Islam

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Islam

Questions of sex and gender in Islam are particularly controversial for several reasons. Sex roles and rules have been for centuries a major weapon in what is sometimes called the clash of civilizations. Westerners have stigmatized Islam as a religion that imprisons and degrades women, a position that reached its extreme in the fascination for the harem as an erotic locus. More recently, anti-Western Muslims have pointed to the West as a space of debauchery and a sexual freedom that destroys families and morality.

A major interpretative problem between the cultures is created by the fact that Islam is both a world religion and a civilization with a historical existence in time and space, which identified itself by its appartenance to that religion. Given that in the last two centuries educated Muslims have become increasingly sensitive to the way their mores are described in the West, it has always been possible to argue that a given trait (now seen as unflattering) can be attributed to the culture and not the religion.

Historically, religions and cultures interpenetrate. Religions develop in a given cultural environment, which they in turn influence. Islam has been dominant in societies across Asia and Africa. Despite local variations, however, there is a remarkable consistency in the basic approaches taken by historically Muslim societies to questions of sex and gender, a consistency that is even greater with regard to the central Islamic lands from North Africa to South Asia. This can be understood as elements brought to these societies by Islam, as elements already present that made Islam attractive to them in the first place, or as a combination of the two.

After the rapid conquest of a territory from what is today Portugal to Pakistan, Muslim jurists began a process, which extended through the eighth and ninth centuries, of formulating a legal system. Called the sharia, this code covers all aspects of life, from international law to personal hygiene, and of course addresses questions regarding sex and family life. It is based on the Qur'an (which includes a limited number of legal items as well as more general moral strictures), the hadith (or sayings and exemplary actions of the Prophet Muhammad [570–632]), and the historical usages of certain Muslim societies. It is conventionally divided into four legal schools (with Shiites sometimes being considered a fifth), which can be arranged from the more conservative (the Hanbali) to the more liberal (Hanafi). Nevertheless, the differences between these schools (which are usually dominant in different regions) are relatively minor. Even the schism between Sunnis and Shi'is, which is theologically and historically considerable, has minor impact on sex and family law.

While the sharia evolved within a historical society, and unavoidably reflected many of its values, it also was in some respects an ideal construction. Put another way, as in other times and places, people chose which legal and religious precepts to observe rigorously and which to honor more in principle than in practice.

PATERNITY AND SEPARATION

Like its close relatives, Judaism and Christianity, Islam has historically been a patriarchal religion. But it has approached common patriarchal values in two distinctive ways. The first is by privileging physical separation as the only effective way of regulating sexual conduct; the second is by emphasizing the preeminent need to ascertain the identity of the father in all cases.

One of the most popular hadiths says: "When a man and a woman are alone, the devil is the third." This means that the sexual drive will win out over any moral compunctions. Males and females over puberty must be rigorously segregated with the exception of certain close family members. The ultimate expression of this system is the harem, or separate women's quarters. Obviously this is easier for wealthy individuals, but even many modest villages have kept women segregated. As much as is economically possible, women should remain at home, with public space being treated as male.

When a woman enters male space she must be veiled—that is, the veil is a form of female modesty that defines the entry into public space, as a woman does not need to be veiled when in her own home surrounded by her close family. The principle of the veil as a marker of public space and female Muslim identity is quasi-universal in the Muslim world in the early twenty-first centry. What varies is its degree of modesty. In its most limited form, the veil covers just the hair. In its more modest versions (such as the chador or the burqa) it can cover the whole body and even the face and hands. The logic behind the veil is that the less a woman is exposed to view, the less likely she will be able to sexually excite the men she might encounter. (Male standards of modesty are less restrictive and are not defined by presence or absence from the family home.)

Paternity dominates the regulation of sexual behavior. Sexual relations are licit between a man and his wife, and a man and his concubines. While the number of wives is limited to four, concubinage and sexual slavery were limited only by wealth. (Slavery is presently illegal as a matter of civil law.) A divorced woman can only remarry after she has had a period. An extreme version of this is the Shi'i institution of mut'a, or temporary marriage. This is for a preset period that can be as short as an hour. Because Muslim marriage (like Jewish marriage) is a legal contract, such temporary marriages can be accompanied by payment. The continuum between concubinage and marriage can be seen in the practices of the Ottoman sultans (who were also caliphs). These rulers kept numerous concubines, and would transform into legitimate wives—those (up to the legal four) who produced male offspring.

