Justice and Beauty in Muslim Marriage
Towards Egalitarian Ethics and Laws
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- £13.49
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- £13.49
Publisher Description
The model of marriage constructed in classical Islamic jurisprudence rests on patriarchal ethics that privilege men. This worldview persists in gender norms and family laws in many Muslim contexts, despite reforms introduced over the past few decades.
In this volume, a diverse group of scholars explore how egalitarian marital relations can be supported from within Islamic tradition. Brought together by the Musawah movement for equality and justice in the Muslim family, they examine ethics and laws related to marriage and gender relations from the perspective of the Qur’an, Sunna, Muslim legal tradition, historical practices and contemporary law reform processes. Collectively they conceptualize how Muslim marriages can be grounded in equality, mutual well-being and the core Qur’anic principles of ‘adl (justice) and ihsan (goodness and beauty).
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
These thoughtful essays compiled by Islam studies scholars Mir-Hosseini (Journeys Toward Gender Equality in Islam), Al-Sharmani (Gender Justice and Legal Reform in Egypt), Rumminger, and Marsso offer a feminist take on Muslim marriage. Dispatches on the Quran, Mohammad's views, and Muslim legal theory contend that many modern understandings of Islamic law do not reflect the lived realities of contemporary Muslims, especially Muslim women. The contributions challenge patriarchal discourse by outlining perspectives on Muslim marriage rooted in "equality, beauty, and goodness," as when Shadaab Rahemtulla and Sara Ababneh suggest in "Reclaiming Khadīja and Muhammad's Marriage as an Islamic Paradigm" that Mohammad was the weaker partner in his marriage to Khadīja, illustrating that husbands need not dominate their wives. The diversity of the selections lead to sometimes contradictory recommendations that are nonetheless thought-provoking; for example, Yasmin Amin recommends rejecting hadith that place unfair responsibilities on women, though elsewhere, Faqihuddin Abdul Kodir accepts the validity of such hadith but counters that they must be interpreted in a way that affirms the equality of men and women. The contributions are consistently insightful and stimulating, adding up to a provocative vision of what a more progressive approach to Muslim marriage might look like. This will leave readers with plenty to ponder.
