Adultery In Islam vs. In the Judeo-Christian Tradition

in my research on the topic of polygamy in the Judeo-Christian tradition, in particular looking at the historical development of the criminalization and demoralization of polygamy by the Christian church, I came across a book entitled "The History and Philosophy of Marriage" written in 1869 by a Christian philanthropist. in the book, the author compares polygamy to monogamy through the lens of Bliblical texts with the ultimate goal of proving that polygamy is the true foundation of marriage according to the sciptural foundations of Christianity and that making marriage exclusive to monogamy has many negative social repercussions, while if polygamy is allowed, it would provide a remedy to many of the social ills plaguing society. it was while reading this treatise that i came across the following passage regarding adultery in the Bliblical tradition:

"According to the system of polygamy, if any man has intercourse with another's man's wife, they are both guilty of adultery; but if any man has intercourse with an unmarried woman, then both are guilty of fornication. That is, it is the married or unmarried state of the woman, and not of the man, that determines the nature of the crime."

i investigated this further, in particular how this differs with the Islamic tradition, and i came across the following:

Adultery is considered a sin in all religions. The Bible decrees the death sentence for both the adulterer and the adulteress (Lev. 20:10) . Islam also equally punishes both the adulterer and the adulteress (Quran 24:2). However, the Quranic definition of adultery is very different from the Biblical definition. Adultery, according to the Quran, is the involvement of a married man or a married woman in an extramarital affair. The Bible only considers the extramarital affair of a married woman as adultery (Leviticus 20:10, Deuteronomy 22:22, Proverbs 6:20-7:27).

"If a man is found sleeping with another man's wife, both the man who slept with her and the woman must die. You must purge the evil from Israel." (Deut. 22:22)

"If a man commits adultery with another man's wife both the adulterer and the adulteress must be put to death." (Lev. 20:10)

According to the Biblical definition, if a married man sleeps with an unmarried woman, this is not considered a crime at all. The married man who has extramarital affairs with unmarried women is not an adulterer and the unmarried women involved with him are not adulteresses. The crime of adultery is committed only when a man, whether married or single, sleeps with a married woman. In this case the man is considered adulterer, even if he is not married, and the woman is considered adulteress. In short, adultery is any illicit sexual intercourse involving a married woman. The extramarital affair of a married man is not per se a crime in the Bible. Why is the dual moral standard? According to Encyclopaedia Judaica, the wife was considered to be the husband's possession and adultery constituted a violation of the husband's exclusive right to her; the wife as the husband's possession had no such right to him. That is, if a man had sexual intercourse with a married woman, he would be violating the property of another man and, thus, he should be punished.

To the present day in Israel, if a married man indulges in an extramarital affair with an unmarried woman, his children by that woman are considered legitimate. But, if a married woman has an affair with another man, whether married or not married, her children by that man are not only illegitimate but they are considered bastards and are forbidden to marry any other Jews except converts and other bastards. This ban is handed down to the children's descendants for 10 generations until the taint of adultery is presumably weakened.

The Quran, on the other hand, never considers any woman to be the possession of any man. The Quran eloquently describes the relationship between the spouses by saying:

"And among His signs is that He created for you mates from among yourselves, that you may dwell in tranquillity with them and He has put love and mercy between your hearts: verily in that are signs for those who reflect." (Quran 30:21)

This is the Quranic conception of marriage: love, mercy, and tranquillity, not possession and double standards.

Taken from "Women in Islam Versus Women in the Judaeo-Christian Tradition: The Myth and The Reality" by Sherif Abdel Azim, Ph.D.- Queens University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada