the challenge Allah issued to creation: “Let them create a tiny ant, or let them create a grain of barley.”

In sum, image-making is prohibited, whether it is three-dimensional or coloured, and it is among the major sins. Whoever does it, even once, forfeits uprightness and becomes sinful, unless he repents.

As for images produced by modern means, they fall into two categories:

The first category is that which has no lasting form, visible image, or physical manifestation, such as what has been described to me regarding recording on video tapes. This carries no ruling whatsoever and does not fall under the prohibition at all. For this reason, the scholars who prohibit photographic images produced on paper have permitted it, saying that there is nothing wrong with it. There was even discussion over whether lectures delivered in mosques may be recorded; the view was that this should be avoided, because it may distract those praying, the scene may be inappropriate, and so forth.

The second category is a fixed image on paper. If this is produced by an instant photographic camera, it does not fall under image-making, and one cannot say that its maker is cursed, because he has not, in reality, made an image. For image-making is derived from the verb “to form an image,” meaning to give something a particular form, as Allah the Exalted says:

“It is He who forms you in the wombs however He wills.” [Surah Al ‘Imran, 3:6]

And He says:

“And He formed you, and made your forms excellent.” [Surah al-Taghabun, 64:3]

The linguistic form itself requires there to be an act performed upon the image itself, since the intensive verbal pattern in Arabic entails this. It is well known that transferring the image