Abstract:

Disorders of sexual development (DSD) is the term used to denote intersexuality, hermaphroditism, and androgyny, and has been subjected to examination in different disciplines such as medicine, ethics, philosophy, theology, psychology, sociology, and law due to its critical multidimensional structure. This article reexamines the understanding of DSD in fiqh, which is based on classical medicine, in light of current medical knowledge. This study aims to re-evaluate within the framework of current medicine the classical Islamic jurists’ definition of DSD and the legal norms they determined based on the medical knowledge of their period. Issues such as how DSD are defined in classical Islamic law, what categories they include, how the methods for diagnosis and treatment are developed, and what criteria are set for sex assignment are assessed in light of current medical knowledge. As a result, this study establishes that the perception of DSD in classical Islamic law, as based on the medical knowledge of the period, is broader in one sense and narrower in another when compared to that of contemporary medicine. In this context, modern medicine and classical Islamic law share the view that people with ambiguous genitalia are classed within the category of DSD. Despite this, the condition of having no external genitalia of any sex, which constitutes another category that Islamic law considers to fall within the scope of DSD, has been evaluated as an anomaly (or more specifically, cloacal malformation) that occurs during the development of the digestive system, but does not fall within the scope of DSD according to contemporary medicine.

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