Vivienne Stacey was a long time field worker and trainer in Muslim ministry in Pakistan. These lectures were given at Columbia International University.

 

Here starts the auto-generated transcription of Vivienne Stacey’s Lecture on Introduction to Muslim Women:

 

What I really want to do is to make sure that we none of us has a stereotype of of Muslim women. There is no stereotype. There is infinite variety. And I don’t think of Muslim women first, as Muslim women. I think of them first as humans, human beings.

 

I think the priority is that we we should think of anyone, who is a human being. That is the first line of relationship, person to person, human being to human being. We are made in God’s image, all of us. And the second emphasis is on the fact that they are women. The second emphasis is not Muslim, it is being a woman.

 

So we have human, woman, and then we have Muslim. I think we some of us have got rather geared to thinking Muslim, and then woman, and then I don’t know where the human comes in, but, human has to come first. That’s our primary relationship in the world, and then, sex difference, yeah, I think does come next, and then Muslim, or Hindu, or Christian, or secular, or atheist, or what, whatever. Now, I’ve got up here a chart. It’s rather badly drawn one of mine, but, it gives you the idea of relating to another human being, and in the case of these lectures, this course, to a woman and to a Muslim.

 

I need to remind you that, every 10th person in the world is a Muslim woman or girl or baby. Roughly 20% of the world is Muslim and roughly half of the 20% will be women and girls and babies. So that’s a very high percentage of humanity. When I first went to Pakistan in 1954, I had a idea of Muslims and Pakistanis. I had the idea of mind to mind.

 

I just finished studying theology and, I was sort of rather up here, as it were. My mind, was active. And I had the first thing I had was a long discussion on the train with a member of the, National Assembly, a woman member, and we discussed the trinity. I’m sure I chose the field of, the subject. I don’t remember too much about it, but I do remember that it took me some years to start thinking of relating heart to heart, and I think that’s perhaps even more important, particularly in dealing with women, to think about the heart to heart, the fears and the joys, Fear of death, fear of having no children, fear of having only girls, fear of divorce, fear of sickness, joys as well, the joy of feasts and celebrations, the joy of, having enough to eat, the joy of the wide extended family, in some cases at least, it’s, it’s a joy but it varies, of course, because there is no stereotype.

 

Now, I like to think of the relationship, one side Christian, one side Muslim here. I like to think of the relationship of the mind, thinking their way. I mean, the Muslims we’re gonna meet are not really necessarily going to think our way. It’s we who are trying to relate to them and engage with them, so we will need to try to understand how they think. And, they think quite differently, quite often.

 

Well, east Easterners certainly do. I once preached the same sermon, to a Western congregation, in one of the Arab Emirates, and then I preached it again to a nation congregation, and I found the structure of my sermon was the same, but my illustrations were quite different because I was I suppose I had got to some extent into thinking their way, And the way Westerners think, the way Easterners think is quite often different. With Africans, I think, maybe so. Heart to heart, feeling what they feel. It’s feeling their joys and feeling their sorrows, feeling their fears.

 

And then the last link, as it were, or is it the link of culture and customs, you might put in that worldview, I suppose, as well. Culture and customs, It’s like getting into their shoes. Sometimes I’ve looked at a row of shoes outside a mosque or a shrine. In the case of women, it’s generally outside a shrine, you see a row of shoes. Sometimes I think, you know, I wonder what it’d be like to be in that pair of shoes and go where that person goes for a day.

 

Walking their way. Walking their way, and often our way is very different. So we do need to understand, other people’s culture and other people’s customs, and that there’s a whole area here, for exploring understanding. So there’s no stereotype. In the beginning of your handout handbook, or I I don’t know what you call it, but handbook or published materials or photocopied materials, you’ll find one of my articles just entitled Muslim Women, and I I’ve made these points.

