mulki al-sharmani
Islamic Feminism Transnational and national reflections
his article focuses on contemporary interpretive being produced predominantly by Muslim female knowledge projects that engage critically with scholars (and some male Muslim scholars) from dif- TIslamic religious sciences, and which are driven ferent disciplines and countries. The new scholarship by the question of gender justice. These projects, which has been called Islamic feminism. have been loosely termed as Islamic Feminism, are Some of the scholars who have been studying or undertaken by Muslim women scholars from different engaging in Islamic feminism see a great epistemic countries who are committed to their religious faith and political value in it, not only for Muslim women and who are working towards the production of alter- but also for the reform of religious tradition (Abou- native, gender-sensitive religious knowledge. The paper Bakr 2012, Barlas 2002, Badran 2005, Mir-Hosseini has three aims: 1) to review the contestations about 2006). Other scholars have critiqued Islamic femi- the definition, categorization, goals, and significance of nism as being an unsystematic and heterogeneous what has been termed Islamic feminism, 2) to provide body of knowledge, as having weak methodological an alternative description of these knowledge projects links to classical religious sciences and being politic and identify some hermeneutical characteristics that ally insignificant, or even counterproductive, for link them and which perhaps could be the basis for de- women (Moghissi 1999, Moghadam 2002, Tohidi lineating them as a new field of knowledge, 3) to map 2003). out the trajectory of building new religion-based femi- Some of the women scholars undertaking such nist knowledge in Egypt, shedding light on light on cur- projects have also linked their production of knowl- rent knowledge projects that can be labelled as Islamic edge to building a global Muslim movement for feminism. gender equality and justice. For example, Ziba Mir- Hosseini, the Iranian UK-based anthropologist, is one of these pioneer scholars. She writes critical Over the last three and a half decades there studies of Islamic jurisprudence to highlight its prob- has appeared a new area of scholarship that engages lematic construction of marriage and marital duties with Islamic sacred texts (the Qur’an and Sunnah) and rights. In 2009, Mir-Hosseini and Zainah Anwar, and its interpretive tradition (i.e. exegesis, jurispru- the former executive director of Sisters in Islam dence, Hadith compilations, etc.), driven primarily (the Malaysian women’s rights advocacy group), co- by the question of gender justice and methodological founded the global movement Musawah, along with reform.1 This scholarship consists of studies that crit- other Muslim women activists and scholars from ically revisit and unpack dominant religious inter- different countries. Musawah, which means equal- pretations that are patriarchal and discriminatory ity in Arabic, is a knowledge-building movement against women, and aim to produce new knowledge that is led by Muslim women. Using a four-pronged that makes the case for gender equality and justice approach,2 Musawah links scholarship with activism from within an Islamic paradigm. These studies are
2 This approach integrates Islamic teachings, inter 1 The author wishes to thank two anonymous reviewers national human rights conventions, national consti for their comments. tutions and laws, and lived realities of Muslims.
Approaching Religion • Vol. 4, No. 2 • December 2014 83 to produce knowledge that brings new perspectives Islamic feminism: contestations to the Islamic interpretive tradition, and empowers Omaima Abou-Bakr is among the first who concep- advocates working towards gender equality and tualized Islamic feminism (Abou- Bakr 2001). Abou- justice. Through Musawah, Mir-Hosseini has been Bakr, Professor of English and Comparative Litera- working with scholars such as Amina Wadud, the ture at Cairo University, has also been undertaking African-American Muslim theologian who under- ground-breaking studies that deconstruct traditional takes women-centred readings of the Qur’an; Asma Islamic exegetical interpretations of gender roles and Lamrabet, the Moroccan scholar who also studies the rights. She has also researched and written about Qur’an; Sa’diyya Shaikh, the South African scholar Muslim women’s roles in the production of trad who works on Islamic Sufi thought; Muhammed itional religious sciences as well as women’s mysti- Khaled Masud, the Pakistani scholar who works on cism in Islam and Christianity. According to Abou- Islamic jurisprudence; and Omaima Abou-Bakr, the Bakr, the label Islamic feminism can be limiting Egyptian scholar who conducts genealogical studies when used by Western scholars to name the gender of Islamic exegesis. activism of Muslim women. In such cases, the label But what are the hermeneutical and epistemo can become ‘hegemonic’ and concealing. But Abou- logical contributions of these projects? And what is Bakr does not necessarily reject the term. For her, their political significance both on a transnational the significant element in the term is in the quali- level (i.e. as a global knowledge-building movement) fier ‘Islamic’. For her, the adjective ‘Islamic’ refers to and on a national level in the case of Egypt? And what the key framework under which this knowledge is to are the limits and challenges of Islamic feminism? be situated. Abou-Bakr explains that she espouses a This article draws on a five-year research project feminist knowledge project that is grounded in the that the author is undertaking (2013–18) to address Qur’anic objectives of justice as well as in the speci- these questions.3 My goals for this particular article, ficity of the cultural and historical contexts of the however, are narrower. They are: 1) to review the con- Muslim women undertaking such project. She also testations about the definition, categorization, goals, notes the importance of de-homogenizing feminism, and significance of what has been termed Islamic whether as a Western or non-western intellectual feminism, 2) to provide an alternative description tradition. She points out that there are different kinds of these knowledge projects and identify some her- of feminism and some are not only unopposed to meneutical characteristics that link them and which religion but very much grounded in it. Abou-Bakr perhaps could be the basis for delineating them as a sees Islamic feminism, as part of the latter form of new field of knowledge, 3) to map out the trajectory the feminist tradition and one which entails ‘discuss- of building a new, religion-based body of feminist ing and analysing discourses and methodologies knowledge in Egypt, as well as its transnational and from within our indigenous tradition, which can be national relevance. employed or developed to