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Al-Salafiyya , Feminism and Reforms in Twentieth Century Arab-Islamic Society

2005; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 10; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/13629380500252119

1743-9345

Zakia Belhachmi,

Multiculturalism, Politics, Migration, Gender

Abstract From an education perspective this article provides a periodised epistemological study of al-Salafiyya in the twentieth century. The first part describes the pivotal role of al-Salafiyya's Islamic nationalism in cultural integrity/diversity, engendered reforms and the consolidation of Islamic feminism and women's standpoint in official gender discourse. The second part documents the polarisation between al-Salafiyya and liberalism, and the resulting uneven progress in the endogenous articulations of gender in the Maghrib and the Mashriq alike. The third part unfolds al-Salafiyya's rebirth and the pivotal role of Islamic revivalism as a third orientation in governance, gender egalitarianism for contemporary Arab-Islamic society. It discusses women's leadership in institutionalising gendered postmodernist reforms and in restoring women agency in the sociopolitical and discursive power structures of contemporary Arab-Islamic society. Notes 1. Zakia Belhachmi, ‘Al-Salafiyya, Feminism and Reforms in the 19th Century Arab-Islamic Society’, Journal of North African Studies 9/4 (2004) pp.81–107. 2. ‘Arab-Islamic’ refers to the Muslim people of Arab ethnic background who represent the ‘heartland’ of Islam: the Middle East and North Africa. On the one hand, the term designates the geographic region of the world where Islam is the state religion (except for Lebanon) and Arabic is the language of the nation, education and communication with the world community. On the other hand, it underlines the political and scientific unity of this group, intellectually and geographically. The political unity is incarnated in the 21 Arab nations members of the League of Arab States. The scientific unity is reflected in the scholarship sponsored by ALECSO as the umbrella institution and instance for cultural communication between the nation state members of the League of Arab States and between the members of the United Nations. However, the terminology does not imply that this region is monolithic, or that its peoples' scientific productions are uniform. Rather, it refers to a dynamic sociopolitical and scientific diversity as well as evolution within cultural unity. 3. The Islamic worldview (Weltanschauung) of science and scientific knowledge ('ilm) is embedded in Islamic metaphysics, which conceives reason and revelation as two organic aspects of the same reality. Islamic metaphysics contains a unique cosmology (structure of the space–time relation in the universe) based on the principle of al-Tawhid (unity and balance between the spiritual and temporal orders in the organisation of the universe). From this perspective the Prophet created a new sociopolitical and cultural order based on the 'Uruba/Islam unity (unity between Islamic doctrine and Arabic culture). M.A. Kettani, ‘Science and Technology in Islam: The Underlying Value System’, in Ziauddin Sardar (ed.), The Touch of Midas: Science, Values, and Environment in Islam and the West (Manchester: Manchester University Press 1984), pp.66–90, explains the sociopolitical and scientific ramifications of 'Uruba/Islam unity established by the Prophet for the development of Arab-Islamic society and Islam as a world civilisation. Islam, he points out, meant the development and the renewal of Arab society according to the Islamic message delivered by the Prophet. 