Vivienne Stacey discusses the Quran and Muslim teachings on women and the impact of these teachings in modern society. This lecture was delivered at Columbia International University (CIU). We also have a course study guide that you might find helpful.
Here starts the auto-generated transcription of Vivienne Stacey’s Lecture on What Does the Quran Say About Women Pt. 1:
We learned yesterday that the role of women in the Muslim world is very varied, and, it doesn’t always depend on who’s wealthy or who’s poor. And I once went to visit in a rather remote part of Pakistan, I went to visit with the person I was staying with, the and it was her contact and relationship with that family that caused me to be there. And this millionaire really, a landowner had only 1 child, 1 12 year old girl, and she was growing up illiterate. He had enough money he was gonna fly off to London the next day to see a friend who was sick so plenty of money to educate his daughter even by having teachers come and live in the estate, but but he didn’t. And so that’s his view about women, and in the time there, I had to ask to see his wife, and I also was able to meet his brother’s divorced wife.
She had no children so she got divorced. There wasn’t anywhere for her to go so she still lived there, so the prospect for her was to keep on living in that setup for the rest of her life. She was actually a graduate so things can be difficult even if you have education and even if you have money but, everybody’s condition of course is not as bad as some of those. In Saudi Arabia, we see the benefits of oil whereas previous generations of women have mainly been illiterate and uneducated now because the country has so much oil and has got an eye for development in the modern world, there is a complete educational system for both men and women, and it’s interesting to see that in the gulf countries in general, the oil countries, Kuwait and Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates and Sultanate of Oman and Qatar, and I think in Saudi the larger percentage in the universities are women so it’s 50 more 51, 52, 56 percent of the student enrollment in those countries. I’m not sure of Saudi, but I am sure the others, are women.
One reason for that is, equal education opportunities provided by the oil wealth and the other reason is that women aren’t able to go out of the country to study unless they have a male escort and someone who’s a close male relative to to look after them. And so the men go off and study in the United States, in Britain, in many other places, but the women don’t so they will do their doctorates in the universities of their own country. Anyway that’s an interesting thing that so many women do go go to university. Now, I’d like us, to look really at the Koranic teaching about women, and I think the best way is that you report on on the section that you have particularly studied and and read your quotations from the Quran. I’ll just say a bit and maybe you come and read it So, the first person who’s gonna talk about marriage is one of God’s signs could come and be ready to read, but I’ll tell you when to read.
It’s interesting this word sign, we have it in the bible and we have it in the Quran. The word sign, we Jesus is a sign and for the Muslim God’s signs include marriage and I’ll read this verse of the Quran. It’s Surah, when you see Q it means Quran, when you see 30, surah 30 it means chapter and then 2 dots and then there’s the verse number and when you’re reading the Quran sometimes if you’re reading a different translation of the Arabic Quran then you sometimes find you have to look a verse behind or a verse ahead. So don’t, if you don’t find it on the exact number 21, then try 20 or or or 22 or or even a little bit further afield because they’re not all exactly the same in their numbering and, so it reads Quran or Surah 30 verse 21 and one of his signs is it is that he created wives for you of your own species that you may dwell with them and has put love and tenderness between you. Here truly are signs for those who reflect.
And then we are told in the Quran that marriage is a gift, is represented as a gift of God. The Quran 1672 says Allah has given you wives of your own kind and has given you from your wives’ sons, grandsons, and has made provisions of good things for you. It is then advantage that thou believeth and in in the grace of Allah that thou that they not believeth. Yeah. Thank you.
Now it also is taught in the Quran that marriage is a gift of God and it’s the normal condition of human beings of adult human beings it’s a it’s the normal, to be unmarried is not the normal but it’s, it’s recognized and later today we’ll think about that about singleness for example, but the normal condition Quran 425. So who so is not able to afford to marry free? Believing women let them marry from, the believing made whom your right hand possess. All I know is best concerning your faith in process, one from another. So with them, by permission of their folks, and give them unto them the portion and kindness.
They’re being honest, not debaucher, nor loose condition. And if when they are honorable, marry them, committed lewdness, they shall increase the half of the punishment of free women. In that in that case, this is for him among you who fears to commit to commit sin, but to have patience would be better for you. Allah is forgiving and merciful. Yeah.
