It's easy enough to look up in the Koran and see what it says about weaning -- it is clearly in the context of a divorcing couple, and says that the child is entitled to his minimum full two years of breastfeeding, so the mom gets custody until the child is two, after which the child can go to the dad. Dad must pay a wetnurse til the child is two if he takes the child earlier. These are clearly MINIMUM rules, not MAXIMUM rules. Don't have a Koran handy to quote the exact verse and words, but I've studied this at some length. Many Muslims think the Koran guideline about 2 years means maximum, rather than minimum, just as many US pediatricians thought the old American Academy of Pediatrics guidelines meant a maximum of 12 months of breastfeeding when they really just said "don't introduce cow's milk til 6-12 months of age, before that either breastfeed or use formula." That's why the AAP was so careful in 1997 to state explicitly that one year was the MINIMUM. Unfortunately, I still hear people saying that the AAP recommends "one year" of breastfeeding, no more/no less. So don't be surprised if some Muslims are not familiar with the Koran. By the way, I looked at many different versions/publications/dates of the Koran, all in English, and they all said the same thing -- 2 years is the minimum. The Koran gives no guidelines at all about how long to nurse if the parents are not getting divorced. Katherine A. Dettwyler, Ph.D. _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com *********************************************** The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(TM) mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html