Black Spirituality Religion : The Role and Condition of Women in Islam

abdurratln

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Feb 27, 2007
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Apparently you're the one who had to look hard. Out of all the hundreds of millions of Muslims you had to look in some obscure province of China. So much for a religion being led by women

Sorry for the diversion ru

Hey Sekhemu. Why don't you get off your sorry behind and do a googlesearch on women and Islam. You might learn something.

It just so happened that I had that bit of information in the back of my mind all along. If the truth be told, I only recently learned about what the Muslim sisters are doing in China. And, I referenced it just to prove a point. The point being that most non-Muslims are ignorant about Islam in general and about the Role and Condition of Women in Islam in particular. Accordingly, there is a great need for enlightment on this subject. But, I do not have all the information readily at hand. Nevertheless, there is a great wealth of information available over the internet. All that is needed is for folks to just investigate and research with open minds with a desire and willingness to learn. So, I ask all of us to look into this issue and see what we can learn and share it. I am looking to learn from you and I hope I can offer something that you can learn from me.
 
Hey Sekhemu. Why don't you get off your sorry behind and do a googlesearch on women and Islam. You might learn something.

It just so happened that I had that bit of information in the back of my mind all along. If the truth be told, I only recently learned about what the Muslim sisters are doing in China. And, I referenced it just to prove a point. The point being that most non-Muslims are ignorant about Islam in general and about the Role and Condition of Women in Islam in particular. Accordingly, there is a great need for enlightment on this subject. But, I do not have all the information readily at hand. Nevertheless, there is a great wealth of information available over the internet. All that is needed is for folks to just investigate and research with open minds with a desire and willingness to learn. So, I ask all of us to look into this issue and see what we can learn and share it. I am looking to learn from you and I hope I can offer something that you can learn from me.


Yesterday, 05:16 PM
abdurratln
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I have been advised not to debate stupid people.

- And we've been advised by Allah to no longer take your bait or mistake you for a Muslim...

Once again i see you have broken your fast by slinging insults and calling people names....SMH

I'm on day 15 and feel excellent, but from what i have been reading of you since Ramadan began on the 11th, you haven't even started yet!
 
Women as imams

Women as imams
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There is a current controversy among Muslims regarding the circumstances in which women may act as imams—that is, lead a congregation in salat (prayer). Three of the four Sunni schools and the Shia school[1] agree that a woman may lead a congregation consisting of women alone in prayer. However Shia and Sunni schools do not believe in women leading the mixed congregational prayers.[2]

Some schools make exceptions for Tarawih (optional Ramadan prayers) or for a congregation consisting only of close relatives. Certain sects, such as the Haruriyyah branch of the Kharijites movement in the 7th century, considered it acceptable for a woman to be imam. Certain medieval scholars—including Al-Tabari (838–932), Abu Thawr (764–854), Al-Muzani (791–878), and Ibn Arabi (1165–1240)—considered the practice permissible at least for optional (Nafl salat) prayers; however, their views are not accepted by any major surviving group.

Within the Muslim communities in recent years the debate has been reactivated, arguing that the spirit of the Qur'an and the letter of a disputed hadith indicate that women should be able to lead mixed congregations as well as single-sex ones, and that the prohibition of this developed as a result of sexism in the medieval environment and patriarchal interpretations of religious texts, not part of or reflective of true Islam.[3]

The earliest history of female imams can be found in China, where Quranic schools for girls have evolved into woman-only mosques and where females acted as imams as early as 1820. [4]


[edit] Traditions
The Qur'an does not address this issue; relevant precedents are therefore sought for in the hadith, the traditions attributed to Muhammad. The only hadith that unequivocally states that women may not lead mixed congregations is Ibn Majah (Kitab iqamat is-salat was-sunnati fiha) #1134, narrated through Jabir ibn Abdullah: "A woman may not lead a man in Prayer, nor may a Bedouin lead a believer of the Muhajirun or a corrupt person lead a committed Muslim in Prayer."

