Shariah does not merely tolerate slavery as a tragic relic of the past; it builds a specific category of human beings whose bodies are defined as lawful sexual property. In the language of the Quran, they are “those whom your right hands possess.” These are slaves and captives of war, overwhelmingly women and girls taken from non-Muslim populations. Under Islamic law, they may be bought, sold, inherited, and used sexually by their owners without marriage and without any need for their consent.

This is not a fringe idea. It is rooted directly in the Quran, reinforced by hadith about Muhammad’s own treatment of female prisoners, codified in classical legal manuals, and revived openly by jihadist movements in modern times. When Islamic State fighters kidnapped Yazidi women in Iraq, they published pamphlets defending their right to rape captives by quoting the Quran and early jurists. Boko Haram in Nigeria has done the same. Their atrocities are not a betrayal of Shariah; they are an ugly but honest expression of it.

From a biblical perspective, this practice is a direct assault on Jehovah’s design. Scripture presents sexual intimacy as belonging only within the covenant of marriage, one man and one woman bound together in a lifelong union. A woman’s body is not merchandise to be traded; she is created in the image of God. Forcing sex on anyone, especially under the guise of religious law, is condemned by God as violence and wickedness. The fact that Shariah gives a religious justification for raping non-Muslim women reveals the spiritual darkness behind the system.

“Those Whom Your Right Hands Possess”: Captives as Sexual Property

Across the Quran, a recurring phrase appears: “your spouses or those whom your right hands possess.” The first group refers to lawful wives joined through a marriage contract and dowry. The second group refers to slaves, especially female slaves acquired through conquest or purchase. The wording is coldly possessive. A man’s right hand is the symbol of his power and ownership; what it “possesses” belongs to him as property.

Shariah jurists built a detailed doctrine on this simple expression. They taught that a man may have sexual relations with his wife and with any female slave he rightfully owns. No marriage contract is required with the slave. There is no need for her consent. She is not a partner but an object. Her owner may use her body for his pleasure whenever he wishes, limited only by rules about menstruation and certain forms of intercourse. He may sell her to someone else, ending her sexual availability to him and transferring it to the new buyer. He may give her away as a gift. If she bears him children, her status shifts in some schools of law, but she never becomes his free and equal wife.

These rules draw a sharp line between Muslim and non-Muslim women. A free Muslim woman cannot be raped openly without serious consequences under Shariah’s social expectations, although as we saw in the previous article, the evidentiary rules still work against her. But a non-Muslim woman captured in jihad and made a slave loses any claim to bodily autonomy. The legal categories do not even classify sex with her as zina, because her owner is considered to have a right to her. Her “consent” is irrelevant; the law defines her as sexually available.

In the Christian worldview, such a concept is unthinkable. The Apostle Paul commands Christian men to treat older women as mothers and younger women as sisters, with all purity. He tells believers that their bodies belong to the Lord first, not to human owners. The idea that a person could be defined as sexual property simply because a warrior’s “right hand” seized her in battle has no place in the Kingdom of Christ. Yet in Shariah, that phrase becomes a door through which generations of exploitation have marched.

Quran 4:24 and Muhammad’s Treatment of Female Prisoners

The key verse used to justify sexual access to captives is found in Quran 4:24. After listing categories of women forbidden in marriage—such as mothers, sisters, daughters, and married women—it adds an exception: “except those whom your right hands possess.” That exception is historically understood to mean that even if a captive woman is already married, her marriage is annulled by her capture, and her new Muslim owner may use her sexually.

This verse is linked to specific incidents in Muhammad’s career. Early Islamic sources describe battles in which Muslim fighters captured women from enemy tribes, some of whom were married. The men hesitated to have intercourse with them because of their existing husbands. Quran 4:24 is presented as the revelation that resolved their dilemma. By declaring captive women an exception, it effectively nullified their prior unions and opened the door to concubinage.

Hadith collections record multiple episodes where Muhammad and his companions took female prisoners and used them sexually. At one oasis, after the men were killed or enslaved, women were distributed as war booty. Muhammad is said to have selected a particularly attractive captive for himself, making her part of his household as a concubine. In another event, fighters asked him about practicing withdrawal with captive women to avoid impregnation; instead of condemning the entire idea of sleeping with them, he addressed their technical question, thereby acknowledging the practice as lawful.

