Women in Islam !
H P Chafiq
> in this society (American), women are raised to believe that
>their value is in their beauty, and following their career and " making
>themselves useful".
Women are raised to be equal to men because of the amendments and no sexual
segregation that the united states constitution is built upon . and there is
nothing wrong with that.
>however, when they become muslim, they ar told by ALLah
>to not to reaveal their beuty except to certain relatives. Islam has also made
>it so that it is no longer their responsibility to provide for themselves, but
>to support her husband and to be the caretaker of her family. So,
It is islam that considers the value of the women in their beauty and nothing
else , since , the men would provide and take care of the rest, this thing
on the other hand is easy to prove, just look up any random passage in the
Koran where women are mentioned and judge for yourself.
in fact even the reward to the good muslim male believers is some
beautiful women in the paradise.
Chafiq,
dja...@gemini.ldc.lu.se
>It is islam that considers the value of the women in their beauty and nothing
>else , since , the men would provide and take care of the rest, this thing
>on the other hand is easy to prove, just look up any random passage in the
>Koran where women are mentioned and judge for yourself.
>in fact even the reward to the good muslim male believers is some
>beautiful women in the paradise.
You have just made it up, Chafiq. There is no mention in Quran that
Women value = their beauty. Otherwise Allah would be unjust to cre-
ate uggly people. Nor did the prophet SAAS confirm your claim, on
the opposite he said that Allah would not see your bodies or your
faces but he will look at our hearts and deeds. The duty of the mu-
slim woman is to raise up well educated generations and not spending
time and money in beauty and hair dressing salons.
>
>Chafiq,
>
Djamel.
H P Chafiq
I don't think so, I am not going to tell passages of the koran when
I am not sure of them. for I know how impolite that would be. However
as you know there are three ways to prove something
deduction, recurrence or by assuming it is wrong and prove otherwise
my line of thought was based on what the posting said and it explicitely
said that the only thing that a woman is expected to take care of
once she became Muslim is her beauty while the men would take care of
the rest. This by itself is an enough to prove my point.
I don't have to prove te same thing 3 ways to say it is right.
Anyway, let's talk about the thirld way , I am assuming that
the koran did talk only about the women as an object of beauty and
reward, it is your problem now to prove otherwise !
I will get back to this after sometime , I am busy right now
but I still think , the koran definetely never talked about women in
any other ways than just an object of desire for men.
Chafiq,
dja...@gemini.ldc.lu.se
>>>It is islam that considers the value of the women in their beauty and nothing
>>>else , since , the men would provide and take care of the rest, this thing
>>>on the other hand is easy to prove, just look up any random passage in the
>>>Koran where women are mentioned and judge for yourself.
>>>in fact even the reward to the good muslim male believers is some
>>>beautiful women in the paradise.
>>
>> You have just made it up, Chafiq. There is no mention in Quran that
>> Women value = their beauty. Otherwise Allah would be unjust to cre-
>> ate uggly people. Nor did the prophet SAAS confirm your claim, on
>> the opposite he said that Allah would not see your bodies or your
>> faces but he will look at our hearts and deeds. The duty of the mu-
>> slim woman is to raise up well educated generations and not spending
>> time and money in beauty and hair dressing salons.
>>>
>>>Chafiq,
>>>
>> Djamel.
>
>I don't think so, I am not going to tell passages of the koran when
>I am not sure of them.
Are you kidding ? you say to look up any random passage in the Koran
and then you fail to give a single reference ? If you need a Quran on
PC to facilitate searching I can send you a copy. Or just take the
book itself if you have any in the neighborhood.
> for I know how impolite that would be.
Don't worry, go ahead and I am sure people will come to help.
>However
>as you know there are three ways to prove something
>deduction, recurrence or by assuming it is wrong and prove otherwise
>my line of thought was based on what the posting said and it explicitely
>said that the only thing that a woman is expected to take care of
>once she became Muslim is her beauty while the men would take care of
>the rest. This by itself is an enough to prove my point.
Look either you talk out of some knowledge or let us do other things.
You mean the man is expected to cook food, clean, wash, iron, and all
the home work when he gets back home at 6. Or do you expect every fa-
mily to have a maid at home. I have never seen or heard the like in
any culture or religion. Are you expecting some praising from the fe-
mals reading your messages or what ?
>I don't have to prove te same thing 3 ways to say it is right.
Just take anyone of the two first ways.
>Anyway, let's talk about the thirld way , I am assuming that
>the koran did talk only about the women as an object of beauty and
>reward, it is your problem now to prove otherwise !
You should feel ashame, you are just keeping lying on Allah. And you
say about women ONLY an object of beauty and reward ? Ala techfaqou
'ala nafsika ya hadha ? I get it, you want to come to that Islam is
making of the women only a sex object, well keep on prooving this
also.
Hey ! mister the-impressed-by-the-mathematics, logique has sometimes
killed people when they tried to guess the colour of the ball on
their heads.
It is you claiming and you have to proove it. When I tell you there
is no support to what you say this means that you are lying or at
least mixing things. A man is innocent until proven guilty.
>I will get back to this after sometime , I am busy right now
>but I still think , the koran definetely never talked about women in
>any other ways than just an object of desire for men.
>
Think, think and think. A french proverb says that one should turn
the tongue in the mouth seven times before saying a word.
>Chafiq,
Djamel.
ILYESS B. BDIRA
Brother Djamel, the only reason somebody like Brother Chafiq thinks the way
he does is the existence of people like you, as Malik Ibn Nabi said
The deadly ideologies can only find fertile ground where the dead
ideologies abound.
What he meant by that, for instance, is that extreme westernization could
succede only because our scholars are ideologically impotent. To explain more,
I will give an example related to your reply:
The version of Islam that says that women are there to stay at home
cover their faces and subjucate to their husbands (the dead ideology)
is ONE INTERPRETATION of Quoran that will not be able to reverse the tide
of atheism (the deadly ideology).
I do not think that you read or understand the Quoran better than me or
Sheikhs Ghazali, Qaradhawi, and Ghannouchi among others who do not
share this reactionnary interpretation which tries to face the perceived
danger of westernization by the same dead ideology that lost the war
already in the beginning of the century. This is not Islamic revival,
because your ideas were there throughout the centuries of decay.
That assumption about women was a result of the male chauvinistic Arab
society that still viewed women as the property of men in their
subconscious although Islam fought it out of the conscious of the pious
among them. Witness the start of this conflict since the time of Ibn Umar,
when he told his son about the hadith "Don't prevent women from
going out to the mosque" his son replied "I will prevent them" Then Ibn
Umar did not talk to him the rest of his life.
What kind of Islamic revival that makes one brother boast that
he never saw his brother's wife and he would not know her if he saw her?
This was never in the time of the prophet where women used to actually
mix with men and assist them in battles AND WORK.. Granted there were some
companions who are more restrictive than others, but the general rule was
that women are not bound to their homes by law (written or not). The exception
that was made a rule by Muslims was the widows of the prophet (pbuh).
Enough for now..
Salam Alaikum.
o0r...@summa.tamu.edu
"The seek of knowledge is a must on every male and female"
enough said for the people who view women as a beauty and nothing else.
Moreover, I do not think that Islam values the women in term of their beauty.
Islam does not exploit the beauty of the women by any means.
It is the west which fully exploit the body of the women in all aspect
of life. Just look at the commercials on t.v to see for yoursefl,
specially the beer commercial ones. To say the least about stripers
where men pays money to enjoy watching bodies of nude women.
Thanks God, we do not have such thing legalized back home (at least not yet).
Islam totally forbid the explotation of women beauty, actually women
beauty is for her husband and vise versa.
If there is any oppression to women it is not because of the religion,
it is more into the culture (especially among the arabs). And many times
man uses women lack of knowledge in religion against her.
The issue of women in all religion is very controversial. In chrisianity
the whole faith is based on Jesus who is a male, God at the same time,
and a son a God. So god has a son male not female in christianity!!!.
Let's not forget that this is the religion of the west, although a lot of
them are rejecting it, but it still bounds them together in world affairs
when dealing with other nations. In Bosnia, If the serbs were muslim and
the bosians were christian, noway will such genocide will be allowed to
happen.
In judaism, the orthodox have one famous prayer which states :
" Thanks god for not making me a gentile or slave or a WOMEN"
I am not making this up. Anybody can check it simply by subscribing
to soc.culture.jewish and see how the rabbies justify this prayer.
Moreover, to form a quorum for prayer in judaism, ten men at least
are needed. If there is a small boy, he can be substituded for a male
adult, one hundred women will not do the job.
All i am saying through out these examples, is that the status of women
is controversial in all three Abrahamic religions. Athough, i personally
believe that Islam is much more fair to women than all other religions
in their current form.
I am not trying to defend Islam here. Islam does not need any human being.
If somebody is not muslim, he or she should come forward and state it
clearly, at least we will now whom we are dealing with. Or LEAVE Islam if
he or she is against its principles and articles. That does not mean that
a person is not allowed to criticize the religion. What is not allowed is
slander, lies and hypocrisy. This applies even in internalional laws.
