What about the Modern Arab Renaissance (An-Nahda)?

Now the Arab story begins to get very interesting. This post and the next several are in essence an exploration in outline of the attempts that the Arabs are finally making to get to grips with modernity and modern thought. I've just finished a series on Muslim political thought but this is so much broader than that. It includes political thought and Muslim thought but also other thought and secular thought (and secular thought from both Muslims and non-Muslims). It also includes religion-inspired thought from non-Muslims. In one sense, though, it is narrower (and it is no less engaging for this), it only includes Arab thought, so whereas we have considered the ideas of Turks, Persians and Indians in the recent posts, I will now focus on modern Arab thought.

While Islam as an ideal was dealing with the West and modernity and in a sense attempting to make sense of those forces in a Middle Eastern context, so were both Muslim and non-Muslim Arabs. The Modern Arab Nahda (Renaissance), beginning in the 19^th Century, or an-Nahda al-‘Arabiyya al-Haditha, is so-called essentially because of its (re-)birthing of confident and searchingly critical analysis that this inquiry brought on in the Arab world in that period (and that continues to come in waves of ongoing creativity).

Western ideas and reforms had become a necessary part of the political landscape partly because of direct Western interference in the Arab zone and partly because Arabs ironically and subversively but always creatively sought the support of the dominating Western culture itself for their own emancipation from it. The ideals expressed in the period of the French Revolution were naturally especially popular and Arabs (especially those inclined to be secularist for whatever reason) also saw in European nationalisms models for their own. More recently even post modernist ideas have been marshalled to the cause of understanding and dealings with the problems of being an 'Arab' citizen of the world today.

The essence of the Nahda was a realisation of the need for some kind of reform that might take Western ideas as its inspiration but that would lead to renewal of Arab culture and pride. In a sense it thus carried a kind of “if you can’t beat them, join them” ethos. A rearguard action was, of course, always being fought in the period as today by traditionalist forces which naturally conflated Arab modernisation and even post modernism with Westernisation and opposed them all. Traditional Arab society needed no ‘remaking’, the traditionalists argued. This sector of the Arab world (also generally seeking ‘remaking’, however, but in their case a ‘truly’ Islamic one) may be generally described as Salafiyya and naturally partly draws inspiration especially today from the teachings of Muhammad Ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab and his wealthy Wahhabi followers. The issue posed to the traditionalists and that has ultimately divided many of them to this day was should their traditionalism have a political or a religious focus or indeed whether Islamic traditions could or should be so divided. I've discussed their confusion in the recent posts.

The first issue with which Arab thinkers dealt in the early part of the Nahda was the deficit of scientific knowledge and thought in the Arab world and the first solution was to send students to the West (mainly to France). Muhammad ‘Ali in Egypt was the notable ruler of Arabs (though not an Arab) who encouraged this process (as well as a major translation project of European works of interest into Arabic guided by such students) and the Imam of one such group of Egyptian Arab students in Paris was an early pioneer of the Nahda, Rifa’a Rafi’ at-Tahtawi (1801 - 1873), who I mentioned in an earlier post as he was also a Muslim political thinker (or at least inspired Muslim political thinking).

Tahtawi, as an Imam, naturally considered that the process of any reform should necessarily be fully in conformity with Islam and attempted to produce a synthesis of Islamic and European ideas. He explored the European ideas of a motherland (Watan) and patriotism (Hubb al-Watan), European institutions and the European ways of life and thought generally in public writings in the Arab world for virtually the first time. His interpretation of what patriotism required in the Arab world was a nation of ‘children’ of the Watan speaking the same language and loyal to a single sovereign power such as a king, a single political administration and a single set of laws (shari’a). In return, he suggested, the Watan would be a source and place of shared happiness for its people as a community.

Another early example, this time from Lebanon and Syria, was Butrus al-Bustani (1819 - 1893). From a Maronite Catholic Christian family, he received an extensive Western education and became a noted secular educator and Arab nationalist and Nahda pioneer. As a noted educator and thinker, he added weight to the calls for learning from the West and reform sparked by the writings of Tahtawi. As Tahtawi did, al-Bustani also suggested that borrowing from the West should be discriminating rather than a process of blind copying. He also followed Tahtawi in considering the idea of Arab patriotism and pursued a national secular education system in Lebanon in furtherance of the interests and identity of the Arab peoples while maintaining the merit of their loyalty to the Ottoman system.

