Before Homosexuality in the Arab-Islamic World, 1500-1800 (61 page)

If he [a man] looks licitly at the beardless boy, as in the case of the involuntary glance, and passionate love for the boy results, and he is chaste and keeps the love secret, it is not implausible that it should then be said that he is a martyr, since there is no transgression involved.
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If we assume that the love is involuntary in the sense that he [the lover] cannot choose to end it, then there is nothing to prevent him from gaining martyrdom, since in that case there is no transgression involved.
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The considered ruling of our teacher al-Ramli
and others is not to differentiate between beardless boys and others, the premise being chastity and keeping the love secret.
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Among the martyrs ... [is] one who dies from passionate love if he refrains from transgressions of religious law ... and keeps the love a secret ... whether the passionate love is for what could become available for licit intercourse or not, such as a beardless boy, according to authoritative verdicts. And the assertion of some [scholars] that loving him is a transgression and that he can never become available [for licit intercourse] and thus cannot lead to martyrdom should be understood to pertain to voluntary love, whereas if the love is involuntary, chaste, and kept a secret, in cases where he is [involuntarily] led to love a beardless boy, or is [legally] allowed to look, and love takes hold of his heart without willing what is not permitted, and this leads to his death, then there is no disagreement in his obtaining martyrdom. And how appropriate are the words of the poet:

The lovers’ torment in this world is enough, by God Hell shall not torment them thereafter!

Rather, eternal paradise shall be their adorned home, to be enjoyed by them in reward for their patience.

How could it be otherwise, and they have loved chastely and kept their love secret? Thus attests the tradition ...
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