Islam is a very contreversial issue these days, specially with the new
political wave of Islamic fundamentalist. Even the U.S is making plans
to contain it. I am personnally not your typical fundamentalist beard guy,
but i am not anti-islamic either. I do not believe in forcing Islam over
people who rejected it, I fully understand the secular mind and the secular
approch to religion as whole after living more than ten years in this country.
I have a lot to say about that, but do to time constrain i will not be able
to follow this discussion on day to day basis.
Omar Rais,
Ahmed Bouzid
>Anyway, let's talk about the thirld way , I am assuming that
>the koran did talk only about the women as an object of beauty and
>reward, it is your problem now to prove otherwise !
>
>I will get back to this after sometime , I am busy right now
>but I still think , the koran definetely never talked about women in
>any other ways than just an object of desire for men.
>
>Chafiq,
Ya Chafiq, ya jaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahil! Qul astarghfiru llaaah,
weHshem 3la 3ardak! What you just said is COMPLETELY false, and
ida tkhaf rebbi, you should retract it. Obviously, you know
zilsh about the Quran or Islam. Tlehha with what you know, and
khtiiiiiiiik mel quran.
Ahmed
H P Chafiq
dja...@gemini.ldc.lu.se writes:
>>I don't think so, I am not going to tell passages of the koran when
>>I am not sure of them.
>
> Are you kidding ? you say to look up any random passage in the Koran
> and then you fail to give a single reference ? If you need a Quran on
> PC to facilitate searching I can send you a copy. Or just take the
> book itself if you have any in the neighborhood.
>
com'on be serious for a while, you know it as the palm of your hands, so
don't make a case out of nothing.
let me summarize for you what I knew of the situation :
Apart the mentions of the female in the koran that Laila mentioned which are
fairy story type of tales ( about the past and they are quite common
denominator with previous religion) when Islam dealt with women it dealt
with them as subordinates to men, not to be by themselves.
Now coming to this beauty thing which you do seem to not appreciate in
the first place, all the muslims is to warn women to be aware and watch
for her beauty, in other words the only thing worthy of watching is the
female biological attraction and beauty, for instance , there is no mention
whatsover, to the female, to do other things than be obedient and
under the wings of thy husband or thy father or thy custodian.
If you want to talk about this issue in the light of common sense and
objectivity so let's do it, I keep telling you I am not gonna provide
you any islamic stuff. Sorry for that , but there is a difference, between
presenting my arguments and lying about God !!
>> for I know how impolite that would be.
>
>
> Look either you talk out of some knowledge or let us do other things.
> You mean the man is expected to cook food, clean, wash, iron, and all
> the home work when he gets back home at 6. Or do you expect every fa-
> mily to have a maid at home. I have never seen or heard the like in
> any culture or religion. Are you expecting some praising from the fe-
> mals reading your messages or what ?
>
Okay fine, with me, if you think you can't talk outside religious arguments
then I would understand that too. in fact if you were careful enough,
my comments were about what you said about the west beeing responsible of
our problems not my envy to dissecate Islam.
>
> You should feel ashame, you are just keeping lying on Allah. And you
> say about women ONLY an object of beauty and reward ? Ala techfaqou
> 'ala nafsika ya hadha ? I get it, you want to come to that Islam is
> making of the women only a sex object, well keep on prooving this
> also.
> Hey ! mister the-impressed-by-the-mathematics, logique has sometimes
> killed people when they tried to guess the colour of the ball on
> their heads.
> It is you claiming and you have to proove it. When I tell you there
> is no support to what you say this means that you are lying or at
> least mixing things. A man is innocent until proven guilty.
>
Now, I don't understand you at all, and sorry if I will sound harsh in
the rest of my psoting.
first, what do you call allowing four wives for a man ??
isnt' that considering women as an object of desire, and worse "something"
not able to be in one to one relationship !!!
What do you call, a Female doctor case when she would have to wait for
her junkie drug user brother a jobless, to agree for her to get a
passport or a maariage ???
do you think these rules were implanted in Islam and the Koran
what do you think of a female not able to testify agains the word of
a man but it would take 2 females instead !!!
what do you think of the fact that your prophete had 9 wives and the
smallest one ( Aicha ) was only 9 years when he was about 60 years !!!
What do you call this !!
what do you call the splitting of the women and the female orphans
among the muslim after they would win some war .
most of the war were against non muslim and hence the female were not
even muslim !!!!
I didn't mean to present my arguments so harshly, as you might have known
by now, am following the stream of what you have to present and I am
again sorry if hurt your personal feelings. but please don't call me
liar about God or stuff like that . I never claimed to know Islam outside
inside but I know enough of it to make my case
>
> Think, think and think. A french proverb says that one should turn
> the tongue in the mouth seven times before saying a word.
>
>>Chafiq,
I hope you would do the same !!
Some passage of your last posting are really redundant and you know better
to try to intimidate me. please do present your argument or let's call it
down.
>
> Djamel.
H P Chafiq
You just proved you can't even tolerate any discussions that don't
go with your own beliefs, so don't think you are any saint, and what
you just did is actually the ultimatum of what you called " jahil".
What's wrong with presenting to the world your own version of
the story, if you think it is correct and right so why you are
trying to intimidate me instead of presenting something
that one could read and ponder on !!!
Chafiq,
>
H P Chafiq
>The version of Islam that says that women are there to stay at home
>cover their faces and subjucate to their husbands (the dead ideology)
>is ONE INTERPRETATION of Quoran that will not be able to reverse the tide
>of atheism (the deadly ideology).
>I do not think that you read or understand the Quoran better than me or
>Sheikhs Ghazali, Qaradhawi, and Ghannouchi among others who do not
>share this reactionnary interpretation which tries to face the perceived
>danger of westernization by the same dead ideology that lost the war
>already in the beginning of the century. This is not Islamic revival,
>because your ideas were there throughout the centuries of decay.
It is nice to know that what Djamel and Ahmed presented are only
one way to look at islam. I am sure there must be some other
interpretation of the Quran that is more adaptable to the century
we are living in .
>That assumption about women was a result of the male chauvinistic Arab
>society that still viewed women as the property of men in their
>subconscious although Islam fought it out of the conscious of the pious
>among them. Witness the start of this conflict since the time of Ibn Umar,
>when he told his son about the hadith "Don't prevent women from
>going out to the mosque" his son replied "I will prevent them" Then Ibn
>Umar did not talk to him the rest of his life.
so let me get this right, you are saying that The islamic vision
of the women, is rather a consequence of the arabic society with all its
male dominance rather than an application of what was suggested in
the Quran?
it is a big plus to know that not all the muslim brothers view and interpret
the Articles of the Quran annexed with the Sunnah in the same way
as the original article stated, (stating that american women would be saved
from their own beauty addiction once they would give it up
to become the shadow of some man in Islam who has the sole right to
their beauty, blantly put, the guy wrote that the women are
an object of desire either way !, and still he wanted to prove
that Islam treats women better than the westernized societies )
it wouldn't hurt to remind that guy and his likes to recall
whenever they feel like boasting of their illimitless and exclusive
knowledge of their religion.
" .Wa asber ala ma assabak .. wala tossair khaddaka linnass"
" ..Wa akhfid Sawtak ..inna Ankara Al aswatti la sawtoo Al hammir.."
>What kind of Islamic revival that makes one brother boast that
>he never saw his brother's wife and he would not know her if he saw her?
I lived for five years in Saudi Arabia and I know what you are
talking about. It is no fun to see many things done wrong in
a society under the name of Islam, It ain't funny to see that the
only allowed recreation is to go watch people executed after
the Friday prayer or see few hands cut or if you are lucky to
be able to get few " hassanates" by paricipating in the stoning to
death of some women that committed adultery.
I know you are gonna say it is not quite what you would call
Islam but how do we know that whoever is preaching Islam
dogmatically and sometime even upside down as a solution
doesn't have that in mind as a model. with our weak economy and our
weak family structure, I am sure we will end up with many
one handed citizens and we will run out of stones in few months !
These are my thoughts, I am not claiming that I know of a better
approach but it wouldn't hurt to go to the limit and explore
the alternatives we have.
>This was never in the time of the prophet where women used to actually
>mix with men and assist them in battles AND WORK.. Granted there were some
>companions who are more restrictive than others, but the general rule was
>that women are not bound to their homes by law (written or not). The exception
>that was made a rule by Muslims was the widows of the prophet (pbuh).
I always wonder why the muslims revolve around the Kaaba together
without actually segregating the 2 sexes, it is so crowded and
muslims would push against each other, so If the Kaaba is the holiest
place of Islam and mixture is allowed around it , then how
come the rest of an Islamic society would have to be formed of
2 sides one for men and one for women !
I guess it is just a matter of interpretation.
>Enough for now..
>Salam Alaikum.
It looks some people got so stuck in the dogma of religion , that
whoever would like to try to understand any issue no matter how
disturbing it is about the religion is a sinner !!
The bottom line Mr Ahmed and the likes go back and read the
first Surrah of the Quran ( Ikraa) maybe this time you would
get the message right which means USE YOUR BRAIN !!!
Shock therapy does a lot of marvelous things to senile minds.
Chafiq.
H P Chafiq
o0r...@summa.tamu.edu writes:
>I am not trying to defend Islam here. Islam does not need any human being.