articulate gender aware- ness, as well as to apply the intelligent use of Islamic principles and fields of meaning for the acquisition of rights or for revisioning discourses that encour- age subordinate gender consciousness’ (Abou-Bakr 1999: 3). She stresses that this task of engaged read- 3 The author, an Academy of Finland research fellow, is ing is her responsibility as ‘a Muslim, Egyptian Arab undertaking this five-year research project (2013–18) woman’ (Abou-Bakr 1999: 4). at the Faculty of Theology, University of Helsinki. This study, entitled ‘Islamic Feminism: Tradition, The Pakistani-American Asma Barlas, who has Authority, and Hermeneutics,’ focuses on selected produced insightful scholarship seeking to ‘un-read’ contemporary interpretive projects (transnational and patriarchy in the Qur’an, is uncomfortable with the national). It has two goals: 1) to analyse the hermen term ‘Islamic feminism’ because she rejects ‘femi- eutical approaches, contributions, and limits of these nism’ as an intellectual tradition that is inescapably projects, and 2) to conduct a case study of interpre- entangled with the history of Western colonialism tive knowledge projects that are being undertaken in and the othering of non-western Muslim women Egypt, by the Women and Memory Forum (WMF), (Barlas 2008). Instead, Barlas sees her project of pro- an Egyptian non-governmental organization whose mission is ‘the production and dissemination of ducing new, gender-sensitive religious knowledge alternative knowledge concerning women in the Arab not as engaging in feminism, but as fulfilling her obli- Region’. gation to God as a believing woman. The historian
84 Approaching Religion • Vol. 4, No. 2 • December 2014 Margot Badran, however, finds the term to be a use- question of political reform.4 But Ezzat (1994, 2010) ful analytical tool to describe ‘a feminist discourse has also written critically and insightfully about clas- and practice articulated within an Islamic paradigm’. sical and contemporary religious interpretations that She sees this discourse as specifically grounded in the sanction women’s subordination. The late Abu Zayd Qur’an and ‘seeking rights and justice for women and was Professor of Islamic Studies at Cairo Univer- men in the totality of their existence’ (Badran 2002: sity and moved to the Netherlands after an apostasy 1). Badran sees secular and Islamic feminism as two court case was filed against him on the grounds of distinct discourses, but stresses that there are import his scholarship. Abu Zayd (2008) developed a new ant linkages between the two. For example, Badran and bold theory of Qur’anic exegetical interpretation argues that secular feminism, particularly in Egypt, which argues that the Qur’an is a discourse rather paved the way to Islamic feminism in that the former than a text and has multiple domains of meaning. was always partly grounded in a reformist, modern- Thus, the three scholars are so different, not only ist, Islamic framework. Badran sees Islamic feminism in their methodologies but also in their goals and as more radical and powerful than secular feminism underlying premises, that it is not clear how Hoda because of its quest for a theologically-grounded Saleh sees them as examples of the same larger pro- gender equality and justice, and its growing global ject. So while sometimes the heterogeneity of Islamic appeal to Muslims and non-Muslims alike who are feminism may be meaningful, in other cases it arises concerned with gender justice (Badran 2005). from the lack of a clear and developed analysis of the Also, Ziba Mir-Hosseini, the well-known legal nature, methodologies, and boundaries of this new anthropologist and one of the pioneer scholars field. of writing about Islamic feminism, defines it as ‘a Islamic feminism has also been critiqued for its new consciousness, new way of thinking, a gender supposedly tenuous methodological and epistemo- discourse that was feminist in its aspiration and logical links to classical Islamic religious sciences. demands, yet Islamic in its language and source of Yasmin Moll (2009) contends that Islamic feminist legitimacy’ (Mir-Hosseini 2006: 640). Aside from the scholars such as Omaima Abou-Bakr and Asma contestations around the term, Mir-Hosseini, as well Barlas emphasize the importance of applying ijtihad as Badran and Abou-Bakr, acknowledge that Islamic (independent thinking) but reject the notion that this feminism has been used to refer to a wide range of role in the Islamic tradition is confined to religious diverse and heterogeneous discourses and practices. scholars who meet very specific criteria in religious Can this heterogeneity be a weakness? For knowledge and interpretive skills. In addition, Moll instance, the social scientist Hoda Salah (2010) div sees that the methodologies used by contemporary ides Islamic feminism into three discourses: conserv- Islamic feminists are modern and divorced from ative, liberal, and radical. Yet, some of the scholars the methodological tradition of classical Islamic that Salah cites as exemplifying these three kinds of exegetes and jurists. She argues that contemporary Islamic feminism are so different in their approaches Islamic feminist scholars make use of historical, lit- and the underlying premises of their works that it is erary and deconstructionist approaches that had no difficult to see them all being part of the one and same place in Islamic religious sciences. So Moll sees that broader knowledge project called Islamic feminism. while Islamic feminism derives its legitimacy from For instance, Saleh cites three Egyptian scholars: Soad the Islamic tradition, it transforms the very meth- Saleh, Heba Raouf Ezzat, and Nasr Hamed Abu Zayd odological framework that has long defined classical as representing the three kinds of Islamic feminism religious knowledge and the actors producing this respectively. Saleh, Professor of Islamic Jurispru- knowledge. But the problem with Moll’s critique is dence at Al-Azhar University, produced some liberal that it lacks a historical interrogation of the classical interpretations such as sanctioning qualified female Islamic religious tradition, and its methodologies. To religious scholars’ rights in issuing fatwas (unbind- question, build on, or propose shifts in the Islamic ing legal opinion). Yet, she still espouses an Islamic interpretive tradition and its methodologies is seen perspective that condones unequal gender relations by Moll as a weakness. Yet, this is precisely one of the and rights in the family sphere. Heba Raouf Ezzat, a important contributions of Islamic feminism knowl- political scientist, activist, and Islamic public thinker, edge projects. is a critic of the Western feminist tradition, and a sceptic of Muslim gender activism that focuses on 4 Personal interview with the author, August 2008. See gender-based legal reform without tackling the larger Al-Sharmani 2013.
