Transgender In Nigeria: Panacea In The Light Of Selected Ahādīth In Ṣaḥiḥu Muslim

Abstract

In the last few decades, gender issues have taken hold of important discussion in the local and international organization despite the fact that Islam has a distinctive view on gender and sexuality compared to other religions and cultures. One of the gender issues with bone of contention is transgender through which masculinity is transferred to femininity and vice versa.  This paper therefore attempts to examine this concept among other issues on gender and sexualities as it is becoming the order of the day among the youths in the contemporary Nigerian Society. This is done with a view to using the Hadith of the Prophet recorded in Sahihu 'l-Muslim to address the issue from a religious perspective. The paper employs historical and analytical methods of research. Historical method accounts for the biography of Imam Muslim and brief information of his sahih while analytical is used in analyzing the Hadith in Satitu l-Muslim in relation to transgender. The study reveals that transgender people are as a result of excessive freedom of man to do anything he wants. It also reveals that the act of effeminating and emasculating is strictly detested in Islam. It thus concludes by proffering likely solutions to the issue of transgender in Nigeria in the light of the Prophet's tradition among which are banning of cross dressing, banishing the transgender person from the society and also constraining the influence of transgender in the society.