I’ve received questions, a couple in passing and one in an email, regarding the intense opposition in the Qur’an against worshipping female deities as well as the incidental clarification that angels are not female (chapter 53) and the apparent misogyny that this suggests, particularly when men explain the occasional verses away by stating that God …
Continue reading Taken Out of Context: the Feminization of Divinity
A methodological approach that has been mentioned on this site numerous times in passing is the consideration of the Qur’an holistically; that is, each verse contains the message of the entire Qur’an within it. One verse cannot be isolated from the rest of the religious text. The Qur’an is continuous, self-clarifying, and self-defining. This is …
Continue reading Interpretation: the Qur’an as a Holistic Text
After divorce or widowhood, women in the first Muslim societies married and remarried without the disparagement of social stigma. It was not until the Abbasid era, upon the conquering of immensely patriarchal cultures and the expansive harems that arose in consequence, that the contractual rights of monogamy enforced by women began to erode, and the …
I received two emails yesterday inquiring as to what I thought about the Goatmilk debate on the compatibility of Islam and feminism. Seeing as the argument of the opposition was a collection of the usual pedestrian perspectives that conclude the two are irreconcilable, I hadn’t planned on writing about what I’ve already addressed over a …
Continue reading On the Compatibility of Islam and Feminism: A Response to the Goatmilk Debate
Dun, dun, DUUUUUN! When there was paranoid talk of the 'creeping Shari’a' in the U.S. I responded with the usual scoffing and eye-rolling and exasperated exclamations of you totally do not even know what Shari’a is and also that is so not even happening. Of course, that last bit would be irrelevant—it doesn’t matter what …
Continue reading When we NEED Shari’a Law in the United States
For an overwhelming number of verses, the Qur’an holds men and women equally accountable in communal spheres of responsibilities such as upholding equity and securing justice (4:135), contrary to the misconception that women are not expected to maintain financial security or become protectors of society. In fact women who are privileged enough to be wealthy …
Continue reading Inequality Resulting from the Separation of Moral and Social Spheres
Once the Prophet was with a man whose young son came to him, and the man kissed his son and lifted him onto his lap. Then the man’s daughter came and he sat her in front of him. The Prophet asked, “Why did you not treat them equally?” (al-Haythami) Even for something as minor as …
the fatal feminist 