An indirectly relevant hadith is widely considered to be crucial, since the imam stands at the front of the congregation.[citation needed] The hadith in question is #881 of Sahih Muslim:

Abu Huraira said: The best rows for men are the first rows, and the worst ones the last ones, and the best rows for women are the last ones and the worst ones for them are the first ones.[5]
The sunnah—actions of Muhammad (including but not limited to hadith)—is a more general source of precedent; it is usually considered to militate against women leading mixed congregations, as there are no reports of it happening in Muhammad's time, unless, as Amina Wadud suggested, the aforementioned Umm Waraqah hadith is interpreted to apply to her town rather than to her household alone.

A third source of precedent is the principle of ijma—consensus—supported by the hadith "My community will never agree upon an error." This is also generally quoted against it, since the consensus of the traditional jurists is overwhelmingly against it; however, supporters of the idea argue that this consensus is not universal.

With regard to women leading congregations of women, however, several hadith report that Muhammad's wife Aisha and Umm Salamah did so, and as a result most madhhabs support this. According to Qaradawi:

The hadith of `A’ishah and Umm Salamah (may Allah be pleased with them). `Abdur-Raziq (5086), Ad-Daraqutni (1/404) and Al-Bayhaqi (3/131) reported from the narration of Abu Hazim Maysarah ibn Habib from Ra’itah Al-Hanafiyyah from `A’ishah that she led women in Prayer and stood among them in an obligatory Prayer. Moreover, Ibn Abi Shaybah (2/89) reported from the chain of narrators of Ibn Abi Layla from `Ata’ that `A’ishah used to say the Adhan, the Iqamah, and lead women in Prayer while standing among them in the same row. Al-Hakim also reported the same hadith from the chain of narrators of Layth Ibn Abi Sulaim from `Ata’, and the wording of the hadith mentioned here is Al-Hakim’s.
Furthermore, Ash-Shafi`i (315), Ibn Abi Shaybah (88/2) and `Abdur-Raziq (5082) reported from two chains of narrators that report the narration of `Ammar Ad-Dahni in which he stated that a woman from his tribe named Hujayrah narrated that Umm Salamh used to lead women in Prayer while standing among them in the same row.
The wording of `Abdur-Raziq for the same hadith is as follows: “Umm Salamah led us (women) in the `Asr Prayer and stood among us (in the same row).”
In addition, Al-Hafiz said in Ad-Dirayah (1/169), “Muhammad ibn Al-Husain reported from the narration of Ibrahim An-Nakh`i that `A’ishah used to lead women in Prayer during the month of Ramadan while standing among them in the same row.
Further, `Abdur-Raziq reported (5083) from the narration of Ibrahim ibn Muhammad from Dawud ibn Al-Husain from `Ikrimah from Ibn `Abbas that the latter said, “A woman can lead women in Prayer while standing between them.”
But, all of the hadiths state that the given women lead the other women in prayers while standing among them in the same row, and not standing on the first row of the prayers as Imams do, and also states that they were only among the women and not all the worshippers such as males.

[edit] Mixed-gender congregations
Three Sunni schools accept that women can lead other women in prayer; however none of them see it acceptable to lead men in prayers. A minority of people see it fit in the Hanbali school for women to lead men in tarāwīh in certain conditions and if she remains behind the men during prayers. A woman is not to be in front of men with the consideration to largely obviate the danger of the men being aroused by her presence. According to Imam an-Nawawi “If a woman leads a man or men in a congregational prayer, the prayer of the men is invalid. As for her prayer, and the prayer of the women praying with her, it is sound.” While in a household, if there are no qualified men to lead a prayer it is the one exceptation for women to lead men in prayers.[1]