Approaching Religion • Vol. 4, No. 2 • December 2014 85 Other critics of Islamic feminism see it as politic academic circles. Two notable examples of such ally insignificant and even counterproductive. scholars are Ziba Mir-Hosseini and Amina Wadud. Valentine Moghadam (2002), for example, sees At the national level, important Islamic feminist that the struggle for gender rights cannot be won knowledge projects have emerged in Iran, Indonesia, through theological arguments but by focusing on Malaysia, India, South Africa, Morocco, and Egypt. socioeconomic and political realities. But Moghadam These projects vary in their knowledge outputs and fails to see the connections between multiple sys- political significance, but what they share are two tems that regulate and impact gender relations and main features: they are hermeneutical studies under- rights in Muslim societies (e.g. codified laws, cul- taken by women scholars either based at research tural norms, prevalent religious discourses as well centres or universities and produced in national lan- as socioeconomic policies and conditions). Others guages, and gender-based legal reform efforts that reject Islamic feminism because it is grounded in a draw on this knowledge. religious framework that rests on foundational and Epistemologically, Islamic feminism can be clas- absolute notions of religious truth and doctrines sified according to two main categories that are well- (Moghissi 1999, Tohidi 2003). However, such critics delineated and developed, and two that are less sys- assume that the goal of interpretive feminist pro- tematic. The first consists of works that focus on the jects that are based on religion is the search for the Qur’an and its exegetical tradition, such as the works authentic interpretation and the uniform religious of Amina Wadud (1999, 2006, and 2009), Asma Bar- truth. But actually Islamic feminism emphasizes the las (2002), Maysam Al-Faruqi (2000), Nevin Reda importance of the connection between text and con- (2013), and Omaima Abou-Bakr (2013 and 2015). text, and the multidimensionality of the interpretive The second category of work focuses on critical process, notions that were also implicitly present in engagements with Islamic fiqh or jurisprudence and Islamic religious sciences and are reflected through is spearheaded by Ziba Mir-Hosseini (2000, 2003, the diversity in classical exegetical and juristic inter- 2010, 2013) and Kecia Ali (2010, 2012). pretations. In addition, there has also been a less extensive engagement with the Hadith tradition, undertaken by scholars such as the South African Sa’diyya Shaikh Redefining Islamic feminism: (2004), and the Indonesian Faqihuddin Abdul Kodir categories and hermeneutical approaches (2013). Finally, another emerging category is the I have written elsewhere about the contestations with work of Sa’diyya Shaikh (2012) on Sufi thought and respect to the definition and categorization of Islamic its role as an ethical and theological corrective to the feminism (Al-Sharmani 2011). Here I build on this patriarchal principles and doctrines of Islamic juris- earlier work and seek to contribute to a mapping out prudence. and delineating of this emerging field of knowledge. In my view, Islamic feminism, as a knowledge project, can be classified according to two categories: trans- Islamic feminism and hermeneutical contributions national and national. These projects, which are pre- As part of mapping out this new area of knowl- dominantly undertaken by Muslim women, have two edge, I wish to identify the common hermeneutical broad aims: tracing and problematizing patriarchal approaches of its key works of scholarship. I high- religious knowledge that sanctions gender inequality; light two approaches that I believe some of the main and producing alternative readings that are egalitar- scholars share. The first entails critiquing interpretive ian while at same time being based on Islamic ethical textual traditions such as tafsir and fiqh in light of and theological principles. the ethical principles which constitute, as argued, the The transnational projects consist of works pro- Qur’anic worldview and core message. And the sec- duced in English by Muslim female scholars at aca- ond approach is related to demystifying the assumed demic institutions and from different fields (social singularity, immutability, and sanctity of the Islamic sciences, humanities, Islamic studies, etc.). This textual tradition. Below I will explain each approach, scholarship is mostly read by students and research- giving examples from selected works. ers. But several of these scholars also have strong linkages with movements calling for gender justice, The ethical in the textual tradition and their work has been translated into different lan- In the Qur’an-centred Islamic feminist projects, guages and disseminated to a larger audience beyond exemplified in the works of Amina Wadud (2009),
86 Approaching Religion • Vol. 4, No. 2 • December 2014 Asma Barlas (2002), and Omaima Abou-Bakr (2013), have sexual access to his wife through his payment Qur’an-based ethical/theological principles are put of a dower and spousal maintenance. These views forward as the necessary building blocks for formu- were the product of the jurists’ historical and social lation of gender norms and rulings in Islamic law. contexts. Mir-Hosseini highlights the gap between Wadud (2009) was the pioneer in articulating the the moral/ethical and the legal in jurists’ formula- Qur’anic ethos of God–human and human–human tions of some of the main marriage and divorce doc- relations, and which are based on theological prin- trines. For example, the Qur’anic definition of mar- ciple of tawhid (the unity and oneness of God). This riage as ‘tranquility, love, and mercy’ (Qur’anic verse ethos rests on four central truths: 1) God is one and 30:21) is not translated into enforceable legal rulings just, 2) human beings are in vertical relationships on marital roles and rights. Thus, unilateral repudi with God in which they seek to know and worship ation (divorce initiated by men) and polygamy, for him in their capacity as God’s viceregents on earth, instance, are legally sanctioned, but whether justice 3) human beings can only be in horizontal relation- is served when these legal rights are exercised by men ships with one another (i.e. one of equality) since is left to the ethical realm which is divorced from the any vertical or hierarchical relations among them legal. (e.g. patriarchy) will negate the oneness of God and Similarly, Kecia Ali (2010, 2012) traces the geneal human beings’ submission to the Divine, and 4) the ogy of gender inequality in Islamic legal thought to Qur’an as the word of God has a hierarchy of mean- the assumptions that classical jurists held about mar- ings that point to a trajectory of justice. Thus, it is riage and marital rights, and which often departed the role of Muslims to discern the multiple meanings from ethical readings suggested by the Qur’anic text. of the Qur’an, identify the best of meanings (Barlas Ali, like Mir-Hosseini, argues that classical jurists 2002), and follow the trajectory of Qur’anic justice defined marriage as a form of ownership in which the through our various historical and social contexts. husband owned the right to have sex with his wife. So in this Qur’anic world-view patriarchy must be In addition, Khaled Abou El Fadl (2005) empha- negated and annihilated because it is antithetical to sizes the necessity of grounding Islamic law in ‘a the belief in the oneness of God and our submission moral vision and