>If somebody is not muslim, he or she should come forward and state it
>clearly, at least we will now whom we are dealing with. Or LEAVE Islam if
>he or she is against its principles and articles. That does not mean that
>a person is not allowed to criticize the religion. What is not allowed is
>slander, lies and hypocrisy. This applies even in internalional laws.
>Omar Rais,
>
Who are "WE " !!!
you are obviously not talking anything new here ! and it is not quite
right to just come along and say freely that whatever arguments are presented
AGAINST what is AGAINST common sense and logics is slander lies or hypocrisy
What are you talking about ?
Everybody could criticize the religion or anything he feels like it
must be in practice not just empty words from time to time.
Actually , the topic in itself wasn't about Islam as it was about
Circumcision whether it is right or wrong, but someone Thinks
that by hidding their beauty muslim women are better than the
western women, and he seemed to be convinced that western women are
concerned only about their beauty. and nothing else.
he trapped himself by saying that everything else in life is taken care
of by the husbands !! so what? the women gives up her beauty to
her husband and in return he would feed her and would make sure she stays
healthy to take care of the many children to come.
IS THIS YOUR MESSAGE TO THE WORLD |!!!!
The guy was just hallucinating ! he multiplied by zero all the
positive achievements the western women have done and confused the
role of the female in the west with her role in Hollywood ??
That doesn't look right at all ??? and you know it so why you keep
pushing !! while in the other hand the muslim women haven't even been
allowed to think to achieve anything but to take care of her beauty and
make sure nobody is gonna see her hair or her tiny little finger .
this is the message in islam to the women !!
if you don't get it , then explain please !!
for me it is clear and you can't mistake it for something else .
I don't have anything with that , well that's your lifestyle so be it
but learn to respect mine if you would like me to respect yours.
in passing I should add that it is a torn ideology of calling anything
that deflect from Islamic vertues a weternized ideology .
I don't have time to go into that this time bu I think you got the picture.
As for presenting my arguments, I believe, the debate would have to be
transfered to some religious groups if you would like to
expand it on the religious light. for me I can only take it as it comes
and I am sorry to say that so far, we are talking talking on different
wavelength, I am not convinced that presenting proofs from koran is enough
and you are not convinced until someone proove the things out of the koran
so don't you see the deaf discussion we have over here !
All your arguments seem to be the same old story about what the Jew or
the Mozambic said , I don't care about those people !
What do you have ?
How do you see the role of the women in an islamic society ?
would you accept women to be a part of your working force side by side
with her male peers ? or would that be a real haram if so how
do you think you could compete in the global economical world with
only half of your power force !
Would you be able to give up your paternalistic oppressive voice over the
women or not ??
This would be more enlightening than just exchanging almost
the same thing back and forth. you are not gonna change my conviction and
I am not trying to do the same , but please , do respect my arguments.
and if you don't agree with them , try to say why , calling my
arguments slanders and lies and hypocrisy is merely convincing !
I am not sure , if it is really because of the residual of the arabic society
or it is an indivisible part of the islamic religion.
As for my own conviction. though I don't see what you are up to , since
this question by itself contradict the principle of objectivity, if
you would have to know the conviction of the author before deciding
which way to go .since I don't have anything to hide.
if you are not sure yet . please go read the last posting and also let me
know where and when did I try to be hypocrite and telling you otherwise ???
Chafiq,
RAIS, OMAR
>o0r...@summa.tamu.edu (Omar Rais) writes:
>I am not trying to defend Islam here. Islam does not need any human being.
>If somebody is not muslim, he or she should come forward and state it
>clearly, at least we will now whom we are dealing with. Or LEAVE Islam if
>he or she is against its principles and articles. That does not mean that
>a person is not allowed to criticize the religion. What is not allowed is
>slander, lies and hypocrisy. This applies even in internalional laws.
>Omar Rais,
>>cha...@enp.umd.edu (Chafiq) replied
>>Who are "WE " !!!
>>you are obviously not talking anything new here ! and it is not quite
>>right to just come along and say freely that whatever arguments are presented
>>AGAINST what is AGAINST common sense and logics is slander lies or hypocrisy
>>What are you talking about ?
>>Chafiq,
I am going to tell what i am talking about, hold your horses.
By WE, i mean the readers who reads all the articles you keep posting.
What i am asking you is to address the top part of my posting.
Before i can go and answer all the points you brought about Islam and
women in Islam i need to know where you stand regarding this religion.
You said earlier that you have nothing to hide, well if that is the case
then tell us whether you are muslim, athesist or agnostic or nothing, as
some people choose to say.
Why am i asking ? very simple. If you are athesist or agnostic, then there
is no point to discuss religion with you at all since you do not even believe
in God. So why bother going in so many arguments and counter arguments. It is
better to discuss something else like the economie or culture or what have you,
instead of clashing on each other. It is better to be constructive then
destructive.
My suspicions is that you are either an agnostict or an atheist, to say the
least about being a muslim. Correct if I am wrong.
I will have nothing against you in all cases, but it is better to define where
we all stand in this major issues. (especially since we are all together members
of the same organization M.A.R.S).
By the way, the slander and lies i mentioned earlier in my posting were not
directed to you at all. What i had in mind is the people who publish fantasie
books to slander the religion. I call that hypocrisy, because those people
are afraid to come out of the closet to state clearly that there are rejecting
the religion. I will have more respect for them if they address the issue
directly and declare explicitly their inner thoughts. I brought the whole
issue because i believe anybody has the right to criticize whatever he or
she wants, including the religion. So you are off the hook on that point.
I am not trying to put you on the spot, if that is what you think i am
doing. If you do not want to address the issues i brought forward, you
DO NOT have to. As for me, I consider myslef a muslim and i believe in
each and every word of the Quran. Somes facts are hard to swallow for some
people, but i accept them because God knows better, regardless what human brains
may prove or disprove. It is matter of faith, and no human being is forced
to believe in it. Who would have thought, that "time" and "distance" are
relative and not absolute. It took humanity twenty centuries to prove that,
and still some people do not believe in it. Who would have thought of black
holes where gravity is infinity and time is non existent (scary isn't it).
That is why i believe that God knows better in all aspect of life, and what
does not make sense to us is only because of our lack of knowledge.
Humans have still a lot to learn regardless of how much they have achieved,
and God will be always on top. Believe it or not.
Omar Rais,
dja...@gemini.ldc.lu.se
>The version of Islam that says that women are there to stay at home
>cover their faces and subjucate to their husbands (the dead ideology)
>is ONE INTERPRETATION of Quoran that will not be able to reverse the tide
>of atheism (the deadly ideology).
Here is another one innovating in Islam. Where in Islam have you got
that women are (you have forgotten ONLY because women do actually
have the right),are to stay home ? this is called in arabic IFTIRA:
Did anyone hear me saying it ? or are you reading in my mind ?
>I do not think that you read or understand the Quoran better than me or
>Sheikhs Ghazali, Qaradhawi, and Ghannouchi among others who do not
>share this reactionnary interpretation which tries to face the perceived
>danger of westernization by the same dead ideology that lost the war
>already in the beginning of the century.
The matter is not only to read Islam, and that makes the huge dif-
ference of the early muslim scholars who lived with Islam and to-
days scholars.
>This is not Islamic revival,
>because your ideas were there throughout the centuries of decay.
You mean when the saHabiyyat RAA covered their faces, that happened
in the time of islamic decline ?
>That assumption about women was a result of the male chauvinistic Arab
>society that still viewed women as the property of men in their
>subconscious
You are wrong, one's wife is his belonging, I don't say she is among
the fourniture, but that no one has any right on her but her husband.
>although Islam fought it out of the conscious of the pious
>among them. Witness the start of this conflict since the time of Ibn Umar,
>when he told his son about the hadith "Don't prevent women from
>going out to the mosque" his son replied "I will prevent them" Then Ibn
>Umar did not talk to him the rest of his life.
RaHima llahu Ibn Umar RAA, he was right. Don't you see he was talking
about the mosque, and where was that mosque ? May you miss that women
used to attend the night and morning prayers. But Ibn Umar did not
report anything about women travelling alone, meeting their boy friends
in parties or botanic gardens.
>What kind of Islamic revival that makes one brother boast that
>he never saw his brother's wife and he would not know her if he saw her?
And what kind of Islamic revival that makes the brother boast
that he often sees his (so called) brother's wife ?
>This was never in the time of the prophet where women used to actually
>mix with men and assist them in battles AND WORK..
mix to what extend ? AND WORK ? support by some reference.
>Granted there were some
>companions who are more restrictive than others, but the general rule was
>that women are not bound to their homes by law (written or not). The exception
>that was made a rule by Muslims was the widows of the prophet (pbuh).
>
>Enough for now..
>Salam Alaikum.
>
>
Djamel.
dja...@gemini.ldc.lu.se
>
>Apart the mentions of the female in the koran that Laila mentioned which are
>fairy story type of tales ( about the past and they are quite common
>denominator with previous religion) when Islam dealt with women it dealt
>with them as subordinates to men, not to be by themselves.
