The subtle micro aggressions of islamophobia

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

In the battle of Uhud, as Muhammad's wives supported their community carrying water to the battlefield, Hind led a dozen women of Meccan aristocracy to battle, singing war songs and playing tambourines. The Meccans won that battle and Hind - who lost a father and a brother to Muslims in previous wars - legend has it, has cut out the liver of a man who killed her father, as well as noses and ears of other fallen men. Standing amid the fallen and wearing necklaces made of body parts, she stood on a rock, triumphantly proclaiming victory.

I love this!

[Anonymous]

And about that Abu Sufyan...he didn't simply like mouthy women. His family was famous for them. Let's talk a little bit about another jahiliya woman who made her political opinions - that she had no use for Muhammad whatsoever - clearly known without any guardian or any such nonsense (exactly what the poster would have you believe simply did NOT happen pre-Islam). She was Abu Sufyan's sister named Umm Jamil.

Umm Jamil was the wife of Abu Lahab, Muhammad's uncle, who succeeded his other uncle, Abu Talib, who raised Muhammad, and despite never converting to Islam, gave Muhammad's clan some protection. After Abu Talib's death, Abu Lahab decided he didn't like his nephew after all, and turned him out by withdrawing protection over his group. Not one to forget the grudge, Muhammad delivered a Quranic verse cursing both Abu Lahab and his wife:

1. May the hands of Abu Lahab perish, may he (himself) perish.

2. His wealth avails him not, neither what he had earned.

3. Soon will he roast in a flaming fire,

4. And his wife, the bearer of the firewood,

5. Upon her neck a rope of twisted palm-fibre.

Why such rancor among people whose sin was not believing? Abu Lahab wasn't very nice to Muhammad, and neither was his wife Umm Jamil. Muhammad, according to some sources, was deeply stung that his own uncle would turn him out like that, as well as ridicule him for the death of his two young sons.

But I digress. Why do we care about Umm Jamil?

Because when she learned that Muhammad was carrying about with the verse cursing both of them, she grabbed a stone pestle and rushed to where Muhammad was - no doubt, to give him the what-for. God, glory be, was not sure how Muhammad would fare against the stone pestle, and quickly made him invisible.

"I have been told he's satirizing me", said Umm Jamil. "By God, if I found him, I would have smashed his mouth with this stone." With this stone! (Not for Umm Jamil the subtle micro-aggression. Nuh-huh. The girl went all out when she did). Then, she made her political opinion known by reciting this:

"We reject the reprobate.
His words we repudiate.
His religion we loathe and hate."

There you have it, ladies. The oppressed, chattel-like women of jahilyia running about with stone pestles, declaring their political opinions loud and clear - just not the ones Muslims like to talk about.

[Anonymous]

I have to get that book, it sounds riveting.

[Anonymous]

And here is an interesting little treatise on the state of marriage in pre-Islamic Arabia examined through surviving poetry and prose, by an Arab (!) author.

http://www.davidpublishing.com/davidpublishing/Upfile/3/18/2014/2014031801230398.pdf

A few interesting bits (may paste poorly because of formatting):

From the surviving pre-Islamic texts it may be learned that women had some say in whom they would marry. Some “daughters of noble families were not married off without their consent; they had the right to agree or reject” (Jawad 'Ali 1993; Collins and Coltrane 2000).
The evidence for this is quite manifest, including of course the case of Khadija the daughter of Khuwaylid who proposed herself to the Prophet. It was she who
took the initiative in this matter: “She said to him, so
they say, as a cousin: I want you because you are a
relative, and because you are honorable and of good
morals, and because you speak the truth” (Ibn Hisham
1996) Hind the daughter of 'Ataba (our good friend Hind!) likewise insisted to
her father, 'Ataba b. Rabi'a, that he must ask her
opinion if anyone came to ask for her hand. She said
to him: “I am a woman who is master of her own
affairs, and no man will marry me if you do not present him to me." He replied: “You have this right”
(Ibn Hisham 1996), She chose Abu Sufyan b. Harb as
her husband.

