The Chronikler

Why doesn’t God use Faithbook?

By Khaled Diab

If God wants to reach out to humanity, why rely on prophets and scripture when he presumably has the power to connect with each of us directly?

3 September 2010

An article I recently read posits that, even if we were able to create a foolproof experiment to prove the existence of God, it would not only spell the end of atheism, but also of Christianity (and I presume the same applies to the other monotheistic religions), because without faith there can be no religion.

But do we really need to wait for God to rear his divine face to lay to rest the spectre of religion? For the sceptics among us, this is figuratively a doomsday scenario, as we would have to live with our doubts until the Day of Reckoning comes, which we, of course, highly suspect won’t arrive, leaving us stuck in a sort of secular purgatory for all eternity.

But it strikes me that we’re asking the wrong question here. God may prove to be an impossible hypothesis to (dis)prove, but the same does not apply to faith itself. I believe we can test the veracity of religion, especially religious scripture which claims to be divinely inspired or even revealed.  So, here is my own modest attempt to test run religion and show that it is not worthy of our faith.

God, the author, or humanity, the ghost writer?

The holy books of the three Abrahamic faiths all claim divine authorship, or at the very least, divine inspiration. But if scripture contains the word of God (or his son), why do the monotheistic religious texts show such clear signs of human authorship and contain a recycled mix of older, often polytheistic, myths and legends (Sumerian, Persian, Egyptian, etc.)?

Moreover, if the message in scripture, like the Supreme Being, is timeless and for all time, why do they teach us values and standards that we would, otherwise, find reprehensible and unacceptable, such as slavery (in Judaism, Christianity and Islam), the subjugation of women, the slaughtering of your (read God’s) enemies?

In defending religion, many believers will argue that scripture appeared in the context of a different time and place and, so, not all of it is binding in the modern context. But if we go down the road of selectively choosing which articles of faith to hold on it, what’s to stop us from ditching it all and starting from scratch to create something more appropriate?

Similarly, scripture contradicts so many scientifically proven facts – and contradicts itself, such as in the case of the creation of the world in Genesis I and Genesis II – that it would cast serious doubt on God’s knowledge of the Universe he reportedly created.

Scripture v Faithbook

The Abrahamic tradition of religion is founded on the dual pillars of message (in the form of scripture) and messenger (in the form of prophets and even the son of God). The most fundamental question this raises is: what is the point of this?

If God is omnipotent and omnipresent, surely he could conjure up more imaginative and effective ways to communicate with his creations. As any good communicator knows, messages are often distorted or corrupted in their transmission. So, what better way to avoid confusion than to drop outdated and outmoded scriptures and communicate with each of us directly?

After all, we humble humans already possess the technology, if it were universally distributed, to communicate with everyone on the planet, and social networking sites already boast hundreds of millions of users. So, why can’t God use his omni-powers to create some sort of interactive interface, a sort of Faithbook, to talk to every human? I’m sure he’d have billions of friends (or should that be worshippers?) if he did.

Some might say that God doesn’t have the time to waste on this, but I thought he had all the time in the Universe. Others might argue that this world is a test of our faith and, by revealing himself to each of us, God would be making it too easy. Well, Adam and Eve lived by God’s side and still they disobeyed him – that’s the beauty of free will.

Besides, as they stand, the Abrahamic religions are exclusive clubs that only save those who belong to them. If God is as just and loving as they say he is, then surely he would want to offer all humanity an equal shot at salvation. By addressing us individually, God would be doing the ultimate to empower and enfranchise his creations – not to mention, hold us accountable – and to democratise religion.

Raise prophets by cutting out the middlemen

As purportedly the ultimate proponent of equality, God should not be elevating some humans above others. Yet, between us and him, he has elevated prophets and clergy. If God’s prophets are meant to be role models to us all, why are so many of them such unpleasant characters or commit acts which would otherwise be regarded as reprehensible, or at the very least unacceptable: stealing from neighbours, committing war crimes, sexually coercing women and killing their husbands, committing incest, marrying children, murdering siblings, and much more.

And even though many prophets had commendable attributes, they were human and are, hence, fallible, so it is best that God cut out these middlemen – and they are always men.

Humanity’s forgotten half

The human race is, more or less, evenly divided between men and women. Despite the insistence of religious modernisers and reformers that God is an equal opportunities creator, scripture seems to place men consistently a cut above women, and demands that women obey men.

Right from the word go, Genesis informs us that Adam was created first and Eve was fashioned out of his rib (or simply created after him, according to the Islamic version). Not only is this creation myth totally unscientific, it also makes no symbolic sense. With the human reproductive functions being what they are, one would expect that, if anyone were to come second, Adam would follow Eve. Even at the molecular level, we see that two X chromosomes result in a female, while an X and a Y chromosome result in a male, which might suggest that the male gender is more ambiguous than the female.

To add insult to injury, Eve leads Adam astray by convincing him to eat from the forbidden Tree of Knowledge. In the Islamic version, they are both blamed equally but, still, there are numerous passages in the Qur’an which stress the inferior status of women. For example, Surat al-Nisa (Verse on Women) informs us quite explicitly that: “Men are the protectors and maintainers of women, because God has given the one more (strength) than the other, and because they support them from their means. Therefore, the righteous women are devoutly obedient, and guard in (the husband’s) absence what God would have them guard.”

