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WAF Articles
An apostate, a proposed new marriage contract and Egyptian women: where to now?
Journal no.8 1996. pp29-32.
Azza M Karam(1)
The events
In 1991 Dr Nasr Hamid Abu Zeid was a little known university lecturer at the University of Cairo. His case exploded in 1993 when, on applying for an overdue promotion to Professor, Cairo University Board of Promotions flatly refused. The Board had relied on a report compiled by Dr Abdel Sabour Shahin,(2) who claimed that Abu Zeid's work was not intellectually worthy of a promotion to Professor, and accused it of being against Islam.
The case made newspaper headlines when he was taken to court by a group of religious scholars, who called for him to be separated from his wife, on the basis of his writings which allegedly contained "blatant disbelief (of Islarn)". Despite Abu Zeid's consistent denials of this charge, he was judged by a higher court in Cairo in June 1995, a murtad (apostate), who therefore has to divorce his wife. As a man who is no longer Muslim, he was ordered either to divorce or repent and 1 return' to Islam. The court's right to judge on a persons faith is apparently unquestionable. What is 'graciously' allowed is the right to appeal this decision. While the court cases drag on interminable, what is more pertinent is the impact this case has had on public opinion - and specifically on the 'woman issue' in Egypt.
Meanwhile, a group of politically and socially active women and men, headed by lawyer Mona Zulfiqar(3)' have diligently been drafting up a new marriage contract. The contract aims at safeguarding the rights of both marriage partners during the marriage and in case of divorce. Many of the stipulations within the new contract are in fact specifically stating, in a legal and binding manner, points which are either taboo or taken for granted. In either case, women end up, with the new marriage contract, with some of their rights guaranteed, thus avoiding the interminable hassle and torture of Egyptian personal status courts. These stipulations, which both partners can either agree to all or some or none of, include the wife's right to the furniture, travel, education, work, alimony, requesting a divorce,(4) and ownership of the conjugal home.
Though the whole team involved in drawing up this new contract, took pains to show that it totally complies to the shari'a, 'westernism' is still the main accusation used to discredit it by its opponents. Not surprisingly, these opponents are from the religious establishments and some represent Islamist tendencies.
Fortunately, the religious personalities are not all in accord with each other over the criticism. As happened before, during the explosion of the issue of female circumcision, the grand Mufti and the head of AI-Azhar (a religious institution) are totally at odds. What is important to note is that the Mufti's legitimacy in public eyes is somewhat tarnished since he is perceived as the justifier and defender of some of the government's least popular decisions. Whereas the head of Al-Azhar has much more credibility, and thus his opposition is potentially more damaging. The main criticisms levelled by the head of Al-Azharare that the new contract "legitimises the forbidden and forbids the legitimate".(5) Another criticism levelled at the new contract by the Sheikh of Al-Azharand others is that the stipulations are "contrary to shari'a". Other arguments used against the new marriage contract centre around the fact that some of the stipulations are 11 unnecessary" (such as those regarding women's right to complete their education), since that is not in question. Others are seen as simply damaging to the family (such as women's right to work and to travel abroad for work). In short, the criticisms are identical (and thus not new) to those used against endeavours to bring change on issues regarding women's rights.
The background
No mention of the 'woman issue' (Qadiyat AI-Mar'a) in Egypt is valid without first attempting to describe the context in which this issue is currently dealt with. 'Feminism' or the belief and consequent attempts to eliminate all forms of oppression against women in a society, has a rich heritage which goes back more than a hundred years in Egypt. Consistently throughout these years, feminist arguments have been placed, by their proponents, within the context of a larger Islamic framework. Within this metanarrative of Islam, different feminist smaller narratives emerged. In this manner the legitimacy of Islam was never questioned - except perhaps indirectly in the early 1980s when Dr AI-Saadawi criticised all oppression of women in the name of any religion. Since then a very tentative (small in fact, judging by its still limited adherents) secular feminist narrative began to take shape. It is not surprising then that the Arab Women Solidarity Association created by AP Saadawi was eventually banned by the Egyptian government (in 1991) on some pretext or the other.
Today a secular narrative is more aptly represented by the New Woman Group, who tirelessly and insistently put their arguments about all manner of issues relevant to women, outside the framework of any religious discourse. As Aida Seif El-Dawla(6) clearly states:
The attack on women can only be countered by a feminist discourse grounded in the framework of human rights. To engage in an Islamic discourse, or any religious one for that matter, is dangerous and useless in the struggle for maintaining what rights women already have - let alone what they still have to achieve.