Classical commentators do not hide these stories. They present them as examples of God’s mercy toward Muslim warriors, allowing them to enjoy the spoils of war. The female captives are portrayed as beneficiaries of Islam because, by being enslaved in a Muslim household, they have left “ignorance” behind. Their suffering, violation, and loss of family are rarely considered. The focus is on the rights of the captors and the regulations governing their use of slaves.

From a Christian perspective, this raises a fundamental moral question. If Muhammad is the model for all time, and if the Quran is Allah’s unchanging word, then the sexual use of captives is permanently built into Islam’s moral code. Muslim scholars who wish to end slavery today must argue on pragmatic or humanitarian grounds, but they cannot point to any Quranic verse or prophetic example that categorically forbids owning or sexually using slaves. They are trapped by their own sources.

Jehovah, by contrast, consistently moves His people toward protecting the vulnerable. While the Old Testament world knew slavery as an institution, the Law restricted it sharply, condemned kidnapping, required man-stealers to be put to death, and forbade Israel from treating fellow Hebrews as chattel. The trajectory of Scripture leads away from bondage and exploitation, not toward sanctifying them. Shariah’s affirmation of concubinage stands on the opposite trajectory.

Historical Slave Markets and Concubinage

For centuries after Muhammad’s death, the doctrine of “those whom your right hands possess” translated into a vast network of slave markets across the Islamic world. From North Africa to the Middle East, from Central Asia to the Indian Ocean, Muslim traders bought and sold human beings. Men were taken for labor and as soldiers; women and girls were taken for domestic work and sexual use.

Caravans transported captives from sub-Saharan Africa, Eastern Europe, India, and other regions into Muslim lands. In many cases, non-Muslim villages were raided for the express purpose of taking women and children as booty. These captives were marched long distances, often in chains, and sold in bustling markets where buyers examined their bodies, questioned their age, and bargained over prices. Manuals of fiqh, Islamic jurisprudence, laid out rules for these transactions, specifying how defects should be disclosed and what rights owners had over their slaves.

Within Muslim households, concubinage became commonplace. Wealthy men amassed large harems of wives and concubines, sometimes numbering in the dozens or hundreds. Poorer men might own only one or two slaves. In either case, the pattern was the same: a master could take a female slave to his bed at will. If she bore him a child, some schools of law accorded her a higher status as the “mother of his child,” protecting her from sale and granting her freedom upon his death. Yet even then, she had no say in whether the relationship would exist; it was imposed by ownership.

Many of the most famous women in Islamic history—mothers of caliphs, poets in royal courts, influential figures in palaces—were originally slaves and concubines. Their stories are often told as romantic tales of rise from captivity to favor. Yet behind the romance lies a hard reality: their sexual availability was compelled. Their journey to influence began with the loss of their freedom and their bodily autonomy.

Christian and Jewish communities living under Muslim rule knew this threat all too well. Raids could tear their daughters away, leaving families bereft. Parents feared for their girls, knowing that if they were seized, their bodies would become the property of strangers. Even when treaties or taxes offered some protection, the underlying theology remained: non-Muslim women were legitimate slaves in a world governed by Shariah.

Over time, Western pressure and economic changes led many Muslim-majority states to abolish formal slavery. Yet these reforms were often framed as political necessities, not as obedience to a clear Islamic command. The texts that once authorized concubinage were not repudiated; they were simply shelved. That is why jihadist groups in the modern era have been able to take them down off the shelf and put them back into practice.

Jihadist Revival of the Practice (ISIS, Boko Haram, etc.)

When the so-called Islamic State swept across parts of Iraq and Syria, they did not only impose dress codes and Shariah courts. They resurrected the institution of sexual slavery in the most explicit way seen in generations. Fighters captured thousands of Yazidi women and girls, labelling them “spoils of war.” They separated females from males, executed many of the men, and then distributed the survivors as property.

ISIS did not hide what they were doing. They published detailed tracts explaining the rules of owning and using female slaves. These documents cited Quran 4:24 and other verses, as well as statements from early jurists, to argue that believers had a right to have intercourse with their captives, even if the captives were married. They discussed whether a man could have sex with a prepubescent girl, whether he could beat or sell his slave, and how to divide the booty among fighters. The language was chilling, but it was thoroughly grounded in classical Shariah.