In a way, this early thinking produced a momentum for more engaged thinking in what it meant to be a modern Arab that continues today. One kind of thought led to another in ways that can be seen as a process of progress and in the next few posts I will follow that progress. The first thought was nationalist, then it was how to arrive at freedom of the nation and even from the nation. Then as free people it was how to measure progress and whether or how to arrive at modernity. Then the question of whether secularism is or should be a consequence of seeking freedom and progress. Then people wondered whether secular socialism in some form met the needs of all of these things: the nation, freedoms and progress. All of these debates were followed by debates on what they meant for women as did the debates in all of the Muslim world (as discussed in my last post). What was freedom and progress and the nation and socialism to look like for womankind? After considering all of these arguably but not completely Western-inspired ideas, the next wondering that began to go on was what does our own heritage (Turath) have to offer us Arabs in relation to all of the above? Finally this all left the modern Arab with a final overarching question to ponder: what, then, if anything, is (or should be) my modern (or post modern) Arab identity now? The next several posts will basically follow these flows of thought to see where they lead us (and the Arab thinkers) today. It will all be in scant outline as it must be, of course, but I hope it will be interesing and useful. I will finish the series with more on communication and education which is really what I started this post with. The flowering of communication that began the Nahda isn't letting up anytime soon (what with the increased literacy and thoughtfulness inspired by the Nahda and with the internet age) and my final post in the series will explore some of the (political) cartooning of the Arab world (you may even get to see Jesus with a bomb in his robe).

Part 10: Women and Feminism in Islam and the Middle East

This is the final post for now on political ideas and their recent history in Islam. For this post I will to some extent follow the thread from the very beginning of Islam and see where it has led (up to today).

The Qur’an was a document that arguably improved the lot of 7^th Century women who became Muslims marginally without providing full equality with men. A significant innovation was, perhaps, Qur’anic support for the rights of the family unit as against those of the larger clan and tribe groups. Before Islam, the Arabian societies were by no means homogeneous with regard to their treatment of women. There usually was, however, a division of labour responsibilities between men and women with subordination of the female roles to the roles of males varying according to class. This was no more than marginally affected by Islamic dictates. The generally novel rights for women guaranteed by the Qur’an included the right to hold property, fair treatment within their marriages and in financial arrangements, and fairer treatment in inheritance matters. The spirits of the Qur’an and of the example of the Prophet were generally pro-equality, or at least progressive towards equality as he faced Medinan male opposition, as between men and women and also between husbands and wives. Some Muslims suggest that these progressive spirits thus lend themselves toward a continuation of the progress to full equality. In defence of men, some that argued in turn (probably somewhat anachronistically) that the role of men in war continues to merit a certain degree of inequality. Due respect is naturally paid by Muslims, however, to the somewhat different roles that do appear to have been prescribed in the Qur’an for men and women.

Veiling and segregation/seclusion was at first only enforced for Muhammad’s wives and segregation was not, in fact, practiced at all widely until the late 11^th Century.

There is evidence from early Islam onwards that suggests women were allowed a major public role regardless of their apparently unique covering requirement. Men are also, of course, required to dress modestly in Islam. While there has never been a female Caliph and there is one oft-quoted Hadith which suggests that women should not be leaders, as Fatima Mernissi has shown in her the Forgotten Queens of Islam, there have nevertheless been a significant number of female rulers throughout Islamic history. Incidentally the Arabic word for Caliph, khalifa, is a feminine word in Arabic which means successor and/or deputy and no Caliph has been unwilling to use the title because it is feminine and though Imam is a masculine word note that Muhammad himself appointed at least one female one (perhaps using a different title for her, however). Arguments often persist concerning the validity of Hadiths. It has been suggested that the Hadith just mentioned may have been concocted by a male rival for power to thwart the particular leadership aspirations of Aisha, a young and popular widow of Muhammad’s. In addition, Mernissi showed there may be a traditional reason for disqualifying the Hadith: one of its transmitters before its collection in writing centuries later had at some time fallen foul of the law. Another transmitter had been present at the first ever fight between Muslims, the so-called “Battle of the Camel”, in which the losing general was Aisha and the winner was ‘Ali, who had recently become Caliph in the face of significant opposition led by Aisha. History, as they say, is written by the winners and the loser just happened to be a woman.

There is also evidence from the Qur’an and the Hadith and Siras (biographies) of Muhammad that he permitted some of his wives to divorce him – a public act. He also appointed at least one female Imam to lead Mosque prayers, as I've just mentioned. In addition, early Islamic women including Aisha fought in early battles, transmitted Hadiths, contributed to the canon of the Qur’an and were regarded as wise teachers of both men and women. One story has it that a woman was once able to correct ‘Umar, himself a notable authority, friend of the Prophet and Caliph, in a legal matter. Hence they contributed in major ways to the very fabric of early Islam. Even from a Salafi point-of-view this therefore represents a model to be followed by all Muslim societies.

