When Arab women given intellectual and spiritual autonomy

In a statement to ArabicNews.com, the well-known scholar advocate of Muslim Arab women's rights Nimat Hafez Barazangi, currently on a Fulbright scholarship to Syria, said that among her recent publications is her edited volume "Islamic Identity and the Struggle for Justice," published in 1996 by the University Press of Florida.

She said she included in this volume one of her articles on Muslim women entitled "Vicegerency (Khilafa ) and Gender Justice." concerning obstacles hindering the education of Muslim Arab women. Barazangi said that the basic problems in the education of Muslim woman are her exclusion from deeper knowledge of Islamic teachings and lack of recognition of her identity as an autonomous intellectual and spiritual human being.

Therefore, the question before women intellectuals and activists is how to facilitate for Muslim Arab women religious teachings and human knowledge when women are viewed as dependent and oppressed. She added that the basic principle of justice in Islam is fair play between males and females in which both share mutual responsibility.

Women being viewed as men's dependents has historically resulted in the large gap between males and female knowledge and practice of Islam, she said. This gap further produced biased practices concerning women's leadership and involvement in the decision-making process.

The problem in women's education is not limited to women's entering universities nor access to basic education. Rather the problem lies in the fact that both Muslim and non-Muslim males and females have been taking polarized positions concerning the status of Muslim Arab woman. She said that Muslim Arab women, however they define themselves, need to understand and to choose their own intellectual and spiritual framework. She, then, defines her own action towards regaining her self-realization as an autonomous person.

On the status of Muslim Arab women in the United States, where she resides, Barazangi said that few Muslim Arab women in North America "the States and Canada," have been able to assert their autonomous identities despite attaining higher degrees, she said. The reason, it seems, is because the majority did not acquire deeper knowledge of their basic rights as vicegerent (Khalifa).

She said that vicegerency has been always interpreted as a political leadership of males in the Muslim Arab societies and communities, whereas the Koranic meaning of vicegerent is the freedom of choice to accept or reject the responsibility required a conscious, moral decisions.

She commented that human mortality is not actually moral unless it is a well-informed, free choice. Therefore, to expect women who identify with Islam to be viewed as intellectually and spiritually dependent and at the same time carry the responsibility of a vicegerent is a contradiction.

On strategies before Muslim Arab women to maintain their autonomous identity, Barazangi said that one of the strategies before Muslim Arab women in general, and in North American in particular is to uncover the claims by both Muslims and non-Muslims. Muslims usually claim a relationship between political and religious life, whereas non-Muslims claim secularism. Both claims can be refuted on the ground of the fact that Muslims often separate between their religious and daily behavior, while non-Muslims often base their educational philosophy on Judeo-Christian traditions.

The role of Muslim Arab women in this case is to reconstruct a common ground for a deeper understanding of the Koranic teachings concerning the questions of creation, of vicegerent and of woman's status in Islam, she said.