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The COVID-19 pandemic has significantly affected religious life and has temporarily changed some of the important religious rules of Islam. Most of the highest Shi'ite clerics in Iran and Iraq have become active protagonists in the fight against COVID-19. The author focuses on these clerics' support of state institutions in matters of hygiene and protection measures as well as bans on gatherings. The author then analyzes the attitudes of these clerics toward changes in religious practices during the Coronavirus epidemic: the prohibition of Friday / congregational prayers, the closing of Shi'ite shrines (places of burial of Shi'ite holy Imams), fasting in the holy month of Ramadan, changes in funeral customs, the issue of martyrdom due to Coronavirus infection and changes in performing the major Shi'ite religious ceremonies of Ashura and Arba'een. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article provides an overview of the various opinions, theories and debate concerning the boundaries of human life (the beginning and end of human life) in Shi'i Islam and the important consequences in terms of the use of different medical technologies. It considers this issue from the perspective of Shi'i jurisprudence in contemporary Iran, in particular on the basis of the published legal decisions of important high-ranking clerics and based on the knowledge shared within the Islamic seminaries in Qom. The study first describes various theories concerning the exact beginning of human life and the phases of Qur'anic embryogenesis. The issue of therapeutic abortions is then described and the different views of important Iranian clerics are presented on whether therapeutic abortions can be allowed or not and under what conditions and based on which fiqh arguments. The study further addresses the definition of human death, specifically the very extraordinary case of people with acute brain damage (coma, vegetative state and brain death). It discusses whether brain activity or heart activity is essential for determining human death and presents the views of the clerics on this issue and consequently whether disconnection from medical devices (euthanasia) and organ donation are allowed in these cases. This article draws conclusions on the status of the human foetus (especially before ensoulment) and addresses the reflection over the sources of Shi'i Islamic bioethics, in which Islamic jurisprudence has obviously prevailed over Islamic ethics. Together with the modern methodology of Shi'i jurisprudence and using rationality ('aql) as a basic source, this becomes the basis of a pragmatic and rational attitude towards medical biotechnologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Islamic Republic of Iran is a very progressive state in the field of medical research and its application. Although the country is fully subject to Islamic law (shari'a) and the influence of Shi'ite clerics, the development of medical science is not limited at all; Shi'ite medical ethics (unlike Sunnite) allows most of the modern medical techniques. Due to this attitude, Iran specializes today in many techniques that are prohibited in other countries for religious or ethical reasons. For example, Iranian research on cloning, cell and gene therapy reaches the world level, patients can use a third-party donor program and surrogacy for infertility treatment, the sale of kidney for transplantation was legalized, gender reassignment surgery is performed, and the country is a centre of cosmetic surgery. All of these services (excluding transplantation) are also offered to foreign patients. Thanks to these unlimited possibilities, high quality and low price, Iran has been currently gaining a strong position in the medical tourism market, not only in the Middle East region, but also worldwide.