'Uruba meant using the Arabic language as a universal language of communication between all people of the world, both in the transmission of the Islamic message and in the scientific development of the Islamic Ummah (pp.67–68). Thus, Kettani concludes that the Arab-Muslim 'ulama elaborated a tradition of scientific practice for all Muslim scholars to follow. 4. The question of ‘science’ raises the fundamental issue of definition. What constitutes science? Whose science are we referring to? From which civilisation? If by ‘science’ one means the evolution of cultural thought patterns and institutions that constitute the social sciences (sociology, political science, jurisprudence, etc.), then every culture has its independent ‘social sciences’ that draw from diverse sources of knowledge, both religious and secular. For a study on the history and philosophy of science in the world community and a documentation of the independent Islamic framework of science see G. Sarton, An Introduction to the History of Science, 5 vols (Baltimore: Williams & Wilkins 1927). This reveals the relation between science and culture, and indicates that the history of science is the history of various social constructions of reality, mediated by scientists and scholars. Equally, this raises the issue of ideology contained in scientists' definitions of ‘science’ and ‘scientific knowledge’ in the history of humanity. For a detailed explanation of the relation between science and ideology, see T. Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1970). Also, for further systemic portrayals of Islamic science, theories of scientific knowledge, and scientific institutions see (a) A.M. Sayili, ‘The Institutions of Science in the Moslem World’, PhD thesis, Harvard University, 1941; (b) S.H. Nasr, Islamic Science: An Illustrated Study (London: World of Islam Festival 1976); and (c) M. Abul-Fadl, ‘Contrasting Epistemics: Tawhid, the Vocationist and Social Theory’, American Journal of Islamic Social Sciences, 7/1 (1990) pp.15–38. For a discussion of the Islamic worldview of science in the Arabic literature and its importance for the production of endogenous social sciences, see (a) A. Khalifah, Ishkaliyat al 'ulum al-ijtima'iyya fi al-watan al 'Arabi [The problematic of the social sciences in the Arab nation] (Cairo: Dar al-Tanwir li-ttiba'a wa nashr 1984); (b) I. Rajab, ‘A. Madakhil al-ta'sil al-Islami li al-'ulum al-Ijtima'iya’ [Introductions to the authentication of the Islamic sociological sciences], Al-Muslim al-muassir 63 (1992) pp.45–52. 5. Belhachmi (note 1). 6. M.A. Khamis, Al-harakat al-nissa'iyyah wa-silatuha bi-al-Isti'mar wa ra'y al-jami'at al-nissa'yyah wa-al-hayat al-Islamiyyah wa-kibar al-ulama fi Misr fi istighlal al-mar'ah bi-al-siyyasah wa-al-a'maal al-'ammah [The feminist movement and its link to colonialism and the opinion of the women's groups and the greatest ulama in Egypt regarding the exploitation of the woman in politics and the public life] (Cairo: Dar al-Al-Ansar 1978). 7. Ibid. p.86. 8. Ibid. p.73. 9. Ibid. p.87. 10. Ibid. p.179. 11. H. Mahmud, ‘Sayyidat fi balat sahibat al-jalalah al-Sihafah’ [Women and the press], Al-Hilal 88/5 (1980) pp.74–77. 12. Ibid. pp.75–76. 13. Ibid. p.76. 14. B. Baron, The Women's Awakening in Egypt: Culture, Society, and the Press (New Haven: Yale University Press 1994). 15. Baron's terminology and her classification of the papers are inadequate for this period in history. ‘Liberals’, ‘moderates’ and ‘conservatives’ are more appropriate. 16. Baron (note 14) p.52. 17. Ibid. p.54. 18. 'U.R. Kahhalah, Al-mar'ah fi al-qadim wa-al-hadith [The woman in the old and modern times], Vol. 1 (Beirut: Mu'assassat al-Risalah 1978). 19. Ibid. Vol. 1, p.178. 20. Khamis (note 6) p.78 21. Ibid. 22. Ibid. 23. M. Tuhami, Al-sahafa wa al-fikr wa al-thawra. Thalath ma'arik fikriyya [The press, thought, and revolution. Three intellectual battles] (Baghdad: Dar Ma'mun li al-Tiba'a 1976). 