drops in eyes and fasting

May Allah reward you for your explanations, they were of great benefit.

It would be greatly appreciated and of benefit if a response was given, if you have time in sha Allah.

 

I maybe simplifying this issue but what I’ve learned is that taste alone doesn’t invalidate the fast, it’s when this taste (admixture with saliva) is deliberately swallowed into the stomach. So what does it matter if the tastebuds react to the kohl or eyedrops in the mouth , one just simply spits it out, much like when a cook taste the food out of fear the recipient’s displeasure he would taste the food and spit out the saliva.

Personally I’ve applied Kohl during fasting and through my express I have yet to feel it in my nose , let alone my throat for that matter.

But this does bring an interesting question , what about when it comes to crying and tears?! It definitely drains into the nose that’s why we get a runny nose, but yet again I have yet to ever tasted my tears from the back draining of the nasal cavity, unless we mean by snorting the phlegm pileup and hawking it out , then I believe we’ve all been through that.

Having read the anatomy in the prior posts and some google I felt it could easily be simplified a simple such
:

our eyes have two draining routes
located in the upper and lower eyelids called puncta which have canals that move tears to a sac where the lids are attached to the side of the nose (lacrimal sac). From there tears flow down a duct (the nasolacrimal duct) draining into the nose. (https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/blocked-tear-duct/symptoms-causes/syc-20351369)


We have solids and liquids to deal with.

As for solids for example the kohl, particles (which must be very small to even drain through the puncta) end up in the nose and rarely ever reach the throat directly because they let are drained to the nose first, and if by chance they reach the throat or mouth, it must be at tiny levels ; such levels that are insignificant (similar to the water that is left after doing wudu, especially those from rising the mouth and nose). At this point if one were to taste it he can simply spit it out.

The main issue is with liquids , moving along the same lines , if we are to reject the application of eye drops or the like , with regards to the Rule (Masam YES Manfaz NO) then equally so can be said of Tears , that have exited the lacrimal glands and drained through the lacrimal sacs and if in excess will going into the nose and potentially the throat mouth.

Keeping in mind that it can’t be treated like the absorption of water or sweat
through pores, will this be grounds for a fatwa which says to restrict crying in excess while fasting ?! I hope not.

It is not to undermine the point that the Nasopharynx is in direct communication with oropharynx, Our mouth (oral cavity) is the most direct communication with the oropharynx hence why the hadith cautioning using excess water in the nose and mouth makes sense in light of modern science,
but it is not the case with the lacrimal sac, nasolacrimal duct which all lead primarily to the nasal cavity , and only if leaked through the back of the nasal cavity does it go to the nasopharynx.

To concurs to this would cause a fallacy affirming the consequent which is to say that eyes directly lead to the throat

Premise 1: The eye has a “direct “ passage to the nose,
Premise 2: the nose has a “direct “ passage to the throat

conclusion : Therefore the eye has a “direct passage to the throat .

The first two is sound but the conclusion isn’t.


Given that we have a method to avoid
to prevent such a taste from happening which is by gently pressing on the tear duct for a minute or so after applying the eye drop (https://patient.info/news-and-features/how-to-use-eye-drops)

I feel like this can be easily taught and patients can use this technique and not worry about any taste at all.

 

@SaadSohail
with due respect brother, your questions are also fallacies. will point them out when i get time. in sha'Allah.

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mufti abdun nabi's fatwa is no different than mufti qasim's and both have severe flaws in reasoning.

a hint: which naSS states that something entering from masam does not break the fast, and that entering from manfaz breaks the fast?

 

i have seen the response below. will answer as soon as i get some time. in sha'Allah.

 

Aoa, brother abu Hassan. I am a medical doctor by profession. You can ask any doctor if you wish, all doctors deal this as a fact that the naslo-lacrimal duct is a route- a passage- that provides a conduit for the flow of tears from the eyes to the nasal cavity. In case of blockade of this duct, this leads to excessive lacrimation-tearing. The Nasal cavity communicates directly with the throat or the oropharynx.

Answering your questions:

if the illah is that, "if it is established, that a passage exists between eyes and throat (howsoever small), and if anything reaches the throat from this 'route' of the eyes, the fast is broken", then we need to answer:

1. what about washing/splashing water on eyes and water entering the same passage?

This is something that is impossible to avoid especially in wudu, therefore the fast would not break. Wudu itself, is impossible to avoid for a muslim intending to read namaz.

Utilizing ear drops, is not something that is impossible to avoid. It IS avoidable.


2. what about tears entering the passage?