ethos’ that reflects ‘God’s beauty’. to his will. Furthermore, Qur’anic justice is not set Abou Fadl discusses the need, not only at the indi- in fixed injunctions which are to be found in a lit- vidual level but also at the collective, institutional eral reading of the Qur’an. Rather, Qur’anic justice is level, to ensure that Islamic law reflects at least ‘abso- a historical and interpretive process to be guided by lute moral values’, which are universal across time holistic and contextualized readings that can lead to and place. But this is only a first step in the process multiple legal rules. of reform; what is also needed is to ensure that legal The question of the ethical and its relation to the interpretations and processes are also compatible legal is also undertaken by Ziba Mir-Hosseini and with ‘derivative moral values’, which are needed for a Kecia Ali, who focus on Islamic jurisprudence. Both higher moral society, and which evolve and develop scholars deconstruct and critique the very philo- across times and places (Abou El Fadl 2005: 118–19). sophical, epistemological, and ethical premises that Also Sa’diyya Shaikh (2012) argues that Islamic guided some of the classical jurists’ constructions of Sufi thought can provide a much needed ethically marriage, marital roles, women, men, and relations and metaphysically-grounded corrective for Islamic between the two sexes, and which they identify as the law, to overcome the latter’s under-privileging of the genesis of gender inequality and hierarchy in Islamic ethical in dominant patriarchal religious norms on law. gender rights. Mir-Hosseini (2003, 2013), for instance, argues Thus, taking the ‘legal’ back to the ‘ethical’ is a that early jurists shared certain assumptions that key hermeneutical approach that is being adopted by shaped their development of jurist law. They believed many of the scholars selected here, who are engaged that women were created of and for men; that women with the question of reform and gender equality in were inferior to men both in intellectual and moral the Islamic interpretive tradition. capacities, that women needed male protection, and that male and female sexualities were different, with Demystifying the interpretive tradition the latter being dangerous and unruly. Their under- One key methodological gap that Islamic feminist standing of the marriage contract was based on one scholars find in many religious modernist under- of sale in which the husband acquired the right to standings is the idea that the Islamic textual tradition
Approaching Religion • Vol. 4, No. 2 • December 2014 87 is presented as one singular entity that is sacred and reading of qiwamah is that it demystifies exegesis and immutable. That is, the Qur’an, the Hadith, dominant jurisprudence: they are no longer an indivisible part exegetical works, and the main fiqh schools are seen of an unchangeable sacred text, but of a historically- as constituting one singular entity, referred to as the based and produced religious knowledge. textual tradition, which is often perceived as divine In short, foregrounding the ‘ethical’ in the inter- and unchangeable. An approach that Islamic feminist pretive process and its outcome, and unpacking and scholars use to deal with this gap is to unpack and demystifying the interpretive tradition are two main demystify the different layers of the textual tradition. hermeneutical approaches that characterize key Scholars use different hermeneutical strategies knowledge projects in the emerging field of Islamic within this larger hermeneutical approach. feminism. While scholars engaged in producing this For example, Omaima Abou-Bakr studied the knowledge also use a wider range of hermeneutical construction of qiwamah in exegetical literature methods, the significance of the above-mentioned (understood as a husband’s guardianship, protection, approaches is that they are two broad interpretive and authority over the wife). Abou-Bakr systematic frameworks under which these various methods can ally unearths the assumptions and ideas about gen- be grouped.5 der identities that shaped the exegetes’ interpretive But how does Islamic feminism as a new body of work, identifies the interpretive methods they have knowledge facilitating reform and social transform used, and traces the historical process through which ation emerge and develop in a particular national they have created a cumulative patriarchal construct context? In the following section, I will address this of qiwamah (Abou-Bakr 2015). She shows how the question in the context of Egypt. exegetical construction of qiwamah departs from the Qur’anic understanding of gender roles in marriage as articulated in verse 4:34. Qiwamah as an exegetical Islamic feminism in Egypt: trajectory construct sanctions male control over women in the Egyptian Islamic feminism is important both trans- family domain, the superiority of men and inferi- nationally and nationally. On the transnational level, ority of women, and the diminished rights of Mus- there are strong ties and collaborations between Egyp- lim women. Tracing the exegetes’ interpretations of tian scholars and organizations who are involved in qiwamah in verse 4:34, starting from al-Tabari in the producing this kind of knowledge on the one hand, tenth century and continuing all the way to modern and global movements such as Musawah on the other exegetes such as Muhammad Abduh in the early hand, which seeks to build new feminist Muslim twentieth century, Abou-Bakr shows the follow- knowledge and advocate for change and social trans- ing: First, exegetes turned the adjective ‘qawwamun’ formation on multiple levels, linking scholarship with in verse 4:34 – which describes a particular social activism. For example, the Egyptian research organ organization of marital roles at the time of the rev- ization Women and Memory Forum (including its elation when men provided for women – to a nor- co-founder Omaima Abou-Bakr) collaborates closely mative construct, using the noun qiwamah, in order with Musawah on the production and dissemination to sanction male authority and superiority. Second, of this knowledge through a wide range of activities. they came up with lists of qualities that they attribute In addition, some of the major Egyptian scholars arbitrarily to men and women to justify men’s claim who are producing knowledge that can be termed to authority and superiority on the basis of the con- as Islamic feminism crisscross the transnational and structed norm of qiwamah. Third, they linked the local contexts. For example, Omaima Abou-Bakr and concept of qiwamah to verse 2:228 and the notion of Hoda El Saadi from the Women and Memory Forum men having ‘degree’ over women that is expressed in (WMF) write in English and Arabic and engage with this latter verse in order to reinforce the hierarchal both transnational and local readers. Also Egypt, the meaning of qiwamah, although verse 2: 228 is located largest and (geopolitically) most important country in a unit of verses that tackles the theme of divorce in the Middle East, has been home to the oldest Arab and its central message is to urge men not to do injus- feminist movement as well as the oldest religious tice to women, and fourth, exegetes of modern times such as Abduh cemented the patriarchal meaning of qiwamah, ascribing inherent domesticity to women 5 For an in-depth analysis of the hermeneutical ap- versus an assumed inherent intellectual superiority proaches and challenges of Muslim feminist exegesis, in men. The benefit of Abou-Bakr’s genealogical see Hidayatullah 2014.