24. Ibid. pp.42–45. 25. L. 'Awad, Al-mu'athirat al-ajnabiyyah fi al-adab al-'Arabi al-hadith [The foreign influences on modern Arab literature], Part 1, Qadiyyat al-mar'ah [The woman's cause] (Cairo: Dar al-Ma'rifah 1966). 26. Ibid. p.79. 27. Ibid. p.80. 28. This literature rectifies the assumption that feminists like L. Ahmed (Women and Gender in Islam: Historical Roots of a Modern Debate [New Haven: Yale University Press 1992] and M. Badran and M. Cooke [eds] Opening the Gates: A Century of Arab Feminist Writing [Bloomington: Indiana University Press 1990], pp.112–128, make about al-Sayyid's reforms being derived from Western liberalism. Also, this literature corroborates J.E. Tucker, Women in Nineteenth Century Egypt (London: Cambridge University Press 1985). 29. Majd al-Din Nasif ([ed.], Athar Bahithat al-Badiyyah Malak Hifni Nasif 1886–1917 [The impact of Bahithat al-Badiyyah Malak Hifni Nasif 1886–1917] [Cario, Egypt: Al-Mu'assassah al-Misriyyah al-'Ammah li al-Ta'lif wa-al-Tarjamah wa al-Tiba'a wa al-Nashr 1962]) explains that al-Nisa'iyyat was first published in 1910 and consisted of 24 articles previously published by Malak in al-Jaridah, two lectures and a poem, plus an introduction by al-Sayyid. After Malak's death, al-Nisa'iyyat was republished in 1920 in two parts (one volume), adding new material: Nasif's biography of his sister, Malak, her correspondence with May Ziadah and a selection of speeches given at the ceremony commemorating her death (pp.37–38). 30. The political and cultural affiliation of Malak Nasif within Islamic reformism is also clear in her lecture to the Umma Party (1909). Here, Malak Nasif not only denounces the distortion of the veil by urban women into the European-inspired izar-wear which led to Muslim women's tabarruj (indecent body display), but also calls for the replacement of the izar-wear with the ‘authentic’ custom of the veil in the Turkish style. Also Nasif calls for the elimination of foreign missionary schools, and increased reforms of the public schools. For details on this aspect consult the author's article in English in Badran and Cooke (note 28) pp.232–34. 31. Nisa'iyyat (plural of Nisa'i). The Arabic terms nisa'i and nisa'iyyat connote feminist issues, and refer to women. The dual reference to feminism and women contained in the Arabic terminology reflects the absence of the duality feminine/feminist in gender identity in the original Arab-Islamic feminist discourse established by women. Therefore, to this day the Arabic term nisa'i remains a comprehensive concept that refers to women with no distinction of gender identities (sexual, social, etc.) or feminist struggles. The only way to assess the degree of feminist activism in Arabic literature is through an examination of the content of women's writings. Similarly, the only way to ascertain the nature of women's definitions of gender identity is through an examination of women's definitions of the concept of femininity and how they articulate this concept in their discourses on femininity. For taxonomic accuracy nisa'iyyat (both scientific classification and periodisation in a chronological order) experienced three phases. First, nisa'iyyat (though not referred to by that term) were initiated by al-Taymuriyya and Fawwaz through their involvement in the sociopolitical and cultural movements of Egypt. The second phase of nisa'iyyat occurred when Malak Hifni Nasif presented women's demands as feminist demands to the Egyptian parliament (1909), and published these demands and other works in her book Nisa'iyyat (1910). The third phase of nisa'iyyat happened with the institutionalisation of women's studies/feminist studies in academia in the 1940s. For the first two phases see Chapter 1 of Belhachmi, Al-Sa'dawi and Mernissi, ‘Feminist Knowledge within the History, Education, and Science of the Arab-Islamic Culture', PhD thesis, Faculte des Sciences de l'Education, Departement d'Etudes et d'Administration de l'Education, Universite de Montreal, 1999. For the third phase see Chapter 3 of Belhachmi (note 1). 