Gender equality is not high on Qassim’s mind
10 Mar, 2006 
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In actual fact, it’s not there at all. The equality question that is, not the mind:
قال رئيس المجلس الإسلامي العلمائي الشيخ عيسى أحمد قاسم: «إذا كانت الحياة النيابية تجد صفوفاً رجالية كافية فالأولوية تفرض أن تجد المرأة شرف المكانة العالية في مجالات أخرى كالتخصصات الفقهية»، مشيرا إلى «أن تحقيق الاكتفاء داخل صفوف النساء في التعليم الديني وتخريج المبلغات من المستوى المتقدم والكتابة والبحث هو مطلب نسعى لتحقيقه».جاء ذلك خلال كلمة ألقاها قاسم في مهرجان الولاء الزينبي بصالة شهرزاد مساء الأحد الماضي. وكان الأمين العام لجمعية الوفاق الوطني الإسلامية الشيخ علي سلمان ترك أمر مشاركة المرأة في الانتخابات النيابية المقبلة إلى ظروف الدوائر وكفاءة المرشحات والمرشحين فيها. ونقل عن قاسم في وقت سابق معارضته مشاركة المرأة في الانتخابات البلدية بسبب طبيعة العمل البلدي.
وتناول قاسم قضية دخول المرأة الحياة السياسية موضحا «أن المرأة صارت تبحث عن مواقع جديدة في الحياة»، مستغربا «ربط النساء الرساليات بين المعنوية وبين تقلد المواقع السياسية وشعورها بأنها إن احتلت موقعاً سياسياً فستشعر بالسعادة»، متسائلا «هل للمرأة المسلمة في ظروف الحشمة والتعامل الإسلامي مع الرجل أن تشعر بالنقص والتخلف إذا لم تتقلد منصباً سياسياً؟».
Al-Wasat
What the esteamed “Ayatollah” Shaikh Isa Ahmed Qassim is asserting here is the substandard role women should play in society, according to him and Islam. He specifically forbids women from entering parliamentary politics (he’s already categorically forbade them entering municipal elections because municipality work is not appropriate for women, he thinks) because it is his position that if men are available, women are required to “take the high road and work in positions more commendable to their nature.”
What are those, dare one ask?
Well specialisations in religious studies of course! Not that they could ever become imams in their own right of course, but maybe he’ll teach them subservience and being third-class citizens as portrayed in the Quran, Sunna and of course being a Shi’a leader, the sayings of the 12 apostles. One of whom (Imam Ali (AS)) has already described women in his Nahj Al-Balaghah (Path of Eloquence) as half-brained creatures not worthy of much consideration:
O’ ye peoples! Women are deficient in Faith, deficient in shares and deficient in intelligence. As regards the deficiency in their Faith, it is their abstention from prayers and fasting during their menstrual period. As regards deficiency in their intelligence it is because the evidence of two women is equal to that of one man.
So is it any wonder that this guy, and his “Ulama Council”, are vehemently against the proposed Family Law?
X-Factor: how many wives did the Prophet (pbuh) have?
Your link doesn’t work by the way, can you resubmit it?
X- Factor:
You state ‘Why don’t you mention that the man is the one responsible for everything in our culture and “Sharia” too! the man in fact gets the money and spends it on his family, while the woman is not obligated to spend a single penny. ‘
For someone who claims to be interested in reality, have you actually looked at the real issues of finances and how many women actually support their family? Please …
Also, why does every discusson on Islam and women end up by discussing prostitution? Why doesnt it end up discussing the fact that most moslem men are obsessed with sex? and if they werent concerned with getting laid all the time then perhaps we would have effective leadership? And, beleive me, by clergy, I am also discussing the religious fools. How come we see some innovative and creative laws and debates surrounding zawaj mit’ah and zawaj misyar .. but we dont see innovative and creative debates about inhertiance laws?
Please … X Factor … do not insult the intelligence of moslem women by telling me that Islam as it is currently applied safeguard’s women’s rights. And dont tell me that the historical, cultural context of the 6th centry applies today.
I think Shaira is sexist and highly discrimanatory against women. And I also think that these defunct laws of male to female ratios in witnesses also suck.
First of all, I am pleased that you are speaking about numbers and not merits. Prophet Mohd, was allowed to marry his 7 wives, and no more, for different reasons, you could find a lot of discussion on the web. They have been honoured during the marriage and until this day. All of them were married before andhave children except, our mother Aysha.