What about Saliva entering the throat, produced in your mouth by the salivary glands? Again this is something that is impossible to avoid.

3. what about kohl entering the passage?

the third one is very important here. this poses a major problem as follows:

1. according to all the citations from hanafi books [unbeknown has pointed this out] the illah of the fast not breaking even if the taste is felt in the throat is because, it reaches there by the pores/masaam.

2. so, according to contemporary scholars, if this is mistaken understanding by earlier ulama as they didn't know that a passage exists, then it follows that the fast should break - because the kohl enters the throat by the passage / manfadh and so also eye drops and anything else.

3. if the above is true, that is according to "modern research" kohl entering the throat by way of eyes, breaks the fast, then how do you explain the hadith that RasulAllah sallAllahu alayhi wa sallam applied kohl while fasting? who amongst us will dare to say (ma'adhAllah) that it was because of not knowing...? al-iyadhu billah.


This doesnot change the rule.

1) an accepted principle of Hanafi Fiqh, which is that anything which enters the throat or stomach through the pores does not invalidate the fast. Rather, when something reaches the throat or stomach through any routes or passages, only then does it invalidate the fast.

According to the jurists,
1) Prophet Mohammad (صلى الله عليه وسلم) wore Kohl during Ramadan. Therefore
2)“Surma can be applied at any time, and even if the colour of the surma reaches the throat, there is still no problem, as it passed through the pores [masam]. There is no such hole (passage) in the eyes like in the nose and ears that invalidates the fast if something enters it.” [Fatawa Ridawiyyah 10:511]
3)The reason as to why the fast will not break, even if the taste of the medicine (eyedrop) is sensed in the throat, is because the medicine that is inserted into the eyes reaches the throat through pores (masam) and not through a specific manfaz (passage).

1 is a fact. 2 and 3 (the highlighted part) is an attempt to explain why 1 is a fact and also rationalize why putting medicines in the eye can be permissible. This attempt or more precisely the reasoning doesn't stand tall in front of what has been proven without a doubt on anatomical models, eye scans and even treating different disease etiology. Niether does it (putting eyedrops) stand tall at the face of the hanafi rule stated earlier i.e. Rather, when something reaches the throat or stomach through any routes or passages, only then does it invalidate the fast.

The fact (1), however, remains the fact.

The methodology is to treat 1 as a fact i.e Prophet Mohammad (صلى الله عليه وسلم) wore it and WEARING KOHL DOESNOT BREAK the fast without even delving into WHY IT DOESN'T. Because seriously THIS DOESNOT NEED ANY EXPLAINATION.

However, at the same time necessarily comitting to the ruling that EYEDROPS invalidate the fast?
Why?
Because if this is not done, THEN it would undermine the HANAFI RULE ITSELF, in the light of evidence that nasolacrimal duct is a passage, which is "when something reaches the throat or stomach through any routes or passages, only then does it invalidate the fast." and one could ask the question

"Why does putting eye drops not invalidate the fast where as drinking or eating medicine does, when both of them ultimately lead through passages to the throat*?"
*Nasopharynx is in direct communication with oropharynx.

Or
one can undermine the scientific evidence itself claiming that nasolacrimal duct is an indirect passage, which is what you are attempting to try, i guess.

 

bump.

 

I know, I just posted the ruling for anyone who is unaware and may be reading this.

 

the premise that there is a passage between eye and throat is itself flawed. there is a route, true, but it is not a direct route as amply demonstrated below. let us discount everything i have said below. let us cite mufti qasim zia sahib, from this fatwa here.

let us read it with some key words emphasised.

This is the lacrimal punctum. When you produce tears or have another liquid in your eyes, some of it drains
---> into these holes
---> and then into the lacrimal sac,
---> the nasolacrimal duct,
---> and eventually into the back of your nose
---> and throat, where you might get a taste.’
​

so where is this direct passage like that of the nose and mouth?

---

apart from mere conjecture about previous fuqaha that they did not know, people have glossed over a much bigger thing.

our hanafi imams have asserted that our scholars allowed kohl, because of the Hadith (see badayiy and others) - that RasulAllah sallAllahu alayhi wa sallam applied kohl while fasting; does the theory that 'previous scholars were not aware of this passage' still hold, or is superseded by the action of the shaari'y?

if the illah is that, "if it is established, that a passage exists between eyes and throat (howsoever small), and if anything reaches the throat from this 'route' of the eyes, the fast is broken", then we need to answer:

1. what about washing/splashing water on eyes and water entering the same passage?
2. what about tears entering the passage?
3. what about kohl entering the passage?

the third one is very important here. this poses a major problem as follows:

1. according to all the citations from hanafi books [unbeknown has pointed this out] the illah of the fast not breaking even if the taste is felt in the throat is because, it reaches there by the pores/masaam.