Boko Haram, the jihadist group in Nigeria, followed a similar pattern. They abducted Christian schoolgirls, forced them into marriages or concubinage, and justified it as enforcement of Islamic law. Videos showed commanders boasting that they would “sell the girls in the market” and stating that this was allowed by their religion. Once again, the pattern matched the doctrine of “right hand possession.”

Many Muslims worldwide were horrified by these actions and condemned them. Yet when asked to provide a clear textual basis in the Quran or Sunnah that permanently forbids sexual slavery, they struggled. Some argued from general Quranic themes of kindness and mercy; others appealed to modern human rights. Jihadists dismissed these arguments as weak and un-Islamic, pointing back to the explicit examples of Muhammad and his companions.

From a Christian apologetic stance, this exposes a critical fault line. If a religion’s foundational texts and earliest leaders openly practice something as evil as sexual slavery, those who wish to abandon it must in effect admit that their sources are morally deficient. Yet orthodox Islam insists that the Quran and Muhammad are perfect. Thus, the system remains vulnerable to revivalist movements that seek to “restore” the original practices, including concubinage.

Jehovah’s Word, by contrast, offers no such ammunition to predators. No prophet of the true God ever claimed the right to seize women in war and rape them as a sign of divine favor. When Israel sinned sexually, they did so in defiance of His Law, not in obedience to it. Jesus Christ, the final and greater Prophet, never took a woman to Himself at all, let alone by force. His example cannot be weaponized to justify sexual violence.

Theological Justification for Raping Infidel Women

At the deepest level, Shariah’s allowance of sexual use of captives rests on a particular theology of the non-Muslim. In this view, the unbeliever—especially the polytheist or idol worshiper—is fundamentally unclean. His life, property, and family are subject to the claims of jihad. When Muslim armies fight “in the path of Allah,” they are entitled to the spoils of war. This includes not only land and goods, but also human beings.

Women from conquered peoples are thus redefined. They are no longer seen as wives and daughters within their own communities but as loot—gifts from Allah to the victorious. Their previous religious ties and marital vows are considered null. Islamic jurists argue that by capturing them, Muslims have severed their old allegiances and placed them under a new legal order. Within that order, a Muslim man owning a slave is seen as bringing her under the protection of Islam, even while violating her sexually.

Consent is not central to this theology. What matters is the status change. A free unbelieving woman might have some protections, depending on treaties or dhimma arrangements. A slave, by contrast, is a commodity. So long as certain formalities are respected, the master’s use of her is framed as lawful and even meritorious. Some texts portray captives who accept Islam and bear children as especially blessed, as though their forced situation has been turned into something beautiful.

Jihadist ideologues push this logic to its limit. They claim that raping captive women humbles the enemies of Allah, spreads Islam’s influence, and demonstrates the reality of Quranic promises. In their propaganda, infidel women are trophies, living proof that Allah has given them victory. They quote early reports of Muhammad’s companions rejoicing in their captives as precedent.

This theological framework is entirely incompatible with the Gospel. In Christ, there is no ethnic or national superiority. All have sinned, and all who believe are one in Him. The Church is never authorized to treat unbelievers as subhuman or to abuse them as a sign of divine blessing. Instead, Christians are commanded to love their enemies, to do good to those who persecute them, and to use whatever power they have to serve, not to dominate.

Shariah’s justification for raping non-Muslim women reveals that its vision of God is radically different from the God of Scripture. A deity who calls men to take women as sexual spoils is not the holy and righteous Jehovah who defends the fatherless and the widow. A prophet who personally participates in concubinage is not the sinless Son of God who laid down His life for the undeserving. When we compare the two systems, the contrast is absolute.

For the Christian apologist, this article is not written to foster hatred of individual Muslims. Many Muslims are themselves ignorant of these aspects of their tradition, or they feel deep discomfort when they encounter them. Rather, the goal is to expose the theological foundations that allow such abuses to persist and to point toward the only One who can truly liberate both oppressor and oppressed.

The Lord Jesus Christ offers a kingdom where no woman is ever property, where no captive is ever a trophy, and where every believer—male or female, Jew or Gentile—is loved, honored, and protected. He purchased that kingdom not by enslaving others but by allowing Himself to be bound, mocked, and killed. Any law that legalizes sexual assault on non-Muslim women stands under His judgment and must be rejected by all who love truth and justice.

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