LICIT AND ILLICIT ACTS

In Islam, sex acts are not limited to procreative activity, but they are limited to those who would be otherwise able to procreate: men and women in some legally recognized relationship. Oral sex and anal sex in such circumstances are perfectly acceptable and were freely discussed. Anal penetration of the woman by the man appears as a possible area of marital dispute, with women defending their right to withhold consent to the practice, or with it being compared to polygamy, as a deprivation of vaginal intercourse.

Sexual activity between men is clearly prohibited in Islamic law. Nevertheless, it was commonly practiced and universally recognized in the historically Islamic societies of the Middle East and North Africa. Anecdotally it was very common in literary sources; homoerotic writings were legion and in no sense marginalized. In an effective continuation of the mores of the ancient world, anal intercourse was chiefly seen as humiliating for the penetrated and not the penetrator. Female to female sex, referred to as ishaq (rubbing), perhaps because it was not explicitly mentioned in the Qur'an, was treated more leniently, with some legists suggesting that it could be a neutral, or permitted, activity. Human sexuality in most of its forms (including bestiality) was always frankly, and often explicitly, discussed in literary sources of the highest cultural level.

Because sexuality was controlled by physical separation, there was never any need to deny its nature. Celibacy has always been condemned in Islam; and men (or far more rarely, women) who live without appropriate companionship have traditionally been seen as a threat to the moral stability of the community because it is presumed that they will obtain sexual satisfaction in an illicit and socially disruptive manner. Sexual pleasure is considered a gift from God to be enjoyed by men and women (who are considered, like men, to have a right to sexual gratification). In folk practice, it is often held that a man must pleasure his wife (or each of his wives) at least once per week. In some countries arugula is popularly sold just before the Sabbath to help the man fulfill this periodical obligation.

In partial contradiction to the above lies the practice of clitoridectomy (excision of the clitoris), sometimes also called female circumcision. Tolerated in Muslim law (it is either listed as recommended or permitted, never as required or prohibited), clitoridectomy is practiced in many Muslim societies, especially on the African continent, as well as in some non-Muslim African societies. Though the amount of tissue removed varies from a partial to a total elimination of the clitoris, and though this practice can be understood (like male circumcision) as a symbolic ritual, its most common justification in Muslim societies has been as a necessary limitation of female sexual desire, whose anarchic and insatiable nature would otherwise threaten the stability of the patriarchal unit. In Egypt, clitoridectomy is almost universal among the lower classes and many in the middle classes, though rarely admitted to foreigners. A dismissive view of women's moral fiber is also expressed through the oft quoted hadith, which states that the majority of the inhabitants of hell are women, as well as through the popular expression of Quranic origin, which states that "their (feminine plural) guile is great."

Sexual union between a man and a woman outside the bounds of marriage or concubinage is zina, or fornication, and strongly prohibited. Though the penalty in Islamic law is severe (stoning for adultery), the legal requirements for proof (witnesses to actual penetration) are almost insurmountable. In practice, however, Islamic courts have considered the pregnancy of an unmarried woman de facto proof unless she can prove (her testimony is not enough) that she has been raped.

Adultery and premarital sex are normally handled in almost all Islamic societies through the extralegal honor code. A female who has brought dishonor on the family (either through improper actions or even just the reputation of such actions) must be killed to restore the family's honor, most commonly by stabbing—which should be carried out by the brother if there is one. While such extralegal executions are technically murder in Islamic law, in no Muslim societies have authorities sought to treat them as such (nor have most scholars called for such prosecution). Recently, when the Jordanian royal family sought to change laws that gave lenient treatment to men who avenged the family honor through gynecide, the conservative Muslim opposition blocked the law in the parliament, claiming that it would unleash immorality, reward prostitutes, and violate Islamic principles.

STATUS OF WOMEN

Islamic law gives women a protected but generally inferior legal status. Apologists stress that Islamic law (supported by custom in most places) grants the wife control over her own property (unlike the traditional Western transfer of control to the husband) and that Muslim wives do not take their husband's name. Critics of Islam like to note that women have less weight as witnesses in court and receive half of the male share in inheritance (with apologists explaining that this is fair because they do not have to support others, as men do). The Qur'an explicitly gives men authority over women in marriage and states that a man may beat his wife to restore this authority if milder forms of persuasion (verbal admonitions, the deprivation of sex) have failed. Legists have been careful to stress that any corporal punishment should only be as a last resort and should do no permanent damage.

