Animal Protection through Islamic Shariah

Abstract

This research aims to address animal protection and highlight ways to preserve it, and its impact on the environment in general, to achieve the required ecological balance. The problem with this research lies in many people's lack of awareness of Islamic law's stance on animals, its unique approach to their protection, and avoiding harm to them while preserving them. The importance of the research lies in demonstrating the Islamic law's concern for animals, and how it preceded all human laws in ensuring their rights and protection from all forms of assault. The research adopted an inductive method in collecting the subject's vocabulary by referring to the Quran and Sunnah, and the most famous books of the imams and scholars who addressed this issue. The research also adopted a descriptive-analytical method in analyzing texts, highlighting their universal relationships, extracting principles and rules to regulate this issue, and demonstrating its features. The study reached several conclusions, the most important of which are: that Islamic law preceded all laws and situational studies in protecting animals and ensuring their rights, including the right to life, care, and compassion, and preventing any form of assault on these rights. Also, protecting animals and preserving them is one of the causes of stability and ecological balance that the world is striving to achieve. The study recommends the importance of paying attention to animals as one of the most important elements of the environment, conducting research studies on how to protect and preserve them, creating natural reserves to protect rare species from extinction, providing veterinary care, and other means that ensure animal protection to achieve ecological balance.