Document 23.4: Islamic Feminism: Benzair Bhutto, Politics and the Muslim Woman, 1985

1178

Beyond the Western world and the communist world, modern feminism has also found expression in the developing countries (see Feminism in the Global South). Nowhere has this provoked greater controversy than in the Islamic world. For a few women, exposure to Western gender norms and liberal thought has occasioned the abandonment of Islam altogether. (See Document 22.4.) Far more common have been efforts to root gender equality in both personal and public life within the traditions of Islam. Such was the argument of Benazir Bhutto, several times the prime minister of Pakistan, in a speech delivered in 1985.

BENAZIR BHUTTO

Politics and the Muslim Woman

1985

[O]ne of the first things that we must appreciate about the religion of Islam is that there is no one interpretation to it. . . .

1179

I would describe Islam in two main categories: reactionary Islam and progressive Islam. We can have a reactionary interpretation of Islam which tries to uphold the status quo, or we can have a progressive interpretation of Islam which tries to move with a changing world, which believes in human dignity, which believes in consensus, and which believes in giving women their due right. . . .

I believe that Islam within it provides justice and equality for women, and I think that those aspects of Islam which have been highlighted by the mullas [religious scholars] do not do a service to our religion. . . . But . . . as more and more people in Muslim countries, both men and women, achieve education and begin to examine the Qur’an in the light of their education, they are beginning not to agree with the mullas on their orthodox or reactionary version of Islam.

Let us start with the story of the Fall. Unlike Christianity, it is not Eve who tempts Adam into tasting the apple and being responsible for original sin. According to Islam—and I mention this because I believe that Islam is an egalitarian religion—both Adam and Eve are tempted, both are warned, both do not heed the warning, and therefore the Fall occurs.

As far as opportunity is concerned, in Islam there is equal opportunity for both men and women. I refer to the Sura Ya Sin [Quran 36, 34–35], which says: “We produce orchids and date gardens and vines, and we cause springs to gush forth, that they may enjoy the fruits of it.” God does not give fruits, orchids, or the fruit of the soil just for men to enjoy or men to plow; he gives it for both men and women. . . . Sura an-Nisa [Quran 4, 32]: “To men is allotted what they earn, and to women what they earn.” . . .

The references [in the Quran] are to men and women. . . . The attributes are the same. Both are the creatures of God. Both have certain rights. Both have certain duties. . . . [T]hey have to give alms to the needy, they have to help orphans—the behavior is applicable to both men and women. It is not religion which makes the difference. The difference comes from man-made law. It comes from the fact that soon after the Prophet died, it was not the Islam of the Prophet that remained. What took place was the emergence or the reassertiveness of the patriarchal society, and religion was taken over to justify the norms of the tribal society. . . .

[About] the right of divorce and polygamy. It is often said that Islam provides for four wives for a man. But in my interpretation of this, and in the interpretation of many other Muslims, that is simply not true.

What the Qur’an does say, and I quote: “Marry as many women as you wish, wives two or three or four. If you fear not to treat them equally, marry only one. . . . I doubt you will be able to be just between your wives, even if you try” [Quran 4:3, 129]. So if God Himself and His message says that He doubts that you can be equal, I don’t know how any man can turn around and say that “God has given me this right to get married more than once.”

I would like to say that within Islamic history there are very strong roles for women. For instance, the Prophet’s wife, Bibi Khadija, was a woman of independent means. She had her own business, she traded, she dealt with society at large, she employed the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, when he was a young boy, and subsequently, Bibi Khadija herself sent a proposal [of marriage] to the Prophet. So she is the very image of somebody who is independent, assertive, and does not conform to the passive description of women in Muslim societies that we have grown accustomed to hearing about. . . .

So when we have such powerful role models of women . . . then one must ask, why is it that today in Muslim countries, one does not see that much of women? . . . Why is it that women are secluded? Why is it that women are subject to social control? Why is it that women are not given their due share of property? . . . It has got nothing to do with the religion, but it has got very much to do with material or man-made considerations. . . . It is not Islam which is averse to women rulers, I think—it is men.

Source: Benazir Bhutto, “Politics and the Muslim Woman,” transcript of audio recording, April 11, 1985, in Liberal Islam: A Sourcebook, ed. Charles Kurzman (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), 107–11.