Women's right to divorce:

B.
Woman's
right
to
divorce
The wife in pre-Islamic Arabia could divorce her
husband on her own initiative, without any blame
being attached to her. Some women did in fact divorce
their husbands, in the following manner. If they were
in a tent made of hair, they turned it around: If its
entrance had been facing east, they made it face west,
and if it had been facing s
outh, they made it face north.
When the husband saw this he knew that he had been
divorced and did not enter the tent. This is what
Mawiya did to hatim al-Ta'i (Al-Marzuqi 1991).
Ibn Habib dedicated a special chapter to “The
women who were married and were able to stay if
they wished and leave if
they wished, due to their
honor and esteem” (Ibn Habib N.d.: 398-399).
He mentions the following: “Salma daughter of
'Amr, the mother of 'Abd al-Mutallib b. Hashim b.
'Abd Manaf; Fatima daughter of al-Kharshab
al-Anmariyya; Umm Kharija, 'Umra daughter of Sa'd
from Bajila; Mariya daughter of al-Ja'id; 'Atika
daughter of Murra, the mother of Hashim and Abd
Shams; and al-Sawa' daughter of al-A'yash”(Ibn
Habib N.d.: 398). “If she prepared food for her
husband when he awoke, it was a sign that she was content with him."

Divorced Women's Remarriage:

The Arabs in pre-Islamic times attached no shame whatsoever to marrying a divorced woman or a widow; it was a completely acceptable practice on both sides.

[Anonymous]

I can't wait to see how OP's midnight posts deal with these women....

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:And about that Abu Sufyan...he didn't simply like mouthy women. His family was famous for them. Let's talk a little bit about another jahiliya woman who made her political opinions - that she had no use for Muhammad whatsoever - clearly known without any guardian or any such nonsense (exactly what the poster would have you believe simply did NOT happen pre-Islam). She was Abu Sufyan's sister named Umm Jamil.

Umm Jamil was the wife of Abu Lahab, Muhammad's uncle, who succeeded his other uncle, Abu Talib, who raised Muhammad, and despite never converting to Islam, gave Muhammad's clan some protection. After Abu Talib's death, Abu Lahab decided he didn't like his nephew after all, and turned him out by withdrawing protection over his group. Not one to forget the grudge, Muhammad delivered a Quranic verse cursing both Abu Lahab and his wife:

Not quite. The author of the Quran is not Muhammad. It is Allah/God. Therefore, it was God Himself who delivered the verse cursing Abu Lahab, not Muhammad. Muhammad himself was an extraordinarily peaceful man. God was angry that his uncle betrayed His messenger.

1. May the hands of Abu Lahab perish, may he (himself) perish.

2. His wealth avails him not, neither what he had earned.

3. Soon will he roast in a flaming fire,

4. And his wife, the bearer of the firewood,

5. Upon her neck a rope of twisted palm-fibre.

Why such rancor among people whose sin was not believing? Abu Lahab wasn't very nice to Muhammad, and neither was his wife Umm Jamil. Muhammad, according to some sources, was deeply stung that his own uncle would turn him out like that, as well as ridicule him for the death of his two young sons.

Here you go again, not telling the full truth. It wasn't that they weren't very nice. They were trying to kill or injure him.

But I digress. Why do we care about Umm Jamil?

Because when she learned that Muhammad was carrying about with the verse cursing both of them, she grabbed a stone pestle and rushed to where Muhammad was - no doubt, to give him the what-for. God, glory be, was not sure how Muhammad would fare against the stone pestle, and quickly made him invisible.

"I have been told he's satirizing me", said Umm Jamil. "By God, if I found him, I would have smashed his mouth with this stone." With this stone! (Not for Umm Jamil the subtle micro-aggression. Nuh-huh. The girl went all out when she did). Then, she made her political opinion known by reciting this:

"We reject the reprobate.
His words we repudiate.
His religion we loathe and hate."

There you have it, ladies. The oppressed, chattel-like women of jahilyia running about with stone pestles, declaring their political opinions loud and clear - just not the ones Muslims like to talk about.