This raises the question of why God is such a macho, especially considering that there’s little actual difference between the two genders, and women have consistently proven themselves men’s equals in all walks of life. If, as scripture seems to suggest, women are so much more imperfect and fallible than men, why on earth did the Supreme Being bother to create them? Couldn’t he have just made humanity asexual? Or could it be because it was man who created God in his image, rather than the other way around?

Tweet This

Related posts

• Faith in our children (1)
• Religious freedom at stake in Egypt (12)
• Polygamy for all (0)
• Face to faith: Ramadan for the faith-challenged (0)
• The God veto (0)

Religious freedom at stake in Egypt

By Osama Diab

If you don't fast during Ramadan in Egypt, lie about it; hide it. Otherwise, you might land in jail.

26 August 2010

Tarek Elshabini, a 21-year-old engineering student, is Muslim, but only according to his personal ID card. Every year when Ramadan comes, he faces a dilemma: he doesn't fast because he's an atheist, but everyone, including police officers, expects him to fast because he was born to a Muslim family.

In order to avoid any possible clashes between Elshabini and his family due to his non-religious credos, he decided to move away for a while until they are able to live with this new reality. Most families, in what was called the most religious country in the world by Gallup, would find it bitter to swallow the fact that their son does not believe God exists.

Elshabini managed to find a job in Hurghada as a bar tender in a night club to make his getaway, and on his second day in the Red Sea tourist city, he had to go to the police station to acquire the certificate of good conduct required by his new employer. After a few hours of struggling with governmental bureaucracy, Elshabini got his clean criminal record and was out of the police station at noon.

To kill his thirst, Elshabini stopped at the kiosk across from the police station for a soda. He stood there, bought a can of soda and lit a cigarette. Elshabini had no idea that last Ramadan at least 150 people were arrested in Aswan and Hurghada, where he just arrived, for eating, drinking or/and smoking in broad daylight during Ramadan. This was new and it was the first time it had occurred in Egypt.

It wasn't the last time though. This year, two micro-bus drivers were also arrested in Cairo for the same reason. A Ramadan crackdown was also carried out by police officers in Hurghada to arrest those who eat, smoke or drink publicly before sunset.

While Elshabini was smoking his cigarette and drinking his soda, a plain-clothed officer came up to him and asked what his name was before he invited him into the police station. "At this point, I thought that I might have forgotten something inside while getting my papers, and this very nice man was going to help me get it," explains Elshabini.

The officer knew from his middle name, Ahmed, that he was a "Muslim".

In Egypt, personal ID cards state the citizen's religions. The government of Egypt only recognises the three Abrahamic faiths: Islam, Christianity and Judaism. Therefore, atheists like Tarek, have to state one of these religions in their ID cards.

The officer then told Elshabini he was arrested on the charge of "public breaking of the fast" and locked him up in detention. For three hours, no one would talk to him or tell him what was happening until the officer who arrested him came back. "I kept telling him I was sorry, and that I forgot that it was Ramadan and that I was fasting; anything just to get myself out of this," says Elshabini.

Heba Morayef, a Human Right Watch researcher, explains that there is no such crime as "public breaking of the fast". "The arrest of people for smoking in public during Ramadan is illegal under both Egyptian and international law. These arrests are arbitrary in the absence of any legal provisions under Egyptian law," says Morayef.

After three hours of begging, Elshabini was finally released. "I'll believe you this time, and I'll let you off with no police report. How's that for a favor?" Elshabini says the officer told him.

Morayef also believes that these arrests seem to be occurring as a result of initiatives of individual police stations rather than a top-down policy by the ministry of interior. She believes, though, that this does not absolve the government of the responsibility for these illegal arrests. "The government must clearly issues instructions that its security officers do not have the right to arrest people who appear not to be fasting," she adds.

"Ramadan is the time of year that I would very much like to disappear from the face of the earth. Everybody is badly infected with this mass religious hysteria, and people start to interfere in other people's business," says Elshabini.

The story of Elshabini shows how Egypt's relatively secular police is becoming increasingly intolerant when it comes to freedom of religion. It also demonstrates the government's failure to acknowledge that there are people who might not believe in Islam, Christianity or Judaism. Egyptian law still does not address this issue either. Until last year, members of the Baha'i faiths had to write Muslim on their ID cards because the law does not recognise the Baha'ism as a religion. Last year, the court allowed Baha'is to choose to leave the religion field blank.

These arrests also show that freedom of religion and belief is in danger in Egypt which has always been known for its relative religious tolerance, especially in contrast with more theocratic regimes in the region, such as Saudi Arabia and most of the Gulf countries, Sudan and Iran, but for a second year in a row, this seems to be changing, at least on an unofficial level.

"After three of the most humiliating hours in my life, I couldn't believe what was happening. At some point, I thought that this was a TV show or something; that this was a trick, but unfortunately, every part of what happened was real," says Elshabini.

However, many Egyptians are against these arrests. A facebook group called 'Egyptians from all beliefs are against the arresting of non-fasters in Ramadan' attracted some 800 members in just a few days. "Respect expected by people who fast should be based on personal choice," says Hany Freedom, the creator of the online group who chose to go by his Facebook name. "Otherwise, how would the faster know if others are considerate out of conviction or only because they are forced to."

This article first appeared in The Staggers blog of The New Statesman on 23 August 2010. Republished here with the author's permission. Read comments on this article here. ©Osama Diab. All rights reserved.

Tweet This

Related posts

• Make Ramadan torture-free in Egypt (2)
• Face to faith: Ramadan for the faith-challenged (0)
• The fast and the furious (1)
• Secularism in a veil (0)
• Why doesn’t God use Faithbook? (0)

Make Ramadan torture-free in Egypt

By Osama Diab

It's Ramadan, but the Egyptian police continue to practise brutality and torture. This year, they should set a better example.