32. T.J. Zeidan, Arab Women Novelists: The Formative Years and Beyond (New York: State University of New York Press 1995). 33. Among the prominent members of al-Wafd was Muhammad Sultan Basha, Huda Sha'rawi's father, who was ‘the president of the first chamber of Egypt’ and ‘governed Egypt during Khedive Tawfiq's brief absence’. Also, Ali Sha'rawi became a founding member al-Wafd upon his marriage to Huda Sultan, of whom he was a guardian. Zeidan (note 32) p.34. 34. Z. 'Abd al-Baqi, Al-Mar'ah bayna al-din wa al-mujtam'a [The woman in religion and society] (Cairo: Mataba'at al-Sa'adah 1977) p.273. 35. Islamic modernism remained deeply entrenched in the ideology of al-Salafiyya's reformism. Founded on the principle of al-Tawhid, it sought to maintain Islam as the symbol of national unity and 'Uruba (Arabisation) as its means of political and cultural expression. M.'A. Al-Jabiri (Ishkaliyyat al-fikr al-'Arabi al-mu'assir [The problematic of contemporary Arab thought] [Beirut: Markaz Dirasat al-Wahda al-'Arabiyya 1989]) argues that this period represented an important mutation in the ideology of al-Salafiyya in the Arab-Islamic world as evident in the movement's evolution into four major groups with diverse reform proposals which endure to date. He classifies al-Salafiyya into four major groups: (a) Salafiyyin rafidin (the group of refusal). This group views today's governance and institutions as a sort of al-Jahiliyya and advocates a return to the ‘original’ system of governance established by the Prophet. (b) Salafiyyin mu'tadilin (the moderate group): those who accept change as long as it does not contradict Islamic teachings. (c) Salafiyyin mu'awwilin (the interpreter group): those who seek in Arab-Islamic values and institutions equivalent concepts to Western ones that can enable the development of Islamic institutions and concepts to fit contemporary situations (i.e. shura vs. parliament representation) and yield to the renewal of an Islamic contemporary civilisation. (d) Salafiyyin tawfiqiyyin. This group is the most complex in that it includes people with liberal, Marxist or socialist tendencies who yet attempt to reconcile their political tendencies with their Salafi thinking (p.12). 36. 'U.R. Kahhalah, Al-'alam al-Nisa'i fi 'alamay al-'Arab wa al-Islam [The women's world in the worlds of the Arabs and Islam], 3rd edn, 5 vols (Beirut: Mu'assassat al-Risalah 1977) p.234. 37. I. Khalifah, Al-harakah al-nisai'yya al-hadidatha: Qissat al-mar'ah al-'Arabiyyah 'ala ard Misr [The modern feminist movement: the story of the Arab woman in Egypt] (Cairo: Al-Matba'ah al-'Arabiyyah al-Hadithah 1973) p.160. 38. 'U.R. Kahhalah, Al-mar'ah fi al-qadim wa-al-hadith (Beirut: Mu'assassat al-Risalah 1979) Vol. 1, p.89. 39. This is the very first book written by a Muslim woman feminist on women and labour in Arab-Islamic society; it carries the legacy of Fawwaz, and precedes by seven years T. Al-Haddad, Al-'Ummal al-Tunisiyyun wa dhuhur al-harakah al-naqabiyya [The Tunisian workers and the emergence of the syndicate movements] (Tunis: al-Dar al-Tunisiyya li al-Nashr 1927). 40. Kahhalah (note 38) Vol. 2, pp.128–29. 