Enlightening Your Minds: Prohibition of Alcohol in Islam

Surah Al Baqarah(2:219)- Wisdom behind prohibition of Alcohol

They ask you about intoxicants and games of chance. Say: In both of them there is a great sin and means of profit for men, and their sin is greater than their profit. And they ask you as to what they should spend. Say: What you can spare. Thus does Allah make clear to you the communications, that you may ponder

M Shakir’s Quran Translation

Let us see what harms of alcohol.

Use of alcohol can be classified as:

Abstinent

No use is made.

Controlled
People have made a conscious decision, have evaluated the risks and ‘may’ stop if they want but there is always an element of doubt that they their use might change to ‘impulsive’.

Impulsive
Use is unpredictable and can lead to unexpected accidents and harm. However, there is no continual use or dependency.

Habitual
The use of alcohol or drugs has become a significant and important part of the person’s life-style. Stopping would not be easy.

Dependent
There is a high degree of physical and psychological addiction. Alcohol and drug use disrupts or rules the person’s life. Stopping is not possible without considerable support.

Out of the above-mentioned five categories only the abstinent one are safe. Rest all are, directly or indirectly, suffering from the following harms of alcohol.

Alcohol has following types of harms:

1-It leads to other grave sins

2-Psychological harms

Alcohol the mother of sins:

Alcohol leads to many other grave sins. Continual or large scale use of alcohol has a bad effect on most people’s sex-life. The high rates of incest (sexual relations with close relations like son with mother, brother with sister etc) and rape in the European countries are due to the large consumption of alcohol in those countries.

Psychological Harms:

It may perpetuate your shyness, anxiety, depression, unhappiness etc. rather than dealing with it.

They allow us to feel a temporary confidence or happiness, but the effect is usually one of borrowed time. Often the unhappiness or anxiety returns even more strongly once the effects wear off.

Drink and drugs can cause psychological problems by themselves. Alcohol can commonly cause depression; drugs can also cause depression, or can trigger anxiety or even psychosis (loss of reality).

3-Medical harms

4-Social Harms

Also Read: Enlightening Your Minds: Women and Education in Islam