Title: Beyond the Veil
Author: Fatima Mernissi
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 0253204232
Pro:
• Political and religious problems covered
• Perspective of an insider, not an outsider
Con:
• Academic book, might be difficult for some readers
Description:
• Theoretical and actual status of women in Islam
• Political and religious basis for women’s status discussed
• Suggestions for future efforts
Book Review
Mernissi’s classic study of sex roles, sexuality and sexual inequality in Islam is very useful in understanding the conflicting trends and values which Muslims must navigate. Perhaps the most important thing to understand when looking at the role of women in Islam is that there is a difference between theory and practice. When traditionalists say that Islam does not teach that women are inferior, they do have a point. Islam does indeed “affirm the potential equality between the sexes.”
The key word in Mernissi’s statement there is “potential,” which delineates the difference between theory and practice. Women are potentially equal with men, but that equality is not achieved.
Why is that? They key to understanding why practice does not measure up to theory is realizing that Christianity and Islam start from different premises when it comes to the treatment of women.
In Christianity and Western society generally, women are seen as inferior. There has even been a lot of effort expended in the attempt to show that they are biologically inferior. Islam, however, does not start from such a premise. Quite the contrary, Islam recognizes that women are powerful and sexual beings.
Thus the actual social inequality which women experience does not stem from inferiority, but rather fear. Sexuality must be controlled, and the easiest way to do that (so they claim) is to control female sexuality, because it represents a threat to the order and stability of the ummah, or community of believers.
Why is the ummah threatened by female sexuality? There are a number of different reasons, the most immediate and practical of which is its association the threat of the West. When the Western powers colonized the Middle East, they adopted the defense of women as part of their social reforms. Women may not have had equal rights in the West, but they didn’t have to wear veils and were allowed to walk freely in public.
Because of this, traditionalists and nationalists found themselves defending even practices which they found anachronistic, simply because they were culturally on the defensive. Today the entire program of women’s rights and equality is associated intimately with westernization and modernization. Defending the traditional place of women is the same as defending Islam against the godless and immoral West. The question of the place of women cannot be separated from the question of modernization and the fundamentalist response to it.
Mernissi also offers a religious argument for why women have experienced so much social inequality, even while theoretically they are not supposed to be inferior. According to her, it is not simply women who are feared, but heterosexual relationships themselves. True, sexuality is not seen as being as evil in Islam as it is in Christianity. Nevertheless, a heterosexual unit in which a deep love can grow may distract the man from his primary obligation: worshipping Allah.
Mernissi argues that Islam incorporates three things which serve to limit the intimacy of a man and a wife.
The first is polygamy: by ensuring that the man can obtain sexual satisfaction from more than one person, emotional and psychological intimacy with one person is prevented from growing strong. This is further ensured by rules which mandate that he not favor any one wife and move from one to the next regularly (this has the added benefit of ensuring that she does not seek sexual satisfaction elsewhere).
The second method is “repudiation.” Through this, a man may divorce his wife at any time if he wishes, and she can’t do anything about it. She, however, is not granted the same right. This once again ensures that he can find sexual satisfaction without necessarily having to invest time and effort in emotional intimacy.
The third method is the involvement of the mother-in-law. When a woman marries, she “belongs” to her husband’s family, and quite often the mother-in-law lives with the couple. There is little opportunity for intimacy. Mernissi’s own studies showed that among women from the older, traditional generation, the most important person in a woman’s life was, in fact, her mother-in-law. But with women from the younger, more modern generation, the most important person was the husband.
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