41. These data rectify Badran and Cooke (note 28), who assert that ‘In the Arab world, the period from 1860 to the early 1920s witnessed the evolution of “invisible feminism”' (p.xviii). For further detail on feminism in Egypt between the two revolutions of 1881 and 1919 see A.K.B. Al-Subki, Al-harakah al-nisaiyyah fi-Misr ma-bayna al-thawratayn 1919 wa 1952 [The feminist movement in Egypt between the two wars 1919 and 1952] (Cairo: Al-Hayah al-Misriyyah al-'Ammah li-al-Kitab 1968). 42. M.'A. Al-Jabiri, ‘Tatawor al-intelijansiyya al-Maghribiyya: Al-asala wa al-tahdith fi al-Maghrib’ [The evolution of the intelligentsia in Morocco: aAuthenticity and modernity in Morocco], in Jaghlul Abd al-Qadir (ed.), Al-Intellijansiyya fi al-Maghrib al-'Arabi [The intelligentsia in the Arab Maghrib] (Beirut: Dar al-Hadatha li al-Tiba'a wa al-Nashr wa al-Tawzi' 1984) pp.14–15. 43. Ibid. p.19. 44. Ibid. p.20. 45. Ibid. 46. Ibid. 47. Ibid. p.21. 48. Ibid. p.22. 49. Ibid. p.24. 50. Ibid. p. 29. 51. M. Al-Manuni, Madhahir yaqadat al-Maghrib al-hadith [Aspects of the awakening of modern Morocco], Vol. 1 (Rabat: Matba'at al-Umniyya 1973). 52. Ibid. pp.24–25. 53. Ibid. p.26. 54. Kettani (note 3). 55. N. Salem, ‘Islam and the Legal Status of Women in Tunisia’, in F. Hussain (ed.), Muslim Women (London: Croom Helm 1984) pp.141–68. 56. Ibid. p.150. 57. Ibid. 58. Ibid. p.151. 59. Ibid. p.180. 60. T. Al-Haddad, Imra'atuna fi al-Shari'a wa al-mujtama' [Our woman in jurisprudence and society], 2nd edn (Tunis: Al-Dar al-Tunisiyya li al-Nashr 1930) p.64. 61. Ibid. p.206. 62. For details see Belhachmi (note 31). 63. Al-Jabiri (note 42) pp.52–53. 64. For a critique of 'al-Fassi's liberal trend regarding al-Salafiyya's modernism and political governance see A. Al-Dawway, ‘'Allal al-Fassi kanamudaj lil-fikr al-salafi al-jadid fi al-Maghrib’ ['Allal al-Fassi as a model of the new Salafi thought in Morocco], in Jaghlul Abd al-Qadir (ed.), Al-intelijansiyya fi al-Maghrib al-'Arabi [The intelligentsia in the Arab Maghrib] (Beirut: Dar al-Hadatha li al-Tiba'a wa al-Nashr wa al-Tawzi' 1984) pp.105–18. 65. Al-Jabiri (note 42) p.56. 66. The form of appropriation of universal knowledge through language acquisition advocated by Hajji is detailed in Chapter 1 of A. Al-Qadiri, Said Hajji (Casablanca: Matba'at al-Najah al-Jadida 1978). 67. Ibid. p.56. 68. For a full critique of al-Fassi and his followers' introduction of liberal education and promotion of elitism in Moroccan society see M.'A. Al-Jabiri, Adwa' 'ala mushkil atta'lim fi al-Maghrib [Shedding light on the problem of teaching in Morocco] (Casablanca: Dar al-Nashr al-Maghribiyya 1974). 69. 'A. Tazi, Jami' al-Qarawiyin, Vol. 3 (Beirut: Dar al-Kitab al-Lubnani 1976) p.756. 70. Ibid. p.767. 71. See al-Jabiri (note 68). 72. Ibid. p. 45. 73. Ibid. p.46. 74. My mother, Khadija al-Idrissi (1925–74) was among the Moroccan women educated in al-waqf schools. Also, she was vigorously engaged in the nationalist movement among wives of politicians in the 1940s and the 1950s, namely the group of Sala (Salé) later headed by Fatima Hassar, and the group of Fès later headed by Malika al-Fassi. 75. When I was growing up, my mother and aunts used to rave about the literary salon hosted in the house of Basha Hassar in our hometown Sala. There, women across classes shared their poetry and essays and discussed women's issues (i.e. education, work, family planning and political participation). 76. For a discussion of the secularisation of fields of knowledge during this period, see 'A. Tazi (note 69). 77. Ibid. p.767. 78. Khnata Benouna set a trend for women's periodicals in Morocco, which was followed by other women in the 1970s and the 1980s, i.e. Thamaniiyya Mayyu (Eighth of May) and Kalima (A Word). 79. M. Badran (Al-nisa'iyya ka quwa fi al-'alam al-'Arabi [Feminism as power in the Arab world], in Al-fikr al-'Arabi al-mua'ssir wa al-Mar'ah [Contemporary Arab thought and the woman] Jam'iyyat Tadmun al- Mar'ah al-'Arabiyya [Cairo: Matba'at al-Meligi 1988] pp.75–89) makes this assertion about the Maghribi women's feminism and scholarship and links it to oil exploration in the Gulf area (pp.87–88). 