WOMEN IN ISLAM

HRH, The Prince of Wales, Islam And The West

 Islamic countries like Turkey, Egypt, and Syria gave women the
 vote as early as Europe did its women -- and much earlier than in
 Switzerland! In those countries women have long enjoyed equal pay,
 and the opportunity to play a full working role in their
 societies. The rights of Muslim women to property and inheritance,
 to some protection if divorced, and to the conducting of business,
 were rights prescribed by the Quran twelve hundred years ago, even
 if they were not everywhere translated into practice. In Britain
 at least, some of these rights were novel even to my grandmother's
 generation!

Karen Armstrong, Muhammad: A Biography Of The Prophet

 Western critics often blame the Quran for its treatment of women,
 which they see as iniquitous, but in fact the emancipation of
 women was dear to the Prophet's heart. There are complaints that
 the Quran teaches a double standard: the laws of inheritance, for
 example, decree that a woman can inherit only half of what her
 brothers (who have to provide the mahl to start a new family) will
 receive. Again, women are allowed to be witnesses in law, but
 their witness is only half as valuable as that of a man. In the
 context of the twentieth century - when, we should remember, we
 are still campaigning for equal rights for women - this Quranic
 legislation does seem prohibitive. But in seventh-century Arabia
 it was revolutionary. We must remember what life had been like for
 women in the pre-Islamic period when female infanticide was the
 norm and when women had no rights at all. Like slaves, women were
 treated as an inferior species, who had no legal existence. In
 such a primitive world, the very idea that a woman could be a
 witness or could inherit anything in her own right was
 astonishing. We must recall that in Christian Europe, women had to
 wait until the nineteenth century before they had anything
 similar: even then, the law remained heavily weighted towards men.
 -- p. 191

Sir Abdullah Suhrawardy, The Sayings of Muhammad

 Muhammad was content with his lot as a shepherd, but his uncle,
 Abu Talib, desired something better for him, and obtained him
 employment with a rich widow, Khadija, the daughter of Khuweilid,
 son of Asad, and thus Muhammad found himself at the age of 25 in
 charge of a caravan conveying merchandise to Syria. On Muhammad's
 return, Khadija was so pleased with his successful management of
 her business, and was so attracted by his nobility of character,
 reports about which she heard from her old servant who had
 accompanied him, that she sent her sister to offer the young man
 her hand. Muhammad had felt drawn to Khadija, and so matters were
 soon arranged and, though Khadija was by fifteen years his senior,
 their twenty-six years of married life were singularly happy.

Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, Discovery of India

 Among the unfortunate developments that took place in Inda was the
 growth of purdah or the seclusion of women. . . In India there had
 been previously some segregation of the sexes among the
 aristocracy, as in many other countries and notably in ancient
 Greece. Some such segregation existed in ancient Iran also and to
 some extent all over western Asia. . . Byzantine influence
 travelled to Russia where there was a fairly strict seclusion of
 women right up to Peter the Great's time. This had nothing to do
 with the Tartars who, it is well established, did not segregate
 their women-folk. The mixed Arab-Persian civilization was affected
 in many ways by Byzantine customs . . . there was no strict
 seclusion of women in Arabia or other parts of western or central
 Asia. The Afghans, who crowded into northern India after the
 capture of Delhi, had no strict purdah. Turkish and Afghan
 princesses and ladies of the court often went riding, hunting, and
 paying visits. It is an old Islamic custom, still to be observed,
 that women must keep their faces unveiled during the Haj
 pilgrimage to Mecca. -- p. 242 - 243

Mary Walker, A World Where Womanhood Reigns Supreme

 [Mary Walker was Production Coordinator on the BBC2 series "Living
 Islam". Article courtesy of Impact Magazine]

 When I joined the team of "Living Islam" two years ago, my
 perception of Islam was dominated by prejudice and ignorance, and
 I found its treatment of women abhorrent. To me the veil
 symbolised the oppression of women, making them invisible,
 anonymous and voiceless, and the cause of this oppression lay in
 the will to perpetuate the family and maintain a patriarchal
 framework - the very basis of an Islamic Society. I thought women
 were entirely submerged by divine justification of their role as
 wife and mother. . .

 "Living Islam" was filmed over two years in 19 different countries
 and on location I was a lone female in an otherwise male team. . .

 The first Muslim woman I met in Mali was far removed from my
 preconception about the Muslim female. She was the wife of a
 Shaikh dedicated to converting pagan villagers to Islam. A
 sophisticated, well-educated woman, previously married to a
 diplomat, she had renounced a Western lifestyle for a life in
 purdah. . .

 The emancipated woman in the West faces the conflict between
 confirmation of her femininity and the privileges that she
 associates with it, and repudiation of the confines of her female
 role and all the limitations that men want her to assume. From
 where I stood, this woman had transformed those limitations into
 priviliges. . .

 On my next trip to northern Nigeria I met two more women who would
 alter my views even further. . . And once again they had rejected
 the Western lifestyle which I considered so superior to Islam in
 its treatment of women. . .

 The women talked and in their answers I saw the seeds of my own
 re-evalutions. They argued that the veil signified their rejection
 of an unacceptable system of values which debased women while
 Islam elevated women to a position of honour and respect. "It is
 not liberation where you say women should go naked. It is just
 oppression, because men want to see them naked." Just as to us the
 veil represents Muslim oppression, to them miniskirts and plunging
 necklines represent oppression. They said that men are cheating
 women in the West. They let us believe we're liberated but enslave
 us to the male gaze. However much I insist on the right to choose
 what I wear, I cannot deny that the choice is often dictated by
 what will make my body more attractive to men. Women cannot
 separate their identity from their appearance and so we remain
 trapped in the traditional feminine world, where the rules are
 written by men.

 By choosing to wear the veil, these women were making a conscious
 decision to define their role in society and their relationship
 with men. . .

 So were my notions of oppression in the form of the veil
 disqualified? If my definition of equality was free will then I
 could no longer define that oppression as a symptom of Islam. The
 women had all excercised their right to choose. To some extent,
 they were freer than me - I had less control over my destiny. I
 could no longer point at them and say they were oppressed and I
 was not. My life was influenced by male approval as theirs - but
 the element of choice had been taken out of mine. Their situations
 and their arguments had, after all, served to highlight
 shortcomings in my view of my own liberty.

Sherif Abdel Azeem, Women In Islam Versus Women In
      The Judaeo-Christian Tradition

 Why are there four female converts for every male convert to Islam
 in the US? This paper provides clues by examining the teachings of
 the three monotheistic faiths.