Time for Muslim Organizations to Campaign for Women's Rights in Mosques

By Asra Q. Nomani

Islam is at a crossroads, much like the place where the Prophet Muhammad found himself when he was on the cusp of a new dawn with his migration to Medina from Mecca. Medina became “the City of Enlightenment” because of the wisdom with which the Prophet nurtured his community, or ummah.

In much the same way, the Muslim world has the opportunity to rise to a place of deep and sincere enlightenment, inspired by the greatest teachings of Islam. It is our choice which path we take. It is our mandate to take action to insure that we define our communities as tolerant, inclusive, and compassionate places that value and inspire all within our fold.

Islam grants all people inalienable rights to respect, dignity, participation, leadership, voice, knowledge, and worship. These rights must be granted to women, as well as men, in the mosques and Islamic centers that are a part of our Muslim communities. Islamic teaching seeks expressions of modesty between men and women. But many mosques in America and beyond have gone well beyond that principle by defining themselves with cultural traditions that perpetuate a system of separate accommodations that provides women with wholly unequal services for prayer and education. And yet, excluding women ignores the rights the Prophet Muhammad gave them in the 7th century when he created a Muslim ummah, or community, in Medina and represents innovations that emerged after the prophet died.

Scholarly evidence overwhelmingly concludes that mosques that bar women from the main prayer space aren't Islamic. They more aptly reflect the age of ignorance, or Jahiliya, in pre-Islamic Arabia. As Ithaca College Islamic studies scholar Asma Barlas says, “Layers and layers of sedimentation deny women their rightful roles.”

The marginalization seems, if anything, to be worsening. The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) and other organizations including the Islamic Society of North America have concluded, based on a 2000 survey, that "the practice of having women pray behind a curtain or in another room is becoming more widespread" in this country. In 2000, women at 66 percent of the U.S. mosques surveyed prayed behind a curtain or partition or in another room, compared with 52 percent in 1994, according to the survey of leaders of 416 mosques nationwide. In addition, women are not allowed to be on the boards of about one of three mosques included in the survey. The mosque was not a men's club when the Prophet Muhammad built an Islamic ummah and reportedly told men: "Do not stop the female servants of Allah from attending the mosques of Allah." Nothing in the Quran restricts a woman's access to a mosque.

Muslim women, with men supporting them, should obey the Qur’anic command to fight the zulm, or “oppression,” that denies women fundamental rights, their civil rights – especially in America with its strong tradition of fighting for fundamental freedoms over narrow cultural practices. We can make mosques welcoming places for women. To defend women’s rights at mosques, scholar Amina Wadud cites “the tawhidic paradigm,” using the Arabic term for the oneness of Allah, making men and women equal and requiring justice for both: “God is one and created all human beings on a single, horizontal plane. We are equal.”

It is time for our communities to embody the essential principles of equity, tolerance, and inclusion within Islam. And it is incumbent upon each of us as Muslims to stand up for those principles.

Terrorists transformed our world into a more dangerous place when they attacked the World Trade Centers on Sept. 11, 2001. Before we knew it, a minority of Islamic fundamentalists who preached hatred to the West were defining Islam in the world. Alas, moderates, including myself, had largely been quiet, earning us status as the “silent majority.” A combination of fear, shame and apathy had contributed to a culture of silence among even those of us discontent with the status quo in Muslim society. Moderate Muslims have a great responsibility toward defining Islam and their communities in the world.

For me, this effort started at home when I walked up to the front door of my mosque for the first time on the eve of Ramadan 2003. The mosque president yelled at me to take the back entrance. I walked through the front door of my mosque in Morgantown, West Virginia, with my young son, Shibli, on my hip. At that time, women’s voices were not to be heard in the mosque. We were only supposed to enter through a back door. We were not allowed in the main sanctuary. We were supposed to pray in an isolated balcony, staring at a half wall, and we were not in any position of leadership.

I tried to resolve the issue directly with the mosque board but failed to get even a meeting after trying for over one month. In the spirit of jihad bil qalam, or a holy struggle waged with the power of the pen, I published a commentary in the Outlook section of the Washington Post on December 28, 2003, detailing my experience at my mosque and the consensus of Islamic scholars that separate and unequal conditions are not Islamic. The reaction was immediate.

Muslim women and men who shared a vision of equitable mosques responded swiftly electronically with overwhelming support. “Beautiful, simply beautiful!” read the first remark posted on a comment page administered by MuslimWakeUp.com, an Islamic Web site which republished the Washington Post commentary.

“This is a powerful article and it has inspired me with hope and determination. I hope the author continues with her certitude and convictions and that many more sisters will join her. We need Muslim sisters who aren’t scared to use their own intellects and witts [sic] in combating the extreme patriarchy which sees the woman as ‘awrah’ and ‘fitnah’…” wrote a Muslim man.

At least 317 people directly sent me their thoughts or published their views in various venues.