19 August 2010

Ramadan is the month during which the Qur'an was first revealed more than 1,400 years ago. Muslims are supposed to wash away their sins during this month because the reward for good deeds at this time is believed to be bigger. People are not only expected to abstain from eating and drinking during daylight, but also from malicious behaviour. Charity is also encouraged. The most visible signs of this in Egypt are the mawa'ed ar-rahman (tables of mercy) which are scattered all over the country offering poor people free food to break their fast.

Given the altruistic nature of Ramadan, we can only hope that torture and beating people to death are on the police's list of sins to wash away this month.

One thing is for certain: Egypt's police has a long list of sins for which they need to repent. News of police brutality and torture have dominated the pages of independent and opposition news outlets over the past two months. Khaled Said's killing, among other incidents of police brutality, has made Egyptians more furious than ever. Anti-brutality protests took place on an almost daily basis for a few weeks after Said's death. Unsurprisingly, the government responded to its accusers by claiming brazenly that it was just an isolated incident. But its decision to extend the emergency law a few months ago made clear that law enforcement is probably not going to get any less brutal.

These supposedly "isolated" brutal acts have been called "systematic" by human rights organisations. "Torture in Egypt has become epidemic, affecting large numbers of ordinary citizens who find themselves in police custody as suspects or in connection with criminal investigations", reads a Human Rights Watch report from September 2009.

Despite having such a poor record on human rights, the Egyptian police still feels righteous enough to conduct occasional morality raids. Last Ramadan, I wrote that the Egyptian police took a pious stand by arresting more than 150 people who publicly ate and smoked during fasting hours. I argued back then that the increasing religiosity of society, driven by the Muslim Brotherhood and Salafi movements, had put pressure on Egypt's relatively secular regime to act more "Islamic". This time around, a wholesale police campaign has been launched and endorsed by the interior ministry.

Many Muslims, including those in the police, think Ramadan is only about refraining from food, water, smoking and sex, and actually behave in a way that is completely antithetical to the principles of the month. For example, over-indulgence is common during iftar (the meal which breaks the fast), but part of the point of refraining from food is to experience its lack in order to sympathise with the poor. Restraint and self-discipline are the pillars of Ramadan, but many people still completely lose their temper during the hour before iftar when traffic is at its craziest and people are at their hungriest and thirstiest.

This Ramadan, the Ministry of the Interior should give strict orders to its men regarding the ill-treatment of citizens. Rather than giving orders to arrest people for eating and smoking publicly, it should declare Ramadan a torture-free month. In my opinion, it would be more "Ramadanic" to stop torturing people than forcing them to fast. Ramadan's philosophy is about forgiveness and tolerance, not the wielding of absolute authority over citizens who have committed no crime.

This column appeared in The Guardian Unlimited’s Comment is Free section on 11 August 2010. Read the related discussion. Reprinted here with the author's permission. © Osama Diab. All rights reserved.

Tweet This

Related posts

• Religious freedom at stake in Egypt (12)
• The fast and the furious (1)
• Criminal injustice in Egypt (1)
• Secularism in a veil (0)
• I say you want a revolution, Egypt (0)

Malta’s mash of civilisations

By Khaled Diab

Malta's complex heritage is living proof that cultures mash more than civilisations clash.

4 August 2010

Mdina, Malta's one-time capital. ©Khaled Diab

A fifth the size of Greater London, Malta is the smallest country in the European Union and one of the smallest in the world. Given its tiny proportions, it is no big surprise that Malta, which is actually geologically in Africa and less than 300 km away from Tunisia, does not register high in the consciousness of most Europeans, some of whom actually believe that Maltesers come from there.

After having spent a week on the island, I can reliably report that no aged Maltese artisans work with their young apprentices in little chocolatiers patiently passing down the secret of how to get the crunchy bit inside the chocolate ball.

Although the island is no Charlie and the Chocolate Factory wonderland, it is nonetheless a fascinating place where so many cultures have mixed and mashed that Malta has created its own rather original flavour.

Take the language. Maltese, an official language of the EU and the only Semitic language to be written in Latin script, sounds almost as if it is a dialect of Arabic, with Italian and English vocabulary thrown in. In fact, to my ears, it sometimes sounded more comprehensible than the Algerian dialect!

Given that the Arabs only ruled Malta for less than two centuries and the island is overwhelmingly Catholic, it is somewhat surprising that Arabic provides Maltese with its basic structure and an estimated 40% of its vocabulary. This is all the more impressive when you consider that Maltese is derived from Siculo-Arabic, a language that has died out in neighbouring Sicily.

Although the architecture of Malta, which has a strong Baroque character, has less of an Islamic feel about it than Sicily's, the evidence of the Arab presence lives on in a large number of place names, from the old capital, Mdina and its suburb, Rabat, to all the Marsa-this and the Marsa-that ("Marsa" means port in Arabic).

The Arab influence also survives in the cuisine and culture, including some forms of traditional Maltese music. For example, the improvised singing duels of traditional Maltese għana (derived from the Arabic for "song" and "wealth") bear a striking resemblance to the witty exchanges of poetic fire involved in traditional zajal.

This not only indicates an Arab influence but, more profoundly, reflects – as do many aspects of daily life, ancient superstitions and beliefs in the region – an underlying Mediterranean heritage predating both Christianity and Islam. In fact, given their long centuries of shared history, it could be argued that many Mediterranean countries have more in common with each other than with their coreligionists in, say, northern Europe or Arabia.