Yes you are right in some way, for muslims it is still the man
asking a woman for marriage and having the right of divorce. The
woman is assisting the man, there is no equality between the two
but a complementarity. And these notions are very diversified an
fusy in other systems. Muslims have got a code to abide by.
>
>Now coming to this beauty thing which you do seem to not appreciate in
>the first place, all the muslims is to warn women to be aware and watch
>for her beauty,
Woman beauty is not a peculiarity to Islam, neither beauty is a pa-
rticularity to women. "Inna Llaha djemiloun youHibbou ldjemela"
You know nothing about Islam or what ?
>in other words the only thing worthy of watching is the
>female biological attraction and beauty,
This is your own conclusion.
>for instance , there is no mention
>whatsover, to the female, to do other things than be obedient and
>under the wings of thy husband or thy father or thy custodian.
Islam is for all human kind, male and female, black and white,
arab and non arab, you won't tell Allah to mention everybody by
its sex, colour, language and name in his book, will you ?
>If you want to talk about this issue in the light of common sense and
>objectivity so let's do it, I keep telling you I am not gonna provide
>you any islamic stuff. Sorry for that , but there is a difference, between
>presenting my arguments and lying about God !!
>
When you talk either you are right or wrong, when you are wrong either
you do it by ignorance or willingly, so when you do it willingly after
being corrected what shall we tell you then ?
>Now, I don't understand you at all, and sorry if I will sound harsh in
>the rest of my psoting.
>
>first, what do you call allowing four wives for a man ??
>isnt' that considering women as an object of desire, and worse "something"
>not able to be in one to one relationship !!!
You must be sex mind sick ! So you thing that marrying a women is
only for sex, who is going to marry the widows and the old demoi-
selles ? and we have many of them back home and find what made the
problem. Do you allow for a women to be a second wife or to keep
unmarried or worse to prostitude herself ?
>
>What do you call, a Female doctor case when she would have to wait for
>her junkie drug user brother a jobless, to agree for her to get a
>passport or a maariage ???
>do you think these rules were implanted in Islam and the Koran
I don't get it. But is a junkie drug user some degree of religiosity ?
>what do you think of a female not able to testify agains the word of
>a man but it would take 2 females instead !!!
This is in case there are no men.
The creator has decided so and it should be so for reasons we faint
to hide or we ignore.
>what do you think of the fact that your prophete had 9 wives and the
>smallest one ( Aicha ) was only 9 years when he was about 60 years !!!
This is something that can drag a lengthy discussion but I summarize
1. I thought I was talking to a muslim.
2. Our (not yours) married so many women
a. because he has some other duties and rights than other people
and if I had twenty daughters I would try to marry them all
to him but unfortunately this is not allowed in Islam.
How many women do you like to marry to, 9, less, or more ?
b. for social reasons
c. married more than four before the limitation to four came.
d. He married Aisha RAA when she was small because:
d1. her father Abu Bakr decided for her and she agreed.
d2. He married her but did not have relation to her until
she got older.
d3. Tell me at which ages should a man and a woman get married ?
>What do you call this !!
I call this ignorance and hatred to Islam and its prophet from you.
>what do you call the splitting of the women and the female orphans
>among the muslim after they would win some war .
Do you prefer for them to get killed or to get a chance to be muslims ?
>most of the war were against non muslim and hence the female were not
>even muslim !!!!
>
>I didn't mean to present my arguments so harshly, as you might have known
>by now, am following the stream of what you have to present and I am
>again sorry if hurt your personal feelings.
Not at all I can keep a long breath with you, provided we have a
goal and we try to achieve it, in the decency rules and like the
civilised people of course.
>but please don't call me
>liar about God or stuff like that . I never claimed to know Islam outside
>inside but I know enough of it to make my case
As I said it a big outrage to keep saying what Allah or his apostle
have not said. It does not move a hair of my head if you say it about
anyone else. We are all of us ignorants, this is not a major defect,
but the defect is that empty vanity that makes one feel right every
time.
>> Djamel.
ILYESS B. BDIRA
>Not even herself? My impression of the islamic view on women is that she
>is completely right-less as a person. She can make no decisions on her own,
>she can't even have her own passport or travel without her husband's
>permission. The man can sleep around, but if the woman does it, she's
>subject to severe punishment.
....
Well sir your impression is wrong, who gave you that impression
Djamel, your media, or both?
>-Stefan, a christian interested in the arab world.
You sound very ignorant for somebody who is "interested in the arab world."
>P.S. I would appreciate tips on books with a relatively limited vocabulary
>to use for studies in reading the Arab language, prefarably classic Arabic.
>Something like the "Easy Readers" available for studies of other languages.
You see to have a long way to go, not Islam..
>D.S.
ILYESS B. BDIRA
I by no means agree with most things quoted below, nor with
the suspicious intentions of Jane Friedman, but it is worth
reading.
----------------------------------------------------------------------The
Washington Post December 30, 1993, Thursday, Final Edition
HEAD- LINE: Lifestyles; A Woman's Place; An Exhibit Sheds Light on Life
in a Harem
By: Jane Friedman
Since the 19th century, Americans and Europeans have been fas-
cinated, if not obsessed, by the apparent exoticism and sensuali-
ty of life in the Levant. Mark Twain, in "The Innocents Abroad,"
wrote in 1869 on arrival in Morocco of a "bronzed Moor in a pro-
digious white turban, curiously embroidered jacket, gold and
crimson sash ... wrapped round and round his waist" and of Moor-
ish women "enveloped from head to foot in coarse white robes."
But the most romantic perception of the Levant, and the most
lingering, has been that of the imperial or the sultan's harem,
replete with reclining nudes, eunuchs and sensual pleasure. By
the 19th century, a few Western women had managed to see the im-
perial Ottoman harem and had recorded, and probably romanticized,
their observations. Ingres, the 19th-century French painter, im-
mortalized the Western notion of the Turkish harem in his ta-
bleaux.
Americans to this day still understand the harem to be a
19th-century version of a brothel.
But now, a pictorial exhibit assembled by the Arab American
Cultural Foundation and opening at the Martin Luther King Memori-
al Library next week explains that the harem to most Arab fami-
lies referred to a gender-segregated lifestyle, reinforced at
home. It had very little to do with sex and much to do with con-
trol, and it vanished only some 30 years ago.
The exhibit focuses, through photographs and collages, on the
childhood of a Moroccan woman, Fatima Mernissi, who lived until
she was 5 in a gender-segregated home, or harem, in Fez. Her
home, she says, was a multi-storied palace for an extended fami-
ly, with the ground floor a central rotunda. Arabesque pillars
and archways lined the perimeter.
The harem, which had antecedents in the homes of classical
Athens and Byzantium, was designed, said Mernissi, a sociolo-
gist and feminist, "to segregate the sexes as a way of creating
order in the community, and it goes allthrough Islam as an ethi-
cal concept." The architecture, said Middle East historian Mary
Ann Fay, "may have varied throughout the Middle East." But the
way women organized themselves was probably very similar.
Mernissi recalls her home in Fez in the 1940s with both en-
dearment and anger. The women and girls -- sisters, cousins and
aunts -- were allowed outsideonly for school and occasional
visits to the mosque. Otherwise, life transpired at home or, at
most, in a walled-in garden. There were no windows to the out-
side.
"Windows," she said, "only gave on the inside," so that those
banned from certain areas could nevertheless observe.
And those banned, or banished, were the women.
In Mernissi's childhood home, the ground floor -- the most
prestigious space -- was an agglomeration of "salons" without
walls. Each salon was alloted to a male adult in the extended
family. Salons for women were located in the uppermost reaches of
the home, the household equivalent of outer Siberia, with the
least prestigious females (widowed aunts or divorcees, for exam-
ple) having their quarters all the way at the top, far away from
public view.
Although women were allowed on the ground floors, they hastily
retreated to their own quarters upstairs when visitors, particu-
larly unrelated males, came tocall.
"When a male came calling," said Mernissi, speaking in Wash-
ington recently,"people would shout 'make way' in Arabic and the
women would hide in corners to let visitors enter. The adolescent
girls would quickly go upstairs."
Meals at home took place in the ground-floor salons with
separate tables for men, adult women and girls. The wealthier
families had live-in cooks who occupied quarters near the
kitchen.
The exhibit, entitled "The Harem Within: Fear of the Differ-
ence" and shown earlier at the Alif Gallery, highlights not only
the negative. Mernissi's introspective and whimsical text, which
provides a running commentary for the photographs and collages,
also points to positive elements.
"Harem women," she wrote, "who were forced to shrink their ex-
istence to a courtyard, tried to expand their space by exploring
what they had. ... Tactile arts flourished ... flower weaving on
coarse carpets. Trapping birds in silk embroideries."
Under another photograph she wrote, "The tale of the woman who
had a feather dress changed my life. I discovered I could fly if
I raised my head, fixed upon the sky and concentrated."
Nobel Prize-winning author Naguib Mahfouz wrote about the
gender-segregated home, particularly highlighting the latticework
screens that allowed women to see without being seen. Although
his novels were set in the early years of this century, the exhi-
bit underscores the fact that gender-segregated living arrange-
ments faded in the Arab world only three decades ago.