About nine out of ten Muslims, or 91% of 205 respondents, supported improved rights for women in mosques. Just about all non-Muslims, or 99% of 108 respondents, expressed support. A non-Muslim woman sent a one-line email: “Be strong – people like you are the salvation of Islam.”

Men expressed more judgmental attitudes than women. About 20% of Muslim men were judgmental on either the issue of my unwed motherhood or the issue of public discussion of internal issues, compared to 10% of Muslim women who were judgmental.

In separate personal conversations, about six Morgantown Muslims blamed me for tarnishing the image of Islam and the Morgantown Muslim community. A Muslim man sent me an email: “As your eternal brother in Islam I strongly support your ends; but as a member of this community and of the greater ummah I vehemently disagree with your means.”

About one of ten non-Muslims actualized the fears among some Muslims that non-Muslims would negatively judge Islam because of the public disclosure of inequity at mosques. Among non-Muslims, 14% of non-Muslim men were judgmental, compared to 7% of non-Muslim women.

The results revealed, however, the cultural dimension to the issue. The data was analyzed to distinguish between respondents as “Western,” including people born in America or associating themselves as Americans, and “Eastern,” including people from the Middle East, India, Pakistan and other regions outside of the United States. Among the respondents, 98% of Western men and women, including non-Muslims, were supportive, compared to 90% of Eastern respondents. Eastern respondents were about twice as likely as Westerners to be judgmental. Only about one of ten, or 8%, of Westerners was judgmental, while about one of five, or 18% with Eastern ethnicity was judgmental.

There was clear evidence of systematic discrimination around the country. Of the total correspondences, 64 responses from women and men included incidents of discrimination at mosques. A 63-year-old convert to Islam said she regularly confronts men and women who want to move screens in front of her and other women during prayers and meetings. Other women wrote about hostile environments at their mosques toward women. Six women cited fair treatment at mosques. Five Christians cited discrimination against women at churches; four Jewish readers cited discrimination against women at Orthodox Jewish synagogues.

Some Muslims’ worst fears about critics of Islam seizing on the issue to demonize Islam didn’t materialize. Instead, readers and the media made two important distinctions, separating cultural traditions from Islam and recognizing gender discrimination as a universal phenomenon. In a letter to the editor in the Dominion Post, the local newspaper in Morgantown, Morgantown photographer Sue Amos wrote, “Nothing like shining a little light on the darkness…And we all know sex discrimination exists in most religions.” She cited a wedding she had photographed in a Baptist church where the minister declared, “Women are the weaker vessel and must submit to their husbands,” among guests whom the author knew included battered housewives. “No more back doors, Asra,” Amos wrote.

The Charleston Gazette ran an editorial, “Woman’s Place: Taking a Stand for Equality,” arguing, “This issue encourages everyone to do some investigating, to discern the difference between cultural expectations and the real demands of a faith, whether it is in Islam, Christianity or Judaism. All faiths are susceptible and, at different times in different places, have been bent to serve a purpose that has little to do with their adherents’ relationship to the eternal. All faiths at their best treat each of their faithful with dignity and make no demand that requires them to surrender it.”

While CAIR and ISNA have moved cautiously, leaders from both organizations indicate they will participate in an education and mediation program to help women claim their rights in mosques. It is clearly a victory for Islam if Muslim men and women establish the rights of women to full participation in mosques in America. A combination of community organizing, education efforts and legal complaints will be necessary to effectively transform mosques from men’s clubs to centers that welcome both men and women, not to mention children. The cultural dimension to this issue indicates that cultural sensitivity training is also necessary. There is clearly a groundswell of support among ordinary Muslim men and women around the world for such an effort. Acknowledging the injustice prompted me and others to devise a campaign to educate Muslim women and men about women’s rights in the mosque.

“It’s time for action,” said Ahmed Nassef, editor of MuslimWakeUp.com, announcing plans for a campaign we tentatively called “Take Back Your Mosque.” “The days of women being relegated to the attic and being forced to use the back entrance by the dumpster are numbered,” he said.

In Morgantown, the cause of islah, or reform and making righteous, is winning. Since that day, our community has expanded through the wisdom of its members and leaders so that women walk through the front door, pray in the main hall, sit on positions of leadership, and guide community activities. Women are allowed every right that I humbly present before you as the Islamic Bill of Rights for Women in Mosques.

Ultimately, it is incumbent upon Islamic organizations, community leaders, academics and mosques to respond to this call for improved rights for women in mosques by endorsing and promoting a campaign, modeling it after their very successful educational and legal campaigns to protect the civil liberties of Muslim men and women in other areas. To do so would honor not only Muslim women but also Islam.

The journey is never complete, and a long road remains in front of us, but we have as inspiration a time in the 7th century when a new day lay ahead of a caravan trader who had as much to fear as we do today, but, nonetheless, transcended his doubts and fears to create an ummah to which we all belong today.

Allow us all to rise to our highest potential.

Asra Q. Nomani is a journalist and the author of the forthcoming Standing Alone in Mecca, about women's place in Islam.

This article was adapted from a presentation given my Ms. Nomani on September 4, 2004 at the annual convention of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA).