“Mapping the Field of Islamic Bioethics”

Abstract:
There are still few health debates by and for Muslims worldwide. Individual Muslim physicians and Muslim theologians, as well as Islamic international institutions around the world, are involved in this area. What is crucial, however, is an interweaving of practice and Islamic theology with the aim of transferring knowledge into society. These arise in particular from technological developments in intensive care medicine, such as artificial ventilation and organ transplantation. There is a need for an ethical discussion about which principles guide actions when decisions have to be made at the end of life. This lecture therefore is mapping the field of Islamic bioethics and answers the following questions: What constitutes Islamic bioethics? What makes Islamic bioethics Islamic? Who are the main players in this area? Which topics dominate? Which principles guide the medical ethics debates?

Bio:
Dr. Hadil Lababidi is a Lecturer at the University of Zurich. She has a Master of Arts from Leiden University in Modern Middle East Studies and received her doctorate in Islamic theology. She completed her PhD degree in February 2023 at Friedrich-Alexander-University of Erlangen-Nürnberg and was awarded the DAVO Dissertation Prize 2023. Lababidi’s doctoral thesis »Rūḥ and Nafs: From Breath of Life to Selfhood. Basic Questions of Bioethics in Islam Using the Example of Tube Feeding at the End of Life in Dementia» is published (in German) at EB-Verlag. The study is expected to be published in English by Brill in 2024.
Lababidi co-founded the working group “Medical Ethics and Islam” and co-edits the Journal of Medicine, Ethics & Islam.

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