Within the Muslim world, sentiment towards LGBTQ people varies and has varied between societies and individual Muslims. While colloquial and in many cases de facto official acceptance of at least some homosexual behavior was commonplace in pre-modern periods, later developments, starting from the 19th century, have created a generally hostile environment for LGBTQ people. Most Muslim-majority countries have opposed moves to advance LGBTQ rights and recognition at the United Nations (UN), including within the UN General Assembly and the UN Human Rights Council.
The views of the various different religions and religious believers regarding human sexuality range widely among and within them, from giving sex and sexuality a rather negative connotation to believing that sex is the highest expression of the divine. Some religions distinguish between human sexual activities that are practised for biological reproduction and those practised only for sexual pleasure in evaluating relative morality.
Transphobia consists of negative attitudes, feelings, or actions towards transgender people or transness in general. Transphobia can include fear, aversion, hatred, violence or anger towards people who do not conform to social gender roles. Transphobia is a type of prejudice and discrimination, similar to racism, sexism, or ableism, and it is closely associated with homophobia. People of color who are transgender experience discrimination above and beyond that which can be explained as a simple combination of transphobia and racism.
The Kinsey scale, also called the Heterosexual–Homosexual Rating Scale, is used in research to describe a person's sexual orientation based on one's experience or response at a given time. The scale typically ranges from 0, meaning exclusively heterosexual, to a 6, meaning exclusively homosexual. In both the male and female volumes of the Kinsey Reports, an additional grade, listed as "X", indicated "no socio-sexual contacts or reactions" (asexuality). The reports were first published in Sexual Behavior in the Human Male (1948) by Alfred Kinsey, Wardell Pomeroy, and others, and were also prominent in the complementary work Sexual Behavior in the Human Female (1953).
Anti-LGBTQ rhetoric comprises themes, catchphrases, and slogans that have been used in order to demean lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) people. Anti-LGBTQ rhetoric is widely considered a form of hate speech, which is illegal in countries such as the Netherlands, Norway, and Sweden.
Liberalism and progressivism within Islam involve professed Muslims who have created a considerable body of progressive thought about Islamic understanding and practice. Their work is sometimes characterized as "progressive Islam". Some scholars, such as Omid Safi, differentiate between "progressive Muslims" versus "liberal advocates of Islam". Liberal Islam originally emerged out of the Islamic revivalist movement of the 18th–19th centuries. Liberal and progressive ideas within Islam are considered controversial by some traditional Muslims, who criticize liberal Muslims on the grounds of being too Western and/or rationalistic.
Lut, also known as Lot in the Old Testament, is a prophet and messenger of God in the Qur'an. According to Islamic tradition, Lut was born to Haran and spent his younger years in Ur, later migrating to Canaan with his uncle Abraham. He was sent to the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah as a prophet, and was commanded to preach to their inhabitants on monotheism.
Sexuality in Islam contains a wide range of views and laws, which are largely predicated on the Quran, and the sayings attributed to Muhammad (hadith) and the rulings of religious leaders (fatwa) confining sexual activity to marital relationships between men and women. Sexual jurisprudence and marital jurisprudence are the codifications of Islamic scholarly perspectives and rulings on sexuality, which both in turn also contain components of Islamic family jurisprudence, Islamic marital jurisprudence, hygienical, criminal and bioethical jurisprudence.
Gay Muslims (2006) is a Channel 4 documentary about a man named Joe Zakar, produced and directed by Cara Lavan, about the experiences of five Muslim people who identify as lesbian and gay and how they challenge the heterosexual-worldview within Islam, and attempt to integrate Islam with homosexuality. It is usually a stark choice between suppressing homosexual desires and leading an undercover double life, or coming out and losing the respect and support of their families and communities.
Mukhannath was a term used in Classical Arabic and Islamic literature to describe gender-variant people, and it has typically referred to effeminate men or people with ambiguous sexual characteristics, who appeared feminine and functioned sexually or socially in roles typically carried out by women. Mukhannathun, especially those in the city of Medina, are mentioned throughout the ḥadīth literature and in the works of many early Arabic and Islamic writers. During the Rashidun era and first half of the Umayyad era, they were strongly associated with music and entertainment. During the Abbasid caliphate, the word itself was used as a descriptor for men employed as dancers, musicians, and/or comedians.
Homophobia encompasses a range of negative attitudes and feelings toward homosexuality or people who identify or are perceived as being lesbian, gay or bisexual. It has been defined as contempt, prejudice, aversion, hatred, or antipathy, may be based on irrational fear and may sometimes be attributed to religious beliefs. Homophobia is observable in critical and hostile behavior such as discrimination and violence on the basis of sexual orientations that are non-heterosexual.
Homosexuality is sexual attraction, romantic attraction, or sexual behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality is "an enduring pattern of emotional, romantic, and/or sexual attractions" exclusively to people of the same sex or gender. It "also refers to a person's sense of identity based on those attractions, related behaviors, and membership in a community of others who share those attractions."
Qur'anic hermeneutics is the study of theories of the interpretation and understanding of the Qur'an, the central text of Islam. Since the early centuries of Islam, scholars have sought to mine the wealth of its meanings by developing a variety of different methods of hermeneutics. Many of the traditional methods of interpretation are currently being challenged with a more modern or contemporary approach. The three primarily established typologies of tafsir are tradition (Sunni), opinion (Shi'i), and allegory (Sufi). The two main types of verses to be interpreted are Muhkamat and Mutashabihat. The traditional approach to hermeneutics within the Qur'an embodies an awareness of isnad. There are many challenges of addressing modern day human rights, women and minority groups through the traditional hermeneutical model.
Stephen O. Murray was an American anthropologist, sociologist, and independent scholar based in San Francisco, California. He was known for extensive scholarly work on the sociology, anthropology, and comparative history of sexual and gender minorities, on sociolinguistics, history of the social sciences, and as an important editor and organizer of scholarly work in these areas.
The relationship between religion and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) people can vary greatly across time and place, within and between different religions and sects, and regarding different forms of homosexuality, bisexuality, non-binary, and transgender identities. More generally, the relationship between religion and sexuality ranges widely among and within them, from giving sex and sexuality a rather negative connotation to believing that sex is the highest expression of the divine.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) people generally have limited or highly restrictive rights in most parts of the Middle East, and are open to hostility in others. Sex between men is illegal in 9 of the 18 countries that make up the region. It is punishable by death in four of these 18 countries. The rights and freedoms of LGBTQ citizens are strongly influenced by the prevailing cultural traditions and religious mores of people living in the region – particularly Islam.
Moojan Momen is a retired physician and historian specializing in Baháʼí studies who has published numerous books and articles about the Baháʼí Faith and Islam, especially Shia Islam, including for Encyclopædia Iranica the British Library, and is a Fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland.
Islamic family jurisprudence or Islamic family law or Muslim Family Law is the fiqh of laws and regulations related to maintaining of Muslim family, which are taken from Quran, hadith, fatwas of Muslim jurists and ijma of the Muslims. It contains pubertal, marital, sexual, child upbringing, adoption and fostering, inheritance, criminal and other related subjects. The subject mainly discusses on foster relationship, marriage, divorce, Ila, li'an, Raj'ah, Khul', Zihar, Iddah, custody and maintenance of children etc. From the political aspects, Muslim family law is a part of almost every national constitution of the world regarding religious (Muslim) laws, especially of the Muslim-majority countries.
The Ottoman Empire, which existed from the 14th century until the early 20th century, had a complex and varied approach to issues related to sexuality and gender, including those of gender and sexual minorities.
Living Out Islam: Voices of Gay, Lesbian, and Transgender Muslims is a non-fiction book by Scott Alan Kugle. It was published in 2013 by NYU Press, and it describes the lives of fifteen queer Muslims.