 

I’ve said when we meet a Muslim woman, we should regard her as a human being, second as a woman, and 3rd as a Muslim. Whoever she is, her perception of herself may be vastly different, from from this. Many of them are utterly unselfconscious and accept without question the state into which they were born. They do not think of life as offering any alternatives. How does the world look to the 1st woman prime minister of Pakistan?

 

How does the world look to her illiterate neighbor? How does the world look to a refugee in North America? Now, I was asked to write an article, this article for publication on Muslim women, and, I thought how on earth do I write a 3 page or 2 page, article on Muslim women when there are so many, categories and types? Not only categories that are religious categories and different sets and subsets of Islam, not only, different levels of society, those who are very strictly Quran and Hadith orientated, those who are involved in folk Islam, there is an infinite variety. And with 1 within one country, there might be a 100 varieties.

 

You many some of these countries have 50 languages. Even Pakistan has, I think, about 55 languages, so you’ll have women in all those linguistic groups, those ethnic groups. India, I don’t know how many languages, but it’s in the 100, see? But if you just get the idea of, you can’t just say a Muslim woman is like that, You can say you have to have always some qualification about it. I wanted I think I would like here to quote, this way that a Muslim woman spoke.

 

This is a Sindhi poet. Sindh is one of the provinces of Pakistan. Karachi is the is in Sindh, and Sindh has its own language and moment is Cindy. This poem is a translation. It it affect it sort of represents the almost the, despair of a Muslim woman, but, because it is I wouldn’t have put it in if it had been written by anyone else except a Muslim woman, because she writes it, it’s authentic.

 

If someone else from another culture and religion wrote it, one would have to question its validity. But here it is, called The Journey, just a few lines. It’s the whole poem. The journey of my life begins from home, ends at the graveyard. My life is spent like a corpse, carried on the shoulders of my father and brother, husband and son, bathed in religion, attired in customs, and buried in a grave of ignorance.

 

It’s utter despair, it seems to me. This is this is how, at least, Atia Dawood sees herself, I suppose, or sees her fellow many of her fellow country people. And, I must say that in my relationships with Muslim women, I like to have the privilege of praying for them when it seems appropriate. And I when I pray for a Muslim woman in her presence, I nearly always mention her name because she might go for weeks months and no one names her, And I feel it’s one of the high privileges of life to name a person before the triune god and to pray for her. So a name, it’s a symbol of her being a person and not just, carried on the shoulders of father and brother, husband and son.

 

She is perhaps the daughter of Habib and the sister of Yaqoob and the wife of Latif and the mother of Ibrahim, but her name is Mariam or Miriam. But she’s almost forgotten it because in that rather, what shall we say, backward culture in that particular place in Sindh, that’s how it seems to her. And she is illiterate, like probably 3 quarters more than 3 quarters of women in Pakistan are illiterate. Brothers can go to school, but, the country may give her more rights, but because she’s illiterate, she can’t doesn’t know how to exercise them. In her country, the law gives a minimum age for marriage, but there’s no punishment for this not being observed, so it isn’t always observed.

 

There’s a lot of superstition. Well, you can read the article. My second profile here is a very great contrast, just a few lines about Baynazir Bhutto, the, twice the prime minister of Pakistan. She was trained in the same province in Sind by her father, who was prime minister of Pakistan. She was trained in that same province, but she went abroad and studied at Radcliffe in the United States and the University of Oxford in in Britain.

 

She was trained to be a politician by her father. And one thing she seems to have in common with the first person that we’ve discussed, the poet, poetess, is that she visits shrines. I’m sure both these women, one very educated, one illiterate, They both, I’m assuming, the first visit shrines and is involved in folk Islam. Bayn Azir says she is. Baynazir, in her autobiography, very interesting reading, she says she have she mentioned several times things that relate to folk Islam, but the one I’ve recorded here is that, she says that her father, before he was executed, urged her to pray at the shrine of the most famous saint, La Shabaz Kalander.