Aisha transmitted several Hadith that shed light on Muhammad’s attitude to the equality of the sexes, women’s issues and the role of women. Fatima, Muhammad’s daughter and ‘Ali’s wife, was also a notable early Muslim woman as was Muhammad’s first wife, Khadija, who actually supported him financially for some time in his early years with her independent (pre-Islamic) wealth. Even ‘Umar, known as a fairly misogynist Caliph (he is said to have been the first to enforce some veiling, for example), is known to have appointed at least one female market commissioner. Women participated in various ways in public life. There is an example of a public petition from some female partisans of ‘Ali to the 5^th Caliph, Mu’awiya. Women continued to be teachers for some time after the earliest years of the Islamic era. A grand-daughter of ‘Ali, Nafisah, was one among several and Qatr an-Nada, the wife of a late 9^th/early 10^th Century Caliph by the name of Mu’tadid also participated in the rule of her husband.

The existence of female earthly rulers such as Sultanas (fem. form of Sultans) has been legitimated in Islamic law by distinguishing earthly power (mulk) from religious authority. Mernissi discusses, among others, in particular two female rulers, the Sitt al-Mulk (the Lady of the Power) and Shajarat al-Durr (Tree of Pearls) in Egypt, and other female religious and military leaders of note. Ironically, the brother of Sitt al-Mulk, al-Hakim, who also believed he was God, incidentally (or perhaps not), was also the first ruler to enforce both veiling and segregation (before disappearing and being replaced by his sister). He was actually probably using women as scapegoats in a difficult period for Egypt. Ironically, movements for liberation continue to stall action on women’s rights issues arguing that they can’t walk (gain liberation from corrupt regimes, defeat Israel, etc.) and chew gum (i.e. give women rights) at the same time. This is, of course, not a religious but a political issue. Women in turn argue that a fairer society is likely to be a stronger one and consequently better able to overcome any external threats.

Reform to laws that concern the status of women occurred and continue to occur within the Islamic tradition probably despite rather than because of being prodded from outside. Islamic revival movements that may be less female friendly were in fact given the impetus to form in opposition to ‘modernist’ reforms precisely because they were promoted by the alien and then hegemonic West. As I've said, Islam itself came as somewhat of a positive reform to the status of women in a patriarchal society, and even many modern Islamist reformers continue to see the Islamic tradition as being to continue to improve the position of women. The (male) scholars of Islamic law have also not always produced good Islamic law to begin with from virtually the beginning, in their view.

Women are now generally treated equally with men as witnesses in the modern Islamic world with a few exceptions. Generally the laws of Islamic countries make polygyny (being married to more than one wife) difficult (especially when monogyny is contracted for) or don’t allow it at all as in the case of Tunisia. The interests of the child are generally considered the paramount consideration in custody disputes as in Australia, for example, and in the West, generally. The Islamic permission to have four wives in the context of early Arabia was, in fact, a limitation, a fact which reformers have used to justify these ongoing reforms in Islamic terms. It’s rather a case of speculating: what would Muhammad do (WWMD)?

Marriage contracts allowed in some Islamic schools of jurisprudence have been rather modern in appearance (as far as providing adequately for women) since the early Islamic period. The woman received a dowry as her personal property to use as she pleased on personal and not household items. Men could be contracted with to provide adequate servants and income for the wife as well as her sexual contentment and kindness more generally. The contracts also contemplated grounds for divorce and grounds could include polygyny. Remedies could include annulment of the subsequent marriages. The Islamic marriage has the air of a modern pre nuptial agreement. Islamic law always permitted divorce (it was the least preferred of Halal behaviour) in contrast to Roman Catholic law. Men’s rights were taken for granted to an extent (as one would expect in a patriarchal setting) but women’s rights were somewhat well protected.

Under the influence of Western Victorian values (often those of men who did not favour the giving of rights to their own Western women), some Islamic and Arab women began to seek both democracy of an Islamic kind and certain rights for Muslim women from the 19^th Century. One of the problems with the Western model of democracy for most Muslims including women is that Western democracies have supported brutal virtual dictatorships and dubious theocracies (such as the one in Saudi Arabia) in Muslim countries. Women have suffered more than men in these kinds of states so some form of Islamic democracy is favoured by many of them rather than what they perceive might become Western sponsored brutality in the name of Western democracies. The Qur’anic term Shura rather than democracy is most often invoked by Islamist women.

While with a degree of scepticism concerning Western motives in their region, women (and men) in the Middle East have considered the idea of reform of patriarchy for the last century or more. Thinkers have thus considered the relevance of Islamic and other traditions and laws (including those that impose segregation and seclusion of women) in the modern world in the context of the development of a feminist theory of patriarchy. Arab Muslim ‘feminists’, who considered women’s rights in socio-economic terms and in terms of dealing with imposed segregation and seclusion for the first time in a major way, were active in the 1920s. Qasim Amin was an early (19^th Century) promoter of unveiling and an end to seclusion in this movement in Egypt. He was followed in the early 20^th Century by several women such as Huda Shaarawi, also an Egyptian. Nazira Zein Ed-Din began the movement of referring specifically to the two sources of Islamic Law, the Qur’an and Hadith, for support of reform in Lebanon especially. She specifically asserted by that means that true Islam actually abhorred the veil as an insult to both men and women. Two major reform trends that concerned veiling and seclusion of women and that contributed to this movement were secularisation (favoured by non-Muslims) and re-interpretation of Islam (especially favoured by Muslims, as one might imagine).

