Inside the Gender Jihad: Women's Reform in Islam (52 page)

Notes to Chapter 1

1. Amina Wadud, “On Belonging as a Muslim Woman,” in
   My Soul is a Witness: African- American Women’s Spirituality
   , ed. Gloria Wade-Gayles (Boston: Beacon Press, 1995), p. 256.
   

2. Fazlur Rahman,
   Major Themes of the Qur’an,
   2nd edn. (Minneapolis: Bibliotheca Islamica, 1994), p. 37.
   

3. Ibid.
   

4. As discussed in detail in chapter 3, “Muslim Women’s Collectives, Organizations, and Islamic Reform.”
   

5. Toshihiko Izutsu,
   God and Man in the Koran
   (Manchester, New Hampshire: Ayer Company Publishers, 1987), pp. 18–19.
   

6. Khaled Abou El Fadl,
   Speaking in God’s Name: Islamic Law, Authority and Women
   (Oxford: Oneworld Publications, 2001), p. 3. As the title of this book suggests, it is all about the authoritarian practices of speaking
   for
   God. My very succinct references here and elsewhere should entice others to read the book in its entirety as one of the most precise articulations in our time on legal reductionism that inhibits progressive discourse and women’s liberative resistance.
   

7. Fatima Mernissi,
   Beyond the Veil: Male–Female Dynamics in Modern Muslim Society
   

264 inside the gender jihad

(London: Al Saqi Books, 1985), p. 17. Also note that her title could mistakenly suggest that her particular case study of Morocco is representative of the whole of modern Muslim society, rather than one of many.

1. Leila Ahmed,
   A Border Passage: From Cairo to America – A Woman’s Journey
   (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1999).
   

2. The limitations of the source texts themselves, and their authority as a concrete linguistic act, will be looked at below in more detail in chapter 6, “Qur’an, Gender, and Interpretive Possibilities.” Here the emphasis is on interpreting and effective implementation of those sources, since they have so much authority.
   

3. Fazlur Rahman, “Approaches to Islam in Religious Studies: Review Essay,” in
   Approaches to Islam in Religious Studies
   , ed. Richard Martin (Oxford: Oneworld Publications, 2001), pp. 189–202.
   

4. I will discuss this at some length in chapter6,“Qur’an,Gender, and Interpretive Possibilities”.
   

5. Rahman, “Approaches.”
   

6. Carolyn Rouse published a book in 2004 about African-American Muslim women with the title
   Engaged Surrender
   (Berkeley: University of California Press). Although not develop- ed in the substance of her book, she attributes her introduction to this phrase to a lecture I gave in Southern California during the time of her data collection among Muslims in the area.This phrase is undefined in her book and given no direct corollary to her case studies. Furthermore, although I owe the phrase originally to numerous discussions on its meanings and applications with Dr. Alan Godlas from the University of Georgia, I take sole responsi- bility for how I use it here, with the hope that I have done justice to our discussions.
   

7. This dynamic between Allah, as disclosed through text, human agency, and interpretation, requires further discussion, which I provide in chapter 6, “Qur’an, Gender, and Interpretive Possibilities.”
   

8. Amina Wadud,
   Qur’an and Woman
   (New York and Oxford: OUP, 1999), pp. 56–69.
   

9. I argue below against this inequality and restrict it to a specific cultural context at the time of revelation in chapter 4, “A New Hajar Paradigm: Motherhood and Family.”
   

10. The term “Islamist” has been used recently to refer to the neo-traditionalist, neo-conser- vative return to the
    shari‘ah
    as distinct in the role of politics. Islamist hope is to re-establish traditional
    shari‘ah
    as the means for returning to an imagined pristine Islam perfectly attained at the time of the Prophet.
    

11. I elaborate in quite some detail on double-talk, as it confirms a double bind for women, in chapter 4, “A New Hajar Paradigm: Motherhood and Family.”
    

12. See, for example, Ali Shariati, “The World-View of Tauhid,”
    

    Islam
    (Berkeley: Mirzan Press, 1979).
    

    in
    On the Sociology of
    

13. For example, Zia-din Sardar, Mohammad Arkoun, Azizah al-Hibri, Ismail Faruqi, and Fazlur Rahman.
    

14. As emphasized in the Christian tradition : “Do unto others what you would have them do
    unto you.”
    

15. See Sachiko Murata, “Introduction,” in
    The Tao of Islam: A Sourcebook on Gender Relationships in Islamic Thought
    (New York: State U niversity of New York Press, 1992) for further discussion of these
    jalal
    and
    jamal
    attributes or what she calls the
    “
    two hands of God
    ”
    from which the human has been created.
    

16. My translation intentionally removes gender symmetry from its literal translation “one of you does not believe until
    he
    loves for his brother” in order to stress the meaning of the statement in accordance with the gender-inclusive perspective and pluralistic goals of this
    

    Notes
    

    265
    

    book. See
    An-Nawawi’s Forty Hadith
    , trans. Ezzeddin Ibrahim and Denys Johnson- Davies (Damascus: The Holy Koran Publishing House, 1976), p. 56.
    