Despite Malta's obvious cultural mash, many will argue that the island is essentially European, and that the Arab and Islamic influence are the accidental leftovers of an unwelcome conquest. But this raises the tricky and thorny question of what exactly is 'European'.

If, by European, we mean Christian, then Malta probably qualifies more than most. It is not only home to one of the world's earliest Christian communities, it was also the base of the Knights Hospitaller. The knights, drawn as they were from all over Europe, have been described as the "first embryonic council of Europe", and their successful repulsion of a far larger invading Ottoman force in 1565 is the stuff of legend.

And it is this kind of standoff that people who believe in a monumental 'clash of civilisations' draw upon to justify their views. Two major failings of this theory, as I've argued before, are that it ignores the very real conflicts within individual civilisations, and it overlooks the fact that political alliances are multiple, shifting, and often cut across self-defined civilisational boundaries. This is because, although societies may sometimes come to blows over abstract principles, more often they clash over conflicting interests.

Malta's own history demonstrates this. Along with Sicily, it fell into Arab hands following an appeal for Muslim support from its Byzantine ruler in his power struggle with the Byzantine emperor, Michael II.

In addition, the clash between Catholics and Protestants has often been far more bitter than the clash between Islam and Christianity (a similar situation exists between Sunni and Shia Muslims). In Malta, Napoleon's occupation of the island was hugely unpopular because of its hostility towards Catholicism, not to mention its high taxes. Following British rule, Malta actually found common cause with other post-colonial states, such as Egypt, and became a member of the Non-Aligned Movement.

In an increasingly secular age, the suggestion that Europe is just a modern rehashing of what used to be known as 'Christendom' is not appealing or desirable to many, and they will argue that the EU is a union of values. And in terms of democracy and voter turnout, Malta is an exemplary member of the European club.

However, some traditional values that go against what we regard as fundamental freedoms in the modern age continue on the island. For example, divorce is still illegal in Malta, and the public controversy surrounding a bill to legalise it does not bode well. Abortion is also illegal in Malta, whereas, for instance, Albania has some of the most progressive abortion laws in the world.

Malta's complex and mixed heritage, and its continuing cultural and economic ties with the southern Mediterranean, made the island the most reluctant of the new member states to join the EU. Union membership remains something of a contentious issue on the island, as demonstrated by former Labour prime minister Karmenu Mifsud Bonnici's recent pronouncements on the subject.

I personally do not think that Malta should pull out of the EU. Rather, the prospect of future EU membership should be extended to other Mediterranean countries who manage to meet the necessary legal, political and economic criteria. This would not only finally lay to rest the notion that there is some kind of inherent 'clash of civilisations', it would also enable the EU and its Med neighbours to benefit from the region's young population and (renewable) energy resources.

Tweet This

Related posts

• Turkey’s eastern promise (0)
• The mythical European Umma (3)
• What’s the difference between Obama and an Arab? (0)
• The bold and the brilliant (8)
• Secularism in a veil (0)

The freedom of non-expression

By Osama Diab

Advocates of banning the face veil want to take away the only choice some women have – the choice to conform.

28 July 2010

She used to love to sing, dance and swim. She used to daydream of summertime when there was no school and when she could spend the entire day at the beach swimming and building a castle out of sand. She used to do this every year until she was 11 when her mother told her she couldn't wear a swimsuit anymore. When she requested an explanation, her mother simply told her that she was "a big girl now". Puzzled by her mother's words, she thought there was something wrong with her or with her body.

However, they still went to the beach, but the women would sit there mostly covered while the men (her father and younger brother) would enjoy their time in the water. Through this experience, she learned that boys and girls are different. She grew to understand that her actions are not just going to affect her but her entire family.

A few years later when she grew breasts, her mother stopped allowing her to buy certain clothes because they were "too tight" or "too transparent". "You have the entire shop to choose from and you choose this," her mother would chastise her. Her brother would come from the men's section with a pile of clothes which the mother wouldn't even glance at.

The girl was very attractive as a teenager and drew the uninvited attention of men and boys. Since this was new to her, she thought there must be something wrong with the way she dressed or acted. When her family found out about one of the harassment incidents, instead of showing sympathy, they were angry at her.

She eventually chose to wear the hijab and act very seriously, believing that this would keep men away from her. She also knew that she could be a great source of pride for her family if she behaved like a "good girl", or a source of shame if she didn't. So the other reason why she decided to cover her hair was the positive feedback she was expecting from them. She didn't want to be perceived as immoral, useless and a source of disgrace.

After she told her mother, her mother called her friends and siblings and proudly boasted to them about "what a great daughter she has"  who chose "voluntarily" to wear the hijab at just 16.

After high school, she wanted to study acting, but knew that wasn't realistic. Her mother told her, "Out of all the schools in the world, you choose acting. What's wrong with engineering, business, or even languages." She "chose" to study English instead.

At college, she fell in love for the first time in her life. The man had a Muslim name, but was from a Bahai'i family. She was too afraid to tell her mother about it, but when she had the courage to do so, her mother screamed, "Out of all the men in the world, you choose a Bahai'i. I really wish you would die. You need to stop seeing this guy immediately."

The next guy was Muslim and fitted most of her family's criteria. Her family blessed the marriage. One day before her wedding, her mother gave her advice on how to act in bed: "Men get very suspicious really easily. Act like you know nothing and have no experience. Men like innocent girls."