On the other side of the spectrum are some Islamists who also acknowledge that women have been oppressed and robbed of their legitimate rights. Their arguments are just as firmly placed within a certain Islamic framework. In this case, these same people are the ones who are calling for an Islamic society and state based on the shari'a. Theirs is an espousal of 'Islam' for a social but overall political goal - hence Islamists. Because some of them openly acknowledge the oppression of women and put forth solutions to right this wrong, they are, in a sense feminists.(7) Examples of these apparent 'Islamist feminists' include Heba RaY and Adel Hussein.
Ra'uf is a young activist, editor of the woman's page in AI-Sha'b newspaper(8), and is a lecturer at Cairo University, department of political science. Ra'uf maintains that:
In order to address the whole issue of women's oppression, one must address the whole society. It is both men and women which have to be targeted, especially since we must aim to change the traditional way of thinking of the whole fabric of society.(9)
Ra'uf also emphasises the importance of the family unit in strengthening women's positions in society. According to her, the family is not only a social, but a political entity which provides backing to its members against even the strongest oppressor: the state.(10) Hence her call for a reevaluation of the role of the family and its reinstatement in society as an integral element.
Adel Hussein is editor in chief of the same newspaper AI-Sha'b as well as an active and influential member of the Islamist-orientated Labour party. He was imprisoned many times and is a noted critic of the government. He maintains that:
Woman has long suffered from oppression, she has lost out culturally and been bound in the home, so that effectively all that Islam has given her in terms of rights and principles has been withdrawn from her.(11)
He further calls for:
The value of a woman's work inside the home is absolutely equal to (if not more than) the value of the work performed by an ordinary (male or female) worker outside the home in economic and social terms. And in a society based on cash economies I do not see what prevents the local community or the state from providing a regular exchange in cash to this woman in return for the roles she performs for her family and society, it being the case that hers is a situation like that of any other worker in other spheres.
Hussein's explicit acknowledgement of women's oppression and his advocation for reimbursement of her domestic work, is admittedly radical and innovative.
In between the secularists and the Islamists are the 'Muslim feminists'. The latter still believe in grounding their arguments within an Islamic framework. However, what they are calling for is a reinterpretation of Islamic texts. Examples of internationally renown writers in this field are Fatima Memissi (Morocco), Rifaat Hassan (Pakistan), and Azizah APHibri (USA). They differ substantially from the Islamists in that they do not ground their calls in the necessity of the existence of an Islamic society or Islamic state based on Shari'a. An Egyptian example is Tahani AI-Gibali who contends that the principles for women's liberation are "derived from a comprehensive view of human rights".(12) Moreover, AI-Gibali clearly states that:
The feminist movement is not a Western movement ... I see no contradiction between the feminist movement and the rights granted to women by Islam, for it is women's liberation they both aspire to.(13)
The linkages and the dilemmas
The debate raging about the new marriage contract indicate that no change in the positions and status allowed Egyptian women, is achieved without an uphill struggle. Not only that, but no matter how many attempts are made to ground whatever changes in the sharia or Islamic law, the opposition to changes in women's issues will always remain extremely strong and static. The arguments used by the oppositionists, since the inception of feminism, have not changed at all. In fact, the same accusations keep being repeated over and over again. And the same defense used by feminists (specifically the apologists for Islam) are also recurrent. Dr Aisha Abdel Rahman was echoing a commonly held view when she stated: 'We are hearing today the same arguments we heard in the early 1900s - the time of women's breakaway from the harem."(14) According to Abdel Rahman, the reasons for this apparent regression lie in the education that was provided for girls early in the century by colonisers and missionaries. This form of education led to the rise of a 'westernised' group of women who did not speak the same language as the women who gradated from the 'indigenous' Egyptian girls' schools. The westernised women gave an unfavourable impression of liberated women and this contributed to tarnishing the image of the educated and unveiled Muslim women.(15)
Whether Adbel Rahman's reasoning is valid or not is debatable. But what looks far more certain is that feminism remains embedded in the national consciousness is a western enemy.