88 Approaching Religion • Vol. 4, No. 2 • December 2014 institution in the Islamic World, namely Al-Azhar. society along an Islamic path. Al-Ghazali collabor And furthermore, the significance and fate of Islamic ated with the Muslim Brotherhood, but opted for her feminism in present-day Egypt has become even association to be an autonomous entity separate from more interesting with the 25 January Revolution of the Brotherhood. She was an autonomous, strong 2011 and its aftermath of momentous and contradic- woman who left her first husband because he hin- tory events such as the rise and fall of political Islam, dered her activism. Yet despite this empowerment at ongoing political conflicts and societal polarization, an individual level, Al-Ghazali adopted a patriarchal thriving new processes of youth-led activism, along- notion of gender rights, which asserted that a Muslim side a growing and disturbing atmosphere of state woman’s primary role was to be a wife and a mother. oppression and violation of citizens’ civil rights in So were these active and publicly-engaged Egyp- ongoing efforts to combat ‘terrorism’ and protect tian women Islamic feminists, or partaking in projects ‘national security,’ since the new regime took over on that can be labelled as Islamic feminism? In an article 3 July 2013. that sets out to distinguish between different strands In what follows, I will map out the trajectory of of Egyptian feminists, the anthropologist Fadwa El selected individual and collective efforts in the coun- Guindy labels Sha’rawi’s feminism as ‘western-influ- try to build new knowledge that questions patriarchy enced’ and distinguishes it from the feminist views of and gender inequality from within the Islamic inter- Malak Hifni Nasif, another Egyptian pioneer woman pretive tradition. who established the Egyptian feminist movement. El Egypt’s first feminist movement can be traced to Guindi calls Nasif’s strand of feminism ‘authentically 1923 with the establishment of the Egyptian feminist Egyptian’ because Nasif’s advocacy focused on the union under the leadership of Huda Sha’rawi. The inclusion of women in all educational fields and par- early Egyptian feminist movement was grounded in ticularly in the field of Islamic religious knowledge, the nationalist project of establishing an independ- as well as enabling women to have wider access to ent Egypt with a sovereign state. In the post-inde- mosques. Moreover, Nasif, according to El Guindi, pendence era, Egyptian women were among the first articulated her feminist agendas in Arabic and drew in the Middle Eastern region to obtain the right to strongly on her Islamic knowledge. But it is Al- mass education, suffrage, and paid work. But gender Ghazali’s activism that El Guindi calls Islamic femi- equality still eludes women, and much legal and cul- nism. Furthermore, El Guindi sees that Al-Ghazali’s tural discrimination against them remains in place. Islamically-based activism paved the way for what In their struggle for gender equality (particularly in she calls the ‘grass root Islamic feminism’ of the 1970s family law), early Egyptian feminists, whether as part when thousands of Egyptian women began wearing of an organized movement or as individuals, drew on the veil and asserted their right to live by what they Islam as a framework for mobilizing their campaign believed to be the doctrines of their religion while at for rights. Badran (2005) points out that the Egyptian the same time engaging actively in the public sphere. feminist movement has drawn on Islamic modern- El Guindi sees this Egyptian form of Islamic femi- ist discourse and some of the liberal interpretations nism as populist, and grounded in culture and Islam. of Islamic scholars of the nineteenth century such as She describes it as follows: ‘it is feminist because it Muhammad Abduh to advocate for reform in family seeks to liberate womanhood; it is Islamic because law. its premises are embedded in Islamic principles and Individual Egyptian female writers, such as A’isha values’ (El Guindi 2005: 71). She sees both West- Al Taymur in the late nineteenth century, questioned ern-influenced feminism and Islamic feminism as Islamic juristic interpretations that sanctioned a hus- sharing the common goal of liberating women. But band’s guardianship over his wife on the grounds of El Guindi points out that in the Egyptian Islamic an assumed inherent male superiority to the female feminism of the 70s, the sought-after liberation was (Hatem 2011). And there were Egyptian female fig- from ‘imposed, imported identities, consumerist ures such as Zeinab Al-Ghazali who in the twentieth behaviors, and an increasingly materialist culture’ (El century led a life of very public activism by establish- Guindi 2005: 71). Most of all, El Guindi stresses that ing an Islamist women’s association that recruited the main goal of this local Islamic feminism was to many members. Interestingly, Al-Ghazali was a include women in the field of Islamic studies, as bear- member of the Egyptian Feminist Union but left it ers and producers of religious knowledge. because of its overall secular framework and founded A Muslim woman can derive empowerment from the Muslim Women’s Association in order to reform enlightened religious knowledge on an individual
