Sexual Ethics in Islam (22 page)

7

“If you have touched women”: Female Bodies and Male Agency in the Qur’an

O ye who believe! Approach not prayers with a mind befogged, until ye can understand all that ye say, – nor in a state of ceremonial impurity (Except when travelling on the road), until after washing your whole body. If ye are ill, or on a journey, or one of you cometh from offices of nature, or ye have been in contact with women, and ye find no water, then take for yourselves clean sand or earth, and rub therewith your faces and hands. For Allah doth blot out sins and forgive again and again.

Qur’an, Surah 4, verse 43
1

Two brief sentences in a verse discussing observance of the dawn-to-dusk Ramadan fast succinctly capture much of what is essential about marriage and sex in the Qur’an: “Lawful for you on the nights of the fasts is the approach to your wives. They are garments for you and you are garments for them.”
2
First, and most obviously, sex between spouses is not opposed to spiritual practice – in this case, fasting – but exists as a complement and a supplement to it. Second, and a point much remarked on by contemporary interpreters,
3
there is an undeniable reciprocity in the marital relationship; a husband is a garment for his wife just as a wife is a garment for her husband. Third, and much more seldom acknowledged, there is a basic asymmetry in God’s speech here: God is speaking to men, about women. In this verse, as in numerous others that treat the relationship between spouses or refer to women’s bodies in sexual contexts, men are the “you” and women are the “they.”
4
This androcentrism is not equivalent to misogyny, but neither is it unproblematic for interpreters concerned with matters of gender and justice.
5

“if you have touched women” 113

Since the Qur’an is the primary mode of divine guid- ance to humanity as well as the basis for so much Muslim thought, any attempt to formulate an ethics of sex and intimacy must engage with the revealed text. Recent interpretations of the Qur’an have tackled many important topics related to women and gender, but few have explicitly dealt with the verses dis- cussing sex. In this chapter, I argue that close attention to those Qur’anic verses that discuss sex can provide a new lens through which to engage in feminist exegesis. Qur’anic rules are gender- differentiated in intimate and familial matters above all, with men seemingly given greater rights and responsibilities. Recent works by a number of gender-conscious scholars have shown the extent to which standard exegetical treatments of these issues have been shaped by interpreters’ presuppositions about male dominance and superiority. At the same time, feminist attempts to approach the question of male marital and familial authority have not attempted to disaggregate the issues surrounding mar- riage, divorce, and sex. Despite the way quite a number of verses on all topics are directed
to
men
about
women, I suggest that there is often a difference in content and tone between those focusing on marriage and divorce on the one hand, and those discussing sexual intimacy on the other. The former usually direct men to allow women particular freedoms; the latter do not contain similar directives, but rather only command men to behave in particular ways. Even those verses that posit men as having greater agency and control in intimate relationships, though, situate all human actions as being directly subject to divine scrutiny, which implies a higher ethical standard alluded to by, but not explicitly presented in, the Qur’anic text.

To whom am I speaking?

As Amira Wadud has shown, God does not always speak to a specifically male audience; indeed, such treatment is the exception rather than the rule. Yet because Arabic, like French and Hebrew, relies on gendered nouns, readers of the Qur’an must pay close attention to the content and context of each verse

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to determine whether particular passages are gender-specific or gender-neutral. Many Qur’anic verses address women and men together using the gender-neutral terms “human being” or “people” (
insan, nas
). These words are often poorly translated into English as “man,” “mankind,” or “men.”
6
Part of the reason that these terms have often been rendered in this way is that these words take masculine pronouns in Arabic, but the gender of nouns is only sometimes indicative of the gender associated with the signified object. To insist that because
insan
takes a masculine pronoun it refers to a male person is untenable; logic would also then dictate that
nafs
(self or soul), which takes a feminine pronoun, would necessarily refer to a female, making the first creation female rather than male (as Muslim interpret- ation generally, although not universally, holds) or of unspecified gender, as some premodern commentators and a number of contemporary scholars have argued.
7

The structure of Arabic plural forms can make it espe- cially difficult to determine whether a gendered meaning is intended. Only exclusively female groups can be referred to with the feminine plural, while both exclusively male groups and groups including both males and females must be referred to with the masculine plural.
8
A Muslim man is a
muslim
while a Muslim woman is a
muslimah
. A group of Muslim women is
muslimat
; a group of Muslim men is
muslimun
. A group that includes both men and women is also
muslimun
.
9
Thus, when a collective noun such as
muslimun
appears in the Qur’an, it cannot be assumed that it only refers to men. In most cases,
muslimun
and similar collective plurals refer to all Muslims, male and female.

In some instances, though, a particular collective noun clearly refers specifically to males, as it is accompanied by its exclusively feminine counterpart. This tendency is most clearly illustrated in Surah 33, verse 35:

Muslim men (
muslimin
) and Muslim women (
muslimat
), believing men and believing women, devoutly obedient men and devoutly obedient women, truthful men and truthful women, patient men and patient women, humble

“if you have touched women” 115

men and humble women, charitable men and charitable women, men who fast and women who fast, men who pro- tect their chastity and women who protect their chastity, and men who remember God frequently and women who remember God frequently, God has prepared for them forgiveness and a great reward.

