Inside the Gender Jihad: Women's Reform in Islam Read Online Free PDF

of Allah’s vast dominion in all its wonder and glory while admitting to the many ways that I and other Muslims have failed to establish a believing community that mirrors that beauty without constant trials of insufficiency and trails of frailty. Thus, Islam is no longer the goal, but a process. One must continuously engage in

    6 inside the gender jihad

    this process, as I have done for more than three decades, including wrestling with the relationship between meanings and experiences.
    The essays that follow will be expressed in the variety of ways to reflect my engagement in that process. Some essays are more idealistic than others; some are more complex, abstract, and analytical than others; and some essays easily express their commonality with the stories and struggles of
    other writers, thinkers, and
    participants,
    especially
    women,
    in Islam,
    whether living or dead. Others essays stand starkly in the margins of thought and form, as a consequence of recent discourse, developments, discoveries, and disappointments. By negotiating between these structural inconsistencies as elements of my whole experience within the struggle for gender justice, I hope to show my engagement in the process to find a full voice and to contribute to the meanings of being Muslim and woman. That whole experience and full voice both grow from my meager transforma- tions and include understanding multiple meanings of the term “Islam.” The first chapter explicitly examines these multiple meanings, and provides female-inclusive meanings of foundational and key terms that are used throughout this book.
    In particular my contribution remains faithful to the imperative that Muslim women appropriate Islamic primary sources, especially the Qur’an. It is indispensable to women’s empowerment that they apply their experi- ences to interpretations of the sources when they participate in the
    development and reform of Muslim politics – especially in the context of ongoing deliberations of shari‘ah (Islamic law). 7 More female-inclusive interpretations raise the legitimacy of women’s claims to authority within
    the intellectual tradition and bear upon the practical implementation of that tradition. Although my research focus has been particularly on Qur’anic reinterpretation, simple analogies can and on occasion will be made between this reinterpretive methodology and similar applications, especially to shari‘ah. References must be made to the scarcity of existing research reinterpreting ahadith (plural of hadith , oral report), from the Prophet, or about s unnah , which I encourage others to direct more attention to, to form gender-inclusive perspectives .
    I used to feel that my goal in this struggle was to experience well-being in both the public and private domains of human existence; through inter- action with Islamic historical developments, intellectual and practical, and in the context of change and challenge. I have come to ascertain that well-being is a spiritual consequence of the process and participation. It is
    not the goal. Indeed, when it becomes the goal, it is often lost. 8 The Qur’an

    Introduction 7

    does not promise us a life of ease, while it does give indications of how to live a life of struggle and surrender in order to achieve peace and beauty here on earth as a movement toward the Ultimate.
    In a later chapter of this book I will acknowledge and partially validate the recent attacks on Muslim feminists’ interpretive methodologies pro- posed by a few male progressive thinkers. 9 However, this book
    demonstrates how and why these methods remain a significant part of the quest for legitimacy and efficacy for the more than 50% of the Muslim population who happen to be female. In our struggles, women continue to be either marginalized or excluded because Muslim men, including many of those who consider themselves progressive, assume and maintain authority not only based on their interpretation of those