'Men can have sex with daughters born out of wedlock,' says Egyptian cleric

According to this cleric's logic, there is an interpretation of al-Shafi'is work saying if a man impregnates a woman who is not his wife, the child is not technically his.

Narrated

3 min read

Diana Alghoul

04 Nov, 2017

The resurfacing of the video caused fury on social media [Youtube]

Anger has spurred after an Egyptian cleric drew light to an interpretation of the work of an Islamic jurist saying that men can have sex with their "illegitimate" daughters.

A video of cleric Mazen al-Sersawi, who is also a lecturer at Egypt's al-Azhar Islamic institution began circulating of him claiming that it is Islamically permissible for men to marry their "illegitimate" daughters, meaning their daughters that they have had outside of wedlock according to a certain interpretation of an Islamic jurists work.

According to this logic, if a man impregnates a woman who is not his wife, the child is not technically the man's child because it was born as a result of adultery.

"So if girl is born out of out of wedlock, the man can marry her according to these interpretations? What is this?", al-Sersawi said.

Therefore, means that a man is able to have sex with his 'illegitimate' daughter.

He cites the work of one of Islam's most cited jurists, Imam al-Shafi'i. Scholars urge that this "ruling" comes from a misinterpretation of the Imam's work.

The video was originally recorded in 2012, but had recently resurfaced online, leaving many angry at the ruling.

In September, another Egyptian cleric caused shockwaves on social media after he said it is Islamically permissable to marry off new-born girls.

Cleric Muftah Mohammad Maarouf, also referred to as Abu Yahya said this during a televised debate on whether the marital age for girls should be so low that it should allow new-born babies to be married off.

He urged that as long as “no harm” is done to the child, there should be no issue with “preventing her from getting married” before claiming that "in Islamic Sharia there is no set age for marriage when it comes to females."

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Translation: There is no God but God himself for how long are people going to use Islam to satisfy their perverted desires on a whim?

This is not the first time an Egyptian cleric has made a ludicrous ruling when it comes to marriage. Many have noticed a pattern and are getting sick of it:

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Translation: God damn you and damn these pseudo-scholars. It feels like we hear a new ruling on marriage every day based on their lusts.
The madness of the ruling was also highlighted:

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Translation: What is this madness?
People refused to stay quiet on the fact that this ruling has no real basis in Islam:

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Translation: Which religion says this?
And unsurprisingly, the video was also met with sheer disgust:

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Translation: Ewww

Editor's note: An earlier published version of this story failed to note the sarcastic tone in which the lecture was delivered. The article has been updated to reflect the fact that the speaker acknowledged such an interpretation of the scholar's remarks was ridiculous.