Approaching Religion • Vol. 4, No. 2 • December 2014 89 level. But to end gender inequalities in Muslim soci- exegetical tradition as well as historical studies that eties resulting from discriminatory normative sys- shed light on the roles of women in the production tems, what is needed is a transformative change in of Islamic religious scientific works. Hoda El Saadi, public discourses, laws, and policies as well. And an another member, works on the role of women in the essential part of the pathway to this change is the pro- production of classical Islamic religious sciences and duction and dissemination of new religious knowl- the development of different social institutions in edge that solidly and persuasively grounds egalitarian Islamic history that have paved the way for civil soci- gender relations and rights in the core principles and ety. Hoda El Sadda, also a founding member, focuses doctrines of Islam. I believe it is this kind of Islamic on the roles and representations of women in con- feminism – a transformative knowledge project – temporary Arabic/Egyptian intellectual traditions. that counts. And these knowledge projects are effec- Abou-Bakr is the key scholar at the WMF who tive when they are systematic, coherent, ongoing, and undertakes hermeneutical studies of the Islamic linked to advocacy work. interpretive tradition. She employs a range of her- In contemporary Egypt, I see one notable example meneutical methods, including tracing the construc- of such a kind of Islamic feminism. It is being led by tion of particular juristic or exegetical constructs that the work of the research/activist organization the condone patriarchal interpretations through genea- Women and Memory Forum (WMF). The WMF is logical readings of the exegetical tradition; identi- an Egyptian non-governmental organization that fying and reflecting on the contradictions in inter- was established in 1995 by a group of women schol- pretations of individual exegetes and jurists, not to ars from a variety of disciplines. WMF scholars discredit them, but to locate their interpretations in produce a wide range of Arabic studies that aim at the context of their times and world-views; unearth- re-reading Islamic and Arabic intellectual traditions ing the hidden voices and contributions of women and producing alternative readings that underscore in the interpretive tradition; and juxtaposing dif- gender equality and unearth women’s unknown roles ferent texts in the tradition (such as biographies of in the establishment and development of these trad Hadith teachers and transmitters, exegetical works, itions. Also, the organization collaborates with local or fiqh manuals) to identify the linkages and diver- NGOs working on reform in family law. In addi- gences between these texts and unearth alternative tion, the WMF organizes workshops for students at discourses that have been hidden or marginalized in national universities in which they are taught the the history of the interpretive tradition (Abou-Bakr new knowledge and trained, in Abou-Bakr’s words 2012). ‘to understand gender from a Muslim perspective’ Abou-Bakr’s scholarship illustrates that the prob- (Abou-Bakr 1999: 3). lem of religiously-sanctioned gender inequality is One of the key goals for the WMF is to produce not interpretations that discriminate against women scholarship that will lead to change and social trans- per se. Rather it is 1) these interpretations’ underly- formation. Therefore, the organization disseminates ing discourse, which perpetuates gendered notions its knowledge not only through dense theological and about the nature of women, men, and their roles, historical publications but also, through illustrated 2) the gaps and contradictions in the interpretive and linguistically accessible readers, to the general methodologies used by early jurists and exegetes as public. In addition, many WMF scholars are well- well as modern religious scholars who advocate for informed and connected with the transnational pro- patriarchal interpretations, and 3) the disconnect jects of Islamic feminism and some of them engage between some of these methodologies and the inter- in such projects by writing in English and targeting pretations on the one hand and the underlying theo- the anglophone academic audience. They also organ- logical and ethical principles of upholding justice and ize workshops with scholars from different parts of living a God-conscious life in Islam. In other words, the world on Islamic feminism and translate anglo- the significance of the work of Abou-Bakr and schol- phone literature not only about Islamic feminism but ars like her is not only to enable alternative, egalitar- also feminist theological studies in Christianity and ian, gender-sensitive readings of sacred texts, but also Judaism, so that this scholarship would be available to raise the broader question of reform in the inter- to Arabic-speaking readers. pretive tradition. Omaima Abou-Bakr, one of the founding mem- Another organization producing similar scholar- bers of the WMF, undertakes hermeneutical studies ship – though on a much smaller scale – is Women that problematize gendered interpretations in the and Civilization. It was established in 2000 by a num-
90 Approaching Religion • Vol. 4, No. 2 • December 2014 ber of women academics. The group was first estab- rights activists who are lobbying for legal reform. For lished by Mona Abou Fadl, Professor of Literature instance, those who opposed the promulgation of at Cairo University, and then led by Amany Saleh, khul‘ law (the right of a woman to file for unilateral, Abou Fadl’s student and a Professor of Political Sci- no-fault judicial divorce in exchange for foregoing ence at Misr International University. The group con- some of her financial rights) in 2000 and those who ducted hermeneutical studies of the Qur’an, and the later attempted to call for a revocation of this law after exegetical and juristic interpretive tradition, as well the 25 January Revolution of 2011, both groups drew as historical studies of different Islamic eras, in order on the juristic concept of qiwamah to make a religious to unearth women’s voices and roles. They produced argument for their position. The work of Abou-Bakr, three influential issues of a journal, named after their which traces the development of the juristic concept organization, in 2000, 2001, and 2002. Some of the of qiwamah and demystifies its assumed Qur’an- articles in these issues, such as the one by Amany based legitimacy, is providing alternative arguments Saleh on the concept of ‘pairing’ in the Qur’an (Saleh and discourse that persuasively counter this position. 