34, 11:7, 16:38, 17:49-52,
17:99, 18:48, 21:104, 22:7, 23:100, 28:85, 29:19-20, 30:11, 30:25-27,
30:50, 30:56, 31:28, 32:10-11, 34:7, 36:12, 36:32-36, 36:51-52, 36:27-83,
37:16-21, 46:33, 56:47-50, 58:6, 71:3-4, 83:4-6, 86:8-10). NATURE OF LIFE As far as we know human life exists only on
our planet. The possibility of human life on other planets is possible and
is referred to indirectly by the Qur’an (42:29). The details will have
to be unraveled by scientific research and exploration. Life belongs to Allah and not the human
(3:156, 7:158, 8:42, 15:23, 23:80, 30:40, 4:11, 40:68, 45:26, 50:43,
53:44, 57:2, 67:3). There is a continuum in human life. The
start is the state of non-existence (azal). Allah then created the souls
and took an undertaking from them to worship him (al ‘ahad). Starting
with Adam (PBUH) Allah created a physical body to house those souls during
life on earth (hayat al duniyat). The physical part of existence on earth
ends with death and the souls continue into eternity. Life in the
integerrum (hayat al barzakh 23:100) is an intermediate stage between life
on earth and life in the hereafter (hayat al akhirat). In the hereafter
human life will re-assume its physical form with the resurrection (al
ba’ath). Life in the hereafter will be eternal. The fortunes of people
will vary; some will be in jannat while others will be in hell being
punished for their transgressions on earth. Human life on earth has a definite time
span (ajal) (6:2, 6:128, 11:3, 13:38). No human endeavor including the
most advanced medical procedures can shorten or extend this time span. The
whole purpose of medicine is to exert maximum efforts to improve the
quality of remaining life since the time of the ajal is known to Allah
alone. The Qur’an has taught the concept of a fixed time of death for
every human (ajal al mawt) (63:10-11; p 73 3:145, 6:60, 10:11, 14:44,
22:5, 39:432, 63:10-11). Only Allah knows this time; humans cannot know it
(jahl al insaan bi zaman al mawt, 31:34). Humans have no means of
foretelling in a certain way the moment of death (31:34). They can predict
or extrapolate from their empirical observations and experience but this
remains ar best an approximation. Death occurs immediately when the
appointed hour strikes (buluugh al ajal). The hour of death is fixed ajal
musamma, ajal ma’aluum (35:45). It cannot be advanced or forwarded (p
1153 15:4, 16:61, 71:4, 63:10-11). Humans naturally want to live for long
(2:96). This may be because they want to enjoy the earth as long as
possible or for fear of the unknown after death. Some humans desire a long
life to be able to make a maximum contribution to improving themselves and
the earth on which they live. Life can be a happy one (hayat sa’id) or
unhappy (hayat dhankat) (20:124). A good life is related to good deeds (p
382 16:97). Life on earth is a test for humans (67:2). Those who pass the test succeed. Human life must be purposive to be meaningful. The first and most important purpose is worship of Allah (‘ibadat). Life devoid of 'ibadat has lost its purpose. Ibadat is a continuous undertaking as long as life continues (19:31). ‘Ibadat is here considered in its comprehensive sense. All good and well-intentioned human activity is ibadat and has a reward. It is part of ibadat to fulfill the trust of human vicegerancy on earth (amanat al istikhlaaf). Humans must improve the earth and leave it better than they found it. They must improve themselves socially and spiritually. They have to play a positive role in preserving the stability of the eco-system and the food chain for their good and that of existing generations and generation not yet born. QUALITY OF LIFE (QOL) The question whether life exists or has
ceased to exist is a recent pre-occupation. For millennia humans did not
bother to answer the question since the answer had no practical value.
