Saudi Scholar Nixes Biofuels as Un-Islamic

In an amusingly self-serving ruling, Muhammad an-Najimi, a Saudi member of the prestigious Islamic Fiqh Academy of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, issued a tentative personal opinion (less binding than a fatwa) to Muslims that filling the gas tank with biofuels is sinful: "I warn Saudis who live abroad and who use alcohol instead of petrol that this case is related and falls within the parameters of what the prophet said." He refers here to a hadith in which Muhammad prohibited the buying, selling, transporting, drinking, or manufacturing of alcohol.

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Najimi acknowledges that the issue "needs to be studied by the relevant religious bodies." A Christian Science Monitor article points out the implications of this opinion: More...

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