In the wake of independence from France in the 1950s, there
was a push to educate women. Today in Morocco, said Mernissi,
not only has the harem disappeared, but single women are allowed
to leave the family and live on their own.
A housing shortage throughout the Arab world has made the
old-fashioned palace an anachronism, but gender segregation at
home is reemerging in another way, said Mernissi. As Arab
economies continue to endure dislocation and crisis, Islamic fun-
damentalism is flourishing. With it have come new restrictions on
women. Many lower-middle-class Arab families, living in crowded
apartments, have turned to Islam, and the women again wear veils.
And when unrelated males or even females visit, the women of the
family retreat to the bedrooms.
Speaking of the urban poor in the Arab world, Mernissi said,
"their life isin shambles. There is no order and they have no
power. If you separate the sexes, you put order in your life.
"When you don't control anything at all -- your job, infla-
tion, the environment -- making strictness makes some sense."
The exhibit includes 21 black-and-white photographs by Ruth
Ward, an Americanphotographer, of a re-created harem, caftans and
all, plus a dozen collages by Pakistani artist Mansoora Hassan.
It was conceptualized about a year ago during a visit Mernissi
made to Washington. She had been thinking about the harem
foryears and was writing a book about it. Ward had already gone
to Fez to stage thephotographs.
Mernissi said she has fixated on her early harem years be-
cause hers was thelast generation to experience this traditional
Arab home.
The show evokes that experience through photos of women roam-
ing their elaborately tiled quarters, huddling behind wooden
screens to see without being seen, dancing among themselves and
using their only lifeline to the outside world -- the telephone.
Doors that are pushed open lead only to equally confining gar-
dens.
Hassan, who created the mixed-media collages, also experienced
gender segregation as a child in Pakistan. Her works too are
keyed to Mernissi's text, which is scribbled on the bottom of
her canvases as stream of consciousness. She said her use of
layers reflects the screens or barriers in the lives of women.
But the exhibit attempts to reach not only those interested in
the Arab worldbut average Americans as well. It argues that the
harem is not specific to the Middle East but a metaphor for
segregation of all kinds.
"All segregation boils down to the fear of the other," said
Lama Dajani, projects director of the Alif Gallery. "It's not
culturally specific. We're trying to draw similarities between
segregation in the Arab world and segregation in America and to
get people to rethink the vision of the Orient as intoxicating,
cruel and passionate."
"When I saw the Clarence Thomas/Anita Hill hearings," said
Mernissi, "I realized the Senate is a harem and women don't go
there."
In conjunction with the show, the Smithsonian's Resident Asso-
ciate Program sponsored a series of lectures in November on the
harem and its role in society.Close to 100 people, mostly Ameri-
can women, attended.
And the hundreds who have visited the Alif Gallery have make
the connection between Mernissi's harem and their own lives.
"My wings are just beginning to grow and my shoulders hurt,"
wrote an American woman in the gallery's guest book.
"I am trying to break down the barriers that exist in my busi-
ness harem," wrote another.
"It was good," wrote a third, "to get a view of a culture
about which we all have assumptions and stereotypes and to start
to think about the frontiers in this society."
After Washington, the show will move on to other locations
throughout the United States.
"I feel," said Mernissi, "that with all this communication,
the world can be a better place. You have to trust that people
will get out of their frontiers."
Jane Friedman, a Washington writer, reported from the Mideast
for 10 years. The photographs will be on display at the Martin
Luther King Memorial Library from Jan. 6 through 28.
PHOTO, FROM FATIMA MERNISSI'S TEXT FOR THE EXHIBIT: "TO DEVELOP
WINGSSEEMS AN OLD MUSLIM WOMEN'S TRADITION.", RUTH WARD/ALIF GAL-
LERY
The Washington Post December 11, 1993, Saturday, Final Edition
HEADLINE: Galleries; Drawings For Their Own Sake By Lee Fleming,
Special to The Washington Post
Artists make drawings for many reasons: to explore new
theories, to alter andrearrange scenes before committing them to
canvas or plate, and to test the limits of media. The fine exhi-
bition of drawings by European masters at St. Luke's Gallery
provides ample evidence of drawing as process while remaining
focused on beauty and immediacy.
There are lovely studies for paintings: the small charcoal
"Study for the Head of an Angel" by an unknown 16th-century ar-
tist from the school of Durer, orthe elegant 18th-century French
"Head of Christ," limned in shadowy red chalk. The show also
contains baroque and renaissance drawings based on contemporary
paintings that indicate how ardently people desired to have im-
ages from popular pictures. For example, a 1528 "Portrait of Ul-
rich Varnbuler," after Durer, is modeled on the master's woodcut
portrait of his close friend, and is an adept recapitulation of
Durer's woodcut masterpiece.
The romantics also receive their due: Henry Fuseli's "Furies,"
an arresting 1780 drawing of brown ink and gray wash over red
chalk, layers lavish rounded forms in an orgy of emotion and bold
line.
But the drawings that seem satisfied to be "just" drawings
linger longest in the eye. Most remarkable is "Peasants at Market
With a Bird Cage," attributed toAdriaen Van Ostade, a serene
grouping of a woman and three men regarding a cage.Brown ink and
g> ray wash imbue the surface with a wonderful winter light.
Here, hand and eye accord in gestures both spontaneous and
searching, producing a quiet treasure.
'The Harem Within' at Alif
As the often-poignant "The Harem Within: Fear of the Differ-
ence" at Alif Gallery reminds us, "harem" originally meant "for-
bidden space" -- the architecturally segregated women's quarters.
Today, however, it has other connotations. According to writer
Fatima Mernissi, for Westerners "it is a sexconcept, for Arab
men, a control concept, for Arab women, a fear concept."
Mernissi's musings and family anecdotes are the text element of
a three-part collaboration that includes mixed media works by
Mansoora Hassan and photographsby Ruth Ward. The images on the
walls explore this notion of the harem as a barrier between the
sexes, and ultimately, between peoples and cultures.
Hassan's images consist of photo-transfers of elaborate archi-
tecture onto paper embossed with other details of flora, fauna
and adornment; the sum of the parts is a sense of opulent claus-
trophobia. Her human figures are shadowy, visually veiled by
overprinting and by the swaths of color that "veil" the pictures'
surfaces. Among her most striking images is "Frontier Within," in
which a tower rises behind washes of silver and red like a
mirage. In rounded hand-lettering, Hassan traces the phrase
"Grandmother Yasmeen never told me about the frontier within," so
that the words float like smoke and yet seem to recede into the
depths, the way light waves fracture as they penetrate a pool.
Ward's photographs are fascinating for the insider glimpse
they give into modern women encased in another culture -- but
these are no National Geographic "candids": The scenes are com-
posed for irony and even humor -- a veiled lady dances with a
telephone, instrument of freedom; another confronts the machines
of the computer age. Ward's commentary is at its best when most
subtle: Pearls wrapping a wrist echo the less attractive chain on
a graceful grillwork gate, and make the point of gilded prisoners
and prisons without fuss.
The Harem Within, at Alif Gallery, 1204 31st St. NW, through
Dec. 23.
The Washington Post November 26, 1993, Friday, Final Edition
HEADLINE: Out of Harem Into Feminism By Hank Burchard
ASK ARAB feminist Fatima Mernissi where she's coming from and
the answer is: a harem. Now a sociology professor at Morocco's
Mohammed V University,
Mernissi was born in a harem. The women who raised her also
raised her consciousness to such a pitch that she has become an
international crusader for women's rights.
The story of her transformation is told in a collaborative
Alif Gallery exhibition that combines Mernissi's text with pho-
tos by Ruth Ward and mixed-media collages by Mansoora Hassan.
While her collaboration with the two Washington artists is an ef-
fective one, Mernissi's words are by far the most powerful ele-
ment.
Harems, still widespread in Muslim lands, are in fact the best
places to produce feminists, Mernissi says, because of the
frustrations of such enforcedseclusion.
"A woman can walk miles without making one single step for-
ward," she says. "As a child born in a harem I instinctively
knew that to live is to open closed doors. To live is to look
outside. To live is to step out. Life is trespassing."
While men hold the keys to the harem, Mernissi says, the
system oppresses both sexes. "Now that Arab women are pouring
into the streets by the million, men discover with dismay that
they, not women, were the captives of the harem dream."
Although she left the harem long ago, Mernissi finds that
she is not yet free. "I have a keen sense when a faculty or a
U.N. meeting is drifting into harem scenes," she says. Excusing
herself, she writes, "as elegantly as possible becomes the only
sensible move. In relationships it takes me years to realize that
to ease my suffering, the option to step out was always there.
Grandmother Yasmin never told me about the frontier within."
THE HAREM WITHIN:
Fear of the Difference -- Through Dec. 15 at the Alif Gallery,
Arab-American Cultural Foundation, 1204 31st St. NW. 202/337-
9670. Open 10 to 6 Monday throughFriday and noon to 6 Saturdays.
No wheelchair access (long, steep, steel stairs).
The Times November 9, 1993, Tuesday HEADLINE: Secure in sister-
hood By Lucy Berrington
FOR many, the term ''Muslim women'' prompts images of ex-
hausted mothers chained to the stove, blinded by their veils,
pregnant and frantic to be westernised.