17. Murata,
    The Tao of Islam
    , pp. 49–80.
    

18. Quoted by Shariati in “Tauhid,” p. 83.
    

19. Martin Buber,
    I and Thou
    , 2nd edn., trans. Ronald Gregory Smith (New York: Collier Books, Macmillan, 1958).
    

20. Amina Wadud, “An Islamic Perspective on Civil Rights Issues,” in
    Religion, Race, and Justice in a Changing America
    , ed. Gar Orfield, Holly Lebowitz (New York: A Century Foundation Book, 1999), p. 157.
    

21. Inni ja’ilun fi-l-‘ardi khalifah
    : another translation will be referenced in the footnotes below (see p. 279, note 23). It falls in the context of a lengthy Qur’anic quotation. Two words differ. The first is
    ja’ilun
    , the active participle of
    “
    the One who ‘makes’ or ‘creates’.” I have chosen“create” following my discussions in
    Qur’an and Woman
    , p.18.The other diff- erence is
    khalifah
    , the key term discussed, translated, and interpreted in detail in this chapter.
    

22. Wadud,
    Qur’an and Woman,
    pp. 16–17.
    

23. Ibid., pp. 17–23, indicating how the above cited statement means that duality was pre- intentional to the cosmological process. “[T]he Qur’an establishes that humankind was created in the male/female pair,” p. 21. So male and female are equally essential to what it means to be human created from a single soul (
    nafs
    ).
    

24. Amina Wadud, “Faith and Citizenship,” in
    Women and Citizenship,
    ed. Marilyn Friedman (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), pp. 170–187.
    

25. Note that the two terms are extremely close in transliteration:
    khalifah
    is the agent, while
    khilafah
    is agency.
    

26. Rahman,
    Major Themes
    , p. 12.
    

27. Wadud, “Faith and Citizenship” also discusses the citizen, civil society, and
    khalifah
    .
    

28. “Truly We offered the Trust (
    amanah
    ) to the heavens and the earth and the mountains, but they declined to bear it, and the human being undertook it. But he has been and oppressor [of himself and others] and ignorant” (33:72).
    

29. 7:169,13:19–25, 57:5–9. Coincidentally this next reference precedes the Qur’anic reference to the creation of the
    khalifah
    , and is therefore significant enough to be quoted in full.
    

    “Truly Allah does
    

    not disdain to set
    

    forth an example [even of] a gnat or some-
    

    thing bigger. And as for those who believe, they know that the Truth is from their Lord. As for those who cover up [the Truth], they say, ‘What does Allah want [to teach us] by this example?’ Thereby He misleads many and thereby He guides many. And thereby he misleads only the dissolute – those who break the covenant (
    mithaq
    ) with Allah after confirming it [in their beings], and cut what Allah has ordered to be joined, and who corrupt the earth [thereby]. It is these who are the loser. How can you cover up [the Truth] about Allah when you were dead and He made you alive? Then He will make you dead, then make you alive [again], then to Him you shall return. It is He Who created for you all that is on the earth [and] regulated the heavens – fashioning seven heavenly realms – and He has knowledge of all things. And when you Lord said to the angels, ‘I shall place upon the earth an emissary,’ they said, ‘will you place upon it [one] who will corrupt it and shed blood, [while] it is we who hymn Your praise and sanctify You?’ He said, ‘Truly, I know what you know not’”
    (2:26–30).
    

30. “There is no power except in Allah” (18:39).
    

31. This dual relationship –
    

    agency and service (
    khilafah
    and
    ‘ibadah
    )
    

    – has powerful
    

    symbolism demonstrated in Islam’s major liturgical practice,
    salah
    , the five-times-daily worship or prayer. The worshiper takes the standing position at the opening of the prayer
    

    266
    

    inside the gender jihad
    

    and follows with bowing, repeats standing until assuming the pose of full prostration. Thus the positions of the body juxtapose standing as Allah’s agent with prostration as Allah’s servant.
    

32. Neither the consideration of slavery as inhumane nor the inequalities of the inheritance shares are critically examined here. Both examples, directly from the Qur’an, indicate real social practice in seventh-century Arabia, the time and circumstances of revelation. They are mentioned here as a utility showing literal textual support for the idea of relative responsibility. The text acknowledges the social reality of that time when some humans functioned on unequal terms. However, this book refutes both slavery and subjugated wives through later discussions on interpretation to render these literal examples obsolete. Primarily, this is done by distinguishing between limitation in social function and full human agency.
    

33. Both children and people with certain handicaps are fully human but their capacity in fulfilling some responsibilities requires assistance, so that their humanity is functionally complete.
    

