Politics of Piety: The Islamic Revival and the Feminist Subject (34 page)

28
In the modem period, there have been serious challenges posed to th authority that Muslim ju.. rists have historically accorded to the b.adith in the formulation of the sharta. In the nineteenth cen.. tury alone, a range of well.- Islamic thinkers- Sayyid Ahmad Khan in India and Muhammad Abduh in Egypt-raised doubts about the authenticity of the b. literature. In the twentieth century, other scholars (such as Ali Abd al..Raziq [in Egypt] and Chiragh Ali [in India] ) dramatically limited the scope of the Prophetic tradition to spiritual matters alone.
On
these debates, see
D.
Brown 1999.

erating and generating new forms of relationship between different genres of

b. invocations.

Viewed in this way, Umm Faris's arguments about Q. usage do not rep.. resent a dilution of pristine doctrine (or a kind of "folk Islam" that stands apart from a "scriptural Islam"); rather, these arguments and the transforma.. tive labor they perform on learned debates are precisely the means through which the discursive logic of a scholarly tradition comes to be lived by its or.. dinary adherents . As many examples in this chapter show, when a learn or unlettered Muslim quotes a b. in an argument, she does not simply repeat the memorized words from a fi script. She also comments on the b. in response to the situation of utterance, thereby imparting new meanings to it. This process of interpretation, while it differs from one context to another, is not free..fl , but is structured by the authority ascribed to norms of usage that are grounded in scholarly discourse.29 It is the presupposition of such au.. thoritative norms that defi a speech act as a Q. citation, and it is the deployment of these norms that places the comments of women like Umm Faris within this discursive fi One can say, in other words, that it is through practices of citations-such as those used by Umm Faris-that the authority of the b. is performatively constituted.

S EXUAL TRAN SG RESSIONS AN D TH E FEM ININE GAZE

In the section that follows, I want to trace some of the ways in which the scope and meanings of classical Islamic concepts have been extended in light of the fact that women now deploy these concepts to resolve practical prob- lems generated by the exigencies of urban secular existence. Women's increas.. ing familiarity and engagements with canonical sources-such as b.adith commentaries-tends to push forms of juristic reasoning to address new areas of "problematizations" (Rabinow 2003 ) and points of concern that had hith.. erto been outside the purview of scholarly debates. The mosque participants often encounter practical problems when trying to realize an ethical life based on orthodox readings of Islamic scriptures. For example, while a maj ority of the participants within the piety movement argue that women and men should abide by strict protocols of sex segregation, most working women and students fi it impossible to follow this edict. The mosque participants often resolve such contradictions by returning to the juristic debates and reinter--

29
To use Bakhtin's terminology, one might say that the practice of }:l citation is a combi.. nation of both an "authoritative" and an "internally persuasive discourse" (Bakhtin
1981, 345-46 ).

preting these debates in light of their day..to..day struggles. Such attempts, while clearly bringing women's interpretive practices to bear upon the male exegetical tradition in new ways, also extend the logic and reach of this tradi.. tion into areas of practical and quotidian conduct that might have otherwise remained outside of its purview.

These two tendencies may be elaborated through an ethnographic account of a contentious exchange that occurred between the conservative Nafi d:fiya. and a group of young students at the N afi mosque. As I mentioned earlier, the N afi daeiyat are known for their intense admonitory and severe style of preaching, often selecting the most exacting position from a range of juristic opinions and delivering it with full exhortatory force. In this particu.. lar instance that I am about to recount, their young audience took exception to the Nafi daciyat's insistence that the Quran and the l).adith require strict sex segregation based on the argument that such an interpretation is both im.. practical and incorrect in light of other readings of the tradition.