To British women, whose glossy magazines recount tales of
''honour killings'' and female circumcision, often wrongly iden-
tified with the Muslim faith, it seems inexplicable that Islam
could be a rational choice. Female converts, they say, are either
brainwashed, stupid or traitors to their sex.
Muslim women strongly reject such accusations. British con-
verts are often strikingly well-educated. Dozens of the older
women seem to be perpetual students, and are anxious to distin-
guish between genuinely Islamic behaviour andcultural diktats.
The oppression of women, they say, is a political issue not a re-
ligious condition.
A recent interview in Vanity Fair quoted Fatima Mernissi, a
leading Islamic scholar based in Morocco, thus: ''You find in the
Koran hundreds of verses to support women's rights and perhaps
four or five that do not. (The fundamentalists) have seized upon
those four and thrown away the rest.''
Rabia Lemahieu-Evans, a Belgian convert, social anthropolo-
gist and postgraduate student at the Muslim College in London,
feels Muslim law, the Sharia, should be re-examined in its modern
context.
''The Prophet was a reformer of the 7th century,'' she says.
''It was a tribal society but he united people in a religious
sense. He encouraged the emancipation of the slaves but, as in
Judaism and Christianity, he did not outlaw it because perhaps
society wasn't ready. He did the same for women. He set things in
motion but in the 20th century we need to look carefully at the
historical circumstances.''
Muslim women are regularly asked to defend their faith. Many
respond by questioning the alternatives.
''A woman in my office said, 'At least I'm not a traitor to
my sex','' says Hassana, 39, who converted in 1988.
Her friend Nouria, 36, who converted in 1974 after finding
some verses of the Koran in a dustbin, said: ''Most of the women
in this country are traitors to their sex. It's almost as if
we've been defeminised.'' Both women are from Scottish Protestant
backgrounds and live in London.
Hassana wears the hijab (the scarf) and has tried the veil:
''It makes you feel very private, very safe. Your self-confidence
gets boosted. You can be doing what you like under there. I've
worn my personal stereo.''
The attraction of Islam for many converts is its premise of
separate spheres; the different biological destinies of men and
women. Many Westerners feel this smacks of discrimination, but
Muslims say the alternatives impose impossible demands. They de-
fine Western emancipation as ''women copying men'', an exercise
in which womanhood has no intrinsic value.
Gai Eaton, information officer at the Regent's Park Mosque,
who came to Islam 40 years ago after a diplomatic career, says:
''Whatever the pattern of gender relationships in the Islamic
world, women do have a dignity that on the whole they don't have
in the modern world. I think it springs from the awe in which the
mother figure is held.'' He quotes the Prophet: ''Paradise it at
my mother's feet,'' and cites a wealthy Arab living in London,
exiled for life for mistreating his mother.
Many Eastern women are content with role differentiation be-
cause it ensures their status and power in their own spheres: the
household, family and community. Iranian women can receive pay-
ment for breastfeeding their children.
''On television recently, they were discussing why women
shouldn't have the right to keep their own names on marriage,''
says Nouria, who has an Egyptian husband and five children.
''This is a right I got 1,400 years ago. Issues such as property,
children and inheritance have all been settled, and it's very
finely tuned in the woman's favour.'' She cites arrangements for
divorce, maintenance and child custody, and an Islamic 'wages for
housework' school. She adds that in a sense men are just guests
in their own homes: ''My husband has toask my permission before
another man can stay in the house. This is my kingdom, my
domain.''
Many Muslims contrast the status of women in Islam with what
they see as thedismal plight of women in the West. They note that
here women work full-time outof financial necessity, remaining
lumbered with the housework and childcare. It is a puzzling v>
ersion of emancipation.
Modern Muslims, they say, are not necessarily destined to be
housewives. There is a demand in the community for their own so-
cial workers, lecturers, journalists and doctors. A female Muslim
gynaecologist would make a good living.
Among the greatest advantages of Islam, which to many em-
phasises the failureof feminism, is its ''sisterhood''. Converts
find great mutual support among Muslim women, which reflects the
wider community values of Islam. ''There's no such thing as a
Muslim woman on her own,'' Nouria says, ''nor a single Muslim
parent on her own. Nor a mentally ill woman on her own. If any-
one with a commitment to Islam sees you in hijab and you're
suffering, they step in and help. That's abnormal in Britain.''
According to Riffat Yusuf, 27, a London radio journalist who
was born a Muslim, the community is the point. ''Rather than the
issue of 'the Muslim woman' it's really about societal progres-
sion, moving on. The thing about 'the Muslim woman' is also the
thing about 'the Muslim family' and 'the Muslim community'.''
Nouria agrees. ''I see no future in this country, the way it's
going,'' she says. ''It comes back to women. ''Scratch any 'new
man' and you find an old man trying to get out; men will always
be the same. Women are changing much faster, but they are not>
trying to get what they want. Everything the feminist movement is
aiming for, except abortion and lesbianism, we've got.''
EQUAL RIGHTS
'And for women are rights over men similar to those of men
over women'
the Koran
'Have the fear of God with regard to women, and I order you to
treat them well' the Prophet
'The best amongst you are those who are kindest to their
wives'
the Prophet
'They are as a garment for you, and you (husbands) are as a
garment for them'
the Koran
'The search for knowledge is a duty for every Muslim, male or
female'
the Prophet
THE DALLAS MORNING NEWS July 21, 1993, Wednesday HEADLINE: Middle
Ground; One woman's fight for recognition clashes with a tradi-
tion other Muslim woman accept - and respect Colleen O'Connor,
Special Contributor to The Dallas Morning News
Sandi Abouzeid never intended to cause a ruckus. All she
wanted was to worship Allah the God of Islam in a way that was
comfortable to her. She wantedto both hear and see the sermon
that was about the brotherhood of man.
It was her desire to see the service at the Islamic Society of
Denton that bucked centuries of religious tradition and has
sparked controversy. She has since appeared on a local radio
show and her situation was the topic of a stormyJuly meeting of
the National Organization for Women's local chapter.
The trouble began about two months ago, when Ms. Abouzeid says
she innocentlyentered the area of the mosque where the sermon was
about to start. At the time, she was unaware only men were al-
lowed to worship in the Denton mosque's main prayer room. Women
used another room.
A Muslim for six years, Ms. Abouzeid protested attempts by
other Muslim womento remove her from the main prayer room. She
sat through the entire service on that day and another day the
following week. Doing so was her personal form of protest.
At the NOW meeting, she recalled what happened before the ser-
vice: "They weretotally covered in black, like women in Saudi
Arabia. I just waved and kept going."
She walked to the main prayer room. As she removed her shoes
prior to prayer, she was approached by a Muslim man. According
to Ms. Abouzeid, the man greeted her and asked, "What are you do-
ing, sister?" When she said she was goingto hear the sermon, the
man responded: "You can't go in there."
She asked "Why not?" and was told, "Because there are a lot of
brothers from other countries who would be offended if there are
women here."
She went inside and sat down. Afterward, she was warned by
some Muslim men that the police would be called if she tried to
enter the prayer room again. Undaunted, she did re-enter the
room at another time.
The police were not called. But NOW did call a meeting in
South Dallas that drew about 30 people, including five devout
Muslim women with jewel-hued head scarves and well-thumbed
Korans. Two Muslim men also attended.
Ms. Abouzeid and her fellow Muslims were polite and con-
trolled.
But the atmosphere of the meeting nevertheless crackled as fe-
minists challenged what is seen by some as a fundamental tenet of
the world's fastest-growing faith. There are more than 3 million
Muslims in the United States and roughly 1 billion worldwide.
Several feminists argued for Ms. Abouzeid's freedom to worship
in the way shewishes, believing that the practice of separating
men from women is a form of oppression and should not be tolerat-
ed.
But Kareemah Abdul-Bashir spoke for the traditional Muslim
women who'd come to the meeting to understand and to educate Ms.
Abouzeid and non-Muslims.
"I've been a Muslim for seven years now," she said. "We
recognize that men are the leaders in society and at home. We
women were created for men; therefore men are attracted to us.
If a woman bends in front of a man (during prayer), he is not go-
ing to be thinking about Allah."
The NOW meeting prompted a debate between the two opposing
forces feminists and Muslims. Within the larger Muslim communi-
ty, disagreement also exists regarding the source of the tradi-
tion, which is not uniformly practiced from mosque to mosque.
In some mosques, women are closeted in separate rooms. In
others, women sit on one side of the room and men on the other.
In still others, men sit in the front of a mosque and women in
the back. But the only time the sexes ever sit side-by-side or
with women in front is during the hajj, or pilgrimage, to Mecca.
An aid to prayer
Several local Muslim women who were interviewed said they like
sitting behindmen or being separate from them. They said it lets
them totally concentrate on Allah, symbolizes their belief that
men are the leaders and providers in society and gives them
privacy.
But to a minority of Muslim women like Ms. Abouzeid a former
substitute teacher in the Denton Independent School District who
has her own Islamic schoolseparation means oppression. "One
thing that attracted me to Islam is that I met a lot of women who
had equal rights in their homes. A lot of this followed from the
Koran," Ms. Abouzeid says. "It has a chapter that tells basic
things about how to treat a woman. I figure because this is our
holy book, it's put inhere for a reason."