Here brings us to discuss certain issue regarding the polygamy (Plural Marriage, as some may like it to be called). Me personally, I feel it is not the norm, and it should not be. This, in REALITY, is supported by the Holy Book, when speaking about plural marriage, being unjust to women.
Again let us go back to REALITY, It could be easy for any law to give a blind eye to all what is happening, assuming things are right andin fact they are not. It is unfortunate that there are some men out there that misbehave, before and after getting married. It is unfortunate but it exists, and there are women who are giving the chance for such misbehaviour, if not encouraging. There are two options, one is to allow them to do whatever they want to do in the light, but with limits, and the other way is to let them do it in the dark, and with no limits. To me, I think the first choice is the right and less harmful to the individuals committing it, and to the society as a whole. Again this is based on REALITY,, and not on IDEALS.
I personally, support the rights of every person, including foreign women living in the Gulf region. I will not swallow the bite put by your stupid government that claims to support womans rights. Your primer minister, particularly, is a figure that belongs to the mid evil era with all his hotels that support the humiliation of humanity, let a side woman. If he is so concerned about womans rights, let him firstly clean all his shit and wrong doings in his private businesses, in Bahrain and Thailand.
Flight of thoughts would not help in any discussion, generalisations and non-specific examples are nt the way to go forward.
Getting back to the topic… how old was Aysha when your blessed prophet married her, and how long before that marriage was consumated?
Is this “getting back to REALITY” enough for you?
“Similarly, we should not dissociate the circumstances, background, perspective and context from the text.” That is how an intellectual should think. It was the norm at that era, regardless of the age. The Prophets first marriage was from Sayda Khadeeja, who was more than 20 years older than him. The most important thing at that era was they man/woman reach the puberty, that is all. Hence it was not abnormal at all for such marriage and no one opposed that. READ the history, before judging.
Intellectually very weak argument… but let’s carry on…
So tell me, how old was the prophet when he became a paedophile?
Guys, settle down please. Let’s have an open discussion away from extreme views.
Max-Factor, that was bad form.
*-Factor, stop being so het up about issues, remember that not everyone shares your opinion no matter how right you think they or you are. In some of your answers you’re not making any cohesive sense and just returning back to dogma rather than logical thought.
Move on.. both of you. The topic is women in Islam in the modern day and their misfortune under the application of draconian laws which are mostly wrongly interpreted at best or individually interpreted and applied without recourse to modern, clear, written set of rules and regulations.
yeah well… whatever, if you don’t want to hear the truth
“No great religious leader has been so maligned as Prophet Mohammed. Attacked in the past as a heretic, an impostor, or a sensualist, it is still possible to find him referred to as “the false prophet.” A modern German writer accuses Prophet Mohammed of sensuality, surrounding himself with young women. This man was not married until he was twenty-five years of age, then he and his wife lived in happiness and fidelity for twenty-four years, until her death when he was fourty-nine. Only between the age of fifty and his death at sixty-two did Prophet Mohammed take other wives, only one of whom was a virgin, and most of them were taken for dynastic and political reasons. Certainly the Prophet’s record was better than the head of the Church of England, Henry VIII.”
Geoffrey Parrinder, Mysticism in the World’s Religions (New York: Oxford University Press, 1976, pg. 121)
+ Ayesha(ra) was engaged to someone else before she got engaged to Muhammad(saw)
Surprisingly, some will go ahead and defend their Shaikhs regardless of the cost!
Anyway, I still think in order to improve the situation in Bahrain, Al-Khaleefa, and sp. your prime minister needs to end all his non-ethical activities that is bringing all the Saudis every week to Bahrain,
One other thing, I should say,
Alhamed le Allah, with our IDEALS our woman hold the highest record in purity, honesty and fidelity. Yet I will share with them the fight to promote more rights.
They have two enemies,
1. Who wants them to be with no ideals and follow the Hollywood style of life. i.e. to be their for adverts, as not thing but babes,
2. Who wants them to regress in another way, staying at home as a piece of furniture with no development at all.
What I think is not important, they are free to choose, as I am free to choose.
I guess you are a woman, *-factor, I know too that you are at university in the UK and that you are an Arab, most probably Bahraini.
Are my assumptions correct?
If they are, please:
1. don’t talk about Bahrain in the third person, WE have problems and they are being solved, much slower than I would like, but they are being treated.
2. our discussion here is about Islam’s view – in general – about women, to which you have not contributed anything other than platitudes and dogmatic utterances worthy of a die-hard bin Ladenite.
3. you continue to want us to believe that YOU believe in freedoms of choice, when from your comments it is easy to deduce your real position, which is confused and intellectually bankrupt.