When a person was seriously ill all they did was to wait. If there was
some life the patient could revive else he would not. Death was easily
defined in terms of irreversibility. There was no hurry to ascertain
death. Modern technology has complicated the picture by introducing
methods of keeping some functions of life like breathing or blood
circulation beyond the point at which traditionally people would have been
considered in a state of irreversible decline to death. It is therefore
now important to be able to define the moment of death to guide decisions
on whether to apply or stop the advanced technology life support. Criteria
of life are closely related to quality of life indices. A high quality of
life will have more stringent criteria. Low quality life will have fewer
criteria needed to define it. It is not possible to discuss criteria
without taking quality into consideration. Human life must have some quality. It is
not enough to eat and breathe or maintain the vegetative functions only. A
human cannot live like a plant or an animal. The quality of life can be
defined in physical, mental, or spiritual dimensions. Issues of quality of life have been raised
in the recent past because of advances in terminal disease care and the
stresses of technological development. Many patients who used to die of
cancer and other debilitating diseases can now survive. Both the disease
and its treatment cause considerable changes to their lifestyle. The life
under these debilitating conditions is of low quality. Both the original
disease and the treatment contribute to this low quality; the treatment in
some cases has a more contribution. Specialized methods have been
developed to be able to assess the quality of this life empirically. These
indices take into considerations performance status on physical tasks in
addition to social or psychological parameters. Industrial society has
given rise to environmental pollution and mental stress that affect the
quality of life. Decision-making on allocation of health care resources
depends on quality of life assessment. Traditional measures of the quality of life
(QOL) use anatomical, chemical, and physiological indices. They indicate general
goals and are not good measures of actual quality of life. The new QOL
indices are predictors of the goals. They are instruments that are
validated and whose reliability is tested empirically. Some are general
whereas others are specific. Assessment of QOL may be by indices or by
profiles; indices being more popular. These indices are standardized but
it must be remembered that each individual is unique. The indices are used
in clinical trials and clinical practice. In clinical trials QOL indices
include survival duration, impairments (signs, self-reported disease,
physiological measurements, tissue alterations, and diagnosis), and
functional status (physical, psychological, and social) The commonest scales of QOL used are: QOL indices are used in the following special situations: cancer, rheumatoid arthritis, Parkinson's Disease, Asthma and Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, hypertension, angina, psychiatry, and skin diseases. In cancer there are physical, psychosocial and general assessment. Physical performance status is assessed on the activities of daily living (ADL). In general the Sickness Impact Profile and the Quality of Well-being Index are used. START OF LIFE Human life started with the stage of ruh
when Allah took the covenant 'ahad al laah ila al bashar (7:172-173,
36:60). This was life at a spiritual level. It became life in a material
form with the creation of Adam and his wife Hawâ. They were created from
clay and became humans when the ruh was inserted. Biologically the
offspring of Adam and Hawa have continued transmitting the original
biological material in the form of DNA all down the centuries from parent
to offspring. The act of creation is repeated every time there is
conception when maternal and paternal DNA combine to give rise to the
fetal DNA. The act is completed by insertion of the ruh during
intra-uterine life. In a biological sense the continuity of life as not
been interrupted from the time of Adam. There is therefore an unbroken
continuity. It is pointless to try to define the exact moment when human
life on earth is considered to start because of the concept of the
continuum above. This is of practical and not an academic interest.
Defining an exact moment in the intra-uterine phase for the start of life
has legal implications in cases of contraception, abortion, inheritance,
and homicide. We have to be careful about debates on the
start of life. We need to ask ourselves what is the purpose behind the
debates? There are social problems of an ethical nature that people want
to solve by defining the start of life. The interest is therefore not only
legal but is also ethical and moral. Once the point of start of life has
been defined, then it is possible to legalize any medical procedures
involving feticide provided they are done before the defined time. Trauma
or any other man-made cause of fetal death would be considered homicide
only if it occurred after the defined start of life. In a similar way, a
fetus would have rights of inheritance from the father if the father died
after the period of the defined start of life. In all three cases the
analysis is wrong. Life existed before and beyond conception. Feticide is
committed in societies that want to allow sexual promiscuity unaccompanied
by the responsibilities of childbearing. Any aggression to the body of a
pregnant woman is to be punished and should not be related to the life or
non-life of the fetus. It is justice that any offspring of the deceased
inherit to be able to have physical support. We can therefore conclude
that the main motivation for defining the start of life is to find is to
escape moral and social dilemmas. Islamic law and teachings provide
adequate measures for preventing these dilemmas. The issues of the start of life have not been studied by Muslims well. Study of sub-cellular structures may reveal new relations and explanations. Such studies also will clarify the boundary between the inorganic and organic parts of the body and the relation between life and the organic. The boundary between the world of the seen (alam al shahadat) and the world of the unseen (aalam al ghaib) needs to be elucidated in biological systems. VALUE OF LIFE Human life is a gift from Allah ,ni’imat
al hayat (16:78, 67:23). Those who have life are a select few. A
fertilized ovum that eventually grows into a human being is a very small
statistical probability. One male ejaculate has millions of sperms and
only one of them succeeds in fertilizing the female ovum. In many cases fertilized
ova do not grow into fetuses but are aborted early. Children are a bounty
to parents ni'mat al dhurtiyat (3:38, 6:84, 14:39, 19:5-7, 19:19, 21:72,
21:90, 25:74, 29:27, 38:30, 42:49). Humans must be grateful to Allah for
the gift of life by worshipping Him (ibadat). Each human has an inalienable right to life
from Allah (haqq al hayat). This life cannot be taken away or impaired by
any human being except in cases of judicial execution after due process of
the law. Life is sacred. The sanctity of life (hurmat
al hayat) is guaranteed by the Qur’an. The life of each single
individual whatever be his or her age, social status or state of health is
important and is as equally important as the life of any other human
(5:32). Protection of life (‘ismat al hayat/hifdh al nafs) is the second
most important purpose of the Shariat coming second only to the protection
of the dîn. It has priority over any other mundane consideration. No material value can be put on human life. Legal compensation for bodily damage or homicide is replacement of lost earnings and not paying for the value of life. |