In the early years of Islam, however, the Haruriyyah sect, a branch of the Kharijites movement, founded by Habib ibn-Yazīd al-Harūrī, held that it was permissible to entrust the imamate to a woman if she were able to carry out the required duties. In 699 A.D. (77 A.H.), the founder's wife, Ghazāla al-Harūriyya, even led her male warriors in prayer in Kufa after having controlled the city for a day, following the example of Abu Sufyan's daughter Juwayriyya at the battle of Yarmuk. Not only did she lead Muslim men in prayer, she recited the two longest chapters in the Quran during that prayer.[6]

Modern Islamic scholars such as Dr. Yusuf Al-Qaradawi, based on the Umm Waraqah hadith mentioned above, consider it permissible for a knowledgeable woman to lead mixed prayers within her own household, as he considers this to largely obviate the danger of the men being aroused by her presence.

This view, however, is rejected by the vast majority of Fiqh jurisprudence specialists and religious experts. However, a few fatwas exist permitting women to lead a mixed gender congregation regardless of familial relationship for instance one by Dr. Khaled Abou El Fadl, who recommends that the placement of the imam be made with greater modesty in mind for a female imam. Some traditional scholars caution against Yusuf Qaradawi's methodology and regard him as excessively lenient as he does not limit himself to the positions of the four Sunni schools of fiqh.

Wellknown early jurists like Al-Muthani (d. 878), student of Shafii and contributor to the establishment of the Shafii juristic school, Ibn Thawr (d. 854) mufti of Iraq, and At-Tabari (d. 922) historian, exegete and founder of a now defunct juristic school all allowed women to unconditionally lead men in prayer. In addition, the Hanbalis permitted that a woman leads men in taraweeh prayers.[7]

Thus, although the practice of women leading prayer is not commonly accepted, one cannot simply conclude that it is prohibited without first conducting honest and unbiased research.

[edit] Women-only congregations
Schools differ on whether a woman may be imam (leader) of a Jama'ah (congregational) prayer if the congregation consists of women alone: three of the four Sunni madhhabs—Shafi'is, Hanafis, and Hanbalis—allow this [although Hanafis consider it to be makrooh (disliked act)], while Malikis do not. In such a case, the woman stands among the congregation in the front row, instead of alone in front of the congregation. In 2000, six marjas among Iran's Shia leadership declared that they too allowed women to lead a woman-only congregation, reversing a previous ban in that country.[8]

The hadith of Umm Waraqa has given rise to debates among Islamic leaders, whether it is acceptable or not for women to lead prayers, and some cite it as proof to argue that women can lead congregational prayer.

Umm Waraqa bint Abdallah, an Ansari woman, who was well versed in the Quran, was instructed by Prophet Muhammad to lead ahl dariha (ahl dariha means the people of her home where dar means home and can refer to one’s residence, neighborhood, or village), which consisted of both men and women, in prayer. The "people of Umm Waraqa’s home" were so numerous that Prophet Muhammad appointed a muezzin for her. Umm Waraqa was one of the few to hand down the Quran before it was recorded in writing.[9]

Use of the word "Dar" in the hadith, when speaking of where the prayer was held has resulted in different interpretations of the hadith. A general interpretation of the word is "area", constituting the community around where Umm Waraqa lived. This idea is not accepted by many scholars. The other interpretation of "Dar" means household, saying prayers were led in Umm Waraqa’s home. Who was she leading? Imam Zaid presents three possibilities; she was leading the two servants of her household and the mu'ahdhin, the women of her surrounding “area”, and only the women of her household. All of these possibilities are based on great assumption, but the most accepted is that Umm Waraqa was leading the women of her household. Giving a suggestive response that women are allowed to lead prayers of all women congregations. Furthermore Aisha and Umm Salama led women in prayer as well. Zaid insists that if the Prophet was to establish a mosque in the household of a man, which was not uncommon, Itban b. Malik, then also there would be a women only congregations established by the Prophet.[1]