 

And she says and I quote here, my grandmother had gone to pray at his shrine when my father became very ill as a baby and nearly died. That’s, her father, this one that is now condemned to death. Would God be able to hear a daughter’s prayer for the same person? Well, here’s someone then educated at Radcliffe and at Oxford, but obviously in the family tradition, going to pray at the shrine of this saint is quite high on the agenda. So a different profile, there’s no stereotype.

 

And then the third, I’ve discussed or rather described, an Afghan refugee whom I know. I know this I’m going for 1 week, or a few days while I’m here in North America to visit this Afghan family. When this Afghan refugee girl became about 18, her mother urged her to well, her mother said, you’ve got to get married. Otherwise, I’m gonna turn you out of your home, at the home. It’s time you got married.

 

You’re 18. And she arranged a marriage. It was quite a shock to some other members of the family. After the marriage, she started to wear the veil. She couldn’t she just about finished her education, not going on to college.

 

And she married a man who was arranged about twice her age. I think she I’ve seen her since she’s married. I think she’s reasonably happy at the moment. She’s not happy because she doesn’t have a child, and, she needs to have a child to cement that marriage. I enjoy quoting from Begum Iqramuller, who dedicated her book, it was an autobiography, to her husband, who her to my husband, who he he had allowed her to lay aside the veil, but he regretted it ever since.

 

But all these different types of people. So the refugee who marries the educated people like Begum Ikramullah and Baynazir Bhutto, and the poet of of of Sindh in Pakistan, Atiya, who has such a story. Now, one other overhead here, and diagram which you should have, there are other ways we can categorize Muslim women. I come from Britain, as you’ve already gathered, I’m sure and heard. But, so I did this overhead to show types of Muslims.

 

We often think of types of Muslims in in categories which are religious categories. Well here’s, here’s a category. I’m just thinking that my adding up isn’t quite correct, but never mind. Well, go back to, yes, I suppose 1 in 10 would be Muslim woman. Right?

 

If 1 in 5 is a Muslim, 1 in 10. Just checking my arithmetic. Okay? In the UK, there are over a 1000000 Muslims. That’s a lot because we’ve only got a population of about 55,000,000.

 

And we can divide, as you could here in the United States, into students, foreign students who, come from Malaysia, Egypt, Egypt, so many different countries, and you can make your list. There are refugees, from quite a number of different countries here. Still, some of them on refugee status. Some of them, after 5 years, at least in Canada, have become Canadian citizens. I don’t know how long it takes here.

 

There are immigrants or settlers. I don’t know how you categorize them, but, that’s what in effort in essence they are. And then there are those who are 2nd generation, 3rd generation born American or born British. They’re as British as I am, if they’re 2nd or 3rd generation, 3rd generation. They have the same rights, the same passport, the same the background is is different, but they’ll all speak English, they’ll all know more about some, the modern teenage trends than I do.

 

And then there are those who are tourists. We had lots of Arabic instructions all around London and some of our cities in Britain, and I expect you do around here and not in, perhaps, Colombia, but in some of the major cities. Detroit, which has the largest settlement of Arabs outside the Arab world, there’s a very large population of Arabs in Detroit, So half of them will be women. And then there are those who who were born not into a Muslim culture or to a Muslim country, but who were born on the soil of this country, of my country, who have become Muslim, converts to Islam, and their their number is increasing. I once attended I once attended, in San Fran No.

 

It was in Los Angeles, a mosque service in which about 60, Baptists black Baptists, became Muslims. I sat at the back and, I was taken by 2 Indians to this service, so there are a lot of those who convert to Islam. Now, maybe one person could tell us about a Muslim woman that you know. Yes? Thank you.

 

I’m Doreen, and, I’d like to talk about, Muslim women were going to their house for dinner this evening. Oh, great. They are refugees, and they fled their home country and went to Pakistan and stayed in Pakistan 2 years before their refugee status came in, and, they are of the Bahai faith I see. And, that’s why they got a refugee status Right. Here in America.

