Intra-familial Boundaries from the Viewpoint of Psychology and the Holy Quran

Internal family boundaries are among the most important issues which concern the interactions between family members and were presented in the constructivist approach for the first time. The present study aimed to explain the intra-family boundaries according to the Holy Quran. Thus, 83 verses and 70 interpretive narratives about intra-family boundaries were analyzed with the help of a religious Ijtihad method. The results showed the five important findings that are as follows: First, the intra-family boundaries are clearly explained in the verses of the Holy Quran, this pattern covers the suggestive frame of the constructivist approach, and its sub-systems and boundaries qualitatively and quantitatively have a more comprehensiveness. Second, all rules of inter-personal morality and legal rulings (obligatory, forbidden, supererogatory, and detestable), which concern the internal interactions between family members and triple sub-systems, are named as the internal flexible and inflexible boundaries. Third, special marital commitment, the limits of couples' sexual interactions, the limits of couples' two-way expectations, private mental-physical areas, marital secrecy, and flexibility about each other are among the most significant boundaries of the marital sub-system. Fourth, the boundaries of the parental sub-system are as follows: banning children from entering parents' psycho-physical arena, separating children's beds from parents', avoidance of parents and the children from looking at each other's private organs, being banned parents from not responding to children, and prohibition of disclaimer of responsibility towards children. Fifth, in addition to men's and women's moral and sexual boundaries, the following are among the most important boundaries of brothers' and sisters' sub-system: adhering to physical limits such as keeping children's beds separate and seeking permission for entering another's privacy, keeping mental privacy, and prohibiting spying on each other's work.