An unusual feature of Islam in China is the existence of nüsi, mosques solely for women. The imams and all the congregants are women and men are not allowed into the mosques. A handful of women have been trained as imams in order to serve these mosques.[10] However, in at least some communities where these mosques operated, women were not allowed in the men's mosques. In recent years, efforts have been made to establish similar mosques in India and Iran.[11]

[edit] China
China is probably the first country in the world where women acted as imams and where there were woman-only mosques. Such history dates back to over a hundred years ago. This practice continues today and is a unique feature of Islam in China. [12]

[edit] South Africa
This section does not cite any references or sources.
Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (June 2006)

One of the earliest reported cases of a woman imam in the West occurred in 1995 in Johannesburg, South Africa. For about two years, a congregation met every Friday for the Jum'ah prayer and every night in Ramadan for the special tarāwīh prayer in a building owned by the Muslim Youth Movement of South Africa (MYM). The khutbah for the Jumu'ah was delivered by either a male or female khatib and the imams for the prayer also included men and women. One of the prime movers behind this congregation was well-known South African Muslim women's rights activist Shamima Shaikh (1960–1998).

A year earlier, Amina Wadud (see below) became the first woman in South Africa to deliver the jum'ah khutbah, at the Claremont Main Road Mosque in Cape Town. Farid Esack discusses this event in his 1997 book Qur'an, Liberation, and Pluralism. Following that event, both the Claremont Main Road Mosque and Masjidul Islam, in Johannesburg, often have had women speakers for Jum'ah.

In January 1998, as per her wishes, one of the four funeral prayers for Ms. Shaikh was led by a woman friend.

In 2003, a new venue for Eid prayer was established in Durban by a group of individuals and was later taken on by an organisation called Taking Islam to the People (TIP). The venue is designed to allow entire families to attend the Eid prayer together in a pleasant and comfortable atmosphere. Located at Durban's North Beach, the Eid prayer is an open-air event performed against the backdrop of the Indian Ocean. Each event includes two khutbahs, one each by a male and a female.

To date eleven women have offered khutbah's at this venue. Amongst them are Dr. Lubna Nadvi, Zaytun Suleyman, Fatima Seedat, Fatima Hendricks, Dr Mariam Seedat and Hajra Hussein.

[edit] Canada
2008–present: The Noor Cultural Centre in Toronto includes women on their Board of Khatibs. The women regularly give full length sermons prior to the second adhan. A male Khatib delivers the Arabic portion in brief after the second call. Also, women and men trade off giving the call to prayer each week at the Noor.

Academic Laury Silvers and Lawyer and Activist El-Farouk Khaki founded the El-Tawhid Juma Circle in Downtown Toronto. The circle is gender-equal, homosexual-friendly, and religiously non-discriminatory. All Muslims are welcome to lead the prayer and give the sermon.[13][14][15]

2004: 20-year-old Maryam Mirza, delivered the second half of the Eid al-Fitr khutbah at the Etobicoke mosque in Toronto, Canada, run by the United Muslim Association.[16]

2004: Yasmin Shadeer led the night 'Isha prayer with her congregants including men and women.[17] This is the first recorded occasion in contemporary times where a woman led a congregation in prayer in a mosque. The United Muslim Association is determined to continue this practice of having women delivering the khutbah and leading the salah.

In April 2005, Raheel Raza led Toronto's first woman-led mixed-gender Friday service, delivering the khutbah and leading the prayers of the mixed-gender congregation organized by the Muslim Canadian Congress to celebrate Earth Day in the backyard of the downtown Toronto home of activist Tarek Fatah.[18]

In 2008, Pamela Taylor, a Muslim convert since 1986, gave the Friday khutbah and led the mixed-gender prayers in Toronto at the UMA mosque at the invitation of the Muslim Canadian Congress on Canada Day.[19]

The former Mufti of Marseille, Soheib Bencheikh, requested that either Raheel Raza[20] or Pamela Taylor lead him in prayer during a visit to Canada in February 2006. The prayers were sponsored by the Muslim Canadian Congress and held in a private venue with a mixed gender congregation.[21]

