just as the fetus does during pregnancy, for the harm it inflicts first reaches the mother and then passes on to the unborn child: the mother’s blood becomes poor in nutrients, and when her stored reserves of calcium, iron, and so forth are depleted, the same deficiency afflicts the fetus—and later the nursing infant.

7 – Dr. Muḥammad ʿAlī al-Bār likewise writes in his book “The Creation of Man”: “Breast-feeding is one of the oldest and most significant factors in regulating birth: the nursing mother’s menses usually cease, and because of lactation the ovary refrains from releasing its customary monthly ovum. Islam has affirmed the newborn’s right to be suckled for a full two lunar years for anyone who wishes to complete the period. Even so, the rule may be broken—just as other rules are broken before the divine will—and the Messenger of Allah ﷺ judged that such a breach could harm the fetus conceived while its mother is still nursing its brother or sister.”

8 – ʿAzl is the withdrawal of the penis from the woman’s vagina during intercourse and the ejaculation of semen outside it out of fear of pregnancy. Hadith 888 refers to it as hidden infanticide (al-waʾd al-khafī). Waʾd is the burying of a newborn girl alive, heaping earth over her until she dies—a practice of the pagan Arabs—and it is categorically forbidden. ʿAzl resembles waʾd only in that it destroys a concealed drop of sperm already prepared to grow into a human being, not in the ruling of actually killing an innocent protected soul by so brutal a method.

9 – The hadith indicates that the natural sciences—medicine and the like—are attained through experiment and verified by their outcomes.

10 – It further shows that obtaining non-religious knowledge from non-Muslim nations is not imitation, reliance, or unlawful resemblance, for such knowledge is among the universal laws set by Allah