34. Majid Fakhry,
    Ethical Theories in Islam
    (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1991).
    

35. Ibid, p. 1.
    

36. Ibid.
    

37. Ibid.
    

38. Ibid.
    

39. Ibid.
    

40. Seyyed H. Nasr, “Music and Dance,” in
    Islamic Spirituality II: Manifestations,
    ed. Seyyed Hossein Nasr (New York: Crossroad, 1991) p. 478.
    

41. Susan Moller Okin calls this “false gender neutrality” in her book
    Justice, Gender and the Family
    (New York: Basic Books, 1989) p. 11.
    

42. Rahman,
    Major Themes
    , p. 28.
    

43. This will be dealt with in greater detail in chapter 4, “A New Hajar Paradigm: Motherhood and Family.” The institutions and politics not imbued with Islamic morality but with patri- archal codes, legitimated by the use of authoritative Islamic semantics, deny the woman who speaks out her identity as a true Muslim. Silence and invisibility becomes her only guards against any offenses to her honor.
    

44. This will be discussed at full length in chapter 4, “A New Hajar Paradigm: Motherhood and Family.”
    

45. Rahman,
    Major Themes,
    p. 37.
    

46. Alison Jaggar,
    Feminist Politics and Human Nature
    (Totowa, NJ: Rowman & Littlefield, reprinted 1998).
    

47. Tariq Ramadan and others refer to it with the phrase “
    al-fiqh al-waqi
    ‘
    ah
    ” (the jurispru- dence of current realities).
    

48. According to the U.N.D.P. Human Development Report (Oxford, 1998), the richest fifth of the world’s population consumes and wastes “86% of total private consumption expen- diture,” while the poorest fifth “a minuscule 1.3%.” We have the means to not only eradicate poverty but also to do so without depriving the well-to-do from enjoying extreme luxury and privilege.
    

49. Joan C. Tronto,
    Moral Boundaries: A Political Argument for an Ethic of Care
    (New York: Routledge, 1993).
    

50. Terri Apter,
    Working Women don’t have Wives
    (New York: St. Martin’s Griffin, 1993), p.1.
    

51. Tronto,
    Moral Boundaries
    .
    

52. Sharon D. Welch,
    A Feminist Ethic of Risk
    (Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 1990).
    

Notes
267

60 Ibid., p. 23.

1. Ibid., p. 3.
   

2. Ibid., p. 4.
   

3. Ibid., p. 5.
   

4. Ibid., p. 6.
   

5. Eckhart Tolle,
   Practicing the Power of Now: Essential Teachings, Meditation, and Exercises from the Power of Now
   (Novato, CA: New World Library, 2001), p. 44.
   

6. Diana L. Eck,
   Encountering God: A Spiritual Journey from Bozeman to Banaras
   (Boston: Beacon Press, 1993), pp. 222–223.
   

7. Murata,
   Tao
   , p. 14.
   

8. In chapter 4, “A New Hajar Paradigm: Motherhood and Family,” I give detailed consider- ation to the advantages and disadvantages or shortcomings along the lines of this mutuality as a matter of communal concern and not merely in nuclear or extended kinship.
   

9. Thomas Sowell,
   The Quest for Cosmic Justice
   (New York: The Free Press, 1999), p. 9. It is worth reviewing his full chapter with the same title as the book, pp. 1–48.
   

10. An-Nawawi’s Forty Hadith
    , trans. Ezzedin Ibrahim and Denys Johnson-Davies (Damascus: The Holy Koran Publishing House, 1976), p. 26. Translation as included in this text is my own. Readers looking for a reference to authenticate the
    hadith
    can use an-Nawawi, which includes the original Arabic.
    

11. The human body has nine or ten openings. Nothing about the number of bodily orifices predetermines moral agency.
    

12. Fakhry,
    Ethical Theories in Islam
    , p. 24.
    

13. Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na’im,
    Toward an Islamic Reformation: Civil Liberties, Human Rights and International Law
    (New York: Syracuse University Press, 1990), pp. 86–91.
    

14. As quoted by Ebrahim Moosa in his “Dilemma of Islamic Rights Schemes,”
    Journal of Law and Religion
    , 25 (2000–2001), pp. 209–210.
    

15. Ziba Mir-Hosseini,
    “
    The Construction of Gender in Islamic Legal Thought and Strategies of Reform,
    ”
    Hawwa: Journal of Women in the Near East, and the Islamic World,
    1(1) 2003, 1–28, at p. 2.
    

16. Feisal Abdul Rauf,
    Islam: A Sacred Law: What Every Muslim Should Know About Shariah
    

    (Brattleboro, VT: Qiblah Books, 2000), p. 72.
    

17. Moosa,
    “
    Dilemma of Islamic Rights Schemes,
    ”
    pp. 209
    –
    210.
    

18. An-Na’im,
    Islamic Reformation
    .
    

19. Abdul Rauf,
    Islam: A Sacred Law
    , p. 110. 80 Ibid., p. 15.