BY SARAH ELTANTAWI
I am in strong support of the mixed gender woman-led prayer to
take place on March 18, 2005, in New
York City. While there is no question that Dr. Amina Wadud will make history
during (the) March 18th prayer, this event is at least as important for its
symbolic value, what it implies about Muslim women and its shattering of a
taboo.
Muslims – men and women – will sit down for Friday prayers and
listen to the Koranic reflections of a sensitive, intelligent and pious member
of our community. It will be an honour and a treat for me to precede my prayer
by listening to what Dr. Wadud has to say about various Koranic ayat, or
a more general theme, or perhaps she will simply reflect on the historic nature
of the day.
The point is that I will for the first time cease to be robbed
of my right to hear the melodic spiritual reflections of a respected member of
my community during the hour in which I am supposed to be in community with
fellow Muslims.
Black, White, Asian, Arab, Female, Male: if you are learned and
insightful, I want to hear you reflect on Islam during Friday prayer. And I want
to hear it live, in a clean setting, with full view of the Imam and with full
rights to ask questions.
I am an intellectually curious being and I will not be relegated
to the dungeon of your mosque. No more, not ever again.
The circumstances of the March 18th prayer are not perfect, as
many have been all too quick to point out. It would surely have been better had
the official Muslim community been on board and had we had the support of the
Establishment. And yet the fact that they have ignored our persistent efforts to
explain that this issue is vitally important is their problem, not ours.
Just as many of our families fled tyranny in various countries
to attempt to lead a better, freer life, a life that made sense, so too will
Muslims flee tyrannical, patriarchal mosques in search of freedom, in search of
a mosque, or for now, a congregation, that makes sense. This is the way of
things, and we are not worried.
The responses that the organisers of this event received from
the more conservative members of our community was to be expected…
American Muslims – including American Muslim women – are the
most educated and politically free Muslims in the world. With all due respect,
there is no point in pretending that we suffer the plight of refugees or
illiterate women throughout the Muslim world. Such self-righteous bluster is in
fact condescending and disrespectful to actual victims and the real
underprivileged. Taking the worldwide view, most Muslims in the United States
are not underprivileged, unless of course they have been picked up and
imprisoned without charge by Ashcroft’s goons, another issue entirely.
Absent concrete strategies to alleviate serious issues like
ending worldwide illiteracy, health issues affecting Muslim women, and other
serious, deep, institutional social ills, to prop up these issues as a greater
priority amounts to a disingenuous dodge of actual, winnable issues right here
and now.
It is the singular advantage afforded to only the most
over-privileged Muslims on the planet to point plaintively at all the suffering
people around the world while systematically undermining and attacking the small
steps toward change progressives right here and now, on the achievable planet
earth, are affecting before their eyes. It is a cop out. It is cowardice.
Anyone who has ridden an airplane knows that one is instructed,
in case of emergency landing, to put on one’s own oxygen mask before helping
others put on theirs – even if that person is your own child. I ask the
"moderate" detractors – how are we to address worldwide poverty, widespread
illiteracy and the plight of refugees if the most privileged, educated, and
politically free Muslim women in the world cannot so much as pray in dignity in
their own houses of worship? Are you not ashamed?
What right do you have to talk of the plight of refugee women in
Afghanistan if Muslims in this country of excess and privilege are busy
discussing whether a woman is in her right mind while menstruating? Or worrying
about whether a man will be able to concentrate on his prayers if confronted
with a woman’s backside? Or if a woman should be allowed into a mosque at all?
How fantastically hypocritical for some women to speak of the
ills of women’s illiteracy worldwide (a problem that is for those who worry
about them, of course, only an abstraction) when these very same women do not
believe that they themselves, or their sisters, are intellectually capable of
being the spiritual or intellectual leaders of a community!
What then, sisters, is the point of this literacy? Do you want
to educate illiterate Indian Muslim sisters so that they may sit in the basement
of their local mosque, breastfeeding? Should we educate illiterate Egyptian
sisters, only to have them worry that raising their voice in the mosque will
unleash misogynistic cries of "awra"? Should we educate illiterate
Nigerian sisters, but prevent them from serving as judges in "Islamic" courts
that would otherwise be content to sentence them to death by public stoning for
adultery?
Change is happening because it must. American Muslims must get
our own house in order before we cry crocodile tears about refugees across the
world. Pity is not an honourable emotion. Supporting the change for real
equality for our community so that we may be strong enough to really,
effectively help our sisters and brothers around the world is.
We cannot be strong unless women are fully empowered. Until
then, we can continue to point to refugees in Afghanistan over our lavish
dinners and fine teas, lining up behind men, compromising ourselves yet again –
for how long, no one can say, and no one bothers to ask.
(Sarah Eltantawi is co-founder and communications director of
the Progressive Muslim Union).