[edit] Bahrain
2004: In an aborted attempt of a woman delivering a Jum'ah khutbah, Bahraini police arrested a 40-year old woman in 2004 for trying to deliver the khutbah at one of the biggest mosques in the island state. The incident took place on the last Friday of Ramadan. The would-be khatib was wearing full male dress with an artificial beard and moustache. The mosque was packed with 7000 worshippers. When sat on the minbar just before she was to deliver the khutbah, some worshippers realised that the new imam was a woman in disguise. They and the mosque's imam, Sheikh Adnan Al-Qattan, handed her over to the police.[22]

[edit] USA
The Wadud Prayer: (March 18, 2005) NOTE The Wadud prayer is not the first woman-led mixed-gender congregational prayer (see the above noted events), but the first to gain national and international attention.

In early 2005, it was announced that Amina Wadud, an African American Muslim, and a professor of Islamic studies at Virginia Commonwealth University, would lead a congregation in Friday salat prayer in New York, sponsored by the Muslim Women's Freedom Tour,[23] under the leadership of Asra Nomani, by the website "Muslim WakeUp!," and by members of the Progressive Muslim Union.

Supporters of the event insisted that, to the contrary, it was a long overdue change; Khaled Abou El-Fadl, professor of Islamic Studies at UCLA, California said; "What the fundamentalists are worried about is that there's going to be a ripple effect not just in the U.S. but all over the Muslim world. The women who are learned and frustrated that they cannot be the imam are going to see that someone got the guts to break ranks and do it."[24]

Three mosques refused the group; the event was then scheduled to be held at an art gallery in the SoHo district of Manhattan, but this site was changed after a bomb threat. The final site selected for the service was the Synod House owned by and adjoining the Episcopal Cathedral of Saint John the Divine, on Manhattan's Upper West Side.

On Friday March 18, Amina Wadud acted as imam for a congregation of about 60 women and 40 men seated together, without the traditional separate male and female sections. The call to prayer was given by another woman, Suheyla El-Attar. Wadud stated,

I don't want to change Muslim mosques. I want to encourage the hearts of Muslims, both in their public, private and ritual affairs, to believe they are one and equal.
A small number of protestors gathered outside.

Afterwards, the general ˤUlamā' response from across the world has been similar to that of the widely watched Shaykh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi, who responded that, while a woman could lead other women and even possibly her family in salat, she could not lead a mixed group including non-mahram males:

The currently extant juristic schools agree that it is not permissible for women to lead men in the obligatory Prayer, though some scholars voice the opinion that the woman who is well-versed in the Qur'ān may lead the members of her family, including men, in Prayer on the basis that there is no room for stirring instincts in this case.
The Progressive Muslim Union followed the Wadud prayer with a Woman-led Prayer initiative. The initiative sought to bring together the varied Progressive opinions on the prayer as well as engage more conservative Muslims by encouraging further debate, highlighting legal opinions in support of the prayer (as well as giving space to the overwhelming negative opinions), facilitating Muslims who would like to organize future prayers, and documenting those events as they heard of them. Progressives and others sympathetic to bringing about a transformation of gender privilege in Islam continue to work for the establishment of woman-led prayer.

Many perceived the Wadud prayer to be an inevitable reaction to the deplorable situation of women in mosques in North America. The attention garnered by the event forced more conservative Muslim organizations to publicly acknowledge the situation and call for changes. ISNA responded with guidelines for Women-Friendly Mosques.[25] Scholars such as Imam Zaid Shakir and Dr. Louay M. Safi have been calling attention to and working to change mosque conditions for years. For example, see Imam Zaid's essay "Flight from the Masjid", and Safi's Women and the Masjid between Two Extremes and Towards Women Friendly Mosques. Progressives and others would argue, though, that mosque conditions are merely a symptom of a widespread sense of male entitlement following centuries of male privilege in the intellectual and political power centers of Islam.