She considered telling her husband about her sexual needs and what she would like to experience, but she was too afraid of his reaction or what he might think of her. She decided to live with no sort of sexual communication and even tried to get these ideas out of her head because these things are just not right.

Despite these disappointments, she didn't quite notice that she had little influence over the course of her life, and that it was all predetermined and designed by both her parents and society. She never really dwelt on how social rules and taboos were such a powerful force that she had little option but to abide by them.

She heard on the news that Syria had decided to ban the niqab in schools and that a general ban was being discussed in some European countries. She found that this was s unfair and believed that it should be the woman's choice whether or not to cover her face. The government should simply have no say in it. Even though she agrees that it has nothing to do with Islam, she is still very angry that some people would ban somethingthat enabled women to exhibit their modesty.

Her mind became more accepting of the idea that the West is at war with Islam. She became more appreciative of her values and how she was brought up, and refused to question either.

As a sign of that appreciation and conviction, she decided that when she turns 40, she would don the niqab. She informed her husband and parents and they praised her decision and told her that it would make her a great role model for her daughters.  On her 40th birthday, she celebrates by covering her face, firm in the belief that it was all her own choice.

Published here with the author's consent. ©Osama Diab. All rights reserved.

Tweet This

Related posts

• A ban to celebrate (0)
• The bold and the brilliant (8)
• Een verbod om te vieren (0)
• In the name of equality (0)
• Covering heads and veiling poverty (5)

Miss USA 2010 and an Islamic cover-up

By Khaled Diab

Rima Fakih's Miss USA win is welcomed by many Arab-Americans, but some neocons denounce it as a sinister Islamic plot.

Monday 24 May 2010

When beauty contests mix with geopolitics, things can get rather ugly. This was demonstrated last weekend by the crowning of Rima Fakih as Miss USA, the first Arab-American and Muslim to win the title.

The 24-year-old, who moved to the United States from her native Lebanon in the early 1990s, was understandably proud to become the crowned figurehead of American beauty for a year. She, her family and many Arab-Americans also hope her victory will give her embattled and distrusted community a much-needed facelift.

"My father always says, 'You don't know who you are until you know where you come from'. I believe in that," Fakih says.

Her brother, Rabih, believes his sister challenges prevalent western stereotypes of the Muslim woman: "This will show the good part of Arab-Americans. A lot of people think this area of the world is only about people being covered."

The western image of Muslim women is largely shrouded in the veils – in the form of hijabs, niqabs and burqas – of a grand patriarchal cover-up. This partly explains the mirth and amusement derived from stories of Arabs organising beauty contests for their camels and goats, or crowning Miss Beautiful Morals.

Less widely covered or known is the fact that, despite the objections of conservative Muslims, many Arab and Muslim countries run beauty contests of a similar ilk to their western counterparts. In some ways it's hardly surprising that the first Arab-American Miss USA – which I've discovered is actually different from Miss America – should happen to be Lebanese.

Lebanon is a country where glamour and beauty are a major export industry in the form of sexy singers, both female and male. As a sign of this, its own Miss Lebanon title comes with a $500,000 prize and, in Rima Fakih's words, elicits a kind of "Superbowl" fever among Lebanese.

Other Arab and Muslim beauty contests include Miss Egypt and Miss Indonesia, not to mention the less racy but more inclusive – in terms of dress and dress size – Miss Arab World. Beauty contests were even used as a propaganda tool by Saddam Hussein, with the 2000 crown won by his 15-stone niece.

I am in two minds about the value of beauty contests. On the one hand, they reflect the misogynistic objectification of the female body – even if we do have a few male equivalents nowadays. On the other, celebrating physical beauty is often just innocent fun in the eyes of its beholders and people should be proud of their bodies. The trouble here is the ever-narrowing definition of what constitutes beauty and how this can trigger low self-esteem, eating disorders and other psychological problems.

And when it comes to Muslim women, beauty contests, despite their tedious superficiality, can be a form of empowerment. As a type of metaphorical bra-burning, they allow women to shed the stifling skin of the modest garments conservative Muslims would like to shackle them in and enable them, in an act of subversion to propriety, to revel in their beauty.

At another level, this challenges the easy and lazy stereotypes that anti-Muslim bigots depend on for their demonisation. And Fakih's victory has left the influential outer fringes of the conservative right in something of a pickle: they don't like it that an Arab and Muslim has won but are having trouble forming a coherent case against her, so instead they have resorted to bizarre conspiracy theories.

Daniel Pipes, a neocon intellectual closely linked to the former Bush administration, compiled a list of five other Muslim winners of beauty contests on both sides of the Atlantic (mostly minor ones, including Miss Nottingham 2005), and asked whether this was "an odd form of affirmative action".

Conservative commentator Debbie Schlussel pulled out all the stops, using Fakih's Shia Lebanese background to brand her a terrorist "Miss Hezbollah" and dismissed the colourful business magnate Donald Trump, who is one of the sponsors of the event, as an Islamic "dhimmi".

"Mark my word. Hezbollah is laughing at us, tonight," Schlussel raged. And why? Obviously, because "one of its auxiliary members won the Miss USA title without having to do a thing to denounce them and their bloody murder of hundreds of Americans".

Schlussel does not provide details of Fakih's alleged Hezbollah connection, except to quote unnamed "intelligence sources" who apparently confirm that some of her family members are linked to it. But, given the fact that, in addition to its armed wing, Hezbollah is a large political party, social service provider and the de facto government of the predominantly Shia south, the vast majority of Lebanese Shia – and even many Sunnis and Christians – are inextricably tied with the party. In fact, this is even less meaningful than saying an Israeli has links with the IDF, as pretty much all Israelis, even pacifist peace activists, have family ties with the country's military.

