A Critique and Study of Shiite and Sunni Exegeses regarding Verses of Protecting the Private Parts

The phrase “protecting the private parts” (ḥifz-i faraj) has been repeated four times in the Holy Quran in different forms and God has advised it to the believers. However, since the object of protecting the private parts has been omitted, the implication of these verses is ambiguous. Different views have been expressed regarding the answer to the question of what the intent of the legislator (God) was concerning the object of protecting the private parts, each of which has its own specific requirements and different semantic spheres. Nowadays, in the area of medical jurisprudence, of the main reasons for opposition to phenomena such as surrogacy or some forms of artificial insemination is the contradiction of these phenomena with the obligation of protecting the private parts and the evaluation of these laws is not possible without having the correct and methodical interpretation of “protecting the private parts.” Despite the foundational role of these verses in jurisprudential inferences, so far no independent argumentative work has been authored regarding the interpretation of these verses and this very theoretical vacuum has led to the emergence of sometimes incorrect and undisciplined interpretations. The present study aims to study and critique these exegeses through a descriptive-analytic method and to show that artificial insemination and surrogacy are essentially unrelated to these verses and these two are separate from each other.