And if the wife was evil enough to throw thorns in the Prophets path so his feet would be cut and if she wanted him death, it should follow that all women held lofty positions of right and privilege in pre-islamic Arabia? Is this your persuasive argument? Her husband completely supported her in his own view so she was simply supporting her husband's position against the Prophet.

Nice try disparaging Islam again.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:And here is an interesting little treatise on the state of marriage in pre-Islamic Arabia examined through surviving poetry and prose, by an Arab (!) author.

http://www.davidpublishing.com/davidpublishing/Upfile/3/18/2014/2014031801230398.pdf

A few interesting bits (may paste poorly because of formatting):

From the surviving pre-Islamic texts it may be learned that women had some say in whom they would marry. Some “daughters of noble families were not married off without their consent; they had the right to agree or reject” (Jawad 'Ali 1993; Collins and Coltrane 2000).
The evidence for this is quite manifest, including of course the case of Khadija the daughter of Khuwaylid who proposed herself to the Prophet. It was she who
took the initiative in this matter: “She said to him, so
they say, as a cousin: I want you because you are a
relative, and because you are honorable and of good
morals, and because you speak the truth” (Ibn Hisham
1996) Hind the daughter of 'Ataba (our good friend Hind!) likewise insisted to
her father, 'Ataba b. Rabi'a, that he must ask her
opinion if anyone came to ask for her hand. She said
to him: “I am a woman who is master of her own
affairs, and no man will marry me if you do not present him to me." He replied: “You have this right”
(Ibn Hisham 1996), She chose Abu Sufyan b. Harb as
her husband.

Women's right to divorce:

B.
Woman's
right
to
divorce
The wife in pre-Islamic Arabia could divorce her
husband on her own initiative, without any blame
being attached to her. Some women did in fact divorce
their husbands, in the following manner. If they were
in a tent made of hair, they turned it around: If its
entrance had been facing east, they made it face west,
and if it had been facing s
outh, they made it face north.
When the husband saw this he knew that he had been
divorced and did not enter the tent. This is what
Mawiya did to hatim al-Ta'i (Al-Marzuqi 1991).
Ibn Habib dedicated a special chapter to “The
women who were married and were able to stay if
they wished and leave if
they wished, due to their
honor and esteem” (Ibn Habib N.d.: 398-399).
He mentions the following: “Salma daughter of
'Amr, the mother of 'Abd al-Mutallib b. Hashim b.
'Abd Manaf; Fatima daughter of al-Kharshab
al-Anmariyya; Umm Kharija, 'Umra daughter of Sa'd
from Bajila; Mariya daughter of al-Ja'id; 'Atika
daughter of Murra, the mother of Hashim and Abd
Shams; and al-Sawa' daughter of al-A'yash”(Ibn
Habib N.d.: 398). “If she prepared food for her
husband when he awoke, it was a sign that she was content with him."

Divorced Women's Remarriage:

The Arabs in pre-Islamic times attached no shame whatsoever to marrying a divorced woman or a widow; it was a completely acceptable practice on both sides.

Aaahhhh, and you are the same poster who said you never refuted that islam improved the status of women, eh? Looks like you are trying to prove exactly that.

Do you know who Leila Ahmed? She is an Egyptian American writer on Islam, women's studies professor at Harvard Divinity School, and recipient of the 2013 University of Louisville Grawemeyer Award in Religion for her analysis of the 'veiling' of Muslim women in the United States. She has a doctorate degree from University of Cambridge, had a professorship in Women’s Studies and Near Eastern studies at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and then had a professorship in Women's Studies and Religion at the Harvard Divinity School. She is a well known scholar in Islamic studies and, in particular, women's rights.