But what is the link between Abu Zeid's case and the 'woman issue'? The Egyptian society remains one in which a divorced woman is stigmatised, and may be ostracised by some members of society precisely because of her status as a divorcee. Further, divorce is seen as the least acceptable of options for any married couple facing serious troubles. Not only that, but Egyptian Family Laws lay certain stringent conditions for women who themselves ask for a divorce. The latter have to go through long drawn out court cases, i.e. life can be a nightmare for women who want a divorce. In view of all these circumstances, it seems nothing short of remarkable that a court actually forces a woman to get divorced -unwillingly. In this case, the court ruling is actually forcing a woman to be divorced from a husband who is also an 1 apostate'- hence an unwilling divorcee of an 'apostate'. This combination could not be worse. The decision is remarkable, until we realise that this is a patriarchal state fighting a battle with patriarchal religious fundamentalists in the name of 'Islam'. To put it differently, who cares if one woman is unwillingly forced to be divorced from her husband as long as 'Islam'has been served?
Further, Nasr Abu Zeid claimed to be exercising his right to ijtihad when he wrote the work that is now being seen as proof of his apostasy. Ijtihad is precisely what many Egyptian Muslim women - be they Islamists, Muslims, or even secular -are perceiving the need for, if women are to be able to achieve some of the rights that Islam grants them. What many of the politically conscious and active Egyptian women mean by Islamic law, or sharia, is one that is unadulterated by ahistorical, out of context, male-biased interpretation.
In this respect, Islamist Heba RaY and Muslim feminist Tahani AI-Gibali seem to echo each other in their insistence on the need to come up with a renewed and egalitarian understanding of the shari'a. RaY argues for the need to 11 renew the dominant (Islamic) paradigms from within."(16) AI-Gibali urges that more women should study their religion and calls for the need "to provide an alternative, modern and enlightened interpretation of shari'a that would prevent the ongoing violation of women's rights under an Islamic umbrella."(17)
In explaining the judgement on Abu Zeid, Abdel Sabour Shahin says:
Ijtihad has two conditions the first is the person's qualifications for ijtihad which this apostate does not have since he does not memorise the Quran nor the Sunna and does not read Fiqh or 'Usul, and he knows of Marxism more than he knows of what is being taught at the university and thus it can be said that he has no right to ijtihad because he is not even qualified. And the second condition is that what he looks at must be compatible with ijtihad and all that he has looked at is not open to ijtihad at all. Is it possible to accept ijtihad in the Quranic injunction the 'unto the male twice that of the female' which is a verse with definite evidence and definite indications?(18)
In other words, attempting to carry out ijtihad is restricted and the issues addressed even more so. It is interesting that Shahin chooses this particular verse on which to critique Abu Zeid's ijtihad, since this is one of the verses which many feminists find problematic in its traditional interpretation. By passing this judgement on Abu Zeid's ijtihad, a message is being sent to all those who wish to do the same - meddle not or else.
Another message being passed through this judgement is to underline that serious and important concessions will be made to placate religious opposition. This is clearly a case where the religious consideration is given priority over any other consideration. This aggrandisement of the religious to the extent of publicly judging a person's faith can only be the beginning of the end as far as feminist endeavours are concerned. For if, in a deeply conservative and patriarchal society, a man is ordered by a court ruling to be an apostate and to divorce his wife, what will happen to any woman who advocates deconstructing and rereading such "definitely evidenced and definitely indicated" texts?!
The Islamisation of the discourses of the political parties, whether the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP) or the opposition parties, was and is indicative of the extent to which a non-religious discourse totally lacks legitimacy. For any discourse to gain in strength it must first be allowed to exist - or claim its own legitimacy. Feminist discourses in Egypt have traditionally been based within other discourses (nationalism, Islam) and have therefore not cultivated the art of demanding a separate validity. This is a serious drawback, but not necessarily a fatal one.
The importance of a dialogue between all the different 'feminists' is crucial if there is to be some safeguarding of women's rights. I believe the feminists would have a lot in common once there ideological affiliations are put aside and their mutual identities as women are looked at. Further, there must be some consensus among them that it matters not what the means are so long as the ends can be agreed upon. A recognition of their diverse orientations can in fact be a source of strength for them instead of a drawback in a common struggle. Many of the different feminists agree for example, that women should have all the rights as stipulated in the new marriage contract. Yet because they differ in their manner of implementing these rights, no consensus among them is visible, and thus a more established religious opposition can easily override any possible advantages women could gain. If however, they continue in the current vein, women will risk losing much of hard fought for rights in the overall male scramble to achieve an 'Islamic state'.
Faced with the rise of the prioritisation of certain religious discourses, as manifested by the Abu Zeid judgement, secular and Muslim feminists risk becoming a very endangered species at worst, and an utterly ineffective one at best. Simultaneously, Islamist feminists run the gauntlet of being an insignificant and unheard voice within a larger not so woman-friendly movement.
NOTES
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