Sexual Ethics in Islam (33 page)

180 sexual ethics and islam

Notes to Chapter 6

1. McLoughlin, “Swedish Imam says Islam forbids female circumcision.”
   

2. This translation is mine, from the Arabic text included in Keller,
   Reliance of the Traveller
   , p. 59. I will discuss Keller’s translation, which differs in substantial respects, below.
   

3. I agree with Mahmood that “any social and political transformation is always a function of local, contingent, and emplaced struggles whose blueprint cannot be worked out or predicted in advance. And when such an agenda of reform is imposed from above or outside, it is typ- ically a violent imposition whose results are likely to be far worse than anything it seeks to displace.” Mahmood,
   Politics of Piety
   , p. 36. Mahmood is not writing about FGC here, but her remarks apply.
   

4. Historian Jonathan Berkey has suggested that rather than focus on the seemingly endless “polemical debate as to whether female excision is or is not ‘Islamic’,” one can analyze the ways in which various actors understand the practice “within the broader Islamic framework.” Berkey, “Circumcision Circumscribed,” pp. 20–21. The polemical debate is relevant, though, to the questions about religious authority and authoritarianism that I raise in this chapter.
   

5. Kassamali, “When Modernity Confronts Traditional Practices,” p. 40. For her explanation as to why she prefers “female genital cutting” to other terms, see n. 1, p. 58.
   

6. Brooks,
   Nine Parts of Desire
   , pp. 53–4, has criticized Muslims who “turn their wrath on the commentators criticizing the practices [of clitoridec- tomy and honor killings], and not on the crimes themselves. The
   Progressive Muslims
   volume edited by Omid Safi reflects a determin- ation not to be silenced by the thought of giving ammunition to what Muzammil Siddiqi refers to as “the enemies of Islam” (see chapter 8,
   

   n. 24). See also miriam cooke’s concept of “multiple critique,” in
   

   Women Claim Islam
   .
   

7. Kassamali, “When Modernity Confronts Traditional Practices,” p. 42.
   

8. However, among African Christians, Protestants seem to be more opposed to the practice than Catholics, Orthodox, or Copts. Salecl, “Cut in the Body,” p. 35, n. 2, notes that “The Catholic Church never officially distanced itself from clitoridectomy; the missionaries, in Africa, for example, did not condemn this practice. Only the Anglican Church, in the 1920s, denounced this ritual and advised its missionaries to prevent it.” See also Gollaher,
   Circumcision
   , p. 196–7.
   

9. See Berkey, “Circumcision Circumscribed,” pp. 21–2, for a discussion of pre-Islamic Egyptian practices.
   

10. According to Toubia, “The transmission route of FGM helps to clarify it as a nonreligious practice. When Islam entered Asian countries from Arabia to Iran, it did not carry FGM with it, but when it was imported to Asia through Nile Valley cultures, FGM was part of it. This was the case with the Daudi Bohra of India, whose religious beliefs are derived from an Egyptian-based sect of Islam.” (Toubia,
    Female Genital Mutilation
    ,
    

    p. 32.) Toubia does not discuss Southeast Asian Muslim practices.
    

11. See, for instance, Little, “Female Genital Mutilation: Medical and Cul- tural Considerations,” pp. 30–34.
    

    notes 181
    

12. U.S. Department of State, “Indonesia: Report on Female Genital Muti- lation (FGM) or Female Genital Cutting (FGC).” The medicalization of the procedure – promoted in some African nations as an ameliorative measure – seems to be leading in Southeast Asia to actual “cutting” of some type, as sharp implements such as scissors are used. Moore and Rompies, “In the Cut.”
    

13. “Claiming Our Bodies and Ou[r] Rights: Exploring Female Circumci- sion as an Act of Violence,” quoted in Toubia,
    Female Genital Mutilation
    , p. 30.
    

14. Toubia,
    Female Genital Mutilation
    , p. 31. More recent Western scholar- ship tends to repeat this dismissal of any relationship between Islam and FGC. For example, one recent introductory text declares “Female cir- cumcision is neither an Islamic practice nor is it widespread among Muslims. Rather, it appears to be an African tradition that remains in practice in countries like the Sudan and Egypt, among Muslims and non-Muslims alike.” Esposito,
    What Everyone Needs to Know about Islam
    , p. 102.
    

15. Berkey discusses the Shi‘a on p. 26. For one example of a matter-of-fact reference to female circumcision in another context, see Ruxton,
    Maliki Law
    , p. 155.
    

16. Berkey, “Circumcision Circumscribed,” p. 25.
    

17. On al-Ghazali, see Roald,
    Women in Islam
    , p. 241, and chapter 11, “Female Circumcision,” pp. 237–53 more broadly; see also her brief dis- cussion in the conclusion, p. 299.
    

18. Toubia,
    Female Genital Mutilation
    , p. 43.
    

19. Abou El Fadl,
    Speaking in God’s Name
    , pp. 144–5; 62–3.
    

20. Even Shaikh Muhammad al-Tantawi of Al-Azhar, who has opposed female circumcision, makes this point. The Qur’an itself does not say anything about circumcision, of males or females. However, it is uni- versally acknowledged that male circumcision is an Islamic custom – virtually all Muslim males are circumcised – and it is attributed to the covenant between God and Abraham. According to Gollaher, “when a retired Libyan judge, Mustafa Kamal al-Mahdawi, published a book that questioned the legitimacy of the ritual [of male circumcision], he came under furious attacks from the clergy and the press.” A swift response from a prominent Saudi cleric accused him of apostasy for rejecting the consensus view that circumcision of males was obligatory.
    Circumcision
    , pp. 51–2. See also Abu-Sahlieh, “Jehovah, His Cousin Allah, and Sexual Mutilations,” p. 47. Gollaher bases his discussion of this case on Abu-Sahlieh’s “To Mutilate in the Name of Jehovah or Allah.” See also Barlas,
    “Believing Women” in Islam
    , p. 65.
    

21. Berkey, “Circumcision Circumscribed,” p. 30: “[T]he few medieval sources which discuss female excision in any detail routinely direct their primary attention to the question of sexuality, and in particular women’s sexuality and its control.”
    

22. Kassamali, “When Modernity Confronts Traditional Practices,” claims that Qur’an 4:1 grants Muslim women “the right to sexual satisfaction within the context of a marriage” as well as the right “to initiate sexual intercourse.” (This famous verse recounting the creation of humanity does not actually mention sex at all, except in its reference to the creation of “many men and women” from the original pair.)
    

    182 sexual ethics and islam
    

23. Muslim Women’s League, “An Islamic Perspective on Sexuality.” See also Abusharaf, “Virtuous Cuts,” on women’s sexual responsiveness after excision and/or infibulation.
    

24. El-Saadawi,
    The Hidden Face of Eve
    , p. 42, quoted Abu-Sahlieh, “Jeho- vah, His Cousin Allah, and Sexual Mutilations,” p. 46.
    

25. Abu-Sahlieh (“To Mutilate in the Name of Jehovah or Allah”) has argued that “Juridical logic cannot acknowledge the distinction between male and female circumcision, both being the mutilation of healthy organs and consequently damaging the physical integrity of the child, whatever the religious motivations lying underneath.”
    

26. Abu-Sahlieh, “Jehovah, His Cousin Allah, and Sexual Mutilations,” p. 54.
    

27. In his discussion of “female genital mutilation” and male circumcision under United States law, James McBride suggests that differential treat- ment “may be required for equal protection of men and women,” posing one potential strategy for avoiding the problems with attempts to treat the practices in the same way. McBride, “ ‘To Make Martyrs of Their Children’,” p. 235.
    

28. Trans. by Ahmad Hasan, as quoted in Ahmad, “Female Genital Mutila- tion.” See
    Sunan Abi Dawud
    , K. al-Adab, “Ma ja’a fi’l-khitan,” vol. 2, p. 657.
    

29. Roald,
    Women in Islam
    , p. 247.
    

30. Hoyland,
    Arabia and the Arabs
    , p. 129. Circumcising women appears alongside the eating of locusts as matters where tribes could differ.
    

31. Gollaher,
    Circumcision
    , p. 192; Abu-Sahlieh (“Jehovah, His Cousin Allah, and Sexual Mutilations,” p. 48) extends the same criticism to hadith regarding male circumcision.
    

32. Ahmad, “Female Genital Mutilation.”
    

33. Badawi, “The Issue of Female Circumcision,” appendix to
    Gender Equity in Islam
    . In his footnote to this hadith, Badawi cites “Al-Tabarani, quoted in Al-Albani, Muhammad N., Silsilat Al-Ahadeeth Al-Sahihah, A1 Maktab Al-Islami, Beirut, Lebanon, 1983, vol. 2, Hadeeth no. 722, pp. 353–8 especially pp. 356–7” and also refers to Keller’s translation of
    Reliance of the Traveller
    .
    

34. Lane’s entry for “bazr” (
    Arabic-English Lexicon
    , Book 1, Part 1, p. 222 provides some material suggesting the term might have been under- stood to refer to the prepuce, but the preponderance of his material suggests it means clitoris. See also Faruqi,
    Faruqi’s Law Dictionary
    , p. 76 (where he also gives two Arabic equivalents for “glans clitoris”:
    taraf
    and
    tarth
    ); and Berkey, “Circumcision Circumscribed,” p. 28. Roald,
    Women in Islam
    , p. 243 briefly discusses Keller’s translation.
    

35. See Berkey, “Circumcision Circumscribed,” p. 28.
    

36. Kassamali, “When Modernity Confronts Traditional Practices,” p. 51.
    

37. Abusharaf, “Virtuous Cuts.” See also her forthcoming edited volume
    

    Female Circumcision: Multicultural Perspectives
    .
    