The Prophet Mohammed is credited with vastly improving women's
lives. In theAugust issue of Vanity Fair, Fatima Mernissi an
Islamic scholar who teaches atUniversity Mohammed V in Rabat,
Morocco notes that Mohammed gave women the rightto divorce, to >
get custody of children, to inherit, to pray in the mosque and
toparticipate in life as fully as men.
The author also writes of 16 women "who ruled from 1000 A.D.
to 1800 as governors, sultanas and queens throughout the Islamic
world."
If this is true, where is it written that women must pray
apart from men?
Muslims like Sandi Abouzeid argue that separation is not men-
tioned in the Koran and therefore the practice does not come from
Allah but from man.
But Muslims like Aisha A.K. Hatim of the Dallas Masjid
(mosque) of Al-Islam say that although separation "isn't specifi-
cally in the Koran," it is in the Hadith, a vast volume of the
sayings of the Prophet Mohammed. The Hadith is considered to
have as much validity as the Koran.
But still another Muslim, Salam Al-Marayati of the Muslim Pub-
lic Affairs Council in Los Angeles, says separation is not men-
tioned in either book.
"Women in the time of the Prophet were active, speaking to the
Prophet and tothe people. They were not in the closet. They
were out in the open, involved with people. They were scholars.
People who say this is in the Hadith should back it up," he says.
"There are a hundred thousand versions of Hadith," he says
with some exaggeration. "There are some weak ones, where the re-
porting chain is not authentic or has a missing link, and there
are strong ones. People should clarify whether they are speaking
of the Hadith everyone agrees on or a controversial one."
Traditional practice
What everyone does agree on, however, is that separation is
traditional.
"Arab customs and Islamic principles don't necessarily con-
verge," says Mr. Al-Marayati. "It's important to separate the
two. And with Muslims in America,there are so many different be-
liefs. It's a clash of cultures. Not just Saudisand Americans,
but Pakistanis, Egyptians and African-Americans. There needs to
be a phase of r> econciliation and understanding, rather than
confrontation."
In the Denton mosque case, one voice of understanding comes
from Thurayyah Z.Alwan-Beyah, who has grown up with the Koran.
"I don't feel intimidated if I'm told to sit in the back row (of
the prayer hall), because I understand what my role is and what
the role of the male is," she says carefully. "It might be that
some men go to the extreme, but there again it's cultural and
ethnic background. It's a very sensitive thing, but to me it's
not a big issue."Thoughshe disagrees with Ms. Abouzeid, she does
not attack her.
"I've been to the Denton masjid myself," she says, "and I've
seen the room the sisters go into. I can sympathize when she
says she feels isolated. leading the prayer. I felt kind of
isolated, but I didn't make a big thing of it. Maybe Sandi feels
different about it. It's an individual thing."
The debate that Ms. Abouzeid has triggered among local Muslims
is not that different from struggles that other religions have
suffered, says Richard Cogley, associate professor of religious
studies at Southern Methodist University.
"The real issue going on here," he says, "is that any reli-
gious tradition which originated in the ancient world is going to
reveal the influence of patriarchy that's true of Christianity,
Judaism and Islam. Religious liberals want to dismiss this as a
time-bound reflection of a bygone era. But to traditional beli-
evers, it's a reflection of the unending divine wisdom of the
ages." For now, in Denton, the peace holds mainly because Ms.
Abouzeid has stopped going to the mosque.
This was not the intent of the Muslim sisters, who had hoped
to edify her during the NOW meeting. "We're not here to put you
on the spot," Aisha Hatim tells Ms. Abouzeid. "We love you.
You're our sister, and we want you to understand this religion to
the highest. Keep studying."
But Ms. Abouzeid says she feels shunned by the local Muslim
community.
No other Muslim woman in the area stands beside her on this
issue.
No other Muslim man or woman has chosen to enroll a child in
her small Islamic school, where girls are allowed to study along-
side boys.
She won't attend the Denton mosque because she is not willing
to change her beliefs. Further, she realizes that as a lone wom-
an fighting a mosque filled with traditional Muslim men backed by
traditional Muslim women she has little chance of success. She
doesn't have the option of attending a Dallas or Fort Worth
mosque, which may be more progressive, because she doesn't have a
car.
For Sandi Abouzeid and her feminist beliefs, this is not a
matter of fightingor switching.
For now, she worships at home. And the idea of a protracted
battle does not appeal to her. She is fearful of reprisals for
having spoken her mind, having acted on her convictions. "I
just want to live my life," she says.
Colleen O'Connor is a Dallas free-lance writer.
The New York Times February 6, 1993 HEADLINE: Beliefs By Peter
Steinfels
Joyce Davis, the foreign desk editor at National Public Radio,
says the subject of women and Islam is one that has long puzzled
her. A former reporter at The New Orleans Times-Picayune, she has
lived in Athens, traveled frequently in the Middle East and writ-
ten about the Palestinian Liberation Organization.
She found it hard to reconcile the news media's depiction of
Islam as totallyhostile to women with the many intelligent, arti-
culate and independent women shemet who considered themselves
loyal Muslims.
At the same time she had her doubts. "How can you be a
Muslim?" she asked many of these women. She also asked them other
questions she is willing to call "biased."
Listeners to National Public Radio will be the beneficiaries
next week of herpuzzlement and her willingness to question her
own biases. A five-part series onwomen in Islam will be broadcast
on NPR's "All Things Considered" (Feb. 8 and 14), "Morning Edi-
tion" (Feb. 9) and "Weekend Edition" (Feb. 13 and 14).
The first report comes from Khartoum in the Sudan, where Su-
danese women are enlisted in the armed forces. They have achieved
a new degree of liberation as military nurses. But this service
involves them in the government's brutal suppression of Chris-
tians and animists in southern Sudan who are resisting the impo-
sition of Islamic law.
Sudan is also the setting for the second report, on the muti-
lation of the genitals of girls, often including the removal of
the clitoris, which is called female circumcision. The practice
continues despite opposition from the government as well as
Islamic leaders and many women. They all insist that it isa cul-
tural legacy not sanctioned by Islam.
The most touching report centers on polygamy, which is legal in
most of the Islamic world but is practiced by only a small part
of the population.
Ms. Davis interviews the three wives of Moktiar Sahman, a
prosperous Malaysian businessman. One day the first wife, unso-
phisticated and poorly educated, found herself confronted with
her husband's new partner, younger and skilled in business, and
later with a second wife, still younger and more vivacious.
Neither this drama nor the husband's self-satisfaction is ex-
actly unfamiliar to Western ears. Yet it is recounted by two of
the wives' translating for the first as all three of them giggle
together over their fates in a household enlivened by nine ap-
parently happy children.
The overall impression, underlined in two more reports, is
that Islam, like Judaism, Christianity and other major religions,
is rich in texts and archetypesthat can be interpreted variously.
The Koran's approval of taking up to four wives can be coun-
tered by the verseinsisting that all wives be treated equally.
But that is something that many Muslim women say is no longer
possible psychologically even if it is materially.
None of this is a totally new story. Before his death in 1908,
Qasim Amin, anEgyptian lawyer, judge and leader among Islamic
modernizers, had stirred fierce battles with his books "The Eman-
cipation of Women" and "The New Woman."
But efforts to re-examine Islamic law regarding women, mar-
riage and family have suffered from guilt by association: change
became stigmatized as capitulation to the colonizers or abandon-
ment of Islam by the Westernized upper classes.
Ms. Davis, whose father was a Baptist minister, said that do-
ing the story hadreminded her of restrictions on women in Chris-
tianity. "I come from a little Baptist church in New Orleans
where I can't even become a deacon," she said.
She had tried to approach the subject with an open mind, she
said, but also with a keen awareness of the power of stereotypes.
"As a black American, if I know my people can be so misunderstood
by those around them," she said, how muchmore the danger of
stereotyping distant cultures and groups?
But in trying to avoid Western stereotypes, has Ms. Davis un-
derplayed the depth of Islam's understanding of the sexes, as one
requiring the veiling and seclusion of women and their consign-
ment to family roles?
Fatima Mernissi, a Moroccan sociologist, has described a
deeply embedded Islamic conception of woman as a sexually active
and dangerous force that threatens chaos unless sharply con-
strained. In this respect, her provocative book, "Beyond the
Veil: Male-Female Dynamics in Modern Muslim Society" (Indiana
University Press), resembles feminist critiques of Christianity
and Judaism as steeped in patriarchy.
Yet Professor Mernissi comes to conclusions similar to Ms.
Davis's radio reports. Writing a new introduction about the im-
pact of fundamentalism for the 1987 edition of her 1975 study,
she asserts that by opening education to women, especially higher
education, Islamic states have in fact made dramatic change
inwomen's situation inevitable.
Indeed, she attributes the rise in fundamentalism in part to
the anxiety produced, especially among young university-educated
males from rural backgrounds, by the increase in educated or in-
dependently employed unmarried young women. "The idea of an
adolescent unmarried woman is a completely new idea in the Muslim
world," she writes.