2002) highlights the notion of an ontological and Additionally, these knowledge projects can play a spiritual equality of women and men in Islam, which role in making important shifts in prevalent concep- is a central idea in most of the transnational and tual and methodological premises regarding Islamic national Islamic feminist knowledge projects, and textual knowledge, whether they are about gender or which has become the basis for the idea of gender the nature and authority of religious textual author- equality in the social and legal realms. Among other ity. This is empowering epistemologically on an indi- active scholars in the group is Hind Mustafa, who vidual level to Muslim women (be they university published an important study problematizing juris- students, researchers, activists, or women involved in tic constructions of marital roles and rights in light legal marital disputes) who are seeking to reconcile of the Qur’anic text (Mustafa Ali 2002). Nonethe- their commitment to their faith and religious trad less, Women and Civilization remained fairly inac- ition with their pursuit of justice and dignity. tive after producing these first three issues, though in But a number of challenges face these scholars the last two years the group has been working closely and groups. The most significant is related to the with some scholars from the Women and Memory religious authority of their work. Some of the Islamic Forum and is now planning to publish a fourth issue feminist scholars such as Abou-Bakr refer to their of their journal, focusing on Hadith.6 work as a kind of ijtihad. But is this religious knowl- edge or a new way of thinking about religious trad itions? And how are the two related? Difficulties arise The political significance of Egyptian Islamic in relation to two issues: the reception of their work feminism by religious scholars and how and to whom the work The work and ideas of Islamic feminist scholars such of Islamic feminism is disseminated. Women and as Omaima Abou-Bakr and Amany Saleh are being Memory Forum scholars have been making efforts to drawn on in training workshops and seminars organ- engage with religious scholars through conferences ized by women’s rights activists groups such as the and workshops but thus far these efforts have not Centre for Egyptian Women’s Legal Assistance and led to any fruitful discussions. Often the position of civil society organizations such as the Mada Founda- religious scholars has been one of rejection, claim- tion, which works to promote the values of plural- ing that those producing this new knowledge are not ity, inclusivity, equal citizenship among all Egyptians, trained in traditional religious education; and their regardless of gender or religious or political affili work seeks to undo the whole Islamic tradition. 7 ation. These training workshops and seminars target Also there is the issue of the scope and nature mosque imams, media people, and those involved of the audience that these projects reach. The major- with NGOs and civil society. ity of the WMF’s audiences are university students, Also, some of the new insights produced by this women’s rights activists, public thinkers, and intel- new knowledge have been of direct use to women’s lectuals. And although some of their scholarship (e.g.
7 Such a position was strongly articulated by attend- 6 Personal interview with Dr Amany Saleh and ing religious scholars at the most recent conference Dr Hind Mustafa from Women and Civilization, in March 2014, organized by Mada Foundation and 13.11.2013 and 12.4.2014. Alexandria Library in Alexandria, Egypt.
Approaching Religion • Vol. 4, No. 2 • December 2014 91 their illustrated works) is aimed at the general public, similarities and differences among the works referred their main mechanisms of dissemination and advo- to as Islamic feminism have not been adequately cacy are workshops, seminars, and written materials. investigated. I argue that Islamic feminism, as a new These preclude many Egyptians who do not read. body of reform-centred religious knowledge, can be And the most popular medium for the transmission better understood through an analysis of the goals of religious knowledge continues to be religious lec- and interpretive methodologies of certain inter- tures/sermons given in mosques, on TV programmes connected, transnational and national knowledge or in private religious classes. Yet this medium is one projects. Egypt provides an important case study that has not yet been used by the WMF, perhaps because of the historical trajectory of Egyptian femi- because WMF scholars primarily see themselves as nist engagements with the Islamic interpretive trad scholarly activists, rather than religious teachers and ition; the linkages between contemporary Egyptian mentors transmitting a new kind of knowledge. Islamic feminist knowledge projects and the trans- Nevertheless, the work of organizations such as national movement of Musawah; the methodological the Women and Memory Forum and Woman and and epistemological contributions of the Women and Civilization is still charting the pathway to a new Memory Forum; and the socio-political significance area of knowledge (and a perhaps a movement) that (but also challenges) of such scholarly/activist efforts is beginning to resonate. The development of this at this juncture of Egypt’s history. knowledge and its socio-political impact continue to unfold and require long-term study. In the immedi- ate future, the following questions are pertinent to Mulki Al-Sharmani trained as an anthropologist. She the study of Egyptian Islamic feminism. received her doctorate degree from the Johns Hopkins University, USA in 2005. She is an Academy of Finland What will be the future of existing linkages and research fellow (2013–18) at the Faculty of Theology, Study collaborations between transnational (e.g. Musawah) of Religions Unit, University of Helsinki. Mulki researches, and Egyptian Islamic feminist knowledge projects teaches, and writes about Muslim family law, the Islam- and activism in the current political atmosphere of ic interpretive tradition and the question of gender, migra- the country? tion and religion, Muslim marriage norms and practices in migration, transnational migrant families. A list of her In its efforts to eradicate the influence of the Mus- publications can be found at