Women continue to lead prayers in the United States in their communities with or without media coverage: Nakia Jackson led Eid prayers in 2006 and 2007 with Laury Silvers giving the khutba. In May 2007, as a guest of the Muslim Youth Movement, Silvers gave the Friday sermon at the Claremont Road Mosque in Cape Town, South Africa and an associated mosque in Johannesburg, South Africa.

[edit] Spain
Spanish Muslims have been some of the greatest supporters of the woman-led prayer movement in Islam. Spanish Muslim religious scholar Abdennur Prado responded immediately to the Wadud prayer with a supportive legal opinion. In October 2005 Wadud led a mixed gender congregational prayer in Barcelona.[26]

[edit] United Kingdom
On 17 October 2008, Amina Wadud became the first woman to lead a mixed-gender prayer in the United Kingdom, when she performed the Friday prayer at Oxford's Wolfson College.[27
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_as_imams)
 
Imama Amina Wadud

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaJump to: navigation, search
This article needs additional citations for verification.
Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (April 2008)


Amina WadudAmina Wadud (born September 25, 1952) is an Islamic feminist, imam, and scholar with a progressive, feminist focus on Qur'an exegesis.

Early life
Wadud was born as Mary Teasley in Bethesda, Maryland. Her father was a Methodist minister and her mother descended from Muslim slaves of Arab, Berber and African ancestry dating back to the 8th Century. She received her B.S, from The University of Pennsylvania, between 1970 and 1975. In 1972 she pronounced the shahadah and accepted Islam, not knowing of her maternal ancestry and by 1974 her name was officially changed to Amina Wadud to reflect her chosen religious affiliation. She received her M.A. in Near Eastern Studies and her Ph.D. in Arabic and Islamic Studies from the University of Michigan in 1988. During graduate school, she studied advanced Arabic in Egypt at the American University in Cairo, continued with Qur'anic studies and tafsir at Cairo University, Egypt, and took a course in Philosophy at Al-Azhar University.

[edit] Work
She was contracted for a period of 3 years as Assistant Professor at the International Islamic University Malaysia in the field of Quranic Studies in Malaysia, between 1989 and 1992, where she published her dissertation Qur'an and Woman: Rereading the Sacred Text from a Woman's Perspective, a book, which is banned in the UAE. However, the book, continues to be used by Sisters of Islam in Malaysia as a basic text for activists and academics alike.[1] During the same period that she also co-founded the NGO Sisters-In-Islam.[2]

Wadud's research specialities include gender and Qur'anic studies. After publishing her first book, she spoke at universities, grass roots level, government and non-government forums at various gatherings throughout the United States, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Africa and Europe. In 1992 Wadud accepted a position as Professor of Religion and Philosophy at Virginia Commonwealth University, from where she retired as of 2008.

In 2007 she received the Danish Democracy Prize, and in 2008 she gave the keynote address "Islam, Justice, and Gender" at the international conference Understanding Conflicts: Cross-Cultural Perspectives, held at Aarhus University, Denmark.

From 2008–present, she is a visiting professor at the Center for Religious and Cross Cultural Studies at Gadjah Mada University in Yogyakarta, Indonesia.

In February 2009, she was a speaker at Musawah - Equality and Justice in the Family conference, where she presented a paper titled “Islam Beyond Patriarchy Through Gender Inclusive Qur’anic Analysis”.[3]

Wadud was also a speaker at The Regional Conference on Advancing Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment in Muslim Societies, hosted by United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) and the International Centre for Islam and Pluralism (ICIP) in Jakarta, Indonesia, in March 2009.[4]

Wadud was also spoke at a workshop "Sharia and Human Rights" University of Bergen, Norway in late November 2009.[5]

She is scheduled to speak an upcoming public lecture titled "Muslim Women and Gender Justice: Methods, Motivation and Means" Faculty of Arts, Asia Institute, The University of Melbourne, Australia on 18 February 2010.[6]