80. L. Ahmed, ‘Early Feminist Movements in Turkey and Egypt’, in F. Hussain (ed.), Muslim Women (London: Croom Helm 1984) p.119. 81. Badran and Cooke (note 28) pp.112–128. 82. Zeidan (note 32) p.48. 83. This situates the polarisation between women on gender discourse in the mid-1920s and after the EFU l'Égyptiènne. As such, this challenges Ahmed's (note 28) assertion that the polarisation discourse was encapsulated in Nasif's and Sha'rawi's feminist discourse in the first two decades of the twentieth century. For perspectives on Islamic nationalism and its epistemological implications for cultural production in Arab-Islamic society as a whole, consult Al-Jabiri, M.'A. Al-khitab al-'Arabi al-mu'asir: Dirasa tahliliyya naqdiyya [Contemporary Arab thought: an analytical interpretation] (Beirut: Dar al-Tali'a. 1981); Al-Jabiri, M.'A. Takwin al-'Aql al-'Arabi [The constitution of the Arab mind] (Beirut: Dar al-Tali'a 1984) (Naqd al-'aql al-'Arabi, 1 [A critique of the Arab mind, 1]); Al-Jabiri, M.'A. Binyat al-'aql al-'Arabi: Dirasa tahliliyya li nudhum al-ma'rifa fi al-thaqafa al-'Arabiyya [The structure of the Arab mind: an analytical interpretation of the systems of knowledge in the Arab culture] (Beirut: Markaz Dirsat al-Wahda al-'Arabiyya 1986) (Naqd al-'aql al-'Arabi, 2 [A critique of the Arab mind, 2]). 84. Khalifah (note 37) p.65. 85. Zeidan (note 32) p.48. 86. Ibid, p.48. 87. I use al-Usuliyya al-Islamiyya/‘Islamic fundamentalism’ like H. Hanafi, Al-usuliyya al-Islamiyya [Islamic fundamentalsim] (Cairo: Maktabat Madbuli 1989). He argues that usuliyya (fundamentalism) in Islam connotes a very different ‘signified’ than in the West. First, he points out, usuliyya refers to the scholarly endeavour of identifying the fundamental principles of the religious doctrine of Islam and law, and seeks to implement that legality in the sociopolitical and cultural organisation of the Muslim people. As such, Hanafi explains, usuliyya is not a product of the modern age but has existed throughout the history of Islam as evident in the invariable call to Muslims from conservatives, progressives, reformers and the enlightened to recapture ‘the fundamentals of Islam’ in order to preserve the continuity of Islamic identity and civilisation based on the renewal of Islamic principles in the establishment of Islamic society over time. Second, Hanafi identifies the ‘signified’ within the usuliyya movement and discusses the Islamic fundamentalism agenda in light of the ‘signified’. On the one hand, he contends, usuliyya is a movement that seeks to recapture the multiple variables of Islam as a civilisation with all its constitutive components: religion, law, morality, worldview, culture, and language (Arabic as the sacred language in which the Islamic message was revealed to all Muslims in the world, and Arabic as the vehicle of the scientific productions of the Islamic civilisation). On the other hand, Hanafi argues, since the multiple referents of Islam affect both the identity and identification of the Muslim people, caution towards the reductionism of Islamic fundamentalism to either monolithism or essentialism is recommended. Such a reductionism, he warns, obscures the various layers and meanings of identity and identification among militant ‘Islamists’, Muslim modernists, Muslim feminists and simply conservative Muslims. For discussion of the meanings of various fundamentalist movements since the 1970s in Arab-Islamic society see B. Ghalyun, Al-wa'y al-dhati [Self awareness] (Beirut: Dar al-Baraq li-al-Nashr 1988). For discussion of the rise of the hegemonic discourse on Islamic fundamentalism in the West, see J.E. Campo, ‘The Ends of Islamic Fundamentalisms: Hegemonic Discourse, and the Islamic Question in Egypt,’ in N. Keddie (ed.), Contention 4/3 (1995) pp.167–94. 