Imam Muhsin Hendricks

Imam Muhsin Hendricks, widely considered to be the first openly gay imam, was born in Cape Town, South Africa, in June 1967.  His family was traditional Muslim; his grandfather was an Islamic cleric. Hendricks recounts his heritage and early life in a 2020 interview: “My forefathers are a mixture of Indonesian and Indian background. They were brought to Cape Town as political prisoners and slaves by the Dutch colonialists. All of this played off more than 360 years ago, and this is also how Islam landed in Cape Town. I was born into an environment that was very orthodox Islamic but also had flavors of Sufism that was imported from Indonesia. I grew up in this very orthodox Muslim community, having known from a very young age that I was different from other boys in terms of my sexual orientation. So, I lived with that, as a youth in the closet, and then eventually around the age of 18 I applied for a scholarship to study Islam in Pakistan, and when I was 21 years old, I left to Pakistan to complete my studies over there.”

Hendricks studied at the University of Islamic Studies in Karachi, Pakistan from 1990 to 1994.  He was married to a woman in 1991 with whom he had three children.  He returned to Cape Town from Pakistan where he began teaching in mosques and madrasa. He could no longer suppress his sexual orientation and so in 1996, he divorced his wife and came out as gay.  He was ousted from his teaching positions and formed Inner Circle, a support network for LGBTQ Muslims dealing with their sexuality and faith.  In this setting, Hendricks provided prayers, counseling and Muslim same-sex weddings. In the years following, he became a vocal advocate for inclusive interpretations of Islamic texts, challenging traditional views on homosexuality within Islam. He married a Hindu man in 2006. 

Hendricks achieved international recognition when he appeared in the 2007 documentary film A Jihad for Love, a documentary about devout Muslims struggling with their sexual orientation.  The Muslim Judicial Council in South Africa issued a statement that Hendricks was “outside of the fold of Islam” for appearing in the documentary.  

In 2011 [some sources say 2018 ], Hendricks founded Masjidul Ghurbaah, a mosque providing a safe space for queer Muslims and marginalized women to practice Islam in Wynberg, a suburb of Cape Town.  The name follows a hadith that states: “Islam began as something strange, and will return to something strange.” Hendricks recognized that those deemed strange by society — Muslims, queers and all oppressed people — are worthy not just of God’s love, but of liberation.

Hendricks traveled extensively in Africa and Europe and worked with organizations such as International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association (ILGA), Global Queer Muslim Network, and the Global Interfaith Network, to educate and advocate for justice and equality for LGBTQ Muslims.  During the COVID-19 pandemic, he began posting TikTok clips with positive messages about love and subsequently created online videos about LGBTQ Muslims in Hindi and Urdu.

In 2022, Hendricks was featured in a German documentary, The Radical, which portrayed his courageous witness and bold activism for queer Muslims in the face of opposition and criticism. That same year the Muslim Judicial Council in South Africa issued a fatwa (religious ruling) stating that Islamic laws “unequivocally prohibit same-sex actions and, by extension, same-sex marriages.” As a result, they asserted that any Muslim in a same-sex relationship or engaging in same-sex sexuality would have “taken themselves out of the fold of Islam.”  Hendricks denounced the fatwa, stating: “Of all the socio-political issues that the MJC could have tackled while our country is in turmoil, why did they have to pick on homosexuality?...It just causes harm. It’s a thoughtless statement when queer Muslims are struggling to reconcile their faith with their sexual orientation…Although these imams are calling for people not to be violent, if you make a statement that a [queer ] person is out of the fold of Islam, it will incite hate towards those people or people like myself.”

Hendricks was killed on February 15, 2025, when the car in which he was traveling in the city of Gqeberha was ambushed by two masked gunmen. Hendricks had previously confessed in a 2018 interview: “I’m gay and I’m an imam, and I want to announce it to the world. And if they want to kill me, they can kill me, but I’d like to meet my Maker with that kind of authenticity.”  His assassination was widely condemned by LGBTQ and Muslim groups.   

Hendricks’ widespread and profound influence was described by a colleague: “He reminded me of core Islamic truths: there can be no gatekeepers to God, nothing exists outside of divinity, and the exiled and excluded, too, have a sacred pathway to Allah. God gifted us a queer vessel of knowledge, a scholar who devoted his life to studying the Qur’an, who made it so that not just queer Muslims, but all people could wander into the heart of Islam. The feminist, liberatory and compassionate heartbeat of Islam came to life through Muhsin. It was contagious.”

(This biographical statement written by Mark Bowman from the sources below.)

Biography Date: March 2025

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