Another problem Schlussel's conspiracy theory runs up against is the fact that Hezbollah, being a conservative Islamic organisation, it is unlikely to be recruiting a scantily clad beauty queen as an agent provocateur. In a contorted effort to explain this, Schlussel falls back on an old neocon chestnut: "Muslims frequently go against Islam in this way for propaganda purposes. It's a form of taqiyyah, the Muslim concept of deceiving infidels."

But this reveals a complete and utter misunderstanding of the concept. Derived from the Arabic for "to guard against", taqiyya is a notion which allows Shia Muslims – in periods of imminent danger and persecution – to conceal their faith in order to avoid harm. That it should be a Shia concept is perhaps understandable, and this has little to do with "infidels", but is because of the persecution they have endured over the centuries from their Sunni co-religionists.

I very much doubt that, despite the venom of Schlussel and other conservatives, Fakih feels threatened in the United States. She strikes me as a young woman who loves her adoptive and native homeland and wishes to act as a cultural bridge between the two.

This article appeared in the Guardian newspaper's Comment is Free section on 18 May 2010. Read the full discussion here.

Tweet This

Related posts

• The bold and the brilliant (8)
• The mythical European Umma (3)
• Building intolerance in Switzerland (3)
• Beauty and the bleat (0)
• سبيل للخروج من فوضى الشرق الأوسط (0)

The bold and the brilliant

An Arab-American Miss USA may have put Muslim beauty on the western map, but let's also recall all those women of courage and talent.

It surprised me that my previous article was the most read on CiF on the day of its publication. But equipped with the wonders of hindsight, I should’ve realised that it had all the ingredients of a ripping yarn: a dastardly conspiracy (theory), beautiful but dangerous undercover (or is that uncovered?) double agents armed with sexy bombshells, and mad neo-cons hatching far-fetched plots.

Quite a number of readers found that Miss USA, Rima Fakih, dependent as she is on her looks, was not the most rousing role model for Muslim female empowerment and asked why no similar attention was accorded all those successful and inspirational Muslim women who have made inroads into what is still largely a man’s world.

So, in tribute to the many remarkable women in the Muslim world (including non-Muslims) throughout the centuries – both remembered and forgotten, loved or ridiculed – here’s a list of 10 mould-breaking women. They appear in chronological order.

1.      Mother of the faithful

Khadijah bint Khuwaylid (555-619), “Ameerat Quraysh” (the Princess of Quraysh), Mecca’s wealthiest and most powerful woman, was Muhammad’s first wife. She has the distinction of being the world’s first convert to Islam.

2.      Battle of the sexes

The battleground is one oft-forgotten theatre of the battle of the sexes. Although women have fought alongside men ever since the earliest days of Islam right down to the modern struggle for Algerian and Palestinian independence, their direct contribution to the defence of the community is regularly overlooked because it does not conform to the subdued image of the woman as wife and mother.

Muhammad’s youngest wife Aisha bint Abu Bakr (died 678) is a controversial figure, particularly in the west, because of the young age at which she appears to have been betrothed to the elderly prophet. Less well known is that she was not only a central figure in spreading Islam after his death, earning the title Mother of the Believers, but that she also led  an army into battle.

But the title of the fiercest Arab woman of all must go to Hind bint ‘Utbah - despite her demonisation and unfounded rumours of her commiting cannibalism on the battlefield - who was as daring in her opposition to Muhammad before her conversion as she was in his defence after it. 

3.      Universal woman

At 12 centuries old, the University of  al-Qarawiyyin in Fes (Morocco) is reportedly the world’s oldest academic degree-granting university in the world. This esteemed establishment was set up by Fatima al-Fihri (died 880) in 859.

But medieval Muslim women were not only patrons of academic establishments, they were also prominent scholars. According to the 12^th-century Sunni scholar Ibn Asakir, girls and women could study and earn ijazahs (academic degrees), and qualify as scholars (ulema) and teachers. He, himself, studied under 80 female teachers. In the 15^th century, the Egyptian scholar al-Sakhawi devotes an entire volume of his 12-volume of his biographical dictionary Daw al-lami – an early Who’s Who – to over a thousand female scholars.

However, things got progressively worse for women until the modern emancipation movement began in the late 19^th century. Today, female enrolment in universities is as high, or even higher, than male enrolment. However, the number of top women scientists is relatively small due to the 'glass ceiling'. Nevertheless, there are award-winning women scientists who are at the top of their field.

4.      Around the throne in 80 days

From modest beginnings as a slave of probable Turkic origin in the royal household, Shajaret al-Durr (died 1257 ), whose name means Tree of Pearls, rose to become the wife of the Ayyubid Sultan as-Salih Ayyub. When her husband died at the most inopportune moment possible – during the landing of the Seventh Crusade in Damietta on the Nile Delta – she decided to conceal his death until the successful completion of the campaign to repel the crusaders. 

Amid the political turbulence that ensued, the former slave girl was chosen by the elite slave warriors known as “Mamluks” as Egypt’s Sultana, the first and only female ruler of Egypt in Islamic times. After only 80 days as queen, she passed the throne to her new husband, but continued to rule by proxy, despite her husband’s better efforts to contain her. After she had him murdered, she was confined to a tower and then brutally murdered herself.