The movement was generally an upper class one that never truly ‘caught on’ in the other classes, however, especially in rural areas, and today there has been a reclaiming of the veil even among the formerly reforming privileged class possibly intended to convey more than can easily be understood in the West. The new veiling movement may reflect a desire to reflect religious, political and socio-economic class awareness and identification. Saad Eddin Ibrahim and others have noted these changes and suggested the role of the veil in the new movement in Egypt especially has included being a socially necessary assertion of modesty of women in today’s environment nevertheless still claiming the right to come out of complete seclusion and into public life.

Women in much of the Islamic world have taken advantage of all of their educational and consequent employment opportunities now for many years so that they are now active in many areas of their societies. They have been active in the social programmes of movements such as Amal and Hezbollah during the Lebanese civil wars and in the periphery of the Muslim Brethren movements since the 1980s. There has been opposition from ‘fundamentalists’ to these roles. In part, that opposition stems from a suspicion that the West is using women to destabilise Islamic societies for their own ends. Reform to ‘Islamic’ dress is viewed with suspicion for the same reasons and correct dress in turn is seen as a symbol of resistance against further interference from the West.

With a rationale like this, Al-Mahdi banned ‘Western’ forms of dress especially for women in the area of Sudan he controlled after he helped resist the control of the West thus substituting his own form of control. Al-Banna also sought to restrict the dress of women for reasons of feelings of conservatism and patriarchy rather than strictly for the sake of Islam. The segregation of schools in Jordan was a major goal of the Muslim Brothers there, who were otherwise supportive of social programmes there in which women played a significant role. In Algeria, too, the major Islamic party, FIS, when led by ‘Abbas Madani, sought to blame the conduct of women for essentially all of the then problems of Algeria.

The wearing of the veil is controversial in the West today yet it must be born in mind that many traditions exist from veiling of virtually full face covering to not wearing any head or hair covering. The traditions are, of course, supposed to be Islamic. These variations should indicate clearly, however, the part played by things other than religion. The historian Eric Hobsbawm explores in some detail how traditions such as this are invented in his the Invention of Tradition. We must also remember that the West, too, has standards of dress that are considered mandatory and that women are also often expected by conservative people to dress especially modestly to prevent unwanted male attention in the West. Islam provided guidelines only for appropriate dress. Seclusion and veiling was arguably considered for the purpose of promoting a respect for women in a time when women were vastly under-respected. Therefore today we may feel justified in hoping that the veiling and seclusion of women would be seen by Muhammad and Allah today as unnecessary. Seclusion and veiling could also only ever be afforded to be practiced by upper class city women and their families. The wearing of the veil in Muslim societies was also regarded as to some extent a signifier for a Muslim woman as not all women in the Muslim world were Muslim. It's also worth noting that not all Middle Eastern women or men lobbying for reform were Muslim.

Modern reforms were necessary to ensure more than basic education was available to girls and young women as well as boys and young men. Much of the Islamic world had become part of the Third World in the Age of European Exploration and dominance. Education and even literacy had declined even for men, relative to the European experience. As in the West, women have been seen even in recent times as suited mainly for motherhood, housekeeping, teaching and nursing, for which the necessary education was considered relatively limited. A 2005 report of the UN has nevertheless noted progress for women in the areas of education, employment, politics and their rights as citizens. There have, of course, been wide variations depending on the location and over time.

The role of women in public may appear to be generally quite limited, however. For example, in many parts of the Islamic world including Lebanon, women are generally relatively unwelcome at Mosques. Even when they are allowed they tend to be segregated from and often behind the men’s space so as not to distract the men. Ironically one Hadith notes that Muhammad approved of the pious women who arrived at the Mosque before the men, sitting in front of the late-coming men at the Mosque as they did for purely logistical reasons. While Hadiths are regularly questioned, one may and probably must therefore question the true Islamic credentials of recent practices. Notably, there is no evidence of sex segregation in the earliest Islam. It’s most important also to note the differences as well as the similarities and the controversies that rage within Islam and the Arab world if we are to understand the reality of women’s roles in Islam as it is lived. There are strands that assert that Islam itself authorises poor treatment of women, others that suggest that only men’s interpretations of Islam have authorised poor treatment, still others that don’t accept the traditions treat women poorly at all and finally a traditional strand that asserts a reduced public role for women for reasons other than religion such as conservatism.

Hisham Sharabi, a Palestinian thinker, sociologist and politician, produced a critique of what he saw as ‘neo-patriarchal’ Arab societies, discounting the alleged religious underpinnings of their relative subjection of women in his Neopatriarchy. In this sociological work he argues that Arab society is characterised by heads of extended families living in close proximity being dominating males and fathers. He suggests that the modern nuclear family ideal is beginning to impinge upon this but that more needs to be done for women in the Arab world. Women need especially to be better educated and to be given the capacity to be more economically independent, he suggests, before the progress he considers necessary can be made.

