By Cyril Anderson

Part Two of Two

 Compare this to tobacco.  With tobacco, there are understood to be negative health effects on the person who smokes habitually, even with a moderate level of smoking.  There have been links found between smoking and lung diseases, including cancer and emphysema; heart disease, and overall mortality.  In terms of positive effects, intermittent use can produce a temporary feeling of calm and alertness.  As for intoxication, tobacco does not intoxicate in any normal dosage range.  Extremely heavy doses can produce hallucination, but due to the short-lived effects of nicotine, the active agent in tobacco responsible for the “buzz,” it would be virtually impossible to reach such levels through smoking.  Therefore, smoking in the usual use does not produce any altered state of consciousness and perception, does not dramatically alter mood, does not impair motor skills or reaction time, and does not impair cognitive functioning.  Though nicotine is a poison in high levels (the reason for the hallucinations at extreme levels) it is not an intoxicant at any typical level of use in smoking.  As a result, thinking and behavior are not affected.  As a result, the sort of social effects seen with alcohol are not present with tobacco.

 The only serious apparent effects on people other than the smoker are through so-called “second-hand smoke effects,” or “passive effects.”  There is some research to indicate that prolonged long-term exposure to second-hand smoke has significant negative effects on health.  With children in the home of a smoker, there is some apparent link between smoking and asthma in children.

 Therefore, given the lesser social and public effects of tobacco as opposed to alcohol, and given the lack of explicit reference in the Qu’ran and secondary literature, there is much less strong evidence to support an outright ban on tobacco use, sale, and distribution.  Tobacco can be harmful to the user himself, but it is up to the person how heavily he uses tobacco, and the harm of tobacco is directly related to the level of usage and how long the person smokes.  A person could smoke only occasionally, and have minimal negative health effects.  The danger is not so much the substance in itself, but the overuse of he substance.  In that light, it could be compared to eating fatty food; it is enjoyable, and relatively harmless in moderation, once in awhile, but is harmful as an everyday habit.

On the other hand, the point could be raised that this same argument could be made for alcohol; that is, alcohol can be used moderately by an individual without serious harmful health effects and without the person getting so inebriated that he is out of control, say a glass of wine a day, yet alcohol is outright forbidden.  However, a counterargument would be that alcohol would be different in that there is genetic evidence that some portion of the population is predisposed to abuse alcohol, meaning some level of abuse in the population is nearly inevitable, with the related results on society.  However, on the other hand, a counter to that might argue that there is evidence as well that some significant portion of the population is virtually bound to seriously abuse tobacco.  However, the fact that with alcohol there is not just the direct health effect on the individual, but also behavior effects from the intoxication that effect other people negatively that have no real parallel with smoking, means that the case is seen to be much weaker on this basis for tobacco.

There is definitely an argument, on the level of an Islamic state, whose mandate is to promote the general welfare and protect the well-being of its people, to take a number of steps to protect people from any negative effects of smoking.  First, to take steps to regulate the distribution and sale of tobacco, to prevent the sale to young children.  Second, to educate the public, particularly youth, using schools and the media, about potential dangers of smoking for those who have not started and encouraging those who do smoke to cut or eliminate their use.  Probably some justification could be made to fund programs to help people quit smoking.  Third, to take steps through legislation to protect non-smokers from second-hand smoke, through banning of smoking in and around public buildings such as schools, hospitals, government buildings and administrative offices, in and around daycares and religious centers, and in indoor areas in general to protect workers.  Also in cars and enclosed spaces where children will be transported.  All of these could be justified based on the principle of allowing the restriction of freedom when it impacts negatively on the freedom and well being of others.

On the level of the individual, there is a solid Islamic argument against smoking at least to the level that a person’s body is given them by God as a trust to be used for good purposes, and not abused.  If a person smokes to a level where it is clear that harm is being done, so that it is likely the person would get sick and die early, that would seem to be forbidden, as the person is throwing away potential years of his life that could be used potentially to serve God and His creation.  By compromising our health in a willing fashion, we willingly compromise our ability to serve God, as our health is a God-given blessing given to us in trust, our body being a tool we are given to do His will on the earth.  But again the level of compromising would be usage-level dependant.  For a minimal, occasional sort of level of usage, the health effects would probably be comparable to someone who too regularly overindulges in decadent food.  An undesirable thing, makruh perhaps, but not to the level of haram in itself,

Another potential argument that could be raised against smoking in an Islamic state would be based on economic cost to the public.  This is because, based on reasonable interpretation of Islamic principles of government, hospitals would likely be run by the state and medical care funded fully by the state out of taxes paid by the public.  In this case there would be a public medical cost imposed by smokers upon the population.  (This would also be a relevant problem in any state with universal publicly funded medical care.)  Since this money used to treat patients sick because of smoking related illnesses could have been used elsewhere to fund useful programs, and given that the tobacco use was voluntary, the public would be suffering significant public costs from those who smoke.  Given such negative costs, there would be grounds for some sort of government action to address this issue.  Of course, it could be argued that banning on these grounds is not the only solution to the problem of the medical cost to the public of tobacco related illness; another method, used in Canada, would be to heavily tax tobacco, with the idea being to recover the medical costs directly from those who produce the costs, a relatively just solution.

Overall, there does not seem to be a case for outright prohibition of tobacco.  However, there does seem to be ample evidence for heavy regulation by the state to protect people from second-hand effects and to protect youth and children, taxation by the state to cover medical costs of tobacco use, and, on a personal level, a prohibition on smoking as a heavy regular habit.  Since smoking in itself has some negative effects, it can be reasonably argued that any smoking is makruh (disliked).  This is overall in line with the conclusions of most maraja’ today: makruh in general, and haram if used at a level such that it is clearly harmful to health. 

                               Part One                    Part Two