"Muslim women, illiterate and educated alike, are coming to
diagnose and verbalize their problems -- previously identified
and labeled as being emotional-- as being essentially political,"
she writes. Those are certainly the voices one hears in Ms.
Davis's reports.
Ahmed Bouzid
>
>You just proved you can't even tolerate any discussions that don't
>go with your own beliefs, so don't think you are any saint, and what
>you just did is actually the ultimatum of what you called " jahil".
>
>What's wrong with presenting to the world your own version of
>the story, if you think it is correct and right so why you are
>trying to intimidate me instead of presenting something
>that one could read and ponder on !!!
You call your nonsense discussing, ya insaan? What do you know about
Islam to come around blabbering and talking jibberish? Ittaqi llah,
if you are a Muslim, and don't take these matters lightly. To
discuss anything with anyone, there has to be a minimum of competence
with whom I am discussing. You lack that minimum ya si Chafiq.
So, I advise you to go learn a little before you come expounding
on your "opinion".
Ahmed
H P Chafiq
Stefan Lundstrom
>In article <yess.767978695@alcor>, ye...@alcor.concordia.ca ( ILYESS B. BDIRA ) writes:
... CUT ...
>>That assumption about women was a result of the male chauvinistic Arab
>>society that still viewed women as the property of men in their
>>subconscious
> You are wrong, one's wife is his belonging, I don't say she is among
> the fourniture, but that no one has any right on her but her husband.
Not even herself? My impression of the islamic view on women is that she
is completely right-less as a person. She can make no decisions on her own,
she can't even have her own passport or travel without her husband's
permission. The man can sleep around, but if the woman does it, she's
subject to severe punishment.
It is reasonable that nobody should have any rights on her but her husband,
but it should also be so that nobody has any rights on HIM except his WIFE.
And both sexes should be equal by the law and regarding civil rights,
in marriage as well as outside of it. This is a place where I think Islam
has a long way to go before reaching a situation acceptable from a humanistic
point of view.
It would be interesting to see some arguments why for example women should
not be allowed to drive cars (as in Saudi Arabia) or talk to a stranger about
everyday things, something christians are frequently warned about, since their
talking to a woman might give her problems.
ma:a-s-salaama
-Stefan, a christian interested in the arab world.
P.S. I would appreciate tips on books with a relatively limited vocabulary
to use for studies in reading the Arab language, prefarably classic Arabic.
Something like the "Easy Readers" available for studies of other languages.
D.S.
H P Chafiq
>You call your nonsense discussing, ya insaan? What do you know about
>Islam to come around blabbering and talking jibberish? Ittaqi llah,
>if you are a Muslim, and don't take these matters lightly. To
>discuss anything with anyone, there has to be a minimum of competence
>with whom I am discussing. You lack that minimum ya si Chafiq.
>So, I advise you to go learn a little before you come expounding
>on your "opinion".
>
>Ahmed
>
Notice this is the second time you are extolling your explicit
knowledge without even getting down to earth.
So you want me to wallow you in your own narrow mindedness pulling you
from your beard a si Ahmed !!!
Chafiq,
Chabi M'hamed
"jaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahil" to defend your argument ,believe me your are giving a terrible impression about the religion of Islam ,you and the rest of your gang are a good example of why people in Algeria and Morocco are so scared to have an "Islamic state " ruled by people like yourself
imagine what would be our countries if you ever get the power
no one will be able defend his/her right ,no one will be able to oppose your ruling because
he/she will be called "jahil or kafir" which lead to elmajzara
May Allah save our Beloved Countries from any form of dictatorship especially from
"FOKHA-MULLAH"
M'hamed
Ahmed Bouzid
>It looks some people got so stuck in the dogma of religion , that
>whoever would like to try to understand any issue no matter how
>disturbing it is about the religion is a sinner !!
>The bottom line Mr Ahmed and the likes go back and read the
>first Surrah of the Quran ( Ikraa) maybe this time you would
>get the message right which means USE YOUR BRAIN !!!
>
>Shock therapy does a lot of marvelous things to senile minds.
>
>Chafiq.
Ya Mr. no-brain Chafiq, ya miskiiiiin. You have demonstrated
beyond the shadow of doubt through your half-witted commentary
and interpretation of Islam and the Quran that you are one
hell of a super-duper jaaahil. Talk about exploitation of women,
ya bnadem, and how the woman is respected in the West! Where is
prostitution most spread in ya haaada? The Islamic world?
Where do you see women modeling naked? In the Islamic world?
Where is pornography spread? In the Islamic world?
Where do you find nude dancing bars? The Islamic world?
Wanna-be Westerners, like you ya mister Chafiq, especially
when they open their mouths to loud their idols and
degrade Islam make me laugh. Khaf rebbi wekhtik mettmeskhiir,
Islam is no joke to be played with by a joker like you.
Ahmed
Rabah Seffal
>In article <yess.767978695@alcor>, ye...@alcor.concordia.ca ( ILYESS B. BDIRA ) writes:
>>That assumption about women was a result of the male chauvinistic Arab
>>society that still viewed women as the property of men in their
>>subconscious
>
> You are wrong, one's wife is his belonging, I don't say she is among
> the fourniture, but that no one has any right on her but her husband.
>
>>Salam Alaikum.
>>
>>
> Djamel.
got lost:
If a woman belongs to her man, does the man belong to her?
If the answer is Yes:
Then they will be running in a circle. She belongs to him and
he belongs to her.
It's like the dog trying to bite its tail.
IF the answer is NO, there are two cases:
1) Something has to belong her . What is it ?
2) To whom does the man belong ?. If he belongs to Allah, why
can't the woman belong to Allah, too. If he does not belong
to anything and to anyone, why can't the woman be the same?.
Thequestion is : Why all this business of belonging or not belonging ?
RS
--
Sghur Raveh l'Mulud
H'adar ur qqar a<yigh
Ketc (Kemm) d mmis (yellis) Umazigh
ILYESS B. BDIRA
>In article <1994May4.1...@nomina.lu.se> dja...@gemini.ldc.lu.se writes:
>>In article <yess.767978695@alcor>, ye...@alcor.concordia.ca ( ILYESS B. BDIRA ) writes:
>>>That assumption about women was a result of the male chauvinistic Arab
>>>society that still viewed women as the property of men in their
>>>subconscious
>>
>> You are wrong, one's wife is his belonging, I don't say she is among
>> the fourniture, but that no one has any right on her but her husband.
belonging to somebody in a sentimental way is very different
from being his property.
I will give you a story that shows that even the Fuqaha
may be influenced by the ills of their society:
A man found his wife having sex with a men so he killed them both with
one hit from his sword that cut them in half... When the tribe
of the dead men wanted revenge and the husband was brought to Umar Ibn
Alkhattab (RAA), the husband said "I hit my own wife with a sword and
he happened to be between her legs!" Umar released him!
If the story is true, it would say alot about the attitude of one
of the greatest Shahaba , if it is not true, it would say a lot
about the attitude of the respected Fuqaha who use this story in their
deductions!
what is wrong with the story?
1)Women are not property of a men, he cannot just kill his wife and
by chance a men happens to be one her!
2)What happened to justice? maybe the man is raping her? Maybe
she was sleeping when the guy came on to her?
3)What happened to due process of law?
etc.. etc.. Too many things that anybody living in this
century would see wrong with this story, yet some respected scholars
of the past apparently saw nothing wrong in it and were quoting it in their
jurisprudence books!
Another item:
Some Fuqaha had the opinion that a father should not be
prosecuted or the judge should be more lenient with him
if he kills his son/daughter.. Their arguments were in the line of
"that they BELONG to him..."
So, Sir that is what belong means.
One problem that many Islamists have is with the literal interpretation
of "Khair Al Quruni Qarni Thomma Alldhi Yalih.." This hadith
does not imply that humanity decays rather than progresses in all areas..
I have the opinion that the following are improvements that
humanity as a whole (not only the west) made:
1)The attitude towards women. I am not talking about sexual "liberation"
that, I believe, is mosly decay, but men and women are equal in the degree
of decay. Actually it is men who try to invent all of those fashions
that suit their desires.. Most fashion designers are men by the way.
I think that this decay is independent of the fact that women are more
respected.. It just is linked by two movements; 1) the west who tries
to always link women liberation to sexual connotations and 2) The reaction-
naries who go to the other extreme and fight feminism because of the
same perceived link!
2)The civilian society: the society is more and more disarmed and
discord does not always result in civil war! This is an achievement that
will allow us to discuss openly and oppose official policies without
being labeled as a rebel... This is a big issue and I can write a book about
it starting from Alfetnah Alkubra and ending with Afghanistan...
The subconscious fear of Fitnah had its causes in the fact that
people were armed.. While now, it is no longer a justified term
or even relevent in the political context.
3)People do not stand seeing bloud let alone seeing a severed head of
a person... Incontrast, Al Hussain (RAA) was decapitated and his head
brought to Yazid! This is barbaric by modern standards (not serbian
standards maybe) But it was traditional at the time!
The examples abound....
I will stop for now.
Mohammed Elabdellaoui
In which Islamic world do you live Ahmed? The one I know of from Saudia Arabia to Morocco has most of what you mentioned as specific to the western world.
Dis