In June 1995 the daciyat at the Nafi mosque had organized lessons for young women between the ages of fi teen and twenty..two during their summer vacations fr school. These lessons were part of a "summer package" the daciyat had organized for the girls, a program that also included activities such as visits to important Islamic architectural sites and museums, and Quranic recitation and memorization contests. Many of the participants were the daughters of women who attended the Nafi a mosque regularly; others were girls who lived in the neighborhood but who did not have any particular at.. tachment to the mosque. The daciyat believed that since young women were

more susceptible to the fads and fashions of Egyptian urban life, they were most in need of instruction in Islamic modes of conduct
(
al
..
adab al..islamiyya) .
By in.. volving the young women in "Islamically..oriented" activities, the daciyat's in..

tention was to provide an altern source of information and socialization, diff rent from what they were normally exposed to in their schools.

On this particular morning, the topic of discussion at hand was
ikhtilat,

which literally means "mixing and blending," but which in Islamic ethical lit.. erature refers to rules of conduct that govern interactions between men and women who are not related by immediate kin ties
(ghair maba ).30
The

daciyat started the session with the Quranic verse that has formed the basis for the Islamic injunction that requires Muslim women to veil and behave mod.. estly when in public. The verse reads: "And tell the believing women to lower their gaze and to be mindfu of their chastity, and not to display their charms

3°
Close male kin, according to Muslim j urists, include a woman's immediate kin ( for exam, ple, father, brother, nephews), her husband, the husband's immediate male kin, and any male who was breast,fed by her mother (al-Jumal 1981, 93-95 ).

[in public] beyond what may be apparent thereof; hence, let them draw their head.- over their bosoms" (verse 31, Sii al
..
Nis�t . Since the young women attending the lesson were all veiled, the d�tiyat used this verse to focus on how the girls should interact with men. What follows over the next several pages are excerpts, from the tape recording I made of the discussion, high.. lighting those moments when the exchange between the daeiyat and the young women became particularly intense. Hajja Samira, a forty..year.- d woman with a severe facial expression, began the lesson by explaining the aforementioned Quranic verses in this manner:

God Almighty has informed us that the correct way of understanding ikhtilat is the abstention from the mixing of women and men
unless by necessity [illa bil 4arura].
So the limit here [to the commingling of women and men] is necessity
[4arura].
But how do we understand necessity? Now [the pursuit of] education is a necessity. If a woman is able to acquire a university degree-like a masters or a doctorate-or any other level of education, this is considered necessity. This is because we must fi against ignorance, and this will not be possible unless we have the weapon of the world in our hands, which is education. So we are not saying to you that you should sit at home. . . . But when we exit fr home for a purpose like education, it is required that we do so in accordance with the appearance that God has sketched for us
[f la budda inni akhrug bi..��ura illi rasamhali allah subJ:t ..taeala] ,
which is: I wear a l) jab that covers all but my face and hands so that my hair does not show, and I wear clothes that cover the shape of my body so that it is not apparent. Second thing, when I deal with men
[at�arr ma ea riggala] ,
I do as the verse we started with says, "And tell the believing women to lower their gaze and to be mindful of their chastity" [verse 31, Surat al..Nisa'] . I should lower my eyes as God has commanded when I speak with men because it is sight through which the devil enters you and incites you to fornication
[ash..shitan bi..- idkhul bil..na?: wi yiwaswisik lil..- 1.
Now [the problem is that] there is no segregation between men and women in the universities. Our government does not respect Islam and has not created universities for women. Since you are compelled
[mi4tarra]
to go to these universities, when you talk to male teachers and students you should "lower your eyes
[g min ab�arukum]."
And

remember, you should only speak to them out of necessity, and not for any other reason. . . . [S imilarly] when you take private lessons from male tutors, as many of you do, avoid looking at them because this is what God has commanded. And it is much better if instead of having a male tutor, you ask your mother to get a woman teacher so that the question of
gha.Q al.-
[lowering the gaze] does not arise.

