Beat Those “Twisted Women”

posted by Sam Richards

So I heard on the radio this morning that Egypt’s most powerful (Muslim) cleric, Mohammed Sayed Tantawi, has spoken out against the niqab, the full, face-covering/headscarf (not to be confused with the burka–a full body covering). He has proclaimed that these should be banned from the various schools of the Al-Azhar University. He has asserted that niqab “has nothing at all to do with Islam.”

This is from the Press Trust of India:

Cairo, Oct 9 (PTI) Egypt’s prestigious Al-Azhar University has barred students from wearing face-veils or Niqab in female-only classrooms and dormitories.
The Al-Azhar supreme council, in a statement yesterday, said that it has decided to ban students and teachers from wearing the Niqab inside female-only classrooms that are taught by women.
The ban extends to women dormitories and to schools affiliated with the university.
It said that the aim of the ban is to spread the spirit of confidence, unison, comfort and sound understanding between the teachers and their students.
The decision was announced by Sheik of Al-Azhar Mohammed Sayyed Tantawi, who was recently criticised for forcing a girl to take off her face-veil inside an institute affiliated with the university.
The Muslim brotherhood, the largest opposition bloc, has asked for his removal, describing his action as part of a larger plan to de-Islamise Egypt.

This struck me because it sounds rather progressive and, dare I say, “feminist.” It does not sound at all like some proclamations I’ve heard recently by other Egyptian (Muslim) clerics. Listen to this one:

Now that’s what I’m talking about. Real machismo. I’ve always thought that God/G-d/Allah wanted straight men to have a way to unequivocally express how manly they were in their own homes so as to show that he is on our side — he is a “he,” afterall, isn’t he?

So here’s the deal. This should show all of us that Islam, like all other religions, is ripe for interpretation. I mean, c’mon, god–the g is lower case now in deference to the atheists among you–either wants women to be beaten or to not cover up. Not sure if a bikini is acceptable, but these are two very different interpretations of the will of the creator and I’m struck by how anybody at all can speak for god. Reminds me of some words I read years ago: “You can be pretty certain that you’ve created god in your own image when your god hates all of the same people and things that you do.”

I guess I’d like to leave you with the following: Just like your secular and religious leaders have different interpretations for their people’s actions, so too do the leaders of other lands and cultures. Keep that in mind the next time you hear something that sounds really crazy that has been proclaimed by one of a billion or so followers of some belief system. Perhaps it’s just that one person’s sense of reality! Maybe not every so-called follower agrees with that person — like when Ahmadinejad in Iran expresses his desire to Nuke Israel, or when the Pope decides that using condoms will not help prevent the spread of HIV.

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