While restricted in so many ways, it must also be noted, however, that women are also given some benefits by Islam. They are not compelled by their religious authorities (in regions where they do go to Mosques), as men are, to appear at prayers at a Mosque for each Friday’s sermon, for instance. This is arguably a freedom for women in Islam that doesn’t exist, for example, in Roman Catholicism. Islam certainly also limits the public role of women of child bearing age at least at prayer during their alleged ‘unclean’ time of each month, however.

Variations in veiling practices are especially noticeable from the full burka or niqab with gloved hands to not covering hair at all. We need to go beneath the surface when we attempt to describe how veiling contributes to the role of women in public rather than assume veiling limits the role. In fact, in many parts of the Arab world and in Iran, the recent return to veiling by many women (though it is not always especially voluntary) has also coincided with an increase in the role played by women in public.

There have thus been at least three strands of ‘feminist’ discourse in the Arab world including by men: conservative, reformist and radical. Besides veiling and seclusion they also address politics and aspects of the traditional personal status law that concern marriage, divorce (including child welfare) and inheritance. Women are also sometimes still treated differentially in the most conservative jurisdictions as witnesses in courts and of contracts. Calls for reforms in Lebanon have met with similar responses from all of the 17 or 18 ethno-religious groups, which suggests that Islam is not the only conservative social force preventing reforms there. Morocco’s new young king has proved to be in the reformist camp since 2003. He made polygamy virtually impossible in that country and among other things equal divorce rights were instituted.

As Egypt is a major opinion forming country of the Arab world, the progress of ‘feminist’ thought there is also somewhat instructive. The pattern is similar with Islamist ‘feminists’ who would reject that label for historical reasons relating to Western cultural imperialism but who do aim at reform of ‘Islamic’ norms, feminists who are Muslims and secularist feminists of whatever religious persuasion. The Islamist strand of thinker generally rejects any Western notion of equality for women as un-Islamic and fallacious, holding that Islam (and only Islam) provides both justice and true equality. The secularist thinkers tend to prefer to concern themselves with the values brought out in UN documents and treaties without any consideration of religion. Finally, the Muslim feminist thinkers will consider norms developed by the UN provided they are consistent with Islamic norms that can properly be read into the founding principles of Islam. Their views are thus a ‘middle way’ between those of the Islamists and of the secularists.

With regard to voting, women, after having undergone a rocky path to enfranchisement, are now generally allowed to vote in Islamic countries where men are allowed to vote. Mernissi has written extensively on this subject. Women involved in independence struggles have demanded equal recompense based on their national contributions. Kuwait has been a prime example where the ruler, Amir Shaykh Jabir al-Ahmad as-Sabah, explicitly recognised the contribution of women to the resistance during the 1991 occupation by Iraq by enfranchisement (in a May 1999 address).

Representation in parliaments still generally lags, however, as it also continues to do in the West. Women have actively pursued the vote privately while they also pursued independence from Britain in Egypt publicly in the so-called “Ladies’ Demonstration” in 1919. In one of the freest election systems, Jordan’s, twelve women sought election in the 1989 elections out of a much larger field of several hundred. One of them, Toujan al-Faysal, is noted for her relatively secular political views and was charged with the potentially capital crime of apostasy during her campaign. None of the women were elected that year although al-Faysal was later acquitted of apostasy and elected for a brief term (allegedly cut short by the government) as the first female MP there. Her subsequent career on the wrong side of the illiberal Jordanian law, and consequently an electoral law which now prevents her from standing for a further term, continues to interest the activists of Amnesty International and similar groups. In Algeria in 1997, four women were elected to the parliament. In Iran, women are gradually regaining rights lost in the immediate aftermath of the Islamic Revolution there. In Morocco and some other Islamic states certain seats are actually allocated especially for women and female parliamentary quotas have existed for some time. Dr Sima Samar’s reports on the situation of women in Afghanistan remain grim.

In Lebanon, women got voting rights as late as 1953 and the first women were elected to parliament in 1992. There have now been at least five (but they have generally been elected because of a family relationship with a male politician unable to continue in politics themselves for some reason – three of the males concerned had been assassinated while holding senior positions, one had died of more natural causes and one, a senior military man, had been imprisoned). None of the first five women elected have had any especially explicit feminist agenda. Indicative of this, although quotas of female members are widely discussed and have been used in the Arab world, none of these women expressed support for such quotas. They do arguably have a different focus from their male counterparts, however. In the meantime, in mainly Christian Lebanon as elsewhere in the Arab world, men in politics have more or less successfully used the dubious and socially limited argument that women’s rights must be of secondary importance in activist terms while human rights more generally are yet to be completely secured. I say dubious because it devalues and therefore fails to make full use of the potential resources that women possess, besides being inherently undemocratic.