Friday prayer
Wadud was the subject of controversy, debate and Muslim juristic discourse after leading a Friday prayer (salat) of over 100 male and female Muslims sponsored by the Progressive Muslim Union and held in the Episcopal Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York on March 18, 2005, breaking with the tradition of having only male imams (prayer leaders). Three mosques had refused to host the service and the Sundaram Tagore Gallery withdrew its acceptance of the event after a bomb threat.[7] Becoming the target of death threats, the police and VCU, fearing for her security and reacting to concerns from parents about their children's safety, asked Wadud to conduct her classes from home through a video link.[8] (The event was not the first time in the history of Islam that a woman had led the Friday prayer. See Women as imams for a discussion of the issue.)

Before in August 1994, Wadud also delivered a Friday khutbah (sermon) on "Islam as Engaged Surrender" at the Claremont Main Road Mosque in Cape Town, South Africa.[9] At the time, this was largely unheard of in the Muslim world. As a result, there were attempts in Virginia by some Muslims to have her dismissed from her position at Virginia Commonwealth University.

There has been objection and support from Muslims around the world to Wadud's imamate. In spite of the criticism, Wadud has continued her speaking engagements, and has continued to lead mixed-gender Friday prayer services. On October 28, 2005, following her talk at the International Congress on Islamic Feminism in Barcelona, Spain, she was invited to lead a congregation of about thirty people.[10] Following an invitation by The Muslim Educational Centre of Oxford, she also led a mixed-gender prayer in The U.K., even though Muslims planning to attend were threatened with being disowned by conservative imams through personal visits from mosques.[11]

Scholar Yusuf al-Qaradawi berated her on Al-Jazeera, calling her action unislamic and heretical; while Eygptian scholar Gamal al-Banna argued that her actions were supported by Islamic sources, and were, therefore, orthodox.[12] Other supporters include Leila Ahmed, Islamic Scholar, who thought it was a good thing as it brought attention to the issue of women in Islam, and Ebrahim E.I. Moosa, an associate professor of Islamic studies at Duke University, who called the prayer a "wonderful move".[13]

[edit] Personal life
Amina Wadud is a divorced mother of five children and three grandchildren.[14]

[edit] Media appearances
She was interviewed on WNYC radio on July 14, 2006, to discuss her book Inside the Gender Jihad. She responded to questions and comments about other activities including women in gender-mixed Friday prayer service.[15]

In 2007, Wadud was the subject of a documentary by Iranian-Dutch filmmaker, Elli Safari, called "The Noble Struggle of Amina Wadud".[16]

[edit] Books
Her first book, titled "Qur'an and Woman: Rereading the Sacred Text from a Woman's Perspective", published in March 1999, contributes a gender-inclusive reading to one of the most fundamental disciplines in Islamic thought, Qu'ranic exegesis.

Her latest book, "Inside the Gender Jihad: Women's Reform in Islam", was published in 2006. It not only continues her Qur'anic analysis but also provides extensive details about her experiences as a Muslim, wife, mother, sister, scholar, and activist.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amina_Wadud)
 
Hey Sekhemu. Why don't you get off your sorry behind and do a googlesearch on women and Islam. You might learn something.

It just so happened that I had that bit of information in the back of my mind all along. If the truth be told, I only recently learned about what the Muslim sisters are doing in China. And, I referenced it just to prove a point. The point being that most non-Muslims are ignorant about Islam in general and about the Role and Condition of Women in Islam in particular. Accordingly, there is a great need for enlightment on this subject. But, I do not have all the information readily at hand. Nevertheless, there is a great wealth of information available over the internet. All that is needed is for folks to just investigate and rersearch with open minds with a desire and willingness to learn. So, I ask all of us to look into this issue and see what we can learn and share it. I am looking to learn from you and I hope I can offer something that you can learn from me.
:whip:

"Hey Sekhemu. Why don't you get off your SORRY behind"

I'm gonna give you a Chance to apologize, like a man...before I report you
 

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