Shajaret al-Durr left a profound legacy on her adoptive land: she not only helped defend it against the crusaders but she also established the prosperous and dynamic Mamluk era of Egyptian history when the country underwent the unique experiment of being ruled by elite slaves.

Another prominent woman ruler and contemporary of Shajaret al-Durr – who also happened to be a former slave of Turkic origin – was Razia Sultana who sat on the throne in Delhi from 1236-1240. 

In modern times, many Muslim-majority countries – including Pakistan (Benazir Bhutto), Indonesia (Megawati Sukarnoputri), Bangladesh (Khaleda Zia and Sheikh Hasina) and Turkey (Tansu Çiller) – have been led by women.

5.      Forgotten feminist pioneer

Hoda Sha’rawi is widely considered to be the founder of the modern feminist movement in Egypt and probably the entire Arab world. Given how she rebelled against the male order and placed women at the forefront of the struggle for Egyptian independence, she certainly deserves her place in the history books.

However, she was by no means the first, and she has plenty of predecessors who have been lost to the mists of time. Thanks to the posthumous efforts of her younger brother, the memory of one of these early 'unknown soldiers' was rescued from, quite literally, the 'no man’s land' of collective oblivion. History, after all, is not only written by the victor, but usually by men.

Malak Hifni Nassef (1886-1918) scored a number of impressive firsts in Egypt: the first woman to get a degree from a government school, the first woman to lecture publicly, and the first to publish poetry in a mainstream journal – and at the age of only 13. We know little about her life, but the list of major figures at her funeral attest to the esteem she was held in during her lifetime. And, in contrast to other early women reformers who tended to be from the upper class, Nassef was from the middle class.

Inspired by events in Egypt and the Egyptian Renaissance, women in the Levant also took up their cause. One prominent figure was May Ziade (1886-1941), a Palestinian-Lebanese Christian poet, essayist and translator. 

 6.      A mighty pen

Despite being a physician and psychiatrist by training, Nawal el-Saadawi (born 1931) describes herself as “a novelist first, a novelist second, a novelist third”. She  has, in more than 50 novels, revolutionised the treatment of Egyptian women in fiction, and wielded her pen as her mightiest weapon in the battle for female emancipation.

Her writings have covered numerous controversial feminist themes, including women’s inferior position in religion and female genital mutilation, and their author has endured imprisonment, death threats and attempts to forcibly divorce her from her husband.

Luckily for Egypt, which is in danger of seeing certain gains scored by women reversed, the fight has not died in Saadawi, despite being almost 80. “I am becoming more radical with age,” she recently told the Guardian.

 7.      Bright and constant star

Known as 'Ambassador to the stars', Fairuz is not only the national pride of Lebanon but is the most famous living singer in the Arab world. She was born with the name Nouhad Haddad into a poor Maronite Christian family in 1935, and Arabs may have been deprived of her beautiful voice had her conservative father not relented and allowed her to attend the Lebanese Conservatory, albeit with her brother as chaperon.

Her breakthrough into the big time came in 1957 and throughout the 1960s she was the “first lady of Lebanese singing”, although she was overshadowed on the Arab stage by the giant Umm Kalthoum. Widely regarded as the enchanting voice of Arab nationalism, her output has been prolific and has included hundreds of songs and musical operettas.

Throughout her long career Fairuz showed enormous courage: she refused to give private concerts to Arab leaders (for which she once got banned) and never left her country during its tumultuous civil war.

 8.      Across enemy lines

Everyone recalls, whether approvingly or critically, Egyptian President Anwar Sadat’s audacious trip, in 1977, to Jerusalem to talk peace at the Israeli Knesset. But he was actually beaten there by a fellow Egyptian woman, though history has condemned her to oblivion.

More than three years earlier, at a time when the only Arabs and Israelis who met were soldiers or spies, Sana Hasan, a PhD student in her mid-20s, went to Israel as the Arab world’s first, albeit unofficial and ostracised, peace envoy and probably its most unusual. Her six-week trip turned into a three-year sojourn, from 1974 to 1977, in which she seems to have met, well, just about everyone in Israel, in an attempt to understand her people’s enemy and build bridges to peace.

9.      Scholar and state-builder

When it comes to the Palestinian struggle, one should not forget Hanan Ashrawi (born 1946), who played a pivotal role in the First Intifada and subsequent peace process, where she served as the Palestinian delegations spokesperson.

She has also been elected numerous times to the Palestinian Legislative Council and established the Department of English at Birzeit University. She currently runs Miftah, the Palestinian Initiative for the Promotion of Global Dialogue and Democracy.

10.  The right fight

Across the Arab and Muslim world, courageous women are active as human rights activists. One prominent example is Asma Jahangir (born 1952), the prominent Pakistani lawyer who has built a career defending the rights of women, children and religious minorities. 

During her long career, Jahangir has put herself in the firing line defending Muslims and Christians who have fallen foul of Pakistan’s controversial and intolerant 'Hudood' ordinance and blasphemy laws which were put in place as part of Pakistani dictator General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq’s 'Islamisation programme'.

Jahangir is currently the UN’s Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief.

This is the extended version of an article which appeared in The Guardian's Comment is Free section on 25 May 2010. Read the related debate.

Tweet This

Related posts

• What’s the difference between Obama and an Arab? (0)
• The freedom of non-expression (1)
• Secularism in a veil (0)
• Religious freedom at stake in Egypt (12)
• Miss USA 2010 and an Islamic cover-up (1)

By the book

By Khaled Diab

Following the lead of Islamists, Egyptian Christians are trying to ban an award-winning novel because it 'insults' Christianity.