The states of the Arabian Peninsula (the Gulf States) appear to be the most conservative in this field. In Oman few women have ever been elected. In Kuwait, women, who contributed significantly to resistance to the recent Iraqi occupation of Kuwait, subsequently demanded to be and were allowed to be elected for the first time in 2005. It was the last Arab country to give women the vote before Saudi Arabia, which only recently gave any opportunity for even men to vote, and opposition groups predicted voting and election rights for women would lead to moral corruption. Arabian Sunni Islamists also continue to suggest that Islamic source documents confirm that women have more limited powers of reasoning than men and assert, in coalition with tribal forces, that the duties of women are essentially predominantly limited by the Shariah to the home in order to prevent the evil of 'corruption'. Even the editor of the first local women’s magazine, Ghanima al-Fahd, opposed electoral changes.

The suffragists, on the other hand, see the vote for women as a potential instrument for the production of positive changes. Khadijah Mahmeed, for instance, has argued that voting must be regarded as a necessary Islamic duty for all Muslims including women. Thus, she argues that the absence of voting rights for women in particular, unreasonably inhibits them from being fully functioning Muslims. Even within the ‘feminist’ movement, however, the fear has been expressed that women might be more susceptible than men to the lures of Islamism thus making the enfranchisement of women a potentially retrograde step. The reality, now that women generally have the vote in the Arab world, appears to be that generally Islamists have benefited from the change (despite having themselves initially opposed the suffragists as a bourgeois minority).

Four females were elected to the assertive but relatively powerless 50-member Kuwaiti parliament in the recent 2009 elections. Also in 2005 in Saudi Arabia, but only in local elections, women were allowed to be elected. Opposition from Sunni Islamists in the Gulf has tended to be raised on the basis that voting rights for women would lead to 'moral corruption' without being very specific as to how this would occur. Even female Islamists such as Ghanima al-Fahd have expressed this view. So there are now at least four female MPs in the Gulf but as one is a member of the local Emir’s family there is arguably much progress still to be made.

Part 9: Some More Recent Islamic Political (and other) Thought

Muhammad Arkoun is one Islamic writer today who suggests a pragmatic, empirical attitude to Islamic government which nevertheless does not go as far as Turkey on the road to secularisation. Others also develop the idea that Islam is at least potentially structurally similar to any other religion in its relation to secular life.

It may be asked: does Islam per se encourage innovation or is it atavistic and inherently conservative and inimical to democracy and peace, for example? The first answer to that question is that as Islam is an historical thing that can’t be said to have an unchanging essence there is no per se to talk about. In history, it has certainly appeared to encourage various innovations at various times and in various areas from its very formulation by Muhammad under alleged divine guidance (even innovations that the West may not be comfortable with such as the innovations that allowed Shi’a Ayatollahs to rule Iran). But in other times and areas and places it has certainly given every appearance of discouraging any innovations at all. If the ‘Taliban philosophy’ is Islamic as it would presumably claim to be, it provides one clear example of one extreme end of this range of Islams only. Muhammad ‘Ali Jinnah and Muhammad Iqbal and other modern Islamic thinkers (including, in fact, the Ayatollah Khomeini) prove that Islam inspires innovative thinking whether that thinking leads to a secular or clerical form of the illusive thing that is Islam as practiced by Muslims. Jihad often seems to be misunderstood by ‘jihadists’ and the West alike to mean only violent struggle whereas in reality the jihad most recommended by Muhammad was the struggle for justice for which a mere attitude of atavism is clearly not sufficient. Ultimately Islam’s commitment to revelation undoes the attempts of liberal Muslims to make Islam truly innovative, however, just as liberal Christians and Jews face ‘innovation/revelation crises’ of their own.

Part 8: Iran - Late Modern Revolutionary Theocracy?

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The Ayatollah Khomeini’s revolution firstly arose out of the special circumstances of the Twelver form of Shi’a Islam that predominates in Iran. According to that sect, the valid political and religious authority is the Imam (the Prophet’s son-in-law and then a relative chosen by ‘his’ predecessor). The 12^th Imam had been occulted (hidden) from the mortal world near Samarra in Iraq as a young boy many centuries ago and as such there was no available political or religious sovereign and Shi’a Muslims at first adopted the view that Sunni Caliphs and local rulers, while not legitimate, should be obeyed until the return of the Imam. Occasionally, but by no means generally under Sunni Caliphs, local rulers in Iran (such as the Buyids) also had Shi’a sympathies. The Iranian Shi’a got their big break when they were finally independently ruled from home by the Shi’a Safavid dynasty. More interests were also involved, however.

