gender equality in Islam

[HOPE]

Peace,


GENDER EQUALITY IN ISLAM
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003:195 "I shall not lose sight of the labor of any of you who labors in My way, be it man or woman; each of you is equal to the other"

Spiritual equality, responsibility and accountability for both men and women is a well-developed theme in the Quran. Spiritual equality between men and women in the sight of God is not limited to purely spiritual, religious issues, but is the basis for equality in all temporal aspects of human endeavor.
Adam and Eve: Gender Equality

The concept of gender equality is best exemplified in the Quranic rendition of Adam and Eve. The Quran states that both sexes were deliberate and independent and there is no mention of Eve being created out of Adam's rib or anything else. Even in the issue of which sex was created first is not specified, implying that for our purpose in this world, it may not matter.

004:001 "O mankind! Be conscious of your Sustainer, who has created you out of one living entity (nafs), and out of it created its mate, and out of hte two spread abroad a multitude of men and women. And remain conscious of God, in whose name you demand your rights from one another, and of these ties of kinship. Verily, God is ever watchful over you! "

Quranic translators disagree on the meaning of "nafs" in the above verse which Muhammad Asad translates as "living entity." Many claim that "nafs" translates as "person," that is, Adam. But according to Asad and other scholars, God created humankind and its sexual counterpart out of its own kind. The Arabic word referring to mate (zawj) in the above Quranic verse is grammatically neutral and can be applied both ot male and female interchangeably. So it is not clear, nor should we conjecture, that Adam was created first, Eve was created out of Adam, or that Eve/woman is innately subservient to Adam/man. The fact that this Quranic verse does not specify one specific sex over the other is proof of gender non-bias and equality. It is commonly (and mistakenly) argued that Adam was created first, and that by this gesture God finds the male dominant and superior to the female; however, the wording of the Quran in the aforementioned verse does not support this claim.

The Quran describes how Adam and Eve were told to avoid a specific tree, which they both approached. For this act of disobedience to God, they were consequently banished from the garden; however, later both repented and were forgiven by God. The Quran does not allude to Eve tempting Adam to eat from the tree and being responsible for their downfall. In the Quranic version, both were held accountable and both paid the price for their choices, proving that gender equality is an intrinsic part of Islamic belief. (See 002:030-037)



Accountability, Independence, and Freedom of Choice
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Women are independent individuals, as exemplified by the fact that all human beings will be accountable for their own intentions and deeds on the Day of Judgment when "no human being shall be of the least avail to another human being" (82:19) If men were ultimately responsibile for women (fathers for their daughters, husbands for their wives, etc.), then this accountability would be solely on men's shoulders to bear until the Day of Judgment. But this is not the case:

006:165 "And whatever wrong any human being commits rests upon himself alone; and no bearer of burdens shall be made to bear another's burden..."

Consequently, we cannot be judged according to our own deeds unless we have the freedom of choice to do so. This free choice carries with it the responsibility to make the right choices or paying the consequence for wrong ones, best exemplified by Adam and Eve.


Equality in Practice
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In the Quran, reference to men and women is through attributes and deeds, by which we will be judged. The most pious of us, or those who follow God's commands, are referred to as "believers" or "mu'mineen" (pl.) in the Quran. In many references, in fact, the Quran resonates this equality by eloquently repeating "men and women" with ethical and practical qualities throughout the verses, and even emphasizes this ten times in the following verse:

033:035 "Verily for all men and women who have surrendered themselves unto God, and all believing men and believing women, and all truly devout men and truly devout women, and all men and women who are true to their word, and all men and women who are patient in adversity, and all men and women who humble themselves before God, and all men and women who give in charity, and all self-denying men and self-denying women, and all men and women who are mindful of their chastity, and all men and women who remmber God unceasingly: for all of them has God readied forgiveness of sins and a mighty reward."

It is paramount to understand that the Quran equates being a "mu'min" (sing.) with actual practice, so that it is not enough to just have faith in principle; we must put our faith into practice. The same applies to our belief in the equality of men and women; gender equality as outlined in the Quran must also be put into practice. In reference to the above verse, modern scholar Laila Ahmed in "Women and Gender in Islam" says that "the implications are far-reaching. Ethical qualities, including those invoked here--charity, chastity, truthfulness, patience, piety--also have political and social dimensions."