So marriage is the is a gift of God and it’s the normal condition and men and women are required to remain chaste before marriage and and to avoid adultery. Let’s hear surah 17 and verse 32 Could you do surah 30 17 verse 32 and, our brother here he is using the Pickthal interpretation really of the Quran. Pickthal is it was a a Britisher who became Mohammed Pickthal. He became a Muslim and, he wrote this it’s he doesn’t like to say he’s writing a translation because Muslims on the whole don’t like to use the word translation for the for the Quran After all, they regard it as an eternal book. So if you have an eternal book, you cannot really translate it.
Any translation it ceases to be the eternal book and strictly speaking we should be reading all these things in Arabic anyway Pickthal wrote and he called his book the meaning of the glorious Quran So he didn’t like to say it’s a translation and, it isn’t necessarily our it’s not the best of translations but it’s very easy to carry around and some of the other ones are very large. Muhammad Ali, Muhammad Ayusef Ali is probably the best one and it’s good if you can at some stage get a Arabic and and an English rendering by the side of it. When you visit the mosque, maybe they will give you one. Okay. So we look now avoid adultery, surah 17 verse 32.
17 32. And come not near unto adultery. Lo, it is abomination and an evil way. Yeah. And the punishment for adultery is 100 stripes.
Surah 24 verse 2. The adulterer and the adulteress skirts ye each one of them with a 100 stripes. And let not pity for the twin withhold you from obedience to Allah. If you obey and if if you believe in Allah in the last day and let a party of believers witness their punishment. Yeah.
Now you might say, well, I’ve heard of stoning for for adultery and certainly we’ve had reports from Saudi and 1 or 2 other countries of that but it’s the traditions that say that the punishment for adultery should be stoning and, but the Quran itself does not say that. It says 100 stripes. The punishment for accusing honorable women without producing 4 witnesses is 80 stripes, and a Muslim man may marry a woman from the people of the book. He may marry a Jewess or a Christian but he may not marry an idolatrous or an atheist. Let’s read Quran Sura 5 verse 5 Well, we’ve got a selection here, we can you can read 2 verse 221 or 60 verse 10, they all deal with this idea that a Muslim man may marry a a Jewish or a Christian but not an idolatrous or an atheist, But an a Muslim woman has to marry a Muslim man.
It’s not the other way around. Okay. Chapter 55. This day are all good things made lawful for you. The food of those who have received the scripture is lawful for you and the food is lawful for them.
And so are the various women of the believers and the various women of those who received the scripture before you. Lawful for you. When you give them their marriage portion and live with them in honor, not fornication, nor take them as secret concubines. Whoso delighted the fear the faith, He works his works is vain and will be among the losers here at Thank you. Then it is a great sin, to marry quite a number of relatives.
I mean, to marry one of them and Quran 4 verses 21 to 23 which is written in your text includes Foster sisters so I’ll read it and it’s 4 23 really, I’m reading part of this reference. Forbidden unto you are your mothers and your daughters and your sisters, and your father’s sisters, and your mother’s sisters, and your brother’s daughters, and your sister’s daughters, and your foster mothers, and your foster sisters and your mothers in law and your stepdaughters who are born under your protection. So this is forbidden. Yeah thank you very much and and we’ll now go on to the next subject about about, women in Islam unless you have a question. Anybody’s got a question or a comment?
You could come and just share it. Any question? So anytime after one of these sections, if you have a question, put your hand up. Okay? Let’s, look at spiritually men and women are equal.
We have a an idea, I think, that in Islam women and men are not equal. Well, the Quran teaches that spiritually they’re equal and so who is going to read the Quran about this? The first verse is Quran 1697. You’re going to read that. It said, who so doeth that which is right, whether male or female, if a believer, him will we surely quicken to a happy life and recompense recompense them with a reward me for their best deeds.
Yeah. Thank you. So that clearly makes the statement that, whoever does right, whether male or female, if of a believer, him or it should perhaps be it’s him, will we quick, surely quicken to a happy life, but it’s clearly stated male or male or female, and, this means that they, both men and women, keep the 5 main religious duties, those are the 5 pillars of Islam, reciting of the creed and prayer and fasting, going on pilgrimage if it’s possible, and giving 2 and a half percent of one’s money, as kind of tithe, and I shouldn’t say tithe because the tithe is a 10th but giving a fixed amount of money away or all of goods it doesn’t have to be money it could be from the flocks or from the harvest. Women sometimes miss prayers. They often say their prayers at home and don’t go to the mosque or they can’t go to the mosque perhaps, but menstruating women are considered unclean so they don’t take part in prayers at that time, and also if they miss days of fasting for the same reason they, during the month of fasting, they make it up at some other time, but otherwise, in theory or in statement, in belief, men and women are spiritually equal.