The decline of the Safavids may have led to a renewed interest in jurisprudence and other circles in more activism in the 19^th and early 20^th Centuries in Iran. This was probably exacerbated by the extension of the influence of the Western Powers in the region at the level of government. The Shi’a Safavids had managed to create an expectation of consultation of religious authorities that were closely related to their community. This expectation began to grow the more later governments attempted to suppress it. An 1881 visit by Afghani proved a catalytic instigator of this new trend of religious opposition to government (as unduly influenced by Western ‘imperialists’). The famous Tobacco Revolt of 1891 against tobacco concessions given to Westerners followed soon after this visit. On the constitutional front, Iran gave itself a new constitution in 1906 following the Western inspired Tunisian and Ottoman precedents but leaving a role in final approval or refusal of laws to jurists. So ultra-constitutional theocratic "constitutionality" was the order of the day even in modernising Iran.

Within the Shi’a legal/religious establishment there had been two long established schools up to this point, the Usulis and the Akhbaris, but despite their interest in activism, neither had given much theoretical thought to what constitutional Islamic government required. The establishment also had two major cities of learning, Qom in Iran and Najaf in Iraq, so the idea of Iran itself was diluted by the apparent dissolution of the international Iran/Iraq border in local Shi'a thought. The Akhbari School resembled the Sunni Ahl al-Hadith and Saudi Arabian Islam in its extreme conservatism. The Usulis in turn were more receptive to independent contemporary legal thought and reasoning in interpretation of the law and became the dominant group in Iran. It's worth noting that modern thinking (as we've often seen in recent posts) has often been more radical in its anti-Westernism than much conservative Islamic thinking.

There were two great early 20^th Century thinkers in the Shi’a establishment, Abul Qassim al-Khoei and Muhammad Baqir as-Sadr. As-Sadr was the more modernising of the two but al-Khoei was a prolific writer of opinions (known as fatwas in English and fatawa in Arabic, singular fatwa, as I've mentioned before). Later there were two other prominent scholars based at times in Lebanon, Musa as-Sadr (who started the Amal (Hope) Movement there) and Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah, who has been associated with Hezbollah. Of these four scholars Fadlallah is the only scholar alive today [subsequently died in 2010]. The first as-Sadr was killed under Saddam Hussein and the second disappeared.

The term Ayatollah (God’s Sign), by the way, which was attained by these (except for Musa as-Sadr) and several other men, refers to the second highest rank in religious/legal academic circles in Usuli Twelver Shi’a Islam, the highest being Grand Ayatollah. There is an equivalent ranking to Ayatollah for learned women. A cleric/legal thinker generally attains the rank of Ayatollah upon being male, completion of certain studies (especially in Iran), seniority and production of at least one suitably acclaimed work of religious scholarship. It is usually established somewhat informally by the acceptance of usage of the title by colleagues and students of the person. Grand Ayatollah 'Ali as-Sistani in Iraq is influential there today. One can thus attain the rank and not interest oneself in politics, interest oneself in politics and not attain the rank or, as the example below shows notably, attain the rank and interest oneself in politics.

The most influential Ayatollah (along with his supporters) has been Ruhollah Khomeini (1902 – 1989). His family hailed from Eastern Iran though he was born in Khomein near Qom. His family was steeped in Islam containing many clerics and he was educated at Qom and Najaf and later taught in both of those preeminent centres of Shi’a learning. As I mentioned above, the constitution of 1906 gave him (as a leading cleric) some constitutional power and his position also made him a religious figure of major importance. He was quite influenced by Sufi thought and practices and therefore was able to teach both jurisprudence and irfān (Islamic mystical philosophy).

For most of the time his views of politics were being formed, the Pahlavi dynasty, which had first come to power in 1925 by means of an officer coup, ruled (until 'his' revolution deposed them in 1979). The dynasty proved so unstable that the first dynast was deposed by Western Powers during the Second World War in favour of his son and the son had to flee the country in the 1950s before being restored with American support. Muhammad Reza Shah Pahlavi’s new regime (upon his restoration) continued to be flagrantly discriminatory in favour of westerners and their interests. At the same time, he carefully hid the oppression that he was perpetrating from the westerners (as his father probably did before him) thus maintaining a veneer of respectability with them. One of the most offensive things he did to Islam was symbolic. He effectively ignored it at an extravagant gala at the ancient (and pre-Islamic) ruin of an ancient capital, Persepolis, to celebrate 2,500 years of ‘unbroken’ royal rule of Iran. The clergy (including Khomeini) were also treated badly by the regime but were supported (including economically) by the equally oppressed population.

In this light, and also in keeping with the recent tradition among the senior clerics mentioned above but more so, Khomeini became a militant political activist. He entered clerical politics with confidence as a critic of the establishment in his early 20s in about 1929. He then wrote his first major political work in 1944 while still in his 30s urging scholars to speak up for God against political leaders regardless of personal cost. Later in the 1940s he wrote Kashf al-Asrar (the Revealing of Secrets) about, among other things, the issue of religious and political leadership in the interregnum caused by the occultation of the 12^th Imam (confirming the rightness of the Usuli position with regard to legal reasoning and of the constitutional position of the clerics brought about by the 1906 constitution). In addition to the 1906 constitutional position threatened by the Pahlavis, he suggested that the ulema should also have a role in formally approving or rejecting a proposal for any new ruler as had been the practice in the Safavid period.