2. so, according to contemporary scholars, if this is mistaken understanding by earlier ulama as they didn't know that a passage exists, then it follows that the fast should break - because the kohl enters the throat by the passage / manfadh and so also eye drops and anything else.

3. if the above is true, that is according to "modern research" kohl entering the throat by way of eyes, breaks the fast, then how do you explain the hadith that RasulAllah sallAllahu alayhi wa sallam applied kohl while fasting? who amongst us will dare to say (ma'adhAllah) that it was because of not knowing...? al-iyadhu billah.

mabsut sarakhsi, v3 p67:



4. and unlike other cases, there is not warning about being careful in fasting either. [in the hadith, RasulAllah sallAllahu alayhi wa sallam said, rinse your mouth and wash your nose freely except when you are fasting - and be careful when you are fasting.]

badayiy al-sanayiy, v2 p606

why is there no warning on being careful in not letting water in the eyes? who amongst us will dare to say (ma'adhAllah) that it was because of not knowing...? al-iyadhu billah.

5. also, if you say that it is a special case (that is, applying kohl) then you should specify why so.


wAllahu a'alam.​

 

@Umar99 I am not saying that injections will invalidate the fast. My point is that the reasoning applied to make injections permissible is also applicable to that of eye drops.

If injecting through the needles is allowed - and needle sizes maybe comparable or larger than that of the puncta - then why should eye drops be disallowed - whereas scholars down the centuries have allowed them? Add to that the fact that the former is deliberate and the latter incidental.

If you want to take the approach of scholars who declared it impermissible, then you should disallow kohl as well.

See the information posted below which proves that the argument that past scholars did not know about the puncta is untenable and inadmissible.

See the punctum sizes posted by sidi abu Hasan in post#12 below and compare it to the needle sizes here.

Note that the thinnest is 33 gauge and about 100 microns. And not everyone uses that thin needles.




Allah knows best.

 

"pores between the eyes and throat" sounds like bad anatomy, and does not make sense.

----
pores are tiny openings; so the lacrimal puncta can be treated as a pore. manafidh are open passages/pathways. in badayiy, this is even demarcated:




"...the bodily orifices such as nose, ear or anus..."

===

 

imam sarakhsi also considers it analogous to dust and smoke.



===
if we treat the nasolacrimal punctum as a passage, pathway, 'route' etc. then why do we gloss over the fact that it opens in the nose and not in the throat? from the anatomy we have read, there is no DIRECT passage from the eyes to the throat. specialists, please correct, if i am wrong.

with that caveat, read imam sarakhsi's fatwa.

 

in this fatwa: http://www.seekerspath.co.uk/?p=7090 in sha'Allah, we will examine some aspects post-ramadan, but here are some more quick points:

----
just for perspective, in badayiy al-Sanayiy: 2/608:

if a person fasting applies kohl in the eyes, the fast does not break
even if he feels the taste in his throat, according to most ulama.

ibn abi layla said: this will break the fast.

as for us [hanafis]: our proof is the hadith reported by abdullah ibn mas'ud raDiyAllahu anhu who said: "RasulAllah sallAllahu alayhi wa sallam came out [of his house] in ramaDan and his eyes were full of kohl; umm salamah had applied kohl in his eyes."

this is because there is no direct pathway from the eye to the stomach/abdomen, nor to the brain [i.e. the frontal sinuses]; so the taste that one experiences is because of the traces [trickling down?] not because the thing itself is dropped per se [ayn]; and like dust and smoke it does not invalidate the fast.

similarly, if one applies oil in his hair [i.e. the head] or his body and it is absorbed, this will not harm - because it is the traces that reach, not that the substance reaches directly....​

====

 

One point I noticed regarding this voluntary/involuntary distinction is that the respected mawlana himself has used an involuntary occurrence [which does not break the fast] as valid proof for a voluntary act - that it will not break the fast too.

I mean his fatwa about injections available here in which he writes:

Three proofs will be presented regarding this.

1. The fast does not become invalid from a snake bite, even though the poison from a snake bite enters the body, but despite this even then, the respected scholars of Fiqh have not regarded this as something which invalidates the fast. Rather, they have included this amongst those legally valid excuses due to which it is permissible to break the fast.
​

Thus the case of snake bites [an involuntary occurrence - which people try to avoid rather than risk] is being used as one of the proofs for the permissibly of injections [a completely voluntary act].

