Women in the Qur'an. Asma Lamrabet

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PREFACE TO THE ENGLISH EDITION

      Knowledge is power; and, like power, it can be used to serve diametrically opposed objectives: from serving humanity, to the destruction of what is good for mankind. Hence, the need for sound understanding and informed discussion.

      Islam today is perhaps the world’s most discussed religion; yet, arguably its most misunderstood one. Islamophobia and contrived efforts to impose reforms from outside or engineer them from within, have only aggravated the situation. Nevertheless, it may be worthwhile for both Islam’s advocates and adversaries to revisit their positions and explore avenues of real understanding through reflection and dialogue, as opposed to blind advocacy or outright demonization.

      Square View is not a commercial imprint in the traditional market. Its aim is to make available to the readers, Muslim and non-Muslim, male and female, young and old, literature that may enable them to appreciate Islam and Muslim life, history and culture, as Muslims understand them. This understanding is based on and rooted in the sources that Muslims hold to be authentic, enduring and inviolable. Yet it also reflects the genuine plurality that characterises the historical and contemporary intellectual landscape of the world of Islam. The Qur’an, as the Word of God is the primary and eternal source of the Islamic vision of life and human destiny. The Sunnah of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) is the model for individual and collective behaviour for all times to come. Fiqh, developed in the light of these primary sources, provides a practical framework for individual and collective life and behaviour. This framework has a built-in mechanism to cater for the demands of permanence and change. It is not monolithic. Various schools of thought reflect the plurality of human endeavours to live in accordance with the values and principles of Islam in a variety of contexts. Islamic history showcases these endeavours of applying the guidance provided in the original sources of the Qur’an and Sunnah to problems and challenges as they have arisen in different times and climes. Tafsir literature reflects similar efforts to understand the Divine message and seek its application to changing and evolving situations. Loyalty to the sources, and a disciplined effort to apply the eternal guidance of scripture to temporal situations, is the hallmark of the Muslim intellectual enterprise, spread over almost a millennium and a half. Movements towards reform, revival and reconstruction, drawing upon the internal sources, constitute, despite their diversity and at times apparent conflict, a source of strength. They are an integral part of the historical process. The conscience of the Muslim ummah has welcomed and assimilated reforms and changes which it found to be in consonance with the letter and spirit of Divine guidance and rejected and spurned what it found to be incongruent and inconsistent with the same. External influences have also played their role. There have been trends that represented deviations and departures from the norm. Nonetheless, only that has been acceptable to the Ummah which it deemed authentic and which emerged as part of an internal process, resulting in continuity with change and variety. Respect for Islamic hermeneutic principles, as found in the fields of tafsir and usul-al-fiqh, has ensured the proper following of this process.

      The editorial policy pursued by Square View is consistent with this tradition of Islamic scholarship. The views expressed in the books and monographs published by Square View represent the views of their authors and not necessarily the views of the publishing house or the sponsoring research institutions. We believe that healthy discussion to promote a better understanding of Islam and Muslim history, respecting the integrity and authenticity of the sources along with an opportunity to differ, discuss and innovate within the Islamic tradition is the path that leads to the development of knowledge in the service of Islamic ideals.

      It is in this spirit that we are publishing the English translation of Asma Lamrabet’s book: Women in the Qur’an: An Emancipatory Reading. This is a work of engaged scholarship looking upon the place and role of women in Islam. The author is an accomplished Moroccan Islamic activist and has tried to meticulously study the Qur’an albeit from a fresh perspective. Her original work had been reviewed, revised and corrected by Dr. Ahmed Abaddi, Secretary General of Rabita Mohammadia of Ulema’s of Morocco. Many may disagree with her findings, formulations and interpretations as she has differed from some of the accomplished interpretations of her predecessors. Agreement with all past interpretations is not the real issue. What is to be seen is whether an effort has been made to look at the Revealed Text with a spirit of loyalty and faith in the Divine Authority, while earnestly searching for solutions to new problems within the matrix of Divine Guidance.

      Lamrabet’s work is a radical reinterpretation of the Islamic tradition based on scripture. This is to be praised inasmuch as it is a sincere attempt at bringing the Islamic tradition into conversation with contemporary concerns. Such attempts at remaining true to scripture in light of the changing conditions in which Muslims live, brought about by modernity, are essential to keeping Islam a vibrant religious system. However, some of Lamrabet’s interpretations are quite daring, and will no doubt be seen as problematic. Among other issues, it is unfortunate that there appears to be a general disregard for the hadith corpus, which must be engaged seriously and respectfully if one is to do justice to the sensitive topics under discussion.

      Lamrabet’s sweeping judgements regarding “traditionalist” understanding of Islam, by which she seems to be referring to the scholastic tradition of the past fourteen hundred years, are unfortunately not always substantiated in her work. Rather they are left as broad claims. In attempting to remedy this to some degree, we have included some endnotes. While Square View does not necessarily endorse all the ideas in this work, we hope that the work will provoke a much needed critical engagement with it, and more broadly with modernity and the pre-modern Islamic tradition in light of both the Qur’an and the Sunnah. As a first step in that direction, Lamrabet’s work makes a valuable contribution.

      The present work is being presented to the English reading public with a view to providing access to some trends in contemporary Muslim thinking. The original book was published in French and has run into several editions. The English edition has been ably rendered by Myriam Francois-Cerrah. Every effort has been made to adhere faithfully to the author’s grammatical and typographical style. Our former commissioning editor Yahya Birt initiated the process which was meticulously completed by his successor Dr. Muhammad Siddique Seddon. We are thankful to both of them for their valuable contribution towards the editing of the present work. We are also grateful to PEN for awarding us the ‘Winner of an English PEN Award’ and for a grant towards the translation of this thought-provoking work.

      The Publisher

      January 2016