Hajja Samira and the other daeiyat spent considerable time dwelling on the intricacies involved in avoiding eye contact when taking private lessons from

a male tutor-a practice that is quite common among middle.- ass families since both private and public schools often fail to prepare students to succeed in nationally administered annual examinations. At fi the young women objected to the daeiyat's reading of the Quranic verses on the basis of the prac.. tical diffi they would encounter if they avoided eye contact with male teachers: some said they would appear strange and awkward if they behaved in this manner; others said that it was diffi to fi qualifi women to provide private lessons; and still others argued that they would not understand what was being taught if they did not look their teachers in the eye. Maryam, a tall young woman between sixteen an eighteen years of age, raised another ob.. jection: "But if I know the [male] teacher well and he is well respected, and I

know myself that I am responsible and pious
[mas!l wa mittaq ] ,
and my

intention is pure
[niyyiti naq ,
then what is the problem with taking lessons with a male tutor?"

Hajja lman, another daeiya, responded quickly, "Look, my daughter, who were the most pure and virtuous
[anq wa athar]
on the surface of this earth? These were the Companions of the Prophet and his wives. Right, isn't it? And

yet God commanded
them:
'Whenever you ask them [the Prophet's wives] for

anything that you need, ask them from behind a screen' [verse 53, Sii a}.. AQ.z , meaning there should be no eye contact between the man and the woman. It is not about your or my intent,
0
Maryam, this is the command from God, we have no choice! [Moreover,] as you know, it is incumbent upon

us to follow the Sunna of the Prophet and his household
[bait al-- ."

M aryam shot back, "But those verses were meant for the Prophet's wives, and they were not like other ordinary Muslims. There is another l). that says there are special issues, which only pertain to Muhammed's immediate fe.. male kin, that are different from those for the remainder of [Muslim] women

[yaeni awamir khz4 bT-- mukhtalifa ean ba!l an-- sa1."
She concluded em..

phatically, "These verses are not meant for us!"

Before I proceed with the rest of the discussion, which got progressively more heated
as
the morn wore on, let me draw the reader's attention to certain aspects of the exchange so far that exemplify key trends within the Is .. lamic Revival. First of all, note that the discussion surrounding ikhtilat here is squarely situated within the expectations generated by women's access to pub.. lie education in postcolonial Egypt, and the presumption of their right to

higher education.31 The daeiyat's criticism is directed
not
at the fact that women

are pursuing higher education, but at the failure of the educational institu.. tions to provide the requisite conditions for the cultivation of pious conduct.

31
For a historical analysis of debates about women's education in modem Egypt, see Ahmed

1992;
Nelson
1984.

Their solution to this problem is not to prohibit girls from attending these in.. stitutions, but to train them in those sensibilities, thoughts, and modes of be.. havior that will help them combat what the daeiyat consider to be the delete. rious moral eff of such a system of education. Against their critics who fault the daeiyat for their overly stringent ethical pronouncements (such as their advocacy of the full face and body veil), the daeiyat argue that such severity is a necessary antidote to the institutional conditions that are corro.. sive of Islamic virtues and sensibilities.

The challenge Maryam poses to Hajja !man's interpretation of the Quranic verses demonstrates how familiar the young members of the daewa movement are with scholarly arguments, and the remarkable dexterity they exhibit when using canonical sources to establish an argumentative point. Maryam's objec.. tion to the d�tiyat's argument for avoiding eye contact with male teachers, for example, invokes principles of both Quranic exegesis and l) interpreta.. tion. When the daeiya presents the Quranic verse about the Prophet's wives to counter Maryam's claim that she has pure intentions ( and therefore does not need to avoid eye contact with male teachers), Maryam is quick to point to the inapplicability of these verses to the conduct of Muslim women like her.. self. In this Maryam implicitly invokes a well..known principle of Quranic ex.. egesis, known as
asbab al..- lil..- al..- aniyya,
which Muslim jurists have used to determine the scope a particular verse commands in light of the conditions under which it was revealed, such as the immediate ends it served or to whom it was addressed.32 Following this principle, Maryam argues that the Quranic verses that require a visual separation between men and women were directed at the Prophet's wives and therefore do not pertain to ordinary Muslims. She further buttresses her argument by citing a well..known l)