This verse describes men and women separately but in parallel fashion that makes absolutely clear their spiritual equal- ity. Though an equivalent meaning could have been conveyed by the use of these terms in the masculine inclusive plural, the separate references to men and women emphasize both the inclusiveness of the revelation and the sameness of divine reward to members of both sexes. The latter point is explicit in other verses such as “And whoever does good deeds, whether male or female, and is a believer, will enter Paradise and not be wronged in the least.”
10
The word “believer” appears here in the male singular due to grammatical convention,
11
but the meaning is clear: God will reward males and females alike according to their deeds. Interpreters intent on proving male/ female equality in the Qur’anic message frequently quote these and similar verses as proof of women’s equality with men.
12

On other occasions, the separate treatment of men and women in the Qur’an indicates a lack of sameness. Regulatory verses discussing matters such as witnessing and inheritance explicitly differentiate between males and females. In witnessing certain types of commercial contracts, Surah 2, verse 282 declares that one can employ two men, or one man and two women “So that if one of them errs, the other can remind her.”
13
In dividing inheritance between children of a decedent, Surah 4, verse 11 states that a male gets twice the portion of a female, a ratio that also holds for a number of other cases.
14
Difference, in these instances, involves obvious inequality,
15
though whether this inequality constitutes injustice is a separate and more com- plicated issue.

The clear Qur’anic declarations of sameness and the equally clear Qur’anic acceptance of inequality based upon differentiation must be understood in the context of an

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ever-present tension in the Qur’an between egalitarianism and hierarchy, which exists not only with regard to the sexes but also when it comes to matters such as wealth or slavery.
16
Although the Qur’an famously insists that all people are equals before God and the only distinguishing criterion is piety, other verses acknowledge and seemingly authorize disparities in treatment based on freedom or gender.
17
Not only are some abstract rules meant to apply differently, as in the cases of witnessing and inheritance, but hierarchies of power in the interrelationships between individuals are accepted as a matter of course.
18
As Barbara Stowasser succinctly sums up, “the Qur’an does not associate its principle of equal human dignity and worthiness with notions such as absolute and individual social, political, or economic equality.”
19

Male-female relations embody both norms of ultimate sameness and earthly differentiation. One common line of argument suggests that while men and women are ontologically equal as human creations, they are not meant to be socially equal in the life of this world. Revelation is seen to justify social differ- entiation, either because of an assumed male superiority or, in the twentieth century, a more palatable view of male and female complementarity.
20
Asma Barlas acknowledges, but swiftly dismisses, the argument that one can“distinguish between religious and social/legal equality” in her
“Believing Women” in Islam: Unreading Patriarchal Interpretations of the Qur’an
.
21
In rejecting this division, Barlas must attempt to explain away numerous verses that suggest or command differential treat- ment for males and females. (She does so in part by making the sound point that difference is not always unequal.) Others have argued, persuasively, that the Qur’an does present such a dis- tinction, but that the ontological equality of all human beings takes precedence over the earthly, temporally bound regulations that privilege men over women, as in inheritance and witness- ing. Thus, specific regulations which are discriminatory toward women need not apply always, or in every context.

Feminist or gender-conscious interpretation of the Qur’an, a discipline still in its infancy despite some paradigm altering scholarship, has tended to focus much of its attention

“if you have touched women” 117

on the issue of power as wielded in intimate relationships.
22
How, scholars have attempted to discern, can one reconcile the Qur’an’s basic stance that Muslim women are first and foremost Muslims, the religious equals of men,
23
with the notion expressed in Surah 4, verse 34 that men are “
qawwamun ‘ala
” (“bread-earners,” “maintainers,” “protectors and maintainers,” “the managers of the affairs of,” “in charge of,” “have authority over,” or “shall take full care of ”) women?
24
Even within a single verse, such as Surah 2, verse 228, there can be a tension between the notion that women have rights “similar to” or “just as” or even perhaps “equal to”(
mithl
) those of men, but that “men have a degree over them.” Both verses are crucial for those concerned with gender equality or equity, and the ways that they have been treated illustrate both the significant insights of feminist schol- arship as well as the limitations of certain approaches to the Qur’an.

A difficult verse

Traditional scholars and contemporary Muslims from a variety of backgrounds and perspectives have interpreted Surah 4, verse 34. While classical and medieval interpretations of this verse stress female obedience and male authority, recent inter- pretations tend to emphasize the financial component of men’s marital duties and the limits on a husband’s power over his wife.
25
Many Muslims have gravitated toward the latter views, in keeping with modern discourses of complementarity rather than hierarchy, and fitting with the Qur’anic portrayal of women in other verses as full human beings and partners in the relationship of marriage. The range of ways in which this verse’s key provisions have been interpreted illustrates both the pres- ence of androcentrism and misogyny in some aspects of the Muslim tradition as well as possibilities for more egalitarian readings of scripture.

This verse presents numerous difficulties for transla- tion, since so many of the words have contested meanings. My provisional rendering here leaves three terms in the original

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Arabic since they cannot be translated without taking a position on how they should be interpreted.

Men are
qawwamun
in relation to women, according to what God has favored some over others and according to what they spend from their wealth. Righteous women are
qanitat
, guarding the unseen according to what God has guarded. Those [women] whose
nushuz
you fear, admon- ish them, and abandon them in bed, and strike them. If they obey you, do not pursue a strategy against them. Indeed, God is Exalted, Great.
26

Interpreters from a variety of perspectives have addressed the key issues raised by this verse: are men “in charge” of women? What are the characteristics of righteous women? What is
nushuz
and what are its consequences? Is the command to“strike them,” that is, women, to be taken literally?

This verse begins with the declaration that “Men are
qawwamun
in relation to women.” The word
qawwamun
(sin- gular,
qawwam
) derives from the Arabic term for standing. It signifies one who “stands over” or “stands up for,” thus poten- tially encompassing both authority and responsibility. These dual elements were recognized by classical commentators on this verse who attributed men’s role as
qawwamun
to both divine favor of men in general over women in general (“accord- ing to what God has favored some over others”) and to husbands’ financial responsibility for paying dower and main- tenance to their wives (“according to what they spend from their wealth.”) Some commentators devoted more attention to male “perfection” and female “deficiency” than to men’s financial obligations, while others acknowledged male superiority as a given but stressed a husband’s duty to support his wife.