There’s a slight, handicap for women, in the actual practice, and they have to catch up, and that that’s there are ways to do that. Then we come on to the difference between men and women. Men and women have different have different but complementary roles in society, different but complementary roles in society. So spiritually equal before God, but different functions and responsibilities, and, there are 4 ways in which men are affirmed as being I don’t like to say, over women but they have a primacy of of place over women in 4 areas. Then men may discipline their wives if they don’t keep in line.
That’s Surah 4 verse 34. Would you like to read that? Men are in charge of women because Allah hath made the one of them to excel the other, and because they spend of their property for the support of women. So good women are the obedient, guarding in secret that which Allah hath guarded. As for those from whom ye fear rebellion, admonish them and banish them to beds apart and scourge them.
Then if they obey you, seek not a way against them. Lo, Allah is ever high exalted. Great. And the 3rd area in which men are above women, it relates to the legal situation. I’d like to just say a little about this because I lived through the period in Pakistan when this was very much debated At one period in Pakistan, in fact, through most of its history until this matter occurred, the testimony in court of 1 woman would be equal to that of 1 man.
But then when president Zia ul Haq introduced the ordering of society according to the way of the prophet Nizami Mustafa, then the question of whether the testimony of 1 man should equal that of 2 women. And that’s what is going to be read from the Quran in a minute but the question is how should this be interpreted and it really divided the country because the more progressive and liberal Muslims thought, and especially women, thought that it should be the testimony of 1 woman is the same as the testimony of 1 man. And, the more orthodox and fundamentalist Muslims thought it should be 2 women to 1 man and so it was really dividing the country almost in half and, so the decision was that the judge in charge of any case, should decide whether it’s gonna be 1 to 1 or 1 to 2 and that, of course, satisfied nobody. So but anyway, that’s what happened. So let’s hear it from the Quran.
Surah 2 verse 282. K. This is a lengthy verse. Would you like me just to Yes. Take a portion of it?
If you could read out the portion that replies particularly, that would be great. Sure. And call to witness from among your men, 2 witnesses. And if 2 men be not at hand, then a man and 2 women, of such as ye approve his witnesses, so that if the one heareth through forgetfulness, the other will remember. That’s right.
And then the traditions actually also raise this question and one of Mohammed’s wives was very unhappy with about one of the traditions because Muhammad is reported to have said prayer is annulled by a donkey or a dog and a woman if they pass in front of praying people. And so she said, you have made us women dogs. So she took a dim view of that and then the last area of where men seem to be above women is in the matter of inheritance. The the main reason for this is that, generally, the men in the family take responsibility for the economic situation in the family, and so that men generally have a greater responsibility from women so they therefore daughters would inherit half of what, brothers would inherit and let’s let’s hear the verse it’s, you have it, Surah 4 verse 34. Inheritance?
Yeah. Is. 4 11. Oh, 4 11. Yeah.
Okay. Thank you. Olav chargeth you concerning the provision for your children, to the male the equivalent of the portion of 2 females. And if there be women more than 2, then theirs is 2 thirds of the inheritance. Yeah.
And if there be 1, only then the half. Okay. Now, the summary of this is really like comes in Surah 4 verse 34. You can read that. Sure.
Mhmm. Men are superior to women on account of the qualities with which God has gifted the one above the other, and on account of the outlay they make of their substance for them. Okay. Thank you very much. So you can see then that the Quran clearly states that men and women are spiritually equal and, but in matter of, responsibilities and and roles, they are different, and men are superior, in those areas, particularly in the matter of inheritance, but it’s got a good reason behind it.
In the matter of legal, situation in the courts, which, to my way of thinking, doesn’t have a good reason behind it, and, and men are are stronger and therefore take certain roles. I don’t have a problem about that, but maybe, doesn’t really matter whether I have any problem or not because the question is, what does the Quran teach? And and we’ve just noted that the Hadith have has something else to say, and that’s one of the things that we will be studying, the the Quran and the Hadith because they don’t always reinforce each other. The primary source is the Quran, but the Hadith tends to be a very great influence in guiding thinking and attitudes. We’ll be thinking about this later.
We’ll just have a break and then we will continue on this subject of the Quranic teaching about women and finish that before we come on to the question of singleness in Islam.