88. For details on the relationship between the fundamentalists of this period and al-Salafiyya, see F. Rahman, Islam (New York: Random House 1966), especially pp.23–39. 89. This corroborates al-Jabiri's (note 35) identification of al-Salafiyya as a pluralist movement with many political affiliations from the left to the right. 90. For details on these structural inequalities see Ahmed (note 28) p.193. 91. For critical feminist analyses of the Egyptian Westernised style of government and how this style is a tool of domination compare Ahmed (note 28) and Z. Al-Ghazali, Ayyam min hayati [Days of my life] (Cairo: Dar As-shuruq 1995). 92. Ijtihad is an ongoing controversial issue among scholars. Many conservative scholars identify ijtihad as an intellectual exertion/creativity endowed exclusively upon the 'ulama trained in the madrasah. Conversely others argues that the 'ulama were hegemonic and elitist and that it was that this elitism induced the ‘closing’ of the process of ijtihad in the 13th century. A few others have demonstrated that the thirteenth century marked ‘the re-opening of ijtihad’ as evident in the work of Ibn Taymiyya (1263–1328). See A. Hourani, Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age 1798–1939 (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press 1983); A. Al-Haj Moinuddin, Ulama the Boon and Bane of Islamic Society (New Delhi: Kitab Bhava 1990). W. Hallaq Hallaq (‘Was the Gate of Ijtihad Closed?’, International Journal of the Middle East Studie 16 [1984] pp.3–41) considers that the view of the insidad (closing of ijtihad) believed by many to have occurred after the second/eighth century is ‘entirely baseless and inaccurate’ (p.4). The clarification is provided immediately by the author (Hallaq) in the note. He brilliantly shows that ijtihad was closed neither in theory nor in practice. First, he notes that ‘all groups and individuals who opposed it were finally excluded from Sunism’ (p.4). Second, he points out ‘that the more important point is that indivisibility (tajzi'a) of ijtihad was recognized to be lawful in Sunni laws’ (p.7). W. Mohd Nor Wan Daud (The Concept of Knowledge in Islam and Its Implications for Education in a Developing Country [London: Mansell 1989]) views ijtijad as both a process of individual intellectual exertion (fard 'ayn) and a social deliberative process (fard kifayya) geared to the common good of the Islamic Ummah. As such, these scholars position ijtihad as an ongoing process open to the evolution of history and the Muslim interpretative process over time. In addition, other scholars explain the criteria for ijtihad, namely that scholars follow the tradition of knowledge seeking and verification of the Islamic worldview of science, and comply with tajdid and islah as parallel axes of the process of their scientific discovery. Ghalyun (note 87); B. Ghalyun, Ightiyal al-'aql: Bayna al-salafiyya wa attaba'iyya [The assasination of the mind: between al-Salafiyya and dependency] (Beirut: Dar Attanwir 1987); M. 'Amara, Al-Islam, al-'uruba, wa al-'ilmaniyya [Islam, Arabisation and secularism] (Beirut: Dar al-Wahda 1981); M. 'Amara, Ma'alim al-manhaj al-Islami [Milestones in Islamic methodology] (Herndon, VA: IIIT 1992). For a glimpse of feminine ijtihad from women scholars (e.g. Zayn al-Din 1928) and Muslim women feminists (e.g. Fawwaz and Nasif 1910) see Belhachmi (note 1). For the importance of feminine ijtihad among contemporary women feminists, see Belhachmi (note 1). 