 

But at present, they have with them a family, Muslim family, who have come to visit them, who are believers. Mhmm. And this Muslim family, is trying very hard to show this Baha’i family who are here, they’re all of the same country, background, but, these people are very, very difficult to try to win, to the Lord Jesus. Yes. But tonight, we have another opportunity to be with them.

 

Oh, great. Yes. Maybe you would, pray for them and we’ve got a concluding quarter of an hour or so of worship, so it’d be nice to pray for at least some Muslims. So maybe we could pray for them, tonight. Not tonight.

 

I think it might be earlier, like, quarter to 2, like, before we close our formal studies for the day. Okay. Now, anybody else like to share about any Muslim woman that you’re in touch with? Yes? I’m Ruth and I’ve got to know a lady from West Africa and she is here studying at USC.

 

Actually learning English right this point, but she’s left children back in at home and, just trying to to have opportunities to to spend time with her. Mhmm. Good. Okay. So these are, that’s we got a refugee and then a a student.

 

Yes? Anyone else in touch with Muslim women? Yes? My hairdresser. Your hairdresser.

 

Yes. Right. Good. And, her husband’s here studying and, they have what I find kind of interesting. She had she’s from Saudi Arabia and she was talking about the differences between the real conservative part of Saudi Arabia and her part of Saudi Arabia, which, isn’t as conservative.

 

And I I found it interesting that she doesn’t wear the veil anymore here even though she’s been here for only a few years. Yes. Yes. Very open to the gospel. Okay.

 

Anyone else? Anyone else in touch with any Muslim women? Any of the men in touch with Muslim women? Yes. Yes.

 

My name is Jay. I work with an organization that works overseas and my wife and I served in France for 8 years. And we are in contact with technically, she was a first generation immigrant when she came over to France at such a young age. Practically speaking, she was a second generation. Yeah.

 

And she was discolorously transformed by reading the word of God. Mhmm. And just really became a strong Christian. And it was interesting just to see the dynamics between the cultural aspects of her family, which was very traditionally Moroccan, and herself, which was more French and her culture and language. Mhmm.

 

Right. Thank you. You’re a pastor? Mhmm. Have you come across any Muslim women in your ministry?

 

Not as of yet. No. Because you’re not in the part of the country where there are very many. Is that the reason? That’s right.

 

Yes. Anyone else like to speak? Okay. Well, I’ll give a bit of summing up then. Thank you very much for the, and, we’ll every day try to pray for 1 or 2 Muslim women.

 

But, now we know, that first we think of them as being human, and then we think of them as being women, and then we think of them as being Muslim. Okay? I’m it’s useful to analyze what we actually do. Sometimes we’re so focused on Muslim that we’re forgetting something or we’re narrowing what is wider. And, there’s no stereotype.

 

We could just we could probably put together, a 1,000 different kind of profiles, And those would just be a beginning of the many types of, Muslims Muslim women that there are. And I don’t know if I should even say type, but, and then we should think about Muslim women in minority, as they are at the moment, in our countries. It does make a difference when you share good news or establish a relationship, whether a person is is a student or a refugee or an immigrant or a second or third generation, born British or born American, or whether the person’s a tourist, or whether the person is a convert, to Islam. Coming over last year, I sat next to a Saudi Arabian couple on the plane, and I couldn’t talk very much with a woman because she didn’t speak English, and I my Arabic was pretty bad. But I was able to talk with her husband who sat between us, and I, I was also able to show him an Urdu calendar card with a verse from scripture on it.

 

And I asked him I said, can you read this? He was able to read it, because he it’s written in the same script as Arabic. He picked out some of the words. So I said, it comes from a psalm, a psalm of David. And then we talked about the Psalms, and I was able to give him a new testament and Psalms.

 

And I said, please share it with your wife. So Muslim women of many kinds, let’s just clook conclude with a short prayer. We thank you, oh god, that we can study together. Guide us, we pray, and bless us this day in the name of the one God, the father, the son, and the holy spirit. Amen.