To say that it has only been used as proof because it proves that something that is injected into the flesh does not invalidate the fast - would in fact be arguing the standard hanafi position in regards to eye drops. Because in this case you have overlooked the "voluntary" "involuntary" distinction.

So does the position regarding permissibility of medicine in the eye.

Another point worth noting is that in case of eye drops or lenses, the seeping into the nose is completely incidental - no one deliberately injects medicine in the nose - whereas in the case of injections the intent is to inject it in the muscle/veins.

What a big difference between the two - and yet - we are told that the one is completely impermissible and breaks the fast while the other is completely permissible.

We know that saline I.V drips actually help to re-hydrate the body and yet it is said to not affect the fast but eye drops have no effect on the maqasid of fasting but are absolutely disallowed.

I am unable to come to terms with this fatwa which is said to have the backing of 300 muftis.

Allah knows best.

 

An Untold Story: the Important Contributions of Muslim Scholars for the Understanding of Human Anatomy [link to PDF file]

Quote from PDF pg#13:

The nose (S5) has two pathways that end at the bone that resembles the filter (cribriform plate of the ethmoid bone), which lead to the two processes that look like nipples (olfactory bulb). The membrane of the brain (dura mater) is also pierced at this place to allow the odors to
penetrate these openings. Interestingly, ibn Sina described the nasolacrimal duct and reported the presence of two channels between the inner corner of the eyes and the inner side of the nose, which explains the tasting of tears.

---

S5 is the fifth section of of his, Al-Qanun fi Al-Tibb (The Canon of Medicine).

This was in the late 10th century and early 11th century C.E. - almost a millennium ago.

As is evident from the above paper (and several articles across the internet, see this one for instance), some of history's greatest advancements in ophthalmology came from Muslim lands. We need not wait for Gray and Carter to tell us about tear ducts almost 900 years later.

---

Remember that Sadr-al-shari'ah came from a family of physicians (hakeems) and he was a hakeem himself. And Alahazrat was an empiricist par excellence, see his Ĥusn at-Támmum li Bayāni Ĥadd at-Tayammum to get a feel of his research capabilities. And see this post by sidi abu Hasan as well.

When these giants put their pens to paper, the ink did not despoil the face of the parchment with assumptions and conjectures, it only traced knowledge, in gilded lettering.

wa lillaahil Hamd

 

From the first fatwa:

I am still trying to understand why the knowledge of the presence of the lacrimal duct is being billed as "new" research.

For a start we have Gray's Anatomy whose first edition was published way back in 1858. It's publication history shows that it has seen several editions since and with each successive edition, newer material kept on being added to it.

However, the lacrimal apparatus was described in the first edition itself - see pages 566-567 of the first edition here.

Even if we assume (and quite a big assumption that would be) that he was the first to describe it - it still seems rather an impossibility that this information did not become widespread even in the next half a century (till 1900) - for Alahazrat and Sadr al-Shari'ah, not to mention scores of other scholars, to remain ignorant about it. Note that the British had established themselves in India long before 1858.

See this paper: Physicians of colonial India (1757–1900)

I recommend reading the following section of the above paper in full: Phase 2 (1820–1900): The Game of State Patronage.

It will give you a sense of how much information and knowledge was exchanged between the West and the East and even translated into native languages.

To quote the opening lines:

In 1822, the British set up the Native Medical Institution (NMI) to prepare medical staff for the SMS. Courses were taught in Urdu and included both Western and Indian medical concepts.[9,10,11,13] Similarly, Sanskrit College in Calcutta, founded in 1824, also imparted medical education to Indians in both Western and Indian medicine.[9,10]

------

But that is not all.

See this paper: Origins of lacrimal surgery, and evolution of dacryocystorhinostomy to the present.

I will quote just the first sentence:

The creation of an alternative pathway from the lacrimal sac into the nose has been practiced for over two millennia.

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In the light of the above, the claim that scholars till as late as Alahazrat's time did not know about the presence of these ducts and assumed them to be pores is rendered highly questionable - untenable even.

With due respect to all these scholars, there is no positive proof that Alahazrat and Sadr-al-Shari'ah or for that matter any of the earlier scholars did not know about these passages and assumed them to be pores.

If anyone has such a proof, they are very welcome to share it.

What is more likely is that, due their insignificant dimensions, they classified these ducts as pores and hence used the specific technical term.

At the very least, they were consistent in their treatment of this duct - when they excused, they excused everything - water, tears, surma, medicine.

But with the revised position - the axe has fallen squarely on the eye-drops alone.

---

Allah knows best.