93. R.R. Woodsmall (Moslem Women Enter a New World [New York: Round Table Press 1936]) reports that in the 1930s Christian women from conservative Egyptian towns were not only veiled, but also wore the habera, the traditional Egyptian garment (pp.53–54). Similarly, she notes, Syrian women of Aleppo, Hamah and Damascus wore the veil in order ‘to avoid being conspicuous’ (pp.50–51). 94. J. Tarabishi, 'Muhammad Jamil Bayhum wa qadiyyat al-mar'ah' [Muhammad Jamil Bayhum and the woman's question], Dirasat 'Arabiyya 17/2 (1980) p.82. 95. Zeidan (note 32) lists the international journals on Zayn al-Din's work such as al-Nisr (Brooklyn), al-Sai'h (New York), Mir'at al-Gharb; al-Shams (US), al-Rafiq (Mexico) and al-Khawatir (Mexico). Also, he cites reviews of her book in Jaridat al-Ittihad al-Lubnani (Buenos Aires), Fatat Lubnan (Sao Paulo), al-'Adl (Rio de Janeiro), Abu al-Hawl (Sao Paulo) and al-Zaman (Buenos Aires) (p.288). 96. Ibid. pp.396–97. 97. N. Zayn al-Din, Kitab al-sufur wa-al-hijab. Muhadarat wa-nazarat marmaha tahrir al-marah wa al-tajaddud al-ijtima'i fi al-'alam al-Islami [The book unveiling and veiling: lectures and views on the liberation of the woman and social renewal in the Islamic world] (Beirut: Matabi' Quzma 1928), p.225. 98. Ibid. p.214. 99. In the history of Sunni Islam, the political legacy of 'Aicha is essential and cannot be ignored by women scholars. After all, 'Aicha was a vigorous and vocal political opponent of the fourth caliph, 'Ali Ibn Abi Talib, and a key participant in the first Islamic civil war. Equally, 'Aicha left a scientific legacy in the interpretation of the hadith and fiqh for both genders. For an informative discussion of 'Aicha as the legitimate trustee (khalifa) of the Prophet and her legacy in the interpretation of both the Sunni and Shi'a traditions of Islam, see D.A. Spellberg, Politics, Gender, and the Islamic Past: The Legacy of 'Aisha bint Abi Bakr (New York: Columbia University Press 1994). 100. N. Zayn al-Din, 'Al-fatah wa-al-shuyukh. Nazarat fi wa munazarat fi al-sufur wa tahrir al-'aql wa tahrir al-mar'ah wa al-tajaddud al-Ijtima'ai fi al-'Alam al-Islami' [The young girl and the shuyukhs: views and lectures on unveiling and the liberation of the woman, and social renewal in the Islamic world] (Beirut: Matabi' Quzma 1929). 101. This documents women's leadership work on neo-partriarchy decades before men's scholarship on the subject. For example H. Sharabi, Neopatriarchy: A Theory of Distorted Change in Arab Society [New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press 1988] was written 60 years after Zayn's al-Din's pioneering and seminal work on Arab-Islamic patriarchy in the early 1920s. 102. Zayn al-Din probably inspired 'Aicha Abdelrahmane's writing on women's rights in Islam, which followed only a few years later in Egypt. See 'A. 'Abd al-Rahman [Bint al-Shati'], 'Al-Adab al-'Arabi al-Mu'assir', in Al-Adab al-'Arabi al-mua'sir: A'mal mu'tamar Ruma al-mun'aqid fi Tishrin al-awwal Sanat 1961 [Contemporary Arabic literature: proceedings of the conference of Rome in 1961] (Paris: Adwa' 1962) pp.132–169. For the author's definition of the Islamic view of women's liberation details, see 'A. 'Abd al-Rahman, Al-Mafhum al-Islami li tahrir al-mar'ah [The Islamic concept of the woman] (Cairo: Dar al-Hilal 1967). Also, Zayn al-Din's work is frequently translated by contemporary feminist scholars (e.g. A. Al-Hibri, (ed.), Women and Islam (New York: Pergamon Press 1982). 103. For more details on the communist and the Young Misr groups see Ahmed (note 28) p.192. 104. I deliberately use the term ‘Islamist’ here instead of ‘fundamentalist’ to mark the change in the philosophy and political orientation from 'Usuliyya linked with Wahhabism into a radical political movement against even progressive Islamic thinking in the 1940s. 105. Ahmed (note 28) p.197. 106. 'U.