92 Approaching Religion • Vol. 4, No. 2 • December 2014 lutionnaire’ in Feminismes Islamiques, ed. Zahra Ali Hatem, Mervat, 2011. Literature, Gender and Nation- (Paris, Le Fabrique Editions), pp. 1–10 Building in Nineteenth Century Egypt, the Life and —2013. ‘Turning the tables: perspectives on the con- Works of ‘A’isha Taymur (1840–1902) (New York, struction of “Muslim manhood” ’, Hawwa: Journal of Palgrave Macmillan) Women of the Middle East and the Islamic World 11, Hidayatullah, Aysha A., 2014. Feminist Edges of the Qur’an pp. 89–107 (Oxford and New York, Oxford University Press) —2015. ‘The interpretive legacy of qiwamah as an Mir-Hosseini, Ziba, 2000. Islam and Gender: The Religious exegetical construct’ in Men in Charge? Rethinking Debate in Contemporary Iran (London and New York, Authority in Muslim Legal Tradition, ed. Ziba Mir- I.B. Tauris) Hosseini, Mulki Al-Sharmani, and Jana Rumminger —2003. ‘The construction of gender in Islamic legal (Oxford, OneWorld), pp. 44–64 thought and strategies for reform’, Hawwa: Journal of Abou El Fadl, Khaled, 2005. The Search for Beauty in Women of the Middle East Women and Islamic World Islam: A Conference of the Books (Lanham, Rowman 1(1), pp. 1–25 and Littlefield Publishers, Inc.) —2006. ‘Muslim women’s quest for equality: between Abu Zayd, Nasr Hamed, 2008. Mafhum il Nas. Dirasa Islamic law and feminism’, Critical Inquiry 32, pp. fi Ulum al-Quran (Lebanon, Al Markaz al-Thaqafi 629–45 al-Arabi) —2010. ‘Classical fiqh, contemporary ethics, and gender Al-Faruqi, Maysam, 2000. ‘Women’s self-Identity in the justice’ in New Directions in Islamic Thought: Explor- Qur’an and Islamic law’ in Windows of Faith: Muslim ing Reform and Muslim Tradition, ed. Kari Vogt, Lena Women Scholar-Activists in North America, ed. Gisela Larson, and Christian Moe (London and New York, Webb (Syracuse University Press), pp. 72–101 I.B. Tauris), pp. 77–88 Al-Sharmani, Mulki, 2011. ‘Islamic feminism and reform- —2013. ‘Justice, equality and Muslim family laws: new ing Muslim family laws’, European University Institute ideas, prospects’ in Gender and Equality in Muslim Working Paper RSCAS 2011/29 (Robert Schuman Family Law: Justice and Ethics in the Islamic Legal Centre for Advanced Studies, Mediterranean Pro- Tradition, ed. Ziba Mir-Hosseini, Kari Vogt, Lena gramme), pp. 1–24 Larsen, and Christian Moe (London and New York, —2013. ‘Reforming Egyptian family laws: the debate I.B. Tauris), pp. 7–34 about a new substantive code’ in Feminist Activism, Moghadam, Valentine, 2002. ‘Islamic feminism and its Women’s Rights, and Legal Reform, ed. Mulki Al- discontents: towards a resolution of the debate’, Signs: Sharmani (London and New York, Zed Books), Journal of Women in Culture and Society 27(4), pp. pp. 73–100 1135–71 Ali, Kecia, 2010. Sexual Ethics and Islam: Feminist Reflec- Moghissi, Haideh, 1999. Feminism and Islamic Fundamen- tions on Qur’an, Hadith, and Jurisprudence (Oxford, talism: The Limits of Postmodern Analysis (New York, OneWorld) Zed Books) —2012. Marriage and Slavery in Early Islam (Boston, Moll, Yasmin, 2009. ‘People like us in pursuit of God Harvard University Press) and rights: Islamic discourse and sisters in Islam in Badran, Margot, 2002. ‘Islamic feminism: what is in a Malaysia’, Journal of Women’s Studies 11(1), pp. 40–55 name?’ Al-Ahram Weekly 17–23(569), pp. 1–8 Mustafa Ali, Hind, 2002. ‘Al-fada’ al-Ma‘nawi lil Zawjeya — 2005. ‘Between secular and Islamic feminism/s: reflec- fi al-Bayan al-Qur’ani. Al-‘llaqa al-Zawjeya bayn tions on the Middle East and beyond’, Journal of al-Manzur al-Qur’ani wa al-Qira’a al-Fiqheya’ [‘The Middle East Women’s Studies 1(1): pp. 6–26 semantic plane for matrimony in the Qur’anic lan- Barlas, Asma, 2002. Believing Women in Islam: Un-reading guage: spousal relationship between Qur’anic perspec- Patriarchal Interpretations of the Quran (Austin, TX, tive and juristic reading], Al-Mar’a wa al-Hadarah University of Texas Press) [Women and Civilization] 3, pp. 54–83 —2008. ‘Engaging Islamic feminism: provincializing femi- Reda, Nevin, 2013. ‘From where do we derive “God’s nism as master narrative’ in Islamic Feminism: Current law?” The case of women’s political leadership: a Perspectives, ed. Anitta Kynsilehto, Tampere Peace modern expression of an ancient debate’ in Feminist Research Institute, Occasional Paper 26 (Tampere and Islamic Perspectives: New Horizons of Knowledge Peace Research Institute), pp. 15–24 and Reform, ed. Omaima Abou-Bakr (Cairo, Women El Guindi, Fadwa, 2005. ‘Gendered resistance, feminist and Memory Forum), pp.119–35 veiling, Islamic feminism’, The Ahfad Journal 22(1), Salah, Hoda, 2010. ‘From ijtihad to gender jihad: Is- pp. 53–78 lamic feminists between regional activism and Ezzat Raouf, Heba, 1994. ‘It is time to launch a new transnationalism’, Gender Heft 1, pp. 47–64 woman’s liberation movement – an Islamic one’, Saleh, Amany, 2002. ‘Qadiyat al-Naw‘ fi al-Qur’an. Middle East Report 191, pp. 26–7 Manzumat al-Zawajeya bayn Qutbay al-Jendar wa —2010. ‘Women and the interpretation of Islamic al-Qiwamah’ [The gender issue in Qur’an: the pairing sources’,
Approaching Religion • Vol. 4, No. 2 • December 2014 93 Shaikh, Sa’diyya, 2004. ‘Knowledge, women and gender in the Hadith: a feminist interpretation’, Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations 15(1), pp. 99–108 —2012. Sufi Narratives of Intimacy: Ibn ‘Arabi, Gender, and Sexuality (Chapel Hill, NC, University of North Carolina Press) Tohidi, Nayereh, 2003. ‘Women’s rights in the Muslim world: the universal-particular interplay’, Hawwa: Journal of Women of the Middle East and the Islamic World 1(2), pp. 152–88 Wadud, Amina, 1999. Qur’an and Woman: Rereading the Sacred Text from a Women’s Perspective (Oxford and New York, Oxford University Press) —2006. Inside the Gender Jihad: Women’s Reform in Islam (Oxford, OneWorld) —2009. ‘Islam beyond patriarchy through gender inclusive Qur’anic analysis’ in Wanted: Equality and Justice in the Muslim Family, ed. Zainah Anwar (Kuala Lumpur, Musawah), pp. 95–112
94 Approaching Religion • Vol. 4, No. 2 • December 2014