18 May 2010

Tweet This

Related posts

• Polygamy for all (0)
• For Allah’s sake! (4)
• Egyptian football’s pious turn (0)
• Egypt: a society of taboos (2)
• Church and state in Egypt (2)

Een verbod om te vieren

Badra Djait

Het zogenaamde 'burqaverbod' is een vrouwvriendelijke wetvoorstel.

3 mei 2010

English version

België zou het eerste land ter wereld worden met een wetsvoorstel dat personen bestraft die in het openbaar ‘het gezicht geheel of gedeeltelijk bedekken’ zodat ze niet langer herkenbaar zijn. Hoewel het breder is dan dat, wordt deze wet ook wel het burqaverbod genoemd. Met andere woorden, wie voortaan een burqa draagt die het hele lichaam bedekt of een niqab die de ogen vrij laat, kan bestraft worden tot zeven dagen cel.

Als Vlaamse vrouw van Algerijnse herkomst kan ik dit voorstel alleen maar toejuichen. Hoe kan je nu als westerse islamitische vrouw zorgeloos een burqa dragen, het internationaal gekend symbool bij uitstek van Afghanistan, en tegelijkertijd verklaren dat dit niets te maken heeft met de ultieme minderwaardigheid en onderdrukking van de vrouw?

In het land van mijn ouders, Algerije, zijn de “burqa’s” niet welkom en wordt de typische zwarte lange niqab, geïmporteerd uit Saoudi-Arabië, niet graag gezien. Terwijl in Brussel vrouwen met een burqa of een niqab worden nagestaard, worden ze in Algiers getreiterd. Enkele jaren geleden stapten op de openbare bus in Algiers een vrouw met een zwarte lange niqab en haar bebaarde man. Na enkele minuten stapten ze al snel van de bus af. Ze werden letterlijk buiten gepest door de Algerijnse medereizigers. Ik veronderstel dat Algerije in deze kenmerkende gezichtssluier het symbool zag van de angst voor en de terreur van het religieus fundamentalisme dat het land heeft geteisterd in de jaren negentig. Zij weten wat deze sluier die een religieus-politieke boodschap uitstraalt, kan betekenen.

Ik ben dan ook telkens verwonderd dat verscheidene organisaties klaar staan om zich te kanten tegen dit wetsvoorstel. Volgens Amnesty International is een algemeen verbod op gezichtssluiers in strijd met de mensenrechten, meer bepaald met de godsdienstvrijheid en de vrijheid van meningsuiting. Weet deze organisatie dan niet dat de religieuze fanatici – voornamelijk voor 11 september – politiek asiel kregen in het westen en hun strijd voor een religieuze staat in het land van oorsprong verder zetten, onder het mom van godsdienstvrijheid en het recht op vrijheid van meningsuiting? Soms denk ik dat deze organisaties eerder bezig zijn met een zuiver theoretische ideologische strijd.

Een andere organisatie, Human Rights Watch, is tegen het burqaverbod omdat men de keuzevrijheid van de vrouwen moet beschermen. Volgens deze organisatie is een individuele aanpak noodzakelijk in de bescherming van deze vrouwen. Dient de overheid dan de klederdracht van elke vrouwelijke burger op te volgen en na te vragen of ze al dan niet gedwongen is om een burqa of een niqab te dragen?

Ook islamitische organisaties kantten zich tegen het voorstel. Baas Over Eigen Hoofd (BOEH!) meldt dat er geen specifiek wetsvoorstel moet komen voor de enkele vrouwen die hier met een burqa rondlopen. De opmerking dat dit probleem zich weinig stelt, en dus niet dringend is, heeft veel van de struisvogelpolitiek. De situatie in andere Europese landen tonen aan dat het probleem zich binnenkort ook bij ons duidelijk zal stellen.

De moslimexecutieve, de officiële gesprekspartner met betrekking tot de islam in België die een aantal jaren geleden nog in de media verklaard heeft dat de burqa geen religieus symbool is en dat het niet past binnen de islam, noemt het verbod vandaag ‘vrijheidsberoving’ en ‘discriminerend’. Ook zij beroepen zich vandaag op de godsdienstvrijheid.

Aanvankelijk dacht ik dat de strijd van enkele islamitische organisaties eigenlijk niet gaat om het recht op de niqab of de burqa, maar dat het eerder gaat om een strijd voor aanvaarding, de aanvaarding van de moslimburgers als medeburgers. Alhoewel. Ik geloof eigenlijk niet meer in deze nobele beweegreden van sommigen. Denken we aan de organisatie Sharia 4 Belgium dat recentelijk publiekelijk heeft verklaard op te komen voor een islamitische rechtsstaat in België.

The English version of this article first appeared in the Guardian newspaper's Comment is Free section on 23 April 2010. Read the full discussion here. Republished here with the author's consent.

Tweet This

Related posts

• A ban to celebrate (0)
• The freedom of non-expression (1)
• The bold and the brilliant (8)
• Why doesn’t God use Faithbook? (0)
• We don’t need no segregation (0)

A ban to celebrate

By Badra Djait

Belgium's effort to ban the face veil is a statement of female empowerment and a vote against religious fundamentalism.

3 May 2010

Nederlands versie

Tweet This

Related posts

• Een verbod om te vieren (0)
• The freedom of non-expression (1)
• The bold and the brilliant (8)
• I say you want a revolution, Egypt (0)
• Zero tolerance=zero difference (1)