4. you were asked direct questions that we had hoped that YOU would answer, rather than let Google do the answering for you. When you have formed an opinion that is yourselve’s, please let us know. I am just dying to understand your point of view.
5. Muslim women are not the purist there are in the world, nor are they the best, nor are they the sexiest, nor are they the prettiest, and all the other “ests” there are in the world. They are human beings first and foremost looking to live their lives (or should) as honourable and honoured humans, regardless of religion. Some are better when compared to specific instances, and some are much much worst. Like this mother dumping her newborn IN a rubbish bag and left to die next to a rubbish skip who is most probably Bahraini, if not then she might be a Muslim. And here’s news for you, this mother is not the first, and she won’t be the last, as long as WE Muslims/Arabs prefer to place a woman’s honour in her genitals, rather than respect and adore life.
So do wake up. Please. For your sake. And smell the roses.
Now that we have cleared things, please stick to the topic at hand and let us know your personal opinions rather than hairing off at a tangent.
u go mahmood … tell it how it is!
by the way … anyone who thinks that arabs and moslems are all held to a higher standard of morality and behavior should pay a visit to the orphanage. if they ever got a doctor in there to check dna, i am sure that there will be some, if not significant, evidence of incest ..
so .. please don’t tell me that the prime minister is responsible for that as well? we are just a society in evolution from a tribal patriarchy to …. i dont know really .. but we are in transition. and where we go will depend on x factor, y factor, z factor and max factor …
start with reality, with what exists, and work from there to where we want to be. and lets make sure that where we want to be is somewhere realistic. where does one draw the line? at the way saudi arabia treats its women? or the taleban? or iran ?
Mahmood, and everybody else,
I hope you got time to read the links in my previous comment, but if not, please read this:
http://www.islamology.org/Overview/Women/WomanRights/index.html
This is a translated version of the book which is also avaiable in arabic in Bahrain AFAIK.
Salman ..
I went to the first page of this site and I was completely surprised by what I saw on the first page!! When comparing the White Islamic revolution vs the dark western revolution???
1. ‘ It did not provide any opportunity to the unmarried men who are always after enticing women.’
Why is there a judgement on the women and not the men?
2. ‘It did not snatch away the wives from their husbands and the daughters from their parents and did not hand them over to the sensual executives and the moneyed magnates.’
Oh please…. are you telling me that people aren’t attratced to power or money? Do you think its coincidence that the Prophet’s first wife was a rich older woman?
3. ‘No one knows what to do with all the corruption that is rampant, with the ever-growing cases of infanticide and abortion, with 40 per cent illegitimate children and with those new-born infants whose fathers are not known and whose mothers do not want to have anything to do with them, because they were not born in lawful wedlock. The mothers of such children simply hand them over to some social organisations and then never come back to inquire about them.
Habibi .. have you gone to our orphanages? Have you gone to the counselling centers? Have you gone to see the abuse cases? Sometimes men against women. Sometimes women against children. Sometimes women against the elderly? What makes you think that Moslems are any different than any other human being? Do you really think that we are being held to a higher standard because Islam is a ‘loftier religion’?????
4. ‘Man is after sex and woman is after love. Man is overpowered by his sexual urge, whereas, woman, according to the psychologists, has a greater capacity of controlling and concealing her desires. It is the melody of love, sincerity and faithfulness which subdues woman and brings her to her knees. That is what we mean by credulity of woman. As long as the woman is a maiden and has had no experience of men, she can easily be lured by his love songs. ‘
I am flabbergasted. Salman … I think that this site was written by a man in order ti make himself feel better about his own sexuality as a man. I dont understand how women can be enticing in one sentence, and then innocent/naive in another. But – most fundamentally, I think that you and whoever wrote this site is in serious denial about the male/female dymanics in the Moslem world today. If Islam cannot take a position on what to do if the father doesnt consent, and if it is left to a tribal patriarchial system to do that, then there is something missing in this so called ‘perfect’ religion of ours.
As for west vs moslem treatment of women .. most of my moslem friends who are married to expats have more faith in the civil ceremony that the ‘western’ courts offer in terms of protection than they have in the sharia courts.
something is wrong. and as a moslem woman, i am sick and tired of hearing about how much ‘better’ we are supposed to be than everyone else. i dont see it. i dont like the violence. i dont like the control. i dont like the oppression. and i dont like some straggly beared dunce telling me that i should be grateful for being part of a ‘white’ revolution because he said so.