Read Women and Islam from Oxford Islamic Studies online. Here's what her research shows in response to the point you are trying to prove above:

"The Qur??n, Islam's holy book, changed women's status considerably from that of the pre-Islamic (j?hil?yah) period. Before Islam, both polyandrous and polygamous marriages were practiced, and matrilineal, uxorilocal marriages in which the woman remained with her tribe and the male either visited or resided with her were also quite common. Many women selected and divorced their own husbands, and women were neither veiled nor secluded; some were poets and others even fought in wars alongside men. As Leila Ahmed observes, while these “practices do not necessarily indicate the greater power of women or the absence of misogyny, they do correlate with women's enjoying greater sexual autonomy than they were allowed under Islam” (Ahmed, 1992, p. 42). Islam took away polyandrous marriages, and limited the number of female spouses to a maximum of four (Qur??n 4:1) as early Arabian Muslims gradually moved from a matrilineal to a patrilineal society. The pre-Islamic practice of female infanticide was outlawed by the Qur??n (81:8–9). The dower (mahr), which in pre-Islamic times was paid directly to a woman's male guardian (wal?), was now made payable directly to the woman (4:3), who was also given the rights to inherit property (4:7)."

If you deem sexual autonomy as the only measure of expansion of women's rights, then kudos to you as you have made your point. However, most women, particularly Muslim women, do not measure their status by how many men they can sleep with. There are many other, more important factors to consider, as Professor Ahmed points out.

Once again, nice try in attempting to tarnish Islam.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

If you deem sexual autonomy as the only measure of expansion of women's rights, then kudos to you as you have made your point. However, most women, particularly Muslim women, do not measure their status by how many men they can sleep with. There are many other, more important factors to consider, as Professor Ahmed points out.

Once again, nice try in attempting to tarnish Islam.

Well, since you're now all about Professor Ahmed, let's quote some more from her, shall we? Spin this:

“Islamic civilization developed a construct of history that labeled the pre-Islamic period the Age of Ignorance and projected Islam as the sole source of all that was civilized – and used that construct so effectively in its rewriting of history that the peoples of the Middle East lost all knowledge of the past civilizations of the religion. Obviously that construct was ideologically serviceable, successful concealing, among other things, the fact that in some cultures of the Middle East women had been considerably better off before the rise of Islam than afterwards.” (p.37)


Thanks very much, Dr. Ahmed.

[Anonymous]

P.S. I am still dying to know what was Umar's problem with large clitorises. And how did he know, anyway? You wanna take a crack at that?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

If you deem sexual autonomy as the only measure of expansion of women's rights, then kudos to you as you have made your point. However, most women, particularly Muslim women, do not measure their status by how many men they can sleep with. There are many other, more important factors to consider, as Professor Ahmed points out.

Once again, nice try in attempting to tarnish Islam.

I think being in charge of your sexual decision is important, yes. I also think the ability to select and divorce your husband at will is also very nice, and you must agree Islam imposed limits on women in this - for marriage, for requiring consent of guardian, and for divorce, for making women-initiated divorces dependent on the husband's or the judge's consent.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
And if the wife was evil enough to throw thorns in the Prophets path so his feet would be cut and if she wanted him death, it should follow that all women held lofty positions of right and privilege in pre-islamic Arabia? Is this your persuasive argument? Her husband completely supported her in his own view so she was simply supporting her husband's position against the Prophet.

Nice try disparaging Islam again.

My argument is - and I think I made it very well - that not all women in pre-Islamic Arabia were wordless, right-less chattels as you tried to present.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:And about that Abu Sufyan...he didn't simply like mouthy women. His family was famous for them. Let's talk a little bit about another jahiliya woman who made her political opinions - that she had no use for Muhammad whatsoever - clearly known without any guardian or any such nonsense (exactly what the poster would have you believe simply did NOT happen pre-Islam). She was Abu Sufyan's sister named Umm Jamil.

Umm Jamil was the wife of Abu Lahab, Muhammad's uncle, who succeeded his other uncle, Abu Talib, who raised Muhammad, and despite never converting to Islam, gave Muhammad's clan some protection. After Abu Talib's death, Abu Lahab decided he didn't like his nephew after all, and turned him out by withdrawing protection over his group. Not one to forget the grudge, Muhammad delivered a Quranic verse cursing both Abu Lahab and his wife:

Not quite. The author of the Quran is not Muhammad. It is Allah/God. Therefore, it was God Himself who delivered the verse cursing Abu Lahab, not Muhammad. Muhammad himself was an extraordinarily peaceful man. God was angry that his uncle betrayed His messenger.

