Windows of Faith By Gisela Webb, ed. (Syracuse, New York: Syracuse University Press, 2000.295 pages.)

Abstract

Windows of Faith provides a space where Muslim women speak for
themselves and challenge rigidly traditionalist voices that have often had
hegemonic status in Islamic jurisprudential works regarding women. It is a
volume that represents the voices of some of the most highly regarded
Muslim women scholars and activists today. The book appears to cater to
a primarily academic audience, and one that is familiar with the tradition of
Islamic feminism.
In her introduction, Gisela Webb describes the overall approach of
the contributors as challenging hegemonic discourse in many circles. It
challenges: elements within the Muslim and the non-Muslim imagination
that define Muslim women as mute victims; western feminist patriarchy
toward Muslim women; and also the Muslim cultural patriarchy that
appropriates the sources of Islamic law and praxis yet, in the view of
(probably all of) these women, has abandoned the essential Divine
egalitarian purposes. Windows of Faith is a refreshing read, especially
due to today’s urgent need to respond to the Qur’anic challenge: Do they
not reflect?
In the first part (Qur’anic/rheological Foundations) Amina Wadud’s
piece “Alternative Qur’anic Interpretation and the Status of Muslim
Women” explores neo-traditionalist and secular approaches toward
alternative interpretation of the Qur’an regarding the status of women. It
is interesting to examine her comment, “Being anti-Western has become
a basis for legitimacy in ‘Islam’ ” against some of Maysam al-Faruqi’s
comments in her chapter, which seem to dichotomize “Islamicness” with
westernness in the context of gender relations. In the second chapter
“Muslim Women’s Islamic Higher Learning as a Human Right,” Nimat
Barazangi seeks, through an analysis of qualitative research with Muslim
women, to develop an “action plan for the Muslim woman” in the postmodem
era, “to regain her identification with Islam.” The need of the hour
is to “reinstate woman as an educational agent, both at home and at the
mosque one who herself will outline her priorities as a trustee entrusted
with changing history toward social justice.” Will we see women
as weil as men delivering khutaba and instituting policies in mosques ...