38. Kassamali, “When Modernity Confronts Traditional Practices,” p. 54, suggests that FGC should “be presented as a violation of the right to good health,” with particular emphasis on the consequences of infertility.
    

39. Abu-Sahlieh, “Jehovah, His Cousin Allah, and Sexual Mutilations,” summarizes these debates on pp. 49–50.
    

40. Ahmad, “Female Genital Mutilation.”
    

Notes to Chapter 7

notes 183

1. This translation is by ‘Abdullah Yusuf Ali. See also Q. 5:6.
   

2. Q. 2:187; my modification of ‘Abdullah Yusuf Ali’s translation. The word I have translated here as “your wives” is “nisa’ikum.”
   Nisa’
   is the Arabic word for women, but it is also used to mean wives. The Qur’an also uses the term
   azwaj
   , a masculine/inclusive plural of the word
   zawj
   (see Wadud,
   Qur’an and Woman
   , pp. 20–3), to mean both spouses in a general sense and also wives specifically (e.g., 33:28, with regard to the Prophet’s wives); see also Barlas,
   “Believing Women” in Islam
   , pp. 183–4.
   

3. See, e.g., Syed,
   The Position of Women in Islam
   , p. 57: “Thus, 2:187 tells us God has given the husband and the wife a complimentary [sic] role to each other neither one dominating the other.”
   

4. Wadud,
   Qur’an and Woman
   , 11. I fi encountered this insight regarding the explicit audience for the text in Esack’s essay “Islam and Gender Justice: Beyond Simplistic Apologia,” especially pp. 195–6. Barlas makes reference to this phenomenon on a few occasions, though to very different effect.
   

5. Daniel Boyarin makes this distinction between androcentrism and misogyny (or gynephobia) with regard to rabbinic discourses in Boyarin,
   Carnal Israel
   , p. 94.
   

6. However, there do seem to be some places in the Qur’anic text where, despite the use of terms such as
   nas
   , the people addressed are male. See, e.g., Q. 3:14 which refers to “people” ’s desire for women, progeny, and material wealth. The Qur’an condemns this commodity-lust, but not the implicit commodification of women. On this verse, see Wadud,
   Qur’an and Woman
   , pp. 53–4.
   

7. The most important verse discussing creation is Q. 4:1, occurring at the beginning of the Surah entitled “Women.” Rethinking androcentric accounts of creation has been one vital element of Muslim women’s scholarship. Even a work on modern Jordan contains a discussion of these points; see Sonbol,
   Women of Jordan
   , pp. 207–8 in her chapter on “Honor Crimes.” Al-Sheha,
   Woman in the Shade of Islam
   , p.10 is instructive as to how far the imperatives of modern discourse have affected conservative authors; while it asserts firmly that “Islam made both the male and the female equal in terms of humanity,” it translates 4:1 with parenthetical identification of “Adam” as the first creation, and “Eve” as secondary: “O mankind! Be dutiful to your Lord, Who created you from a single person (Adam), and from him (Adam) He created his wife (Eve), and from them both He created many men and women ...” For broader consideration of creation and the expulsion from the garden, see Calderini, “Woman, ‘Sin’ and ‘Lust’.”
   

8. The rules for plurals referring to non-humans and inanimate objects differ.
   

9. The same problem exists with regard to dual forms as well. The use of a masculine/inclusive dual form in Q. 4:16, describing illicit sexual activ- ity, has given rise to disagreement among commentators as to whether the verse refers to two men or a man and a woman. See chapter 5.
   

10. Q. 4:124.

1. In agreement with the noun
   man
   , “whoever,” which is grammatically masculine.
   

   184 sexual ethics and islam
   

2. For example, see Badawi,
   The Status of Woman in Islam
   , pp.12–13.
   

3. ‘Abdullah Yusuf Ali translation; see also Ahmed Ali’s explanatory note to his translation, p. 50. Barlas demonstrates that not all discussions of witnessing in the Qur’an privilege male testimony over female testi- mony.
   “Believing Women” in Islam
   , p. 190.
   

4. This verse proposes an equal division for parents of a decedent who has also left offspring, indicating that in some cases the gender of the heir is not the deciding criterion.
   

5. My understanding here differs from that of Barlas, who sees difference but not inequality in these regulations.
   “Believing Women” in Islam
   , pp. 197–200, and passim.
   

6. On which, in Muslim contexts more generally, see Marlow,
   Hierarchy and Egalitarianism in Islamic Thought
   . She puts the matter succinctly in her Introduction: “[W]hile the Qur’an frequently points out the mean- inglessness of differences of rank in terms of the afterlife, it certainly does not attempt to abolish them in the present world. On the contrary, it might be observed that the Qur’an endorses several forms of worldly inequality. ... Its central point thus appears to be that such inequalities have no bearing on an individual’s moral worth and ultimate fate in the next world.” (p. 4) Marlow points out that the strong egalitarian trend was limited to “the equality of free Muslim males.” (p. 34)