1. May the hands of Abu Lahab perish, may he (himself) perish.

2. His wealth avails him not, neither what he had earned.

3. Soon will he roast in a flaming fire,

4. And his wife, the bearer of the firewood,

5. Upon her neck a rope of twisted palm-fibre.

Why such rancor among people whose sin was not believing? Abu Lahab wasn't very nice to Muhammad, and neither was his wife Umm Jamil. Muhammad, according to some sources, was deeply stung that his own uncle would turn him out like that, as well as ridicule him for the death of his two young sons.

Here you go again, not telling the full truth. It wasn't that they weren't very nice. They were trying to kill or injure him.

But I digress. Why do we care about Umm Jamil?

Because when she learned that Muhammad was carrying about with the verse cursing both of them, she grabbed a stone pestle and rushed to where Muhammad was - no doubt, to give him the what-for. God, glory be, was not sure how Muhammad would fare against the stone pestle, and quickly made him invisible.

"I have been told he's satirizing me", said Umm Jamil. "By God, if I found him, I would have smashed his mouth with this stone." With this stone! (Not for Umm Jamil the subtle micro-aggression. Nuh-huh. The girl went all out when she did). Then, she made her political opinion known by reciting this:

"We reject the reprobate.
His words we repudiate.
His religion we loathe and hate."

There you have it, ladies. The oppressed, chattel-like women of jahilyia running about with stone pestles, declaring their political opinions loud and clear - just not the ones Muslims like to talk about.

And if the wife was evil enough to throw thorns in the Prophets path so his feet would be cut and if she wanted him death, it should follow that all women held lofty positions of right and privilege in pre-islamic Arabia? Is this your persuasive argument? Her husband completely supported her in his own view so she was simply supporting her husband's position against the Prophet.

Nice try disparaging Islam again.

I can't believe that God, in all his venerable majesty, goes around bearing personal vendettas against individual humans. Why didn't God just make Abu Lahab fall into line?

PP's point was that this woman was expressing her political opinion loud and clear.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

If you deem sexual autonomy as the only measure of expansion of women's rights, then kudos to you as you have made your point. However, most women, particularly Muslim women, do not measure their status by how many men they can sleep with. There are many other, more important factors to consider, as Professor Ahmed points out.

Once again, nice try in attempting to tarnish Islam.

Well, since you're now all about Professor Ahmed, let's quote some more from her, shall we? Spin this:

“Islamic civilization developed a construct of history that labeled the pre-Islamic period the Age of Ignorance and projected Islam as the sole source of all that was civilized – and used that construct so effectively in its rewriting of history that the peoples of the Middle East lost all knowledge of the past civilizations of the religion. Obviously that construct was ideologically serviceable, successful concealing, among other things, the fact that in some cultures of the Middle East women had been considerably better off before the rise of Islam than afterwards.” (p.37)


Thanks very much, Dr. Ahmed.

Well of course. Didn't we just establish that women had greater sexual autonomy before Islam. Thats what they lost after Islam. Wasn't it you who said abstaining from fornication and adultery would be oppressive to you? Naturally, pre Islam would have afforded you the type of privileges you equate with status and power.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

If you deem sexual autonomy as the only measure of expansion of women's rights, then kudos to you as you have made your point. However, most women, particularly Muslim women, do not measure their status by how many men they can sleep with. There are many other, more important factors to consider, as Professor Ahmed points out.

Once again, nice try in attempting to tarnish Islam.

I think being in charge of your sexual decision is important, yes. I also think the ability to select and divorce your husband at will is also very nice, and you must agree Islam imposed limits on women in this - for marriage, for requiring consent of guardian, and for divorce, for making women-initiated divorces dependent on the husband's or the judge's consent.

Islam did not take these two rights away!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:P.S. I am still dying to know what was Umar's problem with large clitorises. And how did he know, anyway? You wanna take a crack at that?

I have no idea what you are talking about.