The 1962 Electoral Bill and the 1963 Reform Bill were clearly not favourable to this legitimate position of the clergy (as Khomeini perceived it). Their joint effect was to remove the clergy from all constitutional roles. By 1964, Khomeini’s actions (in concert with other outraged clergy) had led to his expulsion from Iran and asylum in Iran’s neighbour and rival, Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. While he was in exile at Najaf, he wrote further on the role of government (and the role of the clergy in it) in Tahrir al-Wasilah and expanded upon that and the meaning of Velayat e-Faqih (Rule of the Jurist) in a work of that name in 1970. In essence, his claim was that the Qur’an required that Islamic scholars formally have and exercise political as well as moral authority. In the meantime, as relations between Iran and Iraq thawed, by 1978 Khomeini was again expelled (this time from Iraq) and this time chose to seek refuge in France. From there, he continued to exert influence on the militant opposition in Iran by means of sermons on cassette tapes smuggled into the country from France suggesting a ‘modernised’ and ‘progressive’ Iran be brought about (i.e. regime change).

After the revolution he had encouraged had occurred, he was able to return from exile in 1979 and effectively lead the revolution (and the revolutionary government). He was placed in a category with Abraham and Muhammad as “the Third Idol Destroyer”. During his life, he may also have encouraged (or at least not discouraged) the belief that he was the 12^th Imam returned from occultation after hundreds of years. He was certainly given the honorific title Imam and that is a title considered a couple of magnitudes greater in Shi'a Islam than Ayatollah.

His revolutionary supporters included at that time socialist students and communists as well as bazaaris (members of the rich merchant class that was from time immemorial aligned by marriage with the ulema class in Iran) and the revolution was about removing Western control from Iranian life for many revolutionaries as much as a religious movement. It was also about permitting the bazaaris and the ulema the freedom and independence denied them by the hated Pahlavi Shah rather than imposing theocracy.

Its first orders of business, however, had essentially religious overtones, though they may have seemed opposed mainly to Western influence. Bars and cinemas were outlawed by the new Iranian Revolutionary Council. The revolutionary constitution gave the supreme position of Rahbar (Farsi for captain-navigator) to a cleric. Khomeini was, of course, the first Rahbar. In addition, there was an elected President, an elected parliament and a supervising council of senior ulema including the Rahbar. After Khomeini, each new Rahbar was to be elected by the senior ulema. All government actions were required to be two things: modern and Islamic. There could be no question of legalising brothels or bars or permitting the unveiling of women. In addition, religious police existed to police morality.

The ulema now began to theorise about how to govern whereas before Khomeini they had theorised on how to oppose government (when they could be bothered to discuss politics at all). Traditional Shi’a quietist jurisprudence was therefore supplanted by Khomeini in favour of the revolutionary extension of the rule of the ulema. Khomeini was a charismatic ruler and his rule was thus able to subsume under it divisions within the ruling classes which have nevertheless re-emerged. There has only been one Rahbar since Khomeini, Grand Ayatollah ‘Ali Khamanei, but his rule has not had the charisma that could continue to subsume divisions. The control of the mullahs (mullah being a Farsi (Persian) word for cleric), as the conservative ascendency was called, is hotly debated today in Iran even between the mullahs themselves and has waned somewhat.

Iran was perceived as a threat by many Gulf countries including Iraq and this led to the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s known at the time as the Gulf War. The revolution inspired both Shi’a and Sunni groups and regimes. Its influence in Lebanon, Syria and Palestine continues to be felt. Sunni Islamists in Sudan and other countries saw the regime as a worthy model of Islamic government and it influenced and was favoured by governments in Tajikistan and other Central Asian states, especially those as in Tajikistan with large Iranian populations.

Despite the strict nature of the revolution, relaxations have occurred over the years. Women are now permitted to wear coloured veils, for example, and the police are now (generally) more polite in their policing as they have lost influence. The President before Ahmadinejad, Mohammad Khatami, was firmly in the reformist camp. Democracy has been more limited recently with the limitation of candidates for elected office by the ulema and an apparently flawed recent election. There is an ongoing struggle between conservative and other elements in the society and polity. Devout women, who participated actively in the revolution, have proved winners in post-Revolutionary Iran becoming prominent in business, politics, public life and higher education. The media is subtly suppressed but the blogosphere has been relatively unmolested by government repression until recently (though there has certainly always been some). Such subtle suppression has required subtle expression of controversial views. Student groups remain active politically today (as they were during the vital stages of the 1979 revolution).