Leila Ahmed
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An important and insightful academic study that needs to be read by everyone who cares about women, gender, feminism, Islam, the Middle East, or colonization. Lelia Ahmed is a superb scholar. She combines a traditional respect for the accuracy of the portrayal of the past with a sensitivity to modern theory about contested values and the political use of symbols. In this book, she provides a two-thousand-year survey of a vast region, consistently noting what still needs more research and the potential biases of her sources. She carefully traces differences of class and race within Islam and Middle Eastern societies. Historical context is absolutely critical in her account. Importantly, Ahmed is capable of recognizing contradictions and ambiguity that influence all our thinking.

Women and Gender challenges some basic assumptions about Islam and women. Ahmed clearly displays that Islam is not some sort of alien Other to western Christianity and culture. That view didn’t emerge until the Crusades. Initially, both religions developed in a region connected by trade and armies. She notes the irony of “western civilization” claiming that it started in Babylon and Egypt.

Another misconception that Ahmed identifies is that Islam somehow emerged in isolation, pure and untouched by its neighbors. While Islamic leaders have always claimed authority to interpret their religion, in fact other interpretations and practices have always existed. She distinguishes between the ethical message of equality and the orthodox religious institution that established a legal hierarchy devaluing and attacking women. Muslim women, past and present, have cherished that equality at the core of their religion in a way that is difficult for non-Muslims to understand.

Both Christianity and Islam developed in a region where women were losing the respect and power they had known before the rise of nations. As their religious institutions grew, both added addition restrictions on women and both voiced real misogyny against them. The changing times can be seen in the contrast between Mohamed’s first wife, a wealthy widow and merchant and his later wives and concubines who were secluded. After his death, his wives were able to continue to play important roles in the formalization of religious teaching, but soon such female power was lost. As the Muslim empire grow , it conquered neighboring countries taking many women as slaves and adapting other nations’ traditions of concubinage and harems. Women lost public power and even the language changed, blurring lines between the words for woman, sexual partner, and slave. Despite internal challenges, the place of women within Islam changed little until European involvement in the region increased in the nineteenth century.

In her treatment of the colonialism of the past two centuries, Ahmed focuses her account on Egypt. In doing so, she hopes to make her topic manageable, and she sees Egypt as both a forerunner and representative of patterns which would occur throughout the Middle East. Her choice also allows her to quote the outrageous comments of the British colonizers and those who supported them. Englishman tried to justify their intention to destroy Islamic lifestyles by stating the need to save Muslim women from abuse by inferior Muslim men. In doing so they co-opted feminism and created problems that still exist today.

The colonizers’ rhetoric about the problems of women was straight out of Victorian England, despite the fact that some British officials were working against suffrage in their homeland. In Egypt they did nothing about problematic laws relating to marriage, polygamy, and segregation of women, and they cut back on education for women and girls. Instead, they claimed that the most urgent need was to stop women’s use of the veil. [Ahmed lays out their logic, but it is somewhat convoluted and impossible to summarize.]

In 1898, an Egyptian man, in total support of colonization and the elimination of Egyptian culture, wrote a book entitled, “The Liberation of Women.” Although still sometimes identified as the first Egyptian feminist publication, it was in fact an attack on Muslim women as too dirty and too unattractive to attract their husbands’ desire and too ignorant to raise adequate sons. Those who sought to expel the British and regain control of their country argued strongly against the book. In the process, the veil came to symbolize all that was good or bad about colonization.

After surveying the conflicting forces and beliefs among Egyptians down to the present, Ahmed discusses the conflicted nature of feminism within Egypt in the early twentieth century. She recounts the waves of women entering higher education and the professions in the 1960s and 1970s, linking their expanded lives to economic and political shifts. Then she discusses the rising popularity of Islam in more recent decades, particularly among young upwardly mobile college students and graduates. Rather than labeling them as regressive, she suggests various ways in which veiling can provide a sense of protection and community as they move into unfamiliar worlds of education and urban life. She worries, however, about lack of awareness of the real dangers of Islamic political leaders using religion to curtail their options as women as they have done in Iran.

In her conclusion, Ahmed urges westerners in general and feminists in particular to re-examine what their own positions mean to those who have experienced colonization. To them we are implicated alongside those who would force their countries into various types of submission. If we focus on the sexism of the men in their community or in their political and religious structures, we can only force women to choose between their ethnicity and their womanhood—much as African-American women have been forced to choose.


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NOTE: Extracts, narration, paraphrases and replication from multiple sources. Please contact LMU if you require references.