I increasingly feel that Islam is a square peg trying very hard (by you so eloquently labelled straggly bearded dunces mainly and other ‘saviours of Islam’) to be rammed into a round hole.
The sooner that we wake up to this the better we will be. Taking a humanist and logical approach to life, or at least marrying these principles to Islam, would probably be a good option.
Again, Mahmood I don’t think you looked into the book.
of the penalty. Don’t blame Islam for what -some or all- muslims do.
Mahmood and specially jasra jedi, please just give it some time, as you both are arabs -I think- you can even grab the arabic version of the book from bookstores, try Fakhrawi. Try to hold your judgments untill you get the complete picture of how Islam looks at women, and don’t just jump at the first disagreement.
One think to keep in mind, Muslims do not equal Islam, the same as I can not say that Jews do not represent Jewish relegion. I can not blame Moses for Sharon’s action, the same is with any other relegion.
In Islam in particular, there is a big divide between the teachings and the appications since the early days of Islam’s history. Moawiya and Yazeed among other caliphs were as far as islam as Saddam and Taliban , although all claimed they were muslems and were head of ‘islamic’ government.
We, in Bahrain and all other muslim countries, have people claiming they are applying sharia laws but they are actually not, and people judge true sharia based on these people’s action. Men hit women and humilate them and they claim it is their right to do so ‘as per sharia law’ and people criticize true Islam based on these people’s action.
Please take a deep breath, and try to understand what true Islam is really about, and you will -hopefully- understand that by applying the true spirit of Islam, these problems will never be there in the first place.
I don’t want to go OT but look and the cutting thief’s hand. It is in Quran, and people say it barbarian and should be erased forever. It simply doen’t fit in the 21 century. They based their judgment on many things and among that how Saudi and others are applying this, and creating ‘handicapped’ people depending on the government for living, creating another serious problem.
Removing parts of Quran or Islam is just asking for Islam 2.0, a modified and specially tailored version of Islam, that soon will have more flavours than the new Windows Vista
Instead, go and read history, and see how many hands were actually cut or people beheaded -as a punishment- in days of the prophet, and read the actual strict requirement for a case to be sent to the executioner and the headsman, and the requirment for the execution
back to the topic, I again request every body either to get the arabic version or read the english version -unless you know persian which you can check the original version of the back. But please, read it fully before you make a judgment.
Thank you
Woman And Her Rights
Salman, I’m not as blind as you are, and I can read believe it or not. And if you wish to ascertain the fact that I can and I did puruse your link, you’re more than welcome to come with a couple of your brown-shirts for me to prove the fact.
You cannot blame me for a completely flawed concept nor can you justify it by obfuscating facts and useless, unthought out defence which uses the downgrading of others to prove your lofty “truth”.
Nor do we “need to give it time” and “get a complete picture of how Islam looks at women” or even tax our intellect for “understanding” that in Islam a woman is half that of a man, and sometimes not worth as much as a camel, nor that she cannot bear witness by herself nor that she is described as half-witted, half-faithful and half-worthy if it stares you right in the face every time you either open a book, or speak to an apologist like yourself.
Once you have “facts”, then please come and give me more links to peruse. Until that time, quit your mental masturbation, it’s not doing you any good and you are going blind.
Salman ..
Lets assume that the ‘true’ spirit and ethos of Islam actually honors women. And lets assume, that you are open to Islam version 2.0.
My point, very simply, is that one of the most fundamental develpoments from Islam 1.0 to Islam 2.0 is that it should recognize that in the 21st century, we have states, governments, and civil law. And that, the whole domain of personal legislation should be left to the State and not to the Islamic scholars.
And, please do not come back and tell me that in Islam, we cannot sepaprate governance from religion because that is the way that it was in the 6th century. if you are open to the concept of evolution, then you must accept the premise that the place for evolution is in parliament/ in government and not in the hands of the straggly bearded ones who seems to be more obsessed with sex than Islam.
In other words, the debate of how to deal with marriage, divorce, inheritance, child custody, etc should be centered on things like what education costs today, what health care costs today, what rent costs today .. and not really centered on what the prophet did centuries ago in order to establish some sort of social order. It may be very interesting from a historical perspective, or even to people with an interest in islamic jurisprudence. However, it is simply not relevant in today’s world. And, more worryingly, the debate then is limited to only those ‘scholars’. If these scholars aren’t doing a good job, then its time to change them or broaden the scope of debate. Irrespective of whether the intrinsic nature of Islam is pure or not.
Just my humble opinion.