Divorce exists in two forms in Islamic law. The first judicial divorce, open to men and women, must be for cause. The second, or repudiation, is open to men only and does not require cause. In this case, however, a woman will recover any dowry brought into the marriage. Effectively, a woman's marital security depends upon the economic resources she brought to the relationship.

GENDER AND THE WORLD

The Muslim conception of God is one of total transcendence and incomparability. Hence, God cannot have gender, and the Christian notion of divine paternity is considered blasphemous and absurd. Sufis, or Islamic mystics, have, however, used gender as a way of organizing the universe as a combination of equal and complimentary male and female principles. This may be related to the relative popularity of Sufism among women and to the relative openness of the Sufi tradition to exemplary women, such as Rabi'ah al'Adawiyah (713–801). There was also a flourishing genre of poetry in which mystical love is expressed through profane models (in some cases there is dispute whether the intended meaning of the verses is profane or sacred). In such poetry both homoerotic and heteroerotic images can be models (along, also, with intoxication from alcohol). The Islamic philosophical tradition, in partial overlap with Sufism, included a misogynist strain, which identified the female with the earthly and dreamed of a world without women. This was especially true in the illuminationist school.

Verses in the Qur'an have traditionally been understood as promising the believers sexual access to beautiful virgins in paradise. While many still preach this interpretation, some modernizers have suggested that the verses should be understood allegorically. Abdelwahab Bouhdiba (1985) has argued that the Muslim paradise promises a reconciliation of man with his body and his sexuality.

MODERN TIMES

Western imperialism, which took away the independence of virtually all Muslim societies, had an enormous impact on gender regulation. Many Muslim modernizers (sometimes called male feminists) believed that the liberation of women from traditional restrictions was a key to full membership in the modern world with all of its material benefits (including national independence). Customs bent under the gaze of the powerful Westerner. In Iran and Turkey the veil was banned (to be replaced among upper-class women by hats); and even where veiling survived it was reduced to a compromise that generally left the face open. Among the elite, many adopted slightly more conservative versions of Western clothing. There remains, however, a gendered approach to Westernization as something safer, and more permissible, for men. In all but the most extreme cases (such as in the Taliban) the males can wear the latest jeans, whereas women must honor tradition in dress or behavior.

Family law has been a major area of struggle between conservatives and reformers, as well as has been women's access to public space. Divorce and polygamy have been particularly controversial. The most common compromise has been to permit polygamy but restrict it, for example, by requiring the consent of the first wife before a second is taken. In some countries, high-status women have written such a right into their marriage contracts. Women are still struggling to improve their conditions for divorce and their rights to child custody.

But Westernization also brought Victorian prudery. Educated Muslims quickly discovered that their civilization's traditional sexual frankness (and its absence of homophobia) both titillated Westerners while providing fodder for their sense of moral superiority. Contemporary Islam has thus taken to adopting nineteenth-century standards of censorship in sexual matters, often censoring (or patently ignoring the existence of) the sexual discussions in their own classics. The Islamist movement, which has operated with greater or lesser strength in all Muslim countries, and which transcends the Sunni and Shi'i divide, has reinforced this prudery and even blames homosexuality (and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome [AIDS]) on Western (or Israeli) plots to destroy the Muslim family.

More generally, the mounting political pressure of Islamist groups since the mid-1970, has pushed virtually all Muslim governments (with the possible exceptions of Kuwait and Morocco) toward more conservative positions on the segregation of men and women in public space (such as universities) as it has pushed the women in these societies to greater public modesty. It is far easier for the generally authoritarian regimes of the Muslim world to give ground on such moral matters than to share any real political power with the opposition.

The situation of those who would wish to create a modernist revision of Islam is complicated by the fact that virtually all Muslims consider the Qur'an a perfect text, as the unmediated word of God. Hence it cannot be historicized (as modernists have done with the Bible). Instead reformers are often reduced to arguing that the verses do not mean what they have always been understood to mean, sometimes through creative philology. Against polygamy, modernists argued that because the Qur'an says a man should not take more than one wife unless he can treat them all equally, and because it is impossible for the human heart to be free of partiality, God intended to ban polygamy. Traditionalists quickly countered that because God would not have authorized something that was impossible, the requirement of equality applied to the material conditions of support.

There is a small but growing group of Muslim radical feminists (some of them self-declared lesbians), but they receive far more attention in the West than in Muslim lands where they are effectively cut off from the masses of women.