AT DISTANCE: Virgins, Sex and Paradise

AT DISTANCE: Virgins, Sex and Paradise

By Naomi Ragen
An excepts from the Jerusalem Post, Columns Article, July 7, 2001
Italian translation by I.C.C.I.I.

(September 6) [...] Recently, Bob Simon interviewed Muhammad Abu Wardeh on Sixty Minutes. His remarks in Arabic were translated on the program as: "God would compensate the martyr for sacrificing his life for his land. If you become a martyr, God will give you 70 virgins, 70 wives and everlasting happiness."

Now, Arab Americans are claiming in outrage that this is not only a mistranslation, but absolutely false. Maher Hathout, a Muslim "scholar" with the Islamic Center of Southern California, wrote in the Atlanta Constitution: "There is nothing in the Koran or in Islamic teachings about 70 virgins or sex in paradise. This is ridiculous, and any true Muslim knows that."

Oh, really?

Sheikh Abdul Hadi Palazzi, head of the Cultural Institute of the Italian Islamic Community, and a true Islamic scholar, had this to say: "The only ridiculous thing is that someone who claims to be an 'Islamic scholar' makes public declarations which prove beyond any possible doubt that he has never read the Commentary of Ibn Kathir and 'Sunan' of Imam at-Tirmidhi, which are basic books for the knowledge of Islam. Unfortunately, this attribution of chairs to ignoramuses seems to be the rule in American Islamic Centers controlled by the fundamentalist network of the 'Muslim Brotherhood.' "

According to Islam, Palazzi goes on to say, there are 72 wives for every believer who is admitted to Heaven, and not only for a martyr. The proof is a hadith which is collected by at-Tirmidhi in "Sunan" (volume IV, chapters on "The Features of Heaven as described by the Messenger of Allah," Chapter 21: "About the Smallest Reward for the People of Heaven," hadith 2687).

It is also quoted by Ibn Kathir in his Tafsir (Koranic Commentary) of Surah ar-Rahman (55), ayah (verse) 72: "It was mentioned by Daraj Ibn Abi Hatim, that Abu al-Haytham Abdullah Ibn Wahb narrated from Abu Sa'id al-Khudhri, who heard the Prophet Muhammad (Allah's blessings and peace be upon him) saying: 'The smallest reward for the people of Heaven is an abode where there are 80,000 servants and 72 wives, over which stands a dome decorated with pearls, aquamarine and ruby, as wide as the distance from al-Jabiyyah to San'a.' Ibn Kathir explained in 'al-Bidayah wa an-Nihayah' that al-Jabiyyah is the name of a suburb of Damascus.

"That those 72 wives are virgin is proved by the ayah 74 of the same Surah: "No man or jinn has ever touched them before." [...]
http://www.amislam.com/virgins.htm