Dogs in Islam

I started reading an excellent book when I was in Alexandria last week. The Sad Muslim's Guide, by Hussein Amin (brother of Galal Amin the Economist), is a book by a real progressive Muslim with rich and deep knowledge of Islam and history. I've strongly connected with almost all of what I've read of it so far, and for some reason I found myself tearing at some of the genuine progressive thoughts of this guy.

I've been abit lazy in finishing the book since I came back from Alex, but after meeting with someone who has a dog earlier this week, I decided to jump right into the chapter about dogs --which is equally as interesting as all the other chapters. She told me that after asking a Sheikh, he told her that she can only keep a guard or a shepherd dog, otherwise her clothes would be impure as a result of touching the dog's nose and she can't pray with those cloths unless washed 7 times.

I've always believed that dogs are impure (their nose and saliva), and all you need to do is wash up before a prayer if you touch a dog. But that doesn't demean their status as fine and beloved animals. I've even argued before that dogs are highly regarded and beloved animals in Islam, referencing the story of Ahl AlKahf in suret AlKahf in the Quran, and how God praised them and their dog. I've also claimed in that discussion that creating that barrier between humans (Muslims) and dogs was part of the self-control approach in Islam, and because dogs are such fine animals. So it was a mean to prevent humans from getting too attached to dogs possibly replacing human companionship in the process.

Hussein Amin starts his chapter on dogs by dedicating it to his daughter who loves dogs and who was annoyed that her religion teacher said that the prophet ordered the killing of all dogs and said that no Angels enter a house that has a dog in it (I hope he didn't make up that chapter just to please her!).

Amin says that the order of killing the dogs was a temporary order that served a certain timely need. Dogs at the time were encouraged to eat from the garbage to rid the people of it, and thus they developed a disease (alKalab), that resulted in an epidemic. The disease appeared again after the time of the prophet, and Amin thinks that some of the scholars at the time decided that the only way to get rid of the epidemic as well as dogs was by making up Hadiths, claiming that the prophet said that dogs are impure. Amin says that this in fact contradicts with the proper Hadith in AlBokhary which tells us that dogs used to walk freely in the prophet's mosque.

Amin then draws stories of how Muslims thought highly of dogs, praising their qualitites --stories from AlGahez and Dameiry. He also mentions how Imam Malek, Hassan AlBasry, Orwa IbnalZobair find dogs pure (except for washing dishes from their saliva).

Hussein Amin concludes the chapter by telling his daughter that this is what he can say about the topic, which she can use to refute the religion teacher's claim. And if the teacher insists that angels won't enter your house, then ask her if angels enter her house.

Another topic that I'm sure is interesting to many, which Amin discusses in his book, is the veil. And as I expected, I connected with him on this topic too. My logic that I described in a previous post of mine is actually not far off from what he says in explaining all (not just one like I did) versus about hijab in the Quran, adding a historical and cultural perspective to the matter.