Allegorical Gender

Introduction In the last decade, a number of monographs and forays in the field of Muslim women’s studies have attempted to examine the place of the Muslim woman in the interpretive heritage of Islamic exegetical texts, particuly the hadith tufsir literature from the period of classical Islam.’ The...

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Autor principal: Hibba Abugideiri
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Lenguaje:EN
Publicado: International Institute of Islamic Thought 1996
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spelling oai:doaj.org-article:6eba53a56d99446192532b66c51ddcff2021-12-02T19:40:12ZAllegorical Gender10.35632/ajis.v13i4.22962690-37332690-3741https://doaj.org/article/6eba53a56d99446192532b66c51ddcff1996-01-01T00:00:00Zhttps://www.ajis.org/index.php/ajiss/article/view/2296https://doaj.org/toc/2690-3733https://doaj.org/toc/2690-3741 Introduction In the last decade, a number of monographs and forays in the field of Muslim women’s studies have attempted to examine the place of the Muslim woman in the interpretive heritage of Islamic exegetical texts, particuly the hadith tufsir literature from the period of classical Islam.’ The figure of Eve (Hawwa’ in Qur’anic terminology) is an inevitable topic of discussion in all of these scholarly studies, primarily due to her definitive role in the evolution of gender categories in the Islamic exegetical texts, and, subsequently, how this role has become an indicator of direction for the Muslim woman’s identity. The figure of Eve, in short, as articulated by Muslim classical exegetes, has not ony defined the identity of Muslim woman; it has also set the parameters for how that identity has been forged. Yet, the traditional view of Eve portrays woman as both physically and mentally inferior to man, as well as spiritually inept. This classical interpretation of Eve has come to be endowed with sacred authority, more so by virtue of its place in our Islamic past than by any Qur’anic sanction. This is not to imply that all of the medieval classical writings on Islam constitute a monolithic whole. After all, the sources of the Shari‘ah, namely, the Qur’an and the hadith, historically have been highly adaptable texts: In the case of the Qur’an, its directives are general, broad, and flexible in most cases; therefore they could be translated into the terms of a specific social reality of each generation of interpreters. Concerning the hadith . . . given the inevitable gap between the actual and the idealized. . . it is not surprising that the Hadith contains an abundance of varied and often contradictory traditions, ... Hibba AbugideiriInternational Institute of Islamic ThoughtarticleIslamBP1-253ENAmerican Journal of Islam and Society, Vol 13, Iss 4 (1996)
institution DOAJ
collection DOAJ
language EN
topic Islam
BP1-253
spellingShingle Islam
BP1-253
Hibba Abugideiri
Allegorical Gender
description Introduction In the last decade, a number of monographs and forays in the field of Muslim women’s studies have attempted to examine the place of the Muslim woman in the interpretive heritage of Islamic exegetical texts, particuly the hadith tufsir literature from the period of classical Islam.’ The figure of Eve (Hawwa’ in Qur’anic terminology) is an inevitable topic of discussion in all of these scholarly studies, primarily due to her definitive role in the evolution of gender categories in the Islamic exegetical texts, and, subsequently, how this role has become an indicator of direction for the Muslim woman’s identity. The figure of Eve, in short, as articulated by Muslim classical exegetes, has not ony defined the identity of Muslim woman; it has also set the parameters for how that identity has been forged. Yet, the traditional view of Eve portrays woman as both physically and mentally inferior to man, as well as spiritually inept. This classical interpretation of Eve has come to be endowed with sacred authority, more so by virtue of its place in our Islamic past than by any Qur’anic sanction. This is not to imply that all of the medieval classical writings on Islam constitute a monolithic whole. After all, the sources of the Shari‘ah, namely, the Qur’an and the hadith, historically have been highly adaptable texts: In the case of the Qur’an, its directives are general, broad, and flexible in most cases; therefore they could be translated into the terms of a specific social reality of each generation of interpreters. Concerning the hadith . . . given the inevitable gap between the actual and the idealized. . . it is not surprising that the Hadith contains an abundance of varied and often contradictory traditions, ...
format article
author Hibba Abugideiri
author_facet Hibba Abugideiri
author_sort Hibba Abugideiri
title Allegorical Gender
title_short Allegorical Gender
title_full Allegorical Gender
title_fullStr Allegorical Gender
title_full_unstemmed Allegorical Gender
title_sort allegorical gender
publisher International Institute of Islamic Thought
publishDate 